‘Good Food – Good Life’ – Chinese people are just about to benefit from Nestle’s unique experience of anticipating consumers’ needs. Nestle’s aim is to flood the Chinese market with processed GE products because they anticipate that Chinese people are not happy with the fantastic array of natural foods which are used to produce mouthwatering dishes in dozens of regional cuisines.
…but Nestle didn’t anticipate this .....
Sina.com.cn has created an amazing feature on GE food and Nestle China. It was induced by an anonymous snowball email about the GE food black-and-white list, which was released by Greenpeace China early this year.
It is really surprising for all of us, since Greenpeace has never appeared in mainland Chinese media in such a way. The story is not yet finished, so watch out...
(Sorry that the web site is written in simplified Chinese.)
Just a few days ago was the 18th anniversary of the Bhopal disaster. 8000 people died in the immediate aftermath of the gas leak at the Union Carbide factory. Another 20,000 have died since of related injuries.
But the owner of Union Carbide and the abandoned factory site that is still polluting the community seems to get a bit nervous when confronted with the facts.
A cool parody website attempting to give people an honest look at Dow and the reasons why the company has not cleaned up Bhopal seems to have been shut down (http:www.dow-chemical.com). The site was so slick it took me a few minutes to realise it was a hoax, guess it was a little to close to the truth for comfort.
The site explained why Dow (and Union Carbide) have always refused to take responsibility for the disaster, and have never seen fit to offer any more than $500 compensation per victim.
The Yes Men say that the server, Verio, received a DMCA notice and the entire Thing.net network was shut down including activist, artist, and other websites and bulletin boards late Wednesday night.
You can find out more from the Yes Men at http://www.theyesmen.org/dow-chemical/.
Or read a Indian journalist's first hand account of the Bhopal disaster.
Just discovered Google still has some pages of the spoof cached.
And I'm typing away in a tiny internet cafe? Why I ask myself am I not at the beach on this sultry afternoon? Especially as I'm flying back to a, no doubt, cold and rainy Holland tomorrow? Well the beach is not far away here in Bombay and popular with the locals of an afternoon but, well Bombay beaches are not really conducive to a cooling dip.
MORE...This is probably the most sensitive issue in recent period involving so many riparian countries along one river - Mekong river. (In Yunnan province of China, it is called Lancang. When it comes to the border of Burma and Laos, it is then called Mekong. )
Transboundary water issues have never been addressed in such a way: A lot of local, regional and international groups are now working together to save the rapids and shoals to be blasted. Undoubtedly, this is not merely a conservation issue, but also a trade issue, while China and ASEAN strongly argue for an increasing and 'freer' trade across the whole region.
At this stage, at least what we can do is to:
Urge the Thai government to stop
the work immediately.
Returning to Sydney to live after being in Europe for almost four years
certainly has made me aware of my immediate environment. When I first arrived
three weeks ago there were water restrictions due to the worsening drought. Then
just a couple of days ago when I was driving home with my boyfriend a sheet of
torrential rain suddenly descended on us. We could not see anything and had to
pull off the highway as lightning streaked across the sky and the road rumbled
beneath us. On the way home the water on the roads had swelled over the gutters
and inevitably the car conked out.
Now only a week later bush fires
are ravaging Sydney. The bush reserve in the suburb (Gladesville) next to
where I am living caught on fire today and strong winds are now pushing flames
close to the houses that back onto it. This afternoon as the sun took on the
shape of a fuzzy, glowing orange ball and grey smoke billowed across the sky an
eerie orange light descended on everything. I walked to the reserve to join
other onlookers as the bright orange flames licked across the valley. All around
residents stood on their roof tops hosing down their gutters and surrounding
trees - anything to stop a nasty flying fire spark from catching alight. I stood
and waited wondering if there was anything I could do. Everyone seemed amazingly
calm considering a major bush fire was at the edge of their backyards. Later I
watched the carnage on TV as areas around Sydney caught alight. Apparently the
fires are even worse than last year. Images began to flash across my screen of
houses being burnt to the ground - totally tragic stories.
I think after
living away from Australia for a while made me forget the environmental hazards
that seem to surround people living here daily or possibly they are getting
worse. These last few weeks have certainly been a first hand experience for me
of extreme weather...from drought, to torrential rain, then bushfires and
inevitably back to drought.
I took this rather hazy image below of the fire burning behind houses just
down the road from where I live.
Sinterklaas is the dutch version of Santa Claus or, better, something similar. The date when Sinterklaas comes is three weeks before today (Dec 5th), which is his birthday and the day when he gives most of the presents, but the differences with the more popular Santa don't end here. To show them I'll explain why I think Sinterklaas is a definitely more lucky than Santa Claus.
MORE...Bombs found at Ikea stores in Holland. I wonder what's the reason of this, how am I going to buy my FRAMÅT?
