Search Results for: United Nations

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has warned of a continued boom in counterfeits of clothing and accessory products entering the European Union (EU), with more than 10.9 million fake items seized by customs officials last year. This is 140% more than the numbers of seizures in 2004.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE UNITED Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has struck its first Asia-Pacific development deal with a major oil company – Total, of France. The UNDP and Total will collaborate on boosting poor Asia-Pacific countries’ access to clean and sustainable energy; better and more transparent corporate governance; energy efficiency; alternative energy sources; and training.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has highlighted countries with particularly significant counterfeiting and piracy of medicinal products. Following 290 replies from businesses, trade associations and diplomatic missions, covering 63 countries, its survey report named Egypt as a real problem zone, criticising the December 2004 approval of 850 local copies of pharmaceuticals "without generic companies having to "prove the efficiency and safety of the copy".…

SAEED AKHTAR BALOCH, in Lahore

PAKISTAN’S paint sector – one of its largest industries – has shown an impressive growth over the last few years, mainly because of boost in housing and construction activities.

Unfortunately, being one of the more unorganised sectors in the country, with many small manufacturers, it is difficult to pinpoint the exact number of paint producing units, production and sales data, but figures available from government agencies reveal the industry achieved 25-30 % growth in last five years, with an impressive spurt of 15-20% growth in the financial year ended June 2006, which could be sustained in the medium-term if the housing sector continues growing at its current pace.…

BY MARK ROWE

CONFECTIONARY production is a never-ending battle to balance the ‘feel-good’ factor of products such as a chocolate and cakes with increasing consumer demands for healthy living and enhanced nutrition, according to a leading food scientist.

Dr Johan Ubbink, a senior research scientist and department group leader at the Nestlé Research Centre for Food and Life Sciences in Lausanne, Switzerland, acknowledged that, while chocolate cake would never be the healthiest thing you could eat, research was embracing new technologies that could mitigate the negative effects of confectionary.…

BY PAUL COCHRANE, in Beirut

IRAN’S US$1 billion paint sector is going through a boom period: it is expected to grow by up to 20% this year on the back of strong decorative paint growth, an expanding automotive sector, and surging demand for specialised paints in the shipping and energy sectors.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A SECRETARIAT running the United Nations’ Global Bioenergy Partnership (GBEP) has been opened at the Rome headquarters of the UN Food & Agriculture Organisation. The body is charged with promoting bioenergy, helping international exchanges of know-how and technology, promoting policies and identifying potential funding.…

BY ANDREW CAVE

AFTER 9/11, America positioned itself at the centre of the international crackdown on money laundering and terrorist financing, and its legal response has been well documented in the Money Laundering Bulletin. But what of its federal police and intelligence agencies?…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A UNITED Nations unit is coordinating the introduction of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) accrual systems across all agencies of the global body. The UN Task Force on Accounting Standards is overseeing the development of implementation timetables, which must see all UN agencies and branches adopting IPSAS by January 2010, except for peacekeeping operations, which must comply by July 2010.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

IT’S COMMONLY acknowledged that, whatever its merits, the globalisation of world trade and commerce brings with it vastly enhanced opportunities for money laundering. As the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) points out, in an online report explaining its work, the world-wide spread of inter-connected financial markets greatly extends the range of countries where anti-money laundering (AML) controls are absent or embryonic and enforcement is weak "and unfortunately, many countries particularly those classified as emerging markets, fall into this category."…