Search Results for: World Trade Organisation

Keith Nuthall
THE EUROPEAN Commission is to seek authorisation from European Union member governments to negotiate the formal accession of the EU to the International Maritime Organisation. Brussels said that in spite of the EU’s economic strength and the independent political power of its institutions, it carried little weight in the adoption of essential international safety rules in the sea transport sector.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
AN INTERNATIONAL Labour Organisation meeting has issued detailed recommendations on how to improve industrial relations in the oil and gas production and refining industries. The paper concludes that industrial relations in the sector will become more complex as it juggles environmental and social concerns with cost reduction.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UN Food and Agricultural Organisation and the UN Conference on Trade and Development are developing a task force helping developing countries establish administrative regimes guarantee that locally produced organic foods were made without artificial aids. UNCTAD promotes organic production as sustainable, because its labour intensity and lack of expensive chemical inputs matches poor countries’ economic realities.…

Keith Nuthall
NOONE should ever accuse the European Commission of fighting shy of regulation, and given that proposals on promoting shipping safety are generally framed with good intentions, it would be fair to say that Brussels at least tries to improve standards.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL AND MONICA DOBIE
CONSIDERING the high value of many cargos shipped around the world, a rational observer might assume that pirates would ignore fishing boats in favour of vessels carrying spices, cigarettes, alcohol, metals or electrical goods. Not so.…

BY MARK ROWE
INCHCAPE plc is set to abort its plan to privatise its Singapore-listed subsidiary Inchcape Motors after a key shareholder announced it would block the bid. British investment company Guinness Peat Group, which has been mopping up Inchcape Motors’ shares, said it will reject Inchcape plc’s conditional cash offer of £GB0.90p a share to turn Inchcape Motors and its motor distribution business into a 100 per cent privately owned company.…

BY PHILIP FINE

THE US Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), has reissued a cautionary warning to users of 15-seat vans, popular for groups, such as sports teams, going on outings, following the release of new in-house research about rollovers.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A LAPSED double-checking system for imports of Romanian steel products into the European Union is to be reinstated from July, assuming EU ministers approve a proposal from the European Commission. The system was established when Romania and the EU signed an association agreement, (a broad trade and political relations deal), in 1996, but its legal authority lapsed last December.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union is to update its monitoring systems for its trade in clothing and textiles with the limited number of countries with whom it does not have trade agreements covering the sector, which includes Taiwan.

Notably, the European Commission has asked EU ministers to update rules on surveillance and electronic documentation.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Court of Justice has ruled that a Spanish clothing, footwear and headgear company should have secured European trade mark rights to the word ‘Ellos,’ regarding a mail order service, though it should not use the brand-name for their products.…