Search Results for: Spanish

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A MAJOR Spanish pigmeat processing company may have to repay Euro 15.1 million in government aid it received for improving its manufacturing plants in Spain. El Pozo Alimentacion, which makes ham, sausages, paté and other meat products, is now the focus of a European Commission investigation.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission is considering launching a sectoral competition probe into whether price-fixing by retailers is driving up already high food prices in Europe. The admission came from an unusual source – European Union (EU) monetary affairs Commissioner Joaquin Almunia – not EU competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

WITH Dmitry Medvedev becoming Russia’s new president, the European Union (EU) has been pushing ahead to secure oil and gas supplies independent of Moscow. EU energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs and external relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner met with Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey diplomats and officials to discuss gas pipeline links.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

ETHIOPIA COMMODITY EXCHANGE OPENS

ETHIOPIA has opened a commodity exchange, designed to bring order to the country’s often chaotic food markets. Their informality effectively forces farmers to sell locally to traders they know and trust. This prevents commodities moving from regions where there is abundance to those where there are shortages, intensifying the risk of famine and for prices to plummet in districts with a production glut.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A NEW pilot initiative is aiming to make European Union (EU) national electronic public procurement systems compatible, to ease cross-border online tendering. Although EU law insists that public procurement contracts are made available to suppliers from foreign member states, making such bids can involve difficult and unfamiliar paperwork.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A DEAL has been struck at the European Union (EU) Council of Ministers over unbundling of gas (and electricity) networks, which will allow formal ownership of production and distribution operations.

However, this compromise option will insist on transmission systems being managed by an independent operator.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

PETROL and diesel in Spain could become cheaper by the European Commission threatening legal action to force the abolition of the Spanish ‘Impuesto sobre las ventas minoristas de determinados hidrocarburos’ motor fuel tax. This is charged in addition to standard excise duty and rates are set by regional governments.…

By Keith Nuthall and Monica Dobie

Universities and colleges are constantly working with business and industry to undertake commercially valuable research. University World News here again features a selection of these cutting edge developments in its business pages.

*The University of Latvia’s Institute of Polymer Mechanics Eureka has helped create construction bricks with domestic waste polymers usually considered too varied or dirty to be recycled.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

NEARLY a year after Nicolas Sarkozy was elected president, the widely expected Thatcherite revolution in France he was supposed to bring about has still to arrive. He talked boldly during his election campaign of radical labour market reforms including an end to France’s rigid employment practices, overhaul of the 35-hour working week and at least a start at dismantling the hugely expensive pensions and other perks enjoyed by transport and utility workers.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE SPANISH government has been ordered to repay Euro 54.9 million in European Union (EU) subsidies after the European Commission concluded it had wasted the money on unauthorised planting of vineyards in 2003 and 2004. The expansion broke EU planting controls designed to contract Europe’s wine sector into a commercially viable sector focused on quality wines, rather than churning out cheap wine that ends up in compulsory distillation programmes.…