INTERVIEW WITH KAREN HUDES – WORLD BANK WHISTLEBLOWER
It runs on water – zero point energy
Washington Thinks American’s Are Stupid Sheeple
Aug 08, 2013 - 06:15 PM GMT
There’s the old saying that if the government fears the people, there is liberty, but if the people fear the government there is tyranny. The criminals in Washington not only do not fear us, they do not respect us. Washington looks upon Americans as stupid sheeple.
Washington believes that it can tell the population anything and the people will believe it. For example, the official line is that the recession that began in December 2007 ended in June 2009. Many Americans believe this even thought they have not personally experienced economic recovery. Indeed, they are sinking further into poverty and near poverty.
And don’t forget those nonexistent weapons of mass destruction that Saddam Hussein was alleged by Washington to possess. Or the Gulf of Tonkin fake event when Washington claimed that its warship was attacked by North Vietnam. Really, the list of official lies is very long. Anyone who believes anything that Washington says is too naive to be let out of the house alone. But Americans believe the lies, because that is what they think patriotism requires.
Relying on the proven gullibility of the bulk of the US population, Washington claims to have uncovered an al Qaeda plot to attack US embassies across North Africa and the Middle East. To foil the plot, Washington closed 19 embassies for the past week-end and for this week also.
Washington has not explained how closing the embassies foils the plot. If al Qaeda wants to blow up the embassies, it can blow them up whether they are open or closed.
If al Qaeda wants to kill the embassy personnel, they can kill them at home or on the way to work or later in the embassies when the alert passes.
I only check in with the presstitute media in order to ascertain whether my current estimate of their prostitution for Washington is accurate. Possibly I missed some expression of skepticism about the latest terrorist threat. But I did hear NPR’s account. Back in the Reagan years, NPR was an independent voice. Today it is part of the presstitute media. NPR lies for Washington with the best of them.
The US media has ignored the obvious fact that as soon as the American population, Congress, and Washington’s puppet allies, such as Germany, made an issue over the NSA’s clearly unconstitutional and totally illegal universal spying, the Obama regime pushed the Fear Button and hyped a new terror plot in order to shut up critics and bring Congress and Germany back in line.
Washington proclaimed that a “threat” was discovered that al Qaeda–an organization that Washington is using in Washington’s effort to overthrow the Assad government in Syria and one that is enriched by US military contracts to affiliated groups in Afghanistan–was going to blow up US embassies in the Middle East and North Africa. Washington did not explain why al Qaeda, a recipient of Washington’s largess, was going to turn off the money spigot by attacking US embassies.
I am surprised that bombs haven’t been set off in the embassies in order to prove the value of the National Stasi Agency’s spying, thereby shaming those in Congress and among the puppet states in Europe who object to the spying.
Once you give a moment’s thought to Washington’s claim, you see that Washington is proving its impotence by hyping such non-existent threats. Officially, the US has been at war with al Qaeda since October 7, 2001. The “superpower” has been battling a few thousand lightly armed al Qaeda for almost 12 years, and what is the result?
Despite Washington’s claims to have killed al Qaeda’s top leaders, including Osama bin Laden himself, Washington has lost the war. Al Qaeda has grown so powerful that it not only fights in Syria, with Washington’s help, against Assad, but also has prevented the US military from occupying Afghanistan. Moreover, in addition to al Qaeda’s military success against the “superpower” and the chaos that al Qaeda continues to produce in Iraq, al Qaeda now is so powerful that it can shut down US embassies all across the Middle East and North Africa. The “threat” which was supposed to boost the NSA’s position actually proves Washington’s powerlessness.
We an only pray that soon al Qaeda shuts down Washington itself. Imagine the sense of American liberation if Washington simply was shut down, or even better if Washington could be put under Punjab’s magic blanket and disappeared. For the 99 percent, and the rest of the world, Washington is nothing but an oppressor.
