Archive

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE BRITISH government is coming under intense political pressure to comply with a European Court of Justice ruling that it should implement the European Union (EU) directive on integrated pollution prevention and control (IPPC) in Northern Ireland. The European Commission is threatening to launch legal proceedings that could result in Britain receiving heavy daily recurring fines.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Commission is to take action against the UK government at the European Court of Justice over the failure of south-east London’s Bromley Council to require an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) prior to granting planning permission in 1998 for a massive commercial development of Crystal Palace.…

BY JONATHAN THOMSON
THE NUMBER of recorded BSE cases in Ireland reached a record high in 2002 with 333 cases compared to 246 in 2001. However, the Irish Department of Agriculture claimed the underlying trend was more positive, with the number recorded since the start of August 2002 down 32 per cent on the corresponding 2001 period.…

BY JONATHAN THOMSON
BRITISH government backed scientists have launched a pioneering research project that could see natural plant fibres being used to manufacture car body shells. Biomat is a four-year project using various forms of flax and hemp fibre, as well as willow, and is being funded by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.…

BY MONICA DOBIE
AVON Canada is closing its manufacturing operations in Montreal by the end of the year, a move that will see 150 layoffs. Work will be transferred to American plants in Illinois and Ohio, freeing up money the company said it needs for growth, after spending CDN$16 million on distribution facility improvements and call centre modernisation.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is lending US$20 million to OAO Concern Kalina, the leading producer of cosmetics and personal care products in Russia and the former Soviet Union, to finance its acquisition of smaller Russian competitors, as well as make new capital investments.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKA
SWADESHI Industrial Works Ltd, of Sri Lanka, which manufactures and sells personal and fabric care products, has entered the island’s herbal toothpaste market with the launch of Protekt. It contains fluoride, calcium and herbal ingredients such as clove oil, cinnamon oil, aralu, kohomba and munamal pothu, being packaged in a flexible laminated tube.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE AGREEMENT of a seventh amendment to the European Union’s directive 76/768/EEC on cosmetic products, which addresses the thorny issue of animal testing, brings to an end three years of debates on the current proposals, but actually is the result of a decade of often bitter discussion.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Court of Justice has undermined a case brought by the Austrian authorities against two cosmetics executives, who had allowed the phrase ‘dermatologically tested’ to appear on their products. Gottfried Linhart, managing director of Colgate Palmolive GmbH, and Hans Biffl, managing director of Haarkos Parfumeriewaren und Kosmetika GmbH, were found guilty of administrative offences for releasing a liquid antibacterial soap and dandruff-controlling conditioner respectively with packaging containing this claim without any qualifying information about the tests that led to this conclusion.…

BY MARK ROWE
IF you open the window, flies will enter your home but in post-Soviet Russia it wasn’t just the windows but the doors too that were flung wide open.

Organised gangs, drawn by the sweet smell of easy pickings, duly swarmed all over the decaying house of Lenin.…