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NEW DELHI, Mar 16: Gold prices declined further on the bullion market today on reduced offtake by stockists and local customers in view of a ...more WB
reduces growth BANGKOK, Mar 16: In the wake of the US economic slowdown, the World Bank has reduced its growth estimates for its Asian clients "across the ...more World’s
biggest oil rig tilts MACAE, BRAZIL, Mar 16: The world’s biggest offshore oil rig, owned by Brazil’s state oil giant Petrobras, threatened to sink into the ocean spilling...more International
venture WASHINGTON, Mar 16: International venture capitalists from Sydney to Silicon Valley are flocking to India where industry specialists expect....more |
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Pak seeks $10b assistance ISLAMABAD, Mar 16: Bogged down by international debt to the tune of 38 billion dollars, Pakistan has asked the international donor agencies to grant .....more
No
proposal to ban NEW DELHI, Mar 16: The Government does not have any proposal to ban television game shows, Information and Broadcasting Minister Sushma.....more Instant
noodle summit BANGKOK, Mar 16: Leading producers of Asian-style instant noodles met in Bangkok today to discuss........more Plea
to India for low KUALA LUMPUR, Mar 16: Malaysia and Indonesia have decided to jointly urge India to reduce import tariff on palm..........more |
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NEW DELHI, Mar 16: Gold prices declined further on the bullion market today on reduced offtake by stockists and local customers in view of a weak trend in overseas markets and closed with more losses. Marketmen said a weak trend in the overseas markets influenced the trading trend in the domestic markets. They said activity was restricted as most of the bullion merchants hesitated to extend their holding position in view of political developments. In Hong Kong, gold was down at 260.10 U.S. dollar against previous day’s close of 263.30. Standard gold and ornaments declined further by Rs.30 each at Rs.4240 and Rs.4090 per ten gram respectively. Sovereign also lost Rs.50 at Rs.3650 per piece of eight gram. Silver ready was notably lower by Rs.105 at Rs.7215 per kilo and weekly based delivery by Rs.90 at Rs.7240 per kilo. Silver coins, on the other hand, held previous levels at Rs.11,100/11,200 per 100 pieces. The following were today’s quotations: Silver ready 7215 and delivery 7240. Silver coins buyer 11,100 and seller 11,200 standard gold 4240, ornaments 4090 and sovereign 3650. (PTI) |
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WB reduces growth estimates for Asia across the board BANGKOK, Mar 16: In the wake of the US economic slowdown, the World Bank has reduced its growth estimates for its Asian clients "across the board," a senior World Bank (WB) Executive said today. "It’s quite clear that in the US there is a slowdown, and it’s also quite clear that the slowdown will affect Asia’s technology exports, semi-conductors and associated products which some of the economies in the region are more dependent on than others," said Jemal-ud-Din Kassum, the WB’s Regional Vice President for East Asia. "So what this means is that growth rate estimates across the board are being reduced for the current year," said the senior WB executive. Mr Kassum was in Thailand on a two-day visit to meet the country’s new leadership and economic team under Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Mr Kassum said the World Bank felt that the region was in a better position to sustain an "external shock" than it was in the pre-1997-crisis period and most countries would be able to absorb the adverse impact of a US slowdown as long as it did not exceed a 2 per cent drop in growth and lasts less than nine months. The WB also expressed confidence in the economic policies put forward by Thailand’s new premier Thaksin, a billionaire businessman who won the January 6 election on a clearly "populist" platform that included special development allocations to each of Thailand’s 70,000 villages and a three-year debt moratorium for the farmers who owe money to the Government’s bank of agriculture and cooperatives. (DPA) |
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World’s biggest oil rig tilts into sea after blast MACAE, BRAZIL, Mar 16: The world’s biggest offshore oil rig, owned by Brazil’s state oil giant Petrobras, threatened to sink into the ocean spilling crude oil today, a day after an explosion that apparently killed 10 people. Three powerful blasts rocked the 40-story rig off the coast of Rio De Janeiro state on Thursday, causing a fire that killed at least one of the 175 workers aboard. Nine workers were listed as missing, and Petrobras said on Thursday that there was little chance they had survived. Another worker was hospitalized with severe burns. Yesterday, public outrage mounted against accident-prone Petrobras as its biggest platform tilted into the sea. If the rig sinks it could dump crude and diesel into the open ocean, causing yet another environmental disaster. Tense families of the workers also waited to see if the official death toll would rise when search and rescue operations resume later in the day. "Petrobras is much more worried about cutting costs than ensuring the safety of its workers and of the environment," said Jandira Segalli, a federal deputy who met with officials after the explosion. (REUTERS) |
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International venture