Paul Craig Roberts
Fukushima Research
Time for Japan to take control of the Fukushima disaster | Greenpeace International
Fukushima drainage has 20,000 tons of water with radioactive substance – TEPCO — RT News
BBC News - Fukushima radioactive water leak an 'emergency'
Spill-over threat: Fukushima radioactive groundwater rises above barrier level — RT News
Videos
Radiation Of The Pacific Ocean In The Next 10 Years - Japan Nuclear Disaster
Fukushima NHK Documentary Two Years Later
Sources
Fukushima Update | Nuclear News from Japan
Fukushima Reactor Disaster - Archive with hundreds of articles and videos
FUKUSHIMA PHASE II: The Coriums Enter the Hydrosphere
WE'RE NOW ENTERING THE FUKUSHIMA DAIICHI DISASTER'S SECOND PHASE - BARRIER BREACHED - GROUNDWATER CONTAMINATION SIGNIFICANTLY AFFECTING THE PACIFIC OCEAN (updated 8/06/13)
Recent disclosures by TECPO of severely contaminated groundwater at the Fukushima Daiichi reactor complex have been raising eyebrows in activist communities and beyond. TEPCO has recently been finding in boreholes drilled just meters from the ocean stratospheric quantities of radioactivity, including cesium-134, cesium-137, strontium-90 and tritium. At first, TEPCO said this radiation - near the shoreline, but below the surface - originated 'from initial leaks that have remained since earlier in the crisis' and that stayed near the plant inside the bay. BUT THEY WERE WRONG! This was from leaks. This was radiation that was bleeding from the reactors or the coriums and contaminated the groundwater, which has been flowing to sea all along. The most recent alarming news is that TEPCO found 2.35 *tuh* trillion becquerels of radioactive cesium per cubic meter of groundwater in a trench beside reactor 2.
Since early July 2013, measurements peaking into the hundreds of BILLIONs of becquerels per cubic meter (denoted as Bq/m3) of beta radiation have been found in groundwater at the plant! Beta radiation includes such radionuclide groups as cesium, strontium, tritium, and dozens of other isotopes of chemical elements formed by nuclear fission (look at a trilinear chart; the betas are in broken-lined boxes). TEPCO is reluctant to test for strontium-90. STRONTIUM-90 IS WORSE THAN CESIUM-134 OR CESIUM 137 OR TRITIUM to human health. That's why I focus on this radiochemical across many of the hundreds of pages on NuclearCrimes.org. Read more about why Strontium-90 is a worse health threat than cesium.
When The Pacific Was Last Severely Contaminated
In 1954, the U.S. detonated its largest nuclear bomb ever. Code-named 'Bravo,' the hydrogen bomb explosion was 10,000 times the explosive yield of the A-bomb device it dropped 9 years earlier on Hiroshima.
The target: Bikini Atoll in the central Pacific Ocean. This ultra-radiation release event showered a type ofradioactive snow on a populated island that the U.S. refused to evacuate for 50 hours - this was part of the notorous Project 4.1. The event also tainted the ocean so badly that hundreds of fishing boat hulls became contaminated, fishing sites became too 'hot' to fish, etc... and the effects lingered on for years. The currents pushed much of this radiation, and other radiation generated by USSR and U.S. nuclear dumping and bomb testing in the 1950s, to the Eastern Pacific. We're getting to this point quickly again with Fukushima's radioactive groundwater 'flood.'
TEPCO knows what they're doing. They are trying to keep people apathethic about this disaster and are being advised by the best spin-doctors in the world. For over 2 years now, TEPCO has done their informational 'drip drop' thing for all sorts of data, and now they're doing it with strontium-90 levels measured in groundwater. They're withholding most of this data and waiting, very carefully, to release this data until people no longer care or remember there was even data to be shared. Yet, we see from the few disclosures to date that strontium-90 levels keep increasing in groundwater with each sample; see chart in light blue color.
So, is strontium-90 going to be (or already is) a problem in the PACIFIC OCEAN from historic AND future groundwater releases at Fukushima? Strontium, like cesium, is WATER SOLUBLE, UNLIKE PLUTONIUM AND MANY OTHER RADIOCHEMICALS, so we can expect groundwater to be full of the stuff. And...THERE IS A LOT OF STRONTIUM LEFT TO BE LEACHED from the coriums, which are water-drenched, meaning they are slowly leaching radiation into the groundwater. The coriums at Fukushima contain MILLIONS OF TRILLIONS of becquerels of strontium-90 just waiting to be released...and since the corium's whereabouts are unknown, it's plausible that groundwater contamination could be getting worse, NOT BETTER!
