How To Control Mice Without Poison

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Construction workers and next of kin of deceased workers filed a lawsuit in Tokyo, Japan Friday seeking damages of approximately 6.6 billion yen (about US$64 million) from the government and manufacturers related to illnesses stemming from exposure to asbestos. 178 plaintiffs; including construction workers and family members filed the suit in Tokyo District Court against 46 building manufacturers and the Government of Japan.

According to the Mainichi Daily News, the class action suit is the first that has been filed in Japan related to health damages caused by asbestos exposure at construction sites. The plaintiffs hail from the Japanese prefectures of Tokyo, Saitama and Chiba.

The plaintiffs claim that the government and manufacturers knew of the dangers of asbestos inhalation but failed to take proper precautions, including ceasing to promote asbestos as a cheap fire retardant and banning production of the material.

They state that after inhaling asbestos in the workplace, 172 people have developed lung cancer or mesothelioma, and that almost half of those afflicted are now dead. Plaintiffs argue that the government and health ministry did not act quickly enough after international organizations issued warnings in 1972 that asbestos could be a carcinogen.

Plaintiffs also place blame with the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry for sanctioning the use of asbestos under Japanese Industrial Standards, and with the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport for approving the use of materials comprised of asbestos and other substances under Japan’s Building Standards Law.

“We will do our utmost until we win the suit,” said Kazuo Miyajima, 78, who heads the group of plaintiffs. Lawyers for the plaintiffs released a statement saying: “We seek complete relief for the victims by clarifying the liability of the state and the manufacturers.”

Approximately 40 construction workers from Kanagawa Prefecture plan to file a similar lawsuit in June in Yokohama District Court.

After a 2005 revelation that residents who lived near a factory in Amagasaki, Hyogo Prefecture developed diseases related to asbestos, the government implemented a law in 2006 which provides monetary assistance to asbestos victims and relatives of deceased family members. The plaintiffs argue that the amount of financial assistance given to families and victims of asbestos-related diseases is not sufficient.

Asbestos has been used in Japan as a fire retardant, for sound absorption, and for insulation. It was mixed in concrete and water and sprayed on walls and ceilings, but the practice of spraying asbestos in this manner was banned in Japan in 1975.

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Police have arrested and charged a 45-year-old man from Dharruk in Western Sydney after he went on a 90 minute rampage throughout Western Sydney in an armoured personnel carrier. It is believed that the APC was privately-owned and was recently restored.

The man gained attention of the police shortly after 2 a.m. AEST when he was spotted destroying an electricity substation in Minchinbury. The man then led police on a rampage through Mt Druitt, Dharruk, Emerton, Glendenning and Plumpton where he brought down six mobile phone towers and relay sheds.

The rampage ended in Dean Park after the APC stalled as it was being driven towards another mobile phone tower. Police moved in and arrested the vehicle’s driver.

Chief Inspector Guy Haberly from Mount Druitt Police said the man destroyed mobile phone towers by “crashing through the perimeter fence and colliding with structures causing significant damage”.

The man was reportedly charged with breaking, entering and stealing; predatory driving; six counts of malicious damage; possession of a prohibited drug; use of a weapon to avoid apprehension and driving in a dangerous manner. Police refused the man bail.

Monday, April 6, 2009

Leaders and central banks in Russia, China, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and Kazakhstan have called for an international currency system.

Speaking on April 1 in advance of the G-20 summit in London, Russian president Dmitry Medvedev argued that the international finance system needed a “new construction” including “new currency systems”, saying that such a new system could be the purpose of a revamped IMF and World Bank. The IMF was originally founded in 1946 as the overseer of the Bretton Woods system, which from its founding until the 1970s tied the western world’s currencies to the US Dollar, which was in turn backed by gold. Russia’s proposal was for the new currency to serve as a reserve currency, one which would take the place of the dollar, euro, and other heavily-traded currencies as an international standard of exchange.

