Search Results for: France

BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN Union (EU) ministers have discussed potential EU legislation ensuring Internet-linked tags integrated into products – such as navigation and digital tacograph devices in cars and vans – can be switched off. The development of these technologies has raised concerns amongst privacy activists and such a law is being seriously considered in France, where the ministerial meeting was staged.…

By Alan Osborn

Once again events at the European Parliament have reminded us of how easy it is to brush aside things like common-sense and good financial management when a nation’s self-regard is at stake.

The issue came up recently when a roof collapsed in the parliament’s building in Strasbourg in France so that the assembly was obliged to hold two plenary sessions at its other headquarters in Brussels. Because the parliament didn’t have to move a travelling circus of MEPs, officials, office equipment, files and all its other paraphernalia across to the French city, it saved between Euros 3 to 4 million in operating costs.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

FEW things say more about the growing enthusiasm for nuclear power than the rush of young students eager to make a career in the industry. It is happening mainly in America but other countries are now beginning to see the same development.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A WIDESPREAD outbreak of suspected herpesvirus OsHV-1 has been reported amongst Pacific oysters on the French Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts. The Aquatic Animals Commission, of the Office International des Épizooties (OIE) animal health organisation has reported cases in the coastal departments of Vendée and Charente-Maritime (on the Bay of Biscay); Morbihan, Finistère, Côtes-d’Armor and Ille-et-Vilaine (in Brittany); Manche and Calvados (in Normandy); and Hérault on the Mediterranean, near Montpelier.…

BY MONIKA HANLEY

GONE are the days of the disgruntled, Soviet style Baltic States truck driver, more interested in taking time off than pushing for more deliveries. Since the fall off communism and the coming of independence to Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, a new breed of truckers has come on to the scene, with new trucks and more ambitious attitudes, including the desire to drive west.…

BY DEIRDRE MASON

CONSUMERS are getting fatter and more fitness conscious at the same time, prompting confectionery manufacturers to think hard about squaring the circle of health and indulgence when designing and marketing their products.

CAOBISCO, which represents the European Union’s (EU) chocolate, biscuit and confectionery industries, has traditionally taken a robust line about the benefits confectionery can bring to diets, signing up to the EU’s self-regulating plan for curbing obesity, announced last year.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE INTERNATIONAL Energy Agency (IEA) has backed the European Commission’s fight to comprehensively unbundle European Union (EU) energy giants such as Gas de France. Speaking at the launch of the IEA’s first EU energy policy review, executive director Nobuo Tanaka said: "The proposals on unbundling will help drive the development of a truly European energy market."…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

AN INNOVATIVE combined transport road-rail service helping keep key Alpine passes free of congestion will receive an additional Euro 44 million in subsidies from the Italian and French governments to keep operating. The European Commission approved the handout for the Autoroute Ferroviaire Alpine roll-on-roll-off motorway service taking lorries and trailers by rail between Aiton, France and Orbassano, Italy.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

SOME of Europe’s largest companies – including fuel majors – have been fined heavily for participating in a paraffin wax cartel, raising the cost of this key input for tyre and car component manufacturers. Sasol, Total, ExxonMobil and six others have been fined a total of Euro 676 million for participating in what has been branded the "paraffin wax mafia".…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission is threatening further legal action against the British government in a long-running case involving Marks & Spencer trying to reduce its tax bill because of losses incurred in continental Europe. M&S retreated from France, Belgium and Germany in 2001, following losses made by its subsidiaries in these countries, and sought reductions to its main UK tax bill as a result.…