So, let's say, soon, TEPCO finds 50 billion becquerels per cubic meter of strontium-90 in groundwater. That's 50,000,000,000 Bq/m3 of sr90. In a leak involving the volume of water in an Olympic sized swimming pool (which holds 2500 m3 of water), that's 125 TRILLION becqueruels of strontium-90! That's 125 trillion becquerels of strontium-90 in one big pool's worth of water !! Scientists are more or less in consensus - though this is a conservative estimate in my estimation - that Fukushima in 2011 released into the marine environment 1,000 TRILLION becquerels of strontium-90 (into the Pacific). So, over time, and we're talking just a few months from now, a volume of 10 (ten) Olympic pools of contaminated groundwater containing 50 billion bq/m3 of Sr90 would exceed the most conservative estimate of strontium-90 load put into the Pacific from the 2011 meltdowns (volatilized sr90), dumping and leaks combined! On July 12, 2013, a TEPCO worker said 450 tons of groundwater flow into the Pacific everyday; so it would take just 55 days for 10 volumes of Olympic swimming pools to meet this goal! 1 ton of water equals about 1 cubic meter of water). Perhaps this has already happened, or has happened a few times, since TEPCO has confirmed underground leaks to the sea have been happening since 2011.
We have a real crap-fest on our hands if this keeps going on and no one stops the groundwater flow. On August 5th of 2013, it was learned that tainted groundwater has breached an underground barrier at the Fukushima Daiichi plant's sea front, an event that Japan's nuclear regulatory body, the NRA, dubbed an emergency (data now shows that underground water has risen over this underground wall, a sort of chemical liquid glass barrier; the conclusion: tainted water is now leaking uncontrolled into the sea). Critics have long been saying that barriers being built by TEPCO around its reactors will simply back up the groundwater and cause new challenges, from imminent overflow (and faster flows of tainted water) to thwarting or overwhelming pumping AND STORAGE capability to literally crushing the reactor structures from the water pressure! If the entire REACTOR site becomes a type of 'soup' - if it is all turned into the saturated zone - the reactors could lose their stability and move, or sink. In an earthquake, the moist ground could experience liquefaction: it could behave as water even though it (the soil) is a solid. This would be very bad.
With this latest breach, TEPCO said that it was going to increase its testing for strontium-90 in seawater/groundwater despite an announcement by the utility in mid July 2013 that it was (a) reducing the frequency of analysis of Sr90 in sea samples and (b) was planning to cease reporting measurements (of Sr90) in becquerels, and instead in (erroneous) units of dose or other parameters meant to confuse and mislead, IMO. We shall see what happens. The fact remains that strontium-90 poses a greater danger, unit for unit, than tritium or cesium to human health and the environment, and strontium-90 will be entering the environment via groundwater flows in amounts many times that released by air during the meltdowns in 2011.
The worrisome part is we could soon be seeing radioactive measurements of strontium, cesium, tritium, and soon perhaps even plutonium, reaching record high levels as TEPCO throws up its hands and says it has no way or plan of dealing with UNCONTROLLED groundwater leaks for years, or decades!
THIS LOOKS LIKE IT WILL HAPPEN.
IT COULD BE WORSE FOR THE ECOSYSTEMS OF THE EARTH AND ITS INHABITANTS THAN THE MELTDOWNS IN 2011.
