Latest news clippings 2012.01.12

                  Bengo’s latest news clippings           2012.01.12

1.      Chinese premier to bolster Gulf energy ties

CNN    January 11, 2012

in Abu Dhabi and  in Beijing

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, pictured in Kuta, Indonesia in November, heads to the Gulf this week.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Wen visit will be most senior Chinese mission to Mideast since Hu's in 2009
• Yanbu facility at Red Sea port is Sinopec's first overseas refinery
• Chinese oil companies have landed several service contracts in Iraq
• Wen is said to be skipping Tehran on visit

China will this week launch its highest-level diplomatic visit to the Gulf for more than two years, seeking to bolster its growing energy ties to the region amid jitters over possible western sanctions on Iranian oil and Tehran's counter-threat to block the Strait of Hormuz.

Premier Wen Jiabao's six-day trip will take him to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, while China's state-owned Sinopec is poised to sign a joint venture deal to develop a big refinery on the Saudi Red Sea Coast.

Rising tensions between Iran and its Arab oil producing neighbors have highlighted the delicate path Beijing needs to tread to preserve both as big oil suppliers, while unrest across the Middle East has triggered wider concerns in China about its dependence on the region's oil.

"Half of China's oil imports are sourced from the Middle East, so the region's instability is a major concern," said Ben Simpfendorfer, founder of Silk Road Associates, a Hong Kong based consultancy. "Conflict with Iran tops the lists of worries, should it disrupt physical oil supplies. There is also the risk that the Middle East starts to call on China to play a bigger role in the region, no different to the other major powers."

2.      Romney Wins New Hampshire Primary

Jan 11, 2012

Mitt Romney cemented his status as the Republican presidential front-runner yesterday with a win in the New Hampshire primary that left rivals fighting for a chance to derail his march to the nomination as the race moves south.

Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who won the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses by eight votes, ran 16 percentage votes ahead of his nearest competitor in New Hampshire, the nation’s first primary.

He had 39 percent of the vote, with 95 percent of the precincts counted in the Associated Press tally. U.S. Representative Ron Paul of Texas finished second with 23 percent, followed by former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman Jr. with 17 percent.

“Tonight we celebrate, tomorrow we go back to work,” Romney told supporters in Manchester last night in a speech that debuted new lines of attack against President Barack Obama.

Romney told his audience the president he hopes to oppose in November “has run out of ideas” and is “running out of excuses.”

South Carolina Contest

Referring to the next primary on Jan. 21, Romney added: “Tonight, we’re asking the good people of South Carolina to join the citizens of New Hampshire and make 2012 the year he runs out of time.”

Romney made history as the first Republican non-incumbent to win both the New Hampshire primary and Iowa caucuses since Iowa began kicking off the party’s presidential nominating process in 1976.

2012.01.05 Headline

BBC 

   EU Moves to ban Iran crude oil

  歐盟擬禁止進口伊朗原油

CNN

Romney, Santorum on top as GOP

race shift to New Hampshire

羅姆尼,桑托榮在共和黨初選中領先

下一站新罕布夏州

ALJAZEERA

Bachmann bows out as Romney wins lowa

羅姆尼贏得愛荷華州初選 巴赫曼退選

The  Wall Street Journal

State Department Asked to Investigate Huawei

Business in Iran

國務院要求調查華為是否違反制裁伊朗規定

Latest news clippings 2012.01.05

1.      China TV Grows Racy, and Gets a Chaperon

The New York Times   December 31, 2011

NANJING, China — Wang Peijie’s idea for what would become the most-talked-about show in China was simple: Throw a spotlight on this country’s bright young things as they court each other on stage to pop music and audience applause.

The men boasted of their bank accounts, houses and fancy cars. The women were svelte and sassy, dousing suitors with acid putdowns. But mixed into the banter were trenchant social issues that urban Chinese from their 20s to 40s grapple with, if not always so publicly: living together before marriage, the unabashed pursuit of wealth or the government’s one-child policy.

“Through this show, you can tell what China is thinking about and chasing after,” said Mr. Wang, a veteran television producer.

The show, “If You Are the One,” broke ratings records in the first half of 2010. More than 50 million people tuned in. The sauciest contestants became sensations — one aspiring actress famously rejected a man offering a bicycle ride by saying, “I’d rather cry in a BMW.” The show attracted huge interest from Chinese overseas; some students on American campuses even filmed their own versions. It increased the nation’s cultural influence, which China’s leaders crave.

But reality television proved too real for the censors. Disturbed by the program’s revealing portrait of Chinese youth and the spread of copycat shows, they threatened to cancel it. Producers raced to overhaul the show. They brought on older contestants and added a third host, a matronly professor from the provincial Communist Party school. “We’ve had more restrictions on expressions on the show, to eliminate remarks that could have negative social impact,” the wiry Mr. Wang, 45, said one morning as dozens of screens flickered behind him in a control room here in Jiangsu Province.

Then regulators formulated a sweeping policy that takes effect on Sunday and effectively wipes out scores of entertainment shows on prime-time television. The authorities evidently determined that trends inspired by “If You Are the One” and a popular talent show, “Super Girl,” had gone too far, and they responded with a policy to curb what they call “excessive entertainment.”

2.      Organic Agriculture May Be Outgrowing Its Ideals

New York Times   December 30, 2011

TODOS SANTOS, Mexico — Clamshell containers on supermarket shelves in the United States may depict verdant fields, tangles of vines and ruby red tomatoes. But at this time of year, the tomatoes, peppers and basil certified as organic by the Agriculture Department often hail from the Mexican desert, and are nurtured with intensive irrigation.

Growers here on the Baja Peninsula, the epicenter of Mexico’s thriving new organic export sector, describe their toil amid the cactuses as “planting the beach.”

Del Cabo Cooperative, a supplier here for Trader Joe’s and Fairway, is sending more than seven and a half tons of tomatoes and basil every day to the United States by truck and plane to sate the American demand for organic produce year-round.

But even as more Americans buy foods with the organic label, the products are increasingly removed from the traditional organic ideal: produce that is not only free of chemicals and pesticides but also grown locally on small farms in a way that protects the environment.

The explosive growth in the commercial cultivation of organic tomatoes here, for example, is putting stress on the water table. In some areas, wells have run dry this year, meaning that small subsistence farmers cannot grow crops. And the organic tomatoes end up in an energy-intensive global distribution chain that takes them as far as New York and Dubai, United Arab Emirates, producing significant emissions that contribute to global warming.

From now until spring, farms from Mexico to Chile to Argentina that grow organic food for the United States market are enjoying their busiest season.

“People are now buying from a global commodity market, and they have to be skeptical even when the label says ‘organic’ — that doesn’t tell people all they need to know,” said Frederick L. Kirschenmann, a distinguished fellow at the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University. He said some large farms that have qualified as organic employed environmentally damaging practices, like planting only one crop, which is bad for soil health, or overtaxing local freshwater supplies.

2012.01.03 Headline

CNN
      Iran fires missiles in Strait of Hormuz
      伊朗在荷莫茲海峽試射飛彈
BBC
     Arab call to end Syria shooting

     阿拉伯聯盟要求敘利亞終止射殺

AL JAZEERA
    Thousands flee South Sudan tribal conflict
     南蘇丹部落衝突成千上萬人逃離
FINANCIAL TIMES
       India lifts restrictions on foreign investor
       印度對外資解禁