Search Results for: japan

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union Council of Ministers has intervened in the European Commission’s case against Japan Tobacco – owners of RJ Reynolds – in New York by supporting Brussels’ stance that it is entitled to bring a legal action against the company, on behalf of the whole EU.…

BY MARK ROWE
THE CHAIRMAN of General Motors China has warned that neighbouring south-east Asia’s home grown car industry will in future find itself squeezed by stiff competition from the emerging giant next door. China’s expanding middle class, robust economic growth and low rates of vehicle ownership means that car makers in south-east Asian countries such as Thailand will be hard pressed to compete in the growing Chinese market, according to Phil Murtaugh, chairman of General Motors China.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKE
NIPPON Paper Industries Co. of Japan has developed a paper product that it says is five-to-10 times more elastic than ordinary paper.

The high elasticity comes from tiny wrinkles the company adds to the paper during the production process, as well as the use of extra-elastic pulp fibre.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN football association UEFA launched a joint-anti smoking campaign with the European Commission on the eve of the World Cup in Japan and South Korea. The two organisations booked television advertising space to broadcast their anti-tobacco message, using international footballers including French star Zinedine Zidane and Portugal’s Luis Figo.…

BY SWINEETHA DIAS WICKRAMANAYAKA
Japan’s Nissan Motor Ltd has begun exporting vehicles from plants in Thailand to Indonesia as part of a plan to make the south-east Asian kingdom its main supplier of vehicles in the region. Nissan plans to take advantage of the fact that the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) is lowering duties on locally made vehicles to increase shipments in the region of passenger cars and pickup trucks from Thailand, and commercial vehicles from Indonesia.…

KEITH NUTHALL
JAPAN has been criticised by the Textile Monitoring Body of the World Trade Organisation for failing to establish new liberalised quotas for imports of Chinese silk yarn and fabric by the start of this financial year. In a paper issued at a recent meeting, the TMB said that it was “particularly concerned” at the omission, and said that in future it expected to be “informed by Japan as soon as possible on the timing of the annual consultations between Japan and China, as well as on the trade levels to be determined for both silk yarn and silk fabric for the Japanese fiscal year 2002.”…

BY ALAN OSBORN
SOME sensible words were spoken recently by the EU’s agriculture commissioner Franz Fischler on the way forward for farmers. His starting point was the quality of farm produce. Noone is going to say that quality has ever been far from farmers’ minds, but until recently it wasn’t really the first consideration.…

BY MARK ROWE
THE JAPANESE electronics giant Sharp says it has created an air conditioner that not only cools your office but also rids a room of nitrogen oxide, a substance found in cigarette smoke. A test conducted by Japanese Government scientists found that the air conditioner was able to regulate the balance of positive and negative ions floating in the air and remove virtually all traces of nitrogen oxide the within 12 minutes.…

BY MONICA DOBIE, in Montreal
JAPAN’S Futaba Industrial Co. Ltd. has signed a deal to purchase land in Canada’s Stratford, Ontario, which will be home to a new plant making parts for Toyota automobiles. Kiyoshi Hina, its future plant manager, told the local Beacon Herald that the company will invest a total of US$20 million, employing about 70 employees.…

BY MARK ROWE
A ROW over dealership rights could lead to a permanent parting of the ways for Malaysia’s Oriental Holdings and Honda. Oriental was sole distributor for Honda cars until last July, when Japan’s second biggest carmaker took back those rights to form a local unit, giving it direct involvement in Malaysia’s market.…