SEAFOOD LOVERS ACROSS THE WORLD: - The 'levels' of radiation in the seafood you are eating now and in the future will be ticking with radiation but will be considered 'safe' by government scientists. Why? Because their 'limits' are way too high. Yet it is fact that the only safe level of radiation to reduce genetic defects and cancer incidence worldwide is zero becquerels of anything. I COULD ADD TONS MORE....BUT YOU PROBABLY WON'T BELIEVE ME AND THIS WEBSITE IF IT CONTRADICTED THE RHETORIC OF THE AGENCIES YOU HAVE COME TO TRUST WHICH HAVE ACRONYMS THAT SHOULD BE SHORT FOR DEROGATORY AND INSULTING TERMS INSTEAD OF WORDS LIKE 'REGULATORY' OR 'HEALTH' OR 'PROTECTION.' Protect your own health and regulate your genetic stability for the sake of your children, grandchildren, etc...by NOT EATING SEAFOOD OR CONSUMING ANYTHING MADE IN THE SEA.
- TEPCO ADMITS RADIATION HAS BEEN LEAKING TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN ALL THIS TIME JULY 22, 2013 - ARTICLE -
TEPCO has seen the light and now has admitted what the experts were suspecting. Leaks are happening. The plant operator has also validated a theory put forward by a well-known, tireless blogger last week that tidal movements were responsible for some of this leakage. Iori of Fukushima-Diary wrote on his blog's July 19th post 'Possibility of seawater coming up to the plant side' the following:
'It's the possibility that seawater may come into the plant, and also contamination is flowing to the sea groundwater....Water flows from high to low. It's natural to think the contaminated groundwater is flowing to the deeper part of the sea, which is underground of the sea. Wrapping it all, it seems rational to think groundwater and seawater are moving back and forth as full tide repeats. By repeating the motion of the tide, contamination is possibly moving back and forth between land and sea too. As long as they keep injecting water to the reactors, Fukushima plant will keep being the worst contamination source of the Pacific.'
In late July 2013, The Asahi Shimbun stated that TEPCO had 'confirmed water level variations in monitoring wells as early as in January [2013]'; in other words, TEPCO knew since the beginning of 2013 that the 'wells where the radioactivity was detected were fluctuating in sync with tide levels.' TEPCO's delay in relaying this information to the public was blamed on poor 'in-house communications,' which has angered many groups in Japan.
Strontium-90 Findings in Fukushima Daiichi Groundwater
8,300 Bq/m3 | sample date: 1?/?/12 | publish date: 12/12/12 beside reactor3
850,000 Bq/m3 | sample date: 3/26/12++ | publish date: 6/7/13
1,000,000 Bq/m3 | sample date: 5/24/13 | publish date: 6/19/13
1,200,000 Bq/m3 | sample date: 6/07/13 | publish date: 7/11/13 boring no. 1
++During a four-hour leak event (into the ocean) in March 2012, TEPCO had measured - 10 minutes BEFORE finding the leak! - 17 million Bq/m3 of beta radiation in water and five percent of that was strontium-90.
Thanks Fukushima Diary for their work! It's helping us.
Maritime Safety Agency, 'Sr-90 and Cs-137 density in seawater became the highest in past 40 years'
SEAWATER RESULTS: 5,800 Bq/m3 (157 pCi/L) | sample date: 6/26/13 | publish date: 7/31/13 | north side of units 5 & 6 water outlet
If Iori is right, then deep contamination may be a huge problem, and TEPCO isn't looking for it; they're just looking at seawater in its port. Radiation could be emerging in large quantities daily from a spring or whatchamacallit hundreds of meters out at sea - or even miles or tens of miles away - where TEPCO is barely monitoring; according to Fukushima Diary, TEPCO has 'only three monitoring points outside of the port...' Two are 'close to the coastal line' and in a 1 kilometer radius area offshore they have just one monitoring point.' (source)
What this means...is there's an entire set of NEW plumes of highly contaminated seawater that are floating about and no one has any idea of when these plumes left the plant, their toxicity level or makeup. Some of this undiagnosed leaked radiation in the ocean is mixing with OLDER plumes, especially near the coast, to create significant spikes in contamination in ocean water and fish (seafood).
FLOOD, NOT LEAK - from 'The Food Lab' guy: 'They use the word leak, to play it down. Their estimate is 450 tons a day of ground water flowing into the Pacific Ocean. This is probably a very conservative estimate! It's a flood, not a leak!'
