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International News Services archives articles supplied to clients one year or more after initial publication. These articles are protected by a password and not made available to readers without permission from clients. They are used as a background resource by agency journalists. Upon client requests, International News Services will remove such articles from the archive or not upload them in the first place. They are included to demonstrate the breadth of topics undertaken by the agency and also to help promote clients’ coverage.

CAMEROON PUSHES AHEAD WITH MAJOR 420MW HYDRO PROJECT – DIVERSIFYING IMPORTANT AFRICAN POWER MARKET



In most urbanised industrialised economies, the current focus on renewable energy growth is on wind and solar. Lacking untapped river resources, major hydro-electric projects are rare. However, in larger and more rural countries, especially those still industrialising, large-scale hydro is still an option.…

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HIGH INDIAN TEXTILE COMPANY OFFERS VISION OF INTEGRATED DIGITAL PLATFORM LINKING CLOTHING MANUFACTURERS



A wide variety of small garment orders for manufacturers could be made practical to manage through newly created digital systems developed in India, which can also reduce waste and conserve the environment.

“From growing cotton to dying fabric, 6,000 to 7,000 litres of water is spent on making one garment and eventually 30 percent of [apparel products] end up in landfills,” Gunish Jain, CEO of BlueKaktus, a fashion technology and garment manufacturing company, based in New Delhi, told Twinn, “Big brands have been ordering far in excess of their requirement but that is now changing.”…

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EU APPROVES EUROPEAN CAPITAL MARKETS UNION LAWS, BUT DEEP CAPITAL POOLS AWAIT



The European Union (EU) has been busy chiselling the regulatory edifice of its much-vaunted European Capital Markets Union (CMU), but this growing legal framework has yet to deliver the deep capital pools that its framers envisaged.

Indeed, speaking at the European Banking Congress, in Frankfurt, on November 17, European Central Bank (ECB) president Christine Lagarde, bemoaned the lack of available EU capital (1):

“Today, European start-ups attract less than half the funding of their US counterparts, while the volume of investments in scale-ups in the United States is more than four times greater than in Europe,” she stressed.…

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2024 WILL OFFER NO RESPITE AGAINST THE COVID-19-INSPIRED BOOM IN FRAUD, WARN EXPERTS



Fraud has been booming since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic and the disruption of established living and working patterns, but experts warn that companies and consumers should expect more swindles in 2024, as technology develops, and scams become more sophisticated.…

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INTERNATIONAL REGULATORY ROUND UP – ICCO WARNS OF ONGOING GLOBAL COCOA SUPPLY DEFICITS



The International Cocoa Organisation (ICCO) has predicted that the chocolate industry will continue to face cocoa supply deficits, with its latest quarterly assessment predicting that for 2022/3, there will be 99,000 tonnes more grindings than cocoa production. As a result, global stocks will fall to 1.744 million tonnes, amidst declines in output from key production hubs Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire.…

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VEGAN CHOCOLATE BOOMS WORLDWIDE, WITH BRANDS INVESTING IN QUALITYVEGAN CHOCOLATE BOOMS WORLDWIDE, WITH BRANDS INVESTING IN QUALITY



With consumers becoming increasingly health conscious worldwide, demand for vegan chocolate, replacing dairy ingredients with plant-based materials, is growing fast.

According to US-based Grand View Research, the global vegan confectionery market – dominated by chocolate – is anticipated to generate USD2.62 billion in annual revenues by 2030, expanding at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.9% from 2023’s USD1.23 billion.…

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INDONESIAN GARMENT SECTOR STRUGGLES WITH ILLEGAL IMPORTS



The Indonesian garment sector, already reeling from a decline in international orders, is facing a double whammy: a surge in illegal textile imports that is undercutting local producers and increasing pressure for sustainable production.

According to the Indonesian Fibre and Filament Yarn Producers Association (APSyFi – Asosiasi Produsen Serat dan Benang Filament Indonesia), the value of illegal textile and textile products, notably clothing imports into Indonesia last year (2022) reached USD2.94 billion.

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UNIFOR MEMBERS BACK STELLANTIS CANADA DEAL



Stellantis members of Canadian autoworkers union Unifor have backed the final D3 Canada agreement secured in this year’s contract negotiation round. This means a three-year deal will now apply to 8,200 workers in Canada until September 2026. The union said 60% of members at Stellantis’ Brampton and Windsor assembly plants; and its Etobicoke Casting Plant – all in Ontario – approved the tentative agreement stuck last Monday (Oct 30).…

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TECHNICAL ROUND UP – ISSB COLLECTS 400 SUPPORTERS AS IT LAYS CLAIM TO GLOBAL BASELINE FOR SUSTAINABILITY REPORTING



More than 400 organisations from 64 jurisdictions have signed a declaration, committing themselves to advancing the adoption or use of the ISSB’s S2 climate impact reporting standard as the climate global baseline. This came on December 4, during the UN Climate Change Conference (UNFCCC) Conference of the Parties (COP28) meeting in Dubai.…

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SCOTLAND HANDBOOK OFFERS UNIVERSITIES PRACTICAL COMPREHENSIVE GUIDE ON INTEGRATING SUSTAINABILITY INTO LEARNING



There is no formal blueprint telling universities and colleges how they can encourage skills and practices promoting sustainability, as the world grapples with an ever more demanding impacts from climate change. However, a team of experts in the UK has developed a thoughtful set of guidance, designed to aid higher education institutions in weaving sustainability into their coursework, research and operations.…

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