capitalists flocking to WASHINGTON, Mar 16: International venture capitalists from Sydney to Silicon Valley are flocking to India where industry specialists expect venture capital investments to total as much as 10 billion dollars a year by 2005, a newspaper report said here today. "India has become one of Asia’s hottest centres for technology start-ups," the Wall Street Journal reported today. "The venture capitalists are also fuelling a search for the next big investment opportunity beyond bankrolling firms that offer software development services to larger corporations on a contract basis. On the horizon are start-ups that want to directly market their products in the us, with venture capitalists as liaison," it said. Investment by venture capitalists in India rose sevenfold to dollar 770 million in 2000 from 1999, according to Asia private equity review of Hong Kong. With a total capital pool of dollar 2.47 billion, India is now the fifth largest venture capital target in Asia, behind Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore and Taiwan. "India is attracting individuals with impressive technology credentials, not just corporate money. Much of the start-up funding is coming from these `Angel’ Indians overseas who made fortunes during the 1990s. Examples include founders of such companies as Exodus Communications, Sun Microsystems and Hotmail Corp., now a unit of Microsoft," the journal said. "The success of Indian companies such as Infosys Technologies and Wipro, which develop software for clients in the west, has led to a `me too’ syndrome. Venture capitalists have complained of being flooded with proposals for software services," the journal said. "Helping India is the fact that the new venture capitalists are bringing not only money but also expertise as they return to india from their sojourn abroad," Saurabh Srivastava, Chairman of Infinity Technology Investment Pvt Ltd, said. "We are not just people out of wall street or institutional investors. We are people who made it big in the Silicon Valley and know the domain we are investing in," he said. In January, Cisco systems raised its investment in India to dollar 200 million from dollar 150 million. It hopes to produce 1,500 software engineers by 2002. In February, New Delhi approved an investment by Aol Time Warner’s America online unit of dollar 100 million to develop next generation software for web browsing. International Business Machines (IBM) has said it will invest dollar 100 million in India over the next two years to set up and expand software development labs. (PTI) |
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Pak seeks $10b assistance for debt servicing ISLAMABAD, Mar 16: Bogged down by international debt to the tune of 38 billion dollars, Pakistan has asked the international donor agencies to grant an unprecedented 10 billion dollar loan to service its international debt commitments as well as to carry on with its structural reforms programme. The plea for more international assistance was made by Pakistan Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz, who in a policy paper submitted to the just-concluded Pakistan Development Forum (PDF), said "due to heavy burden the country was caught in a vicious circle of debt repayments which led to stagnation in every sphere of economy." Pakistan is caught in a vicious circle of high debt payments, leading to stagnation in investment and growth and low growth in turn has limited the capacity to service the debt and reduce the debt burden, he said. Of the 10 billion dollar loan sought by Pakistan, Aziz said six billion could be given in the form of soft term loans and the rest for debt servicing. Aziz’s request for a monetary assistance on such a large scale followed pressures faced by Pakistan in servicing short term debt of 21 billion dollar, which it has to repay during the next four years. The overall foreign debt was estimated to be around 38 billion dollar. Significantly, while Aziz made a strong plea for huge international monetary assistance, delegates at PDF meeting made it clear that it linked its future assistance with restoration of democracy and early announcement of elections for both provincial and national assemblies. Delegates, including Meiko Nisihimizu, vice president of World Bank for South Asia, demanded a road map for democracy. Nishimizu remained non-committal about extending a quick response to Aziz’s request for the 10 billion dollar assistance. "The donor community would respond after details of the reform programme initiated by Pakistan", he said. Aziz later told reporters that Pakistan was likely to get 138 million dollar second tranche under standby arrangement of IMF within a month. Pakistan’s plea for more international assistance followed a series of reform measures, which included freeze on defence spending at the current levels and withdrawal of subsidies for gas. According to reports appearing in the local media, in the PDF meeting, which concluded on Wednesday, the delegates stated that without broad-based political consensus, the implementation of the proposed reform programme would be at risk. Despite scepticism of donors, Pakistan’s military ruler General Pervez Musharraf claimed that PDF has endorsed his Government’s policies. He told members of Karachi Stock Exchange on Wednesday that the PDF representatives were fully satisfied with whatever the Government was doing. (PTI) |