Carbon 14 and the 411 on Corium - July 29, 2013 - Bobby1, a blogger at WordPress, explores the hidden story of the latest at Fukushima. Excerpts:
'The neutrons from the chain reactions, along with neutron-emitting isotopes like plutonium and curium, interact with the nitrogen injections to cause carbon-14 to be released. There have been no measurements made of this isotope. Along with tritium (from neutrons and boric acid injections), this isotope is most deleterious to plant life. Linus Pauling, the two-time Nobel Prize-winning chemist, felt that carbon-14 was the most dangerous isotope of them all.'...
'Unit 3, which has been giving off a light show on the Daiichi wecams the past few weeks, has been giving off steam. Nitrogen has been injected into this reactor continuously, in order to prevent a hydrogen explosion. There is a shortfall in nitrogen recovered from the gas management system. This shows that the steam is coming from the reactor, or from the hole in the ground underneath the reactor, with MOX corium down there...The underground corium has encountered water. So there is a risk of a hydrovolcanic explosion with this plutonium-rich fuel.' {More:Cesium density in reactor3 "steam" higher than the gas inside of PCV}
More articles about Fukushima and health
Skyrocketing Levels of Strontium-90 Being Found in Groundwater at Fukushima. A Look at 'Why?' - July 2013
FAQs on radioactive contamination of food in U.S.
'Japan Finds Radioactivity in More Foods from California: The California Radiation Report'- chart of contamination levels
'Vital Information that U.S. Scientists and the U.S. Government Isn't Telling You about Pacific Seafood Tainted by Fukushima,' by NuclearCrimes.org; update on tuna situation update on bluefin tuna study
The threat posed to health by eating radioactive foods
Fukushima's NOT over. IT'S ACTUALLY GETTING WORSE. Please donate if you like seeing our coverage on this situation. DUST OFF YOUR BLOGS AND GET ACTIVE AGAIN ABOUT FUKUSHIMA! Share, like, tweet, flip out!
IS THE PACIFIC OCEAN FOOD CHAIN DOOMED? - May 2013 - Incredibly worrisome levels of cesium, including short-lived radioactive cesium-134, have been found near Hawaii in the LOWEST part of the marine food chain: plankton. Levels up the food chain, i.e. fish, whales, seals, due to bioaccumulation, MUST be magnitudes higher in contamination now or soon - stop eating Pacific wild seafood now - Researchers find high cesium in some Pacific plankton
Yemen Research
8/7/2013 Plot Foiled
Yemen says it foiled major al-Qaeda plot
SANAA, Yemen (AP) -- Authorities foiled plots by al-Qaida to take over key cities in southern Yemen and attack strategic ports and gas facilities, a government spokesman said Wednesday amid a heightened alert that has seen Western embassies evacuated and a new suspected U.S. drone strike that killed seven alleged militants from the terrorist group.
Al-Qaida planned to target the cities of Mukalla and Bawzeer, then send militants disguised as Yemeni troops to attack two strategic oil ports in the impoverished country on the Arabian Peninsula, government spokesman Rageh Badi said.
A strike carried out by a U.S. unmanned aerial vehicle on Aug. 7 killed at least six suspected al Qaeda militants in southern Yemen's Shabwa province, Reuters reported, citing witnesses and local officials. At least six missiles were fired at two vehicles in an area about 70 kilometers (50 miles) north of the provincial capital, Ataq.
Yemeni tribesmen shot down an army helicopter with a rocket, killing eight soldiers, during a clash regarding repairs to a sabotaged pipeline, a tribal chief said, AFP reported Aug. 6. Tribesmen attacked the pipeline Aug. 4, stopping the flow of crude exports.