Medvedev’s comments are a reversal of Russian position from a lukewarm response following a looser outline for a worldwide currency by Kazakhstani president Nursultan Nazarbayev. On March 11, Nazarbayev suggested the establishment of the “acmetal”, a portmanteau of “acme” and “capital“, as a reserve currency replacing the ruble in international transactions, first for Central Asia and then worldwide. 1999 Economics Nobel laureate Robert Mundell, speaking to the Daily Telegraph, endorsed the idea, saying “It would be a very good idea if the G-20 took that idea up in London”.

2001 Nobel economics prize winner Joseph Stiglitz, meanwhile, said the new currency could come about quickly if it was based on an expansion of the IMF’s already established system of Special Drawing Rights, units of exchange used by the IMF which already have some of the features of currency. Stiglitz argued that, as the US dollar has become the standard global reserve currency, it has inadvertently created a system which hurts the world economy. “It’s a net transfer, in a sense, to the United States of foreign aid,” he argued, reasoning that when other countries purchase US dollars in order to use them on international markets (such as for the buying and selling of petroleum), they effectively give the US a zero-interest loan — sometimes at times when they can least afford it. Stiglitz made his comments as head of a United Nations panel of economists giving recommendations to address the global financial crisis.

In the weeks leading up to the G-20 conference, the People’s Republic of China also began discussing a new system for reserve currencies. In a March 23 speech, Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People’s Bank of China, endorsed a new reserve currency, saying “the desirable goal of reforming the international monetary system, therefore, is to create an international reserve currency that is disconnected from individual nations and is able to remain stable in the long run, thus removing the inherent deficiencies caused by using credit-based national currencies.” Zhou went on to endorse the expansion of the SDR system in the long-term creation of a reserve currency government by the IMF. While Zhou did not mention the US dollar specifically, analysis by Qu Hongbin, chief China economist for HSBC, for the Financial Times said that the speech “is a clear sign that China, as the largest holder of US dollar financial assets, is concerned about the potential inflationary risk of the US Federal Reserve printing money”.

China holds $740 billion as assets; inflation in the US economy, which has been low in recent years, would directly cause those assets to lose value.

While the Chinese government has engaged in currency swaps with several other growing economies, such as South Korea, Argentina, Malaysia and Indonesia, the Chinese Yuan cannot be used itself as a reserve currency as it cannot be freely traded on the global market.

The Chinese-Russian proposal was not entered onto the agenda at the G-20 meeting itself. Nonetheless, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said that the G-20 was open to considering the proposal if and when a detailed one is presented. United States President Barack Obama, meanwhile, endorsed the continuation of dollar supremacy, saying that the US dollar is “extraordinarily strong” and arguing that its strength was the result of the intrinsic stability of the United States economic and political system; US treasury secretary Timothy Geithner had, the week before, made comments that while he supported an expansion in the SDR mechanism he rejected the idea of a global currency. Rather than change the role of SDRs, the G-20 meeting instead added $250 billion in support to the fund backing SDRs.

After the G-20 conference ended on Thursday, Malaysia’s The Star BizWeek reported that the central banks of Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand had endorsed the Chinese proposal. All three countries have close economic ties with China and suffered heavily from the collapse of their currencies in the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis; the sudden growth in the value of the US dollar relative to those countries’ native currencies sharply increased debt in Southeast Asia’s economies, leading to a wave of bankruptcies.

International reaction from other economies has been mixed and guarded. Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, President of Brazil, said that the currency proposal was important to discuss but did not give extensive comment. And while UPI reports that India supported the SDR proposal at the G-20 conference, the Indian Press Trust quotes Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as saying last month, “It is too early to talk about common currency.”

Calls for an independent global reserve currency are not new. In 1944, John Maynard Keynes proposed the “bancor“, a unit like the SDR supported by a basket of commodities. Keynes’ idea was rejected and the US dollar took the equivalent role under the Bretton Woods system. Keynes proposed that the bancor system would be reinforced by a tax on participating countries’ current accounts, the difference between their exports and their imports, in order to encourage balanced trade. Meanwhile, monetary unions have become more popular since the end of the gold standard, with most of the European Union now trading the euro, and several countries outside the EU using it as a de facto currency; five West African countries adopting the eco at the end of this year; and the African Union planning to introduce the afro in 2028. Proposals for a North American currency union based around the so-called “amero” have been frequently discussed as the focus of conspiracy theories in the United States, but none of the US, Canada or Mexico have actively pursued the establishment of any such monetary union, however the dollar is the currency of several Latin American countries.