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No proposal to ban TV game shows: Swaraj NEW DELHI, Mar 16: The Government does not have any proposal to ban television game shows, Information and Broadcasting Minister Sushma Swaraj told the Lok Sabha today. The game shows are closer to quiz programmes and prima facie do not attract any specific objections under Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995, she said. There is also no proposal to privatise the broadcast of news bulletins and current affairs programmes aired on FM channels of All India Radio, she said. The Department of Economic Affairs has asked the Industrial Development Bank of India to evolve well recognised and acceptable standards to enable financial institutions fund ventures relating to the film industry. An advisory group comprising key representatives of the film sector has also been set up to advise the ministry on policy and other related issues, Mrs Swaraj said in a written reply. The Government does not intend to announce any new public distribution policy for earthquake affected areas of Gujarat, Minister of State for Food and Public Distribution Sriram Chauhan said. However 80,000 tonnes of wheat and 20,000 tonnes of rice has been allotted for distribution in earthquake ravaged areas, he said. The Government has decided to decontrol the sugar industry in a phased manner, Minister of State for Food and Public Distribution Srinivas Prasad said. The Government has also decided to restructure the public distribution system as far as levy sugar is concerned. The supply of levy sugar has been restricted to the people below poverty line except in north-eastern states, he said. Sugar industry has been dilicensed and entrepreneurs are now free to set up new sugar mills as per techno-economic viability while maintaining a radial distance of 15 kilometres from the existing sugar mills, he said. There is no proposal to set up automobile unit in the public sector, Minister of State for Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises Vallabhbhai Kathiria said. Automobile industry has been delicensed and investors are free to start auto projects, he said. (UNI) |
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Instant noodle summit aims at 100 bln pack market in 2010 BANGKOK, Mar 16: Leading producers of Asian-style instant noodles met in Bangkok today to discuss means of turning the popular product into a healthy food staple for the world by the year 2010, when an estimated 100 billion packs will be consumed. The third World Ramen Summit had drawn 80 top executives from 12 leading manufacturers to discuss means of improving nutritional standards of the popular Asian fast food "to become the international food of the world." "Another goal to be fulfilled is to increase the consumed volume of instant noodles to 100 billion packs in the year 2010, to sustain possible food scarcity in the 21st century," said Pipat Paningvanit, Chairman of the Third International Noodle Powwow which every two years. Instant noodles have been criticized in numerous medical studies for their high fat and salt content, that can lead to obesity and heart disease. The first Ramen Summit to improve the industry was launched in Tokyo in March, 1997, by Momofuku Ando, 92, the inventor of instant noodles and founder of Japan’s Nissin Food Products Company Limited. Ando was inspired to create the dried noodle product as a cheap means of solving Japan’s food shortages after World War II. Instant noodle packs, which costs about 10 cents a pack in Thailand and takes five minutes to cook, are popular throughout Asia where more than 42 billion packs were sold in 1997. The second Ramen Summit was held in 1999 in Indonesia, Asia’s second largest market for instant noodles after only China. Nissin Ajinomoto Alimentos Ltd of Brazil was among the International Ramen Manufacturers Association (IRMA) attending the third such noodle summit in Bangkok. The meeting was officially opened by Thai Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, to whom the IRMA donated three million packets of instant noodles for her charity works. Despite the product’s growing popularity, the medical community have repeatedly warned of the health dangers posed by excessive consumption of instant noodles. An average pot of noodles contains as much fat as a serving of chips, a quarter of a pizza or one and a half candy bars and as much salt as a young child needs all day, the Australian Consumers’ Association said in a recent report, publishing in the South China Morning Post. The Association tested a variety of brands of instant noodles sold internationally and found the average pot of noodles contained 1,700 milligrams of salt - 75 per cent of the recommended maximum daily intake for adults and 100 per cent of what a child aged 4 to 7 should consume. A pot of noodles contains 15 grams of fat, as much as one croissant, a bag of crisps or a quarter of a medium pizza. (DPA) |
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Plea to India for low import tariff on palm KUALA LUMPUR, Mar 16: Malaysia and Indonesia have decided to jointly urge India to reduce import tariff on palm oil from 75 per cent to 45 per cent, similar to the tariff for soya oil, during its three-day visit, Malaysian Primary Industry Minister Dr Lim Keng Yaik said. A joint delegation of the two Governments would visit India from April 11 to 13 to persuade New Delhi to buy more palm oil from the two ASEAN members, he said yesterday. "The lower tariff gives the edge to soya oil and so we will be asking for the same tariff for palm oil," he said. Meanwhile, palm oil will begin replacing diesel at power stations and factories in Malaysia from next week, he said. "The (Malaysian) Finance Ministry has agreed to provide subsidies to power stations and factories which use palm oil as fuel oil," he said. To further stabilise the price of palm oil in the world market, Malaysia would cooperate with Indonesia in research and development to come up with high quality palm oil, he added. (BERNAMA) |
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