AQAP
For the West, AQAP presents three dangers:
- locally, to western embassies and citizens in Yemen
- inspirationally, to potential jihadists around the world through its online magazine Inspire
- globally, by putting bombs on planes
BBC News - Why al-Qaeda in Yemen scares the West
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP; Arabic: القاعدة في جزيرة العرب, Al-Qaida fi Jazirat al-'Arab) is a militant Islamist organization, primarily active inYemen and Saudi Arabia. It was named for al-Qaeda, and says it is subordinate to that group and its now-deceased leader Osama bin Laden, a Saudi citizen whose father was born in Yemen. It is considered the most active[3] of Al-Qaeda's branches, or "franchises," that emerged due to weakening central leadership.[4]
Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
BBC News - Yemen security crackdown as UK and US withdraw staff
BBC News - US embassy closures extended over militant threat fears
BBC News - Al-Qaeda leaders' talks 'sparked US embassy closures'
About Yemen
Yemen 
i/ˈjɛmən/ (Arabic: اليَمَن al-Yaman) officially known as the Republic of Yemen (Arabic: الجمهورية اليمنية al-Jumhūriyyah al-Yamaniyyah), is an Arab country located in Western Asia, occupying the southwestern to southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, theGulf of Aden and Arabian Sea to the south, and Oman to the east.
Yemen is one of the oldest centers of civilization in the Near East.[5] Its capital and largest city is Sana'a. Yemen's territory includes more than 200 islands, the largest of which is Socotra, about 354 km (220 mi) to the south of mainland Yemen. It is the only state in the Arabian Peninsula to have a purely republican form of government.[6]Yemen was the first country in the Arabian peninsula to grant women the right to vote.[7] Yemeni unification took place on 22 May 1990, when North Yemen was united with South Yemen, forming the Republic of Yemen.
The majority of Yemen's population is divided into tribal groups, especially in the northern areas of the country where 85% of local residents belong to various tribes[8]There are also small groups of peoples of Turkish/Ottoman origin in urban areas.[9]Yemen is a member of the United Nations, the Arab League, and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and Ali Abdullah Saleh was the first elected president of the reunified Yemen. Since the 1990s, the Houthis (an armed Zaydi group) has attempted to establish Zaydi Shia principles in the country[10].
New Zealand not so pure
New Zealand's green claims are pure manure: Country's food scares and poor environmental record at odds with '100% Pure' slogan
- Despite marketing claims, New Zealand has a poor environmental record
- Food scares and poor water quality cast doubt on '100 per cent' pure slogan
- Revelations may hit nation's food export industry
Pure? New Zealand's poor environmental record has cast doubt on its claims to be '100% Pure'
For a country that markets itself to the world with the slogan '100% Pure', New Zealand's environmental credentials are not as impeccable as many would think.
The majority of its rivers are too polluted to swim in. Its record on preservation of natural environments is among the worst in the world on a per capita basis.
And it is the only OECD country that does not produce a regular national report on its environment.
The discovery by dairy giant Fonterra of a bacteria that can cause potentially fatal food poisoning in ingredients sold to eight countries exposes New Zealand's vulnerability to food safety scares and the fragility of the clean, green image underpinning its farming- and tourism-based economy.
Agricultural exports, including dairy, meat, fruit and wine, command high premiums internationally thanks to New Zealand's reputation as a producer of safe, natural and high-quality food.
'It was only a matter of time before our dirty little secret came out,' said Jill Brinsdon, brand strategist at Radiation, a brand agency in Auckland.
'Fonterra is our largest exporter and they're completely intertwined with New Zealand's image and also they're the absolute biggest benefactor of the "100% Pure" brand.
'When you're coming out with something that presents itself as fact, or 100 per cent pure, then you have to be 100 per cent pure and we've proven that we're not.'
New Zealand's primary sector, which includes fishing and forestry, accounts for some 60 per cent of exports and 18 per cent of the country's $160billion GDP, among the highest proportions in the developed world. Tourism makes up another 10 percent or so of GDP.
The country has long marketed itself internationally with the '100% Pure' slogan in print and TV ads, drawing millions of visitors each year to experience its national parks, beaches and lakes.
Pollution: Early morning light shines through the smog in Christchurch, New Zealand
Contaminated: A notice warning of industrial liquid pollution in the Waimakariri river, Christchurch in New Zealand
With barely 4.5 million people spread over a mountainous area larger than the United Kingdom or California and more than a quarter of that set aside for reserves and national parks - the backdrop for the popular Lord of the Rings movie trilogy - New Zealand has no shortage of unspoilt natural attractions.
