Big Business and Globalisation

An email to Betty…
I am concerned about Truvia. Truvia claims it is an extract of the stevia plant. However I am concerned that big pharma has added something so they can patent it. What is known about the process of getting Truvia from stevia? I know that Coca Cola is starting to use it even though FDA has not approved it.

It is unlikely that you will know personally any of the ten children under five years old who die every hour in South Africa, and so are spared that suffering.

US oil giant Chevron now fully owns the Caltex refinery in Milnerton, having recently bought out Texaco. But like marooned penguins in an oil slick, Chevron refinery’s reputation of indifference for human health is sticking despite the name change.

The proposed Iranian Oil Bourse could lead to the end of the US dollar hegemony

Dollar hegemony is the term coined by Henry C.K. Liu in a widely circulated and quoted article Dollar Hegemony has to go in the Asia Times of April 11, 2002 that describes the special relationship that the US dollar has to the global economy.

Petrodollars are dollars earned by a country through the sale of oil. The term was coined by Ibrahim Oweiss, a professor of economics at Georgetown University, in 1973.

Supermarkets wield immense power over the way we grow, buy and eat our food. They are shaping our environment, our health and the way we interact socially. By the Biophile Team.

A consultancy agency with government and police connections was running an exercise for an unnamed company that revolved around the London Underground being bombed at the exact same times and locations as happened in real life on the morning of July 7th.

Sodden, in a week of drought-breaking rain, they stood in wretched queues waiting for transport of some kind during the Metrorail strike. Sympathy went to them, along no doubt with anger towards the strikers.

Technically, we are currently able to realize humanity’s dream of providing for the needs of every person on earth and letting machines do the most unpleasant kinds of work. What is
If we look a little closer, it becomes clear that there isn’t a shortage of money at all. There is actually an abundance of it. What is missing is its equitable distribution, together with an equitable distribution of access to the resources of our world.

The search for alternative taxation world-wide is driven by two imperatives. First, we need to diminish dependence on conventional sources of public revenue, without depriving governments of funding. Second, taxation is the least authoritarian and invasive way to limit activities which are destructive to people and the planet. Without actually banning anything, taxation can encourage people to act in the interests of the common good while also meeting their own needs.

Have you ever wondered at the beauty of buildings from the 12th and 13th centuaries in Southern Europe, when about 600 new towns were built with solid stone houses that have survived to this day?

The heart of South Africa’s banking system is the South African Reserve Bank, which is the primary monetary authority and custodian of the country’s gold and foreign exchange reserves.

If you’ve ever owed money to a bank, you’ll know it’s not a pleasant experience. Depending on whether they think you’re good for the money, the bank will either screw you in the short term or milk you dry over the long term. Banks are in the business of making money and generally they’ll stop at nothing to get their way.

Under the guise of helping get Iraq back on its feet, the US is setting out to totally re-engineer the country’s traditional farming systems into a US-style corporate agribusiness. They’ve even created a new law – Order 81 – to make sure it happens.

There once was a time when water fell freely from the clouds in the sky and bubbled from the springs in the hills… when the rivers, streams and lakes were full to the brim… when ancient underground aquifers flowed like great veins beneath the continents… when water nurtured our people, like babes sustained by their mother’s milk.

Vandana Shiva talks about McDonalds, exploitation and the global economy.

The controversial De Hoop Dam is seducing the people of the region with the promise of jobs and water. If they succumb, the legacy they will leave their great-grandchildren is likely to be a denuded landscape, ravaged by toxic waste.