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Rancagua, Chile — Cristóbal Cortina and Víctor Vergara, in conjunction with their horses “Cumpa” and “Tío Pedro”, have won the last phase in the 62nd Campeonato Nacional de Rodeo. They earned the maximum honour for a Chilean huaso: to win the Chile Championship.

José Luis and Jorge Ortega, the horsemen favoured to win, won second place mounting “Ahijado” and “Floro”; third place was won by Ricardo Bustamante and Eduardo Salas with “Rociado” and “Viajero”.

The winners of the movimiento de la rienda were Yenny Troncoso with “Fachoso” and Ricardo González with “Chao No Más”, in the feminine and masculine competence, respectively. The Sello de Raza was given to “Fantástico”, from the Santa Isabel Farm and mounted by Eduardo Tamayo Órdenes.

This championship concludes the Chilean rodeo 2009–2010 season and was performed at the Medialuna in Rancagua.

Saturday, April 7, 2018

In a statement on Wednesday, Brad Banducci, the chief executive of Woolworths, a large retail supermarket in Australia, announced a plan to ban free single-use plastic bags in Woolworths stores in Queensland, Victoria, New South Wales, and Western Australia. The ban would apply from June 20 this year, eleven days earlier than the deadline of July 1 set by some of the states’ legislation.

The planned bans in the stores in Queensland, Victoria, and Western Australia follow state legislation requiring the single-use bags to be banned by July 1. However, Woolworth’s plan to ban single-use plastic bags in its stores in New South Wales was voluntary.

Reusable plastic bags would be sold for fifteen cents; canvas, 99 cents.

The change reportedly would affect Woolworths supermarkets, BWS liquor stores, Woolworth Metro stores, and petrol stations that have shops operated by Woolworths.

Advocates of the change have cited environmental concerns. Brad Banducci said, “Our teams have been working hard behind the scenes to accelerate the rollout of this plan so we can start making a positive impact on the environment as quickly as possible”.

Starting from July last year, Coles and Woolworths had originally planned to phase out single-use plastic bags by June 30.

Tasmania, South Australia, Canberra and the Northern Territory were already not using single-use plastic bags following state bans, SBS reported.

Monday, February 20, 2006

The New Zealand government has announced that it will be reviewing funding for medical and dentistry students at Otago and Auckland Universities to certify the institutions’ standards and help staff retention.

The dean of Auckland University’s Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences, Professor Iain Martin says the review “can’t come soon enough”.

The Medical Students Association welcomes the review. It says that it has been worried about student debt for years “High debt encourages too many graduates overseas, or into high paying areas of practice at the expense of areas like general practice”

Saturday, September 24, 2005

Recently, Google had released Google Desktop 2 (beta), software that aims to provide information on a side-bar that sticks to the right end of your screen. Content on Google Desktop include e-mail searching, news and weather, subscribing to RSS-syndicated websites, and more features.

One particular feature of Google Desktop is how it sends anonymous information of your computer use to Google (at option) in order to help choose RSS feeds and the like for you. This is much akin to how spyware works, however, said features can be disabled rather simply. Along the same lines are the ability to automatically find Weather and Stocks you would like at the first time you open it. This is a Beta so there are a few kinks in this system that can be expected to be sorted out at the full release.

Google Desktop replaces the “Gmail Notifier“, so you can check your gmail emails directly from the Sidebar. In addition to the Gmail mail checker, if you have Outlook, Outlook Express or Thunderbird email clients on your computer then it will check the email accounts in them. All this is automatic, so you get all these emails. Emails can be hidden by using filters.

The program is a 1.3MB download and requires Windows 2000 or Windows XP. It automatically starts up when you load your computer.