But the marketing overlooks a dark side to the country's environmental credentials.
More than 60 per cent of New Zealand rivers monitored by the Environment Ministry had 'poor' or 'very poor' water quality and were rated as unsafe for swimming due to pollution.
Dairy farming, which has a lot riding on New Zealand's strong environmental reputation, has been a significant cause of poor river quality due to fertiliser and effluent runoff.
Unlike many other countries, New Zealand cows are kept on grassy pastures year-round, a major selling point for its $9billion annual global dairy trade.
The country has long marketed itself internationally with the '100% Pure' slogan in print and TV ads, drawing millions of visitors each year to experience its national parks, beaches and lakes
Facade: New Zealand trades off its natural beauty, but many rivers are too polluted to swim in
Fonterra Kauri plant in Whangarei. A botulism scare at Fonterra was the company's second contamination issue this year after it earlier found traces of dicyandiamde, a potentially toxic chemical, in some products
'Because we've had a lack of regulation on farm waste for 20 years it's been a free for all, so farmers have done what they can to produce more milk - which is to put more cows on pastures,' said Mike Joy, an ecology and environmental sustainability scientist at Massey University.
Prime Minister John Key, who has been previously criticised for saying the 100% Pure marketing should be taken with a pinch of salt, said New Zealand would always be reliant on dairying, with its natural competitive advantage and global demand rising.
'The right answer is not for New Zealand to sell less dairy. The right answer is for New Zealand to be absolutely sure that the safety standards are met,' he said on Tuesday.
More than 60 per cent of New Zealand rivers monitored by the Environment Ministry had 'poor' or 'very poor' water quality
While separate from its environmental credentials, New Zealand's food safety record is also not without stain.
Until the late 2000s, New Zealand had the highest rate in the developed world of food-borne campylobacteriosis, a serious and sometimes deadly disease caused by a bacteria often found in uncooked chicken.
By 2011, even after a major government initiative to control the epidemic, New Zealand still reported incidents of the disease at more than double the rate of nearby Australia and 12 times the rate of the United States, according to the University of Otago.
The botulism scare at Fonterra was the company's second contamination issue this year after it earlier found traces of dicyandiamde, a potentially toxic chemical, in some products.
Even so, New Zealand has one of the most stringent food safety regimes in the world and the recent dairy product scares only turned up with the sophisticated and sensitive testing available.
Fonterra expects the current contamination issue to be resolved within days.
A protracted, major animal health incident, rather than a localised contamination issue, could wreak havoc on the New Zealand economy.
A decade ago, at the height of a foot and mouth epidemic in Europe, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand modelled the impact of a limited outbreak of the livestock disease - estimating an immediate 20 per cent hit to the currency, as well as a 12 per cent fall in exports and an eight per cent hit to GDP in two years.
'We've got to wake up and look more closely at our green credentials, and work harder to create a pristine environment so consumers can get a product which matches the story,' said a consultant to New Zealand companies operating in Asia.
'We can't be complacent.'
ALERT – Highly radioactive water flowing into ocean from Fukushima
Title: Exclusive: Japan nuclear body says radioactive water at Fukushima an ‘emergency’
Source: Reuters
Author: Antoni Slodkowski and Mari Saito; Additional reporting by Kentaro Hamada; Editing by Edmund Klamann and Raju Gopalakrishnan
Date: August 5, 2013
Highly radioactive water [is] seeping into the ocean from Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant [...]
This contaminated groundwater has breached an underground barrier [...] Shinji Kinjo, head of a Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NRA) task force, told Reuters. [...]
“Right now, we have an emergency,” he said.
[...] Tepco deeply apologized to residents in Fukushima prefecture, the surrounding region and the larger public for causing inconveniences, worries and trouble. [...]
[Kinjo] acknowledged that if the water reaches the surface, “it would flow extremely fast.”
Tepco is struggling to contain the highly radioactive water that is seeping into the ocean near Fukushima. The head of Japan's NRA, Shinji Kinjo exclaimed, "right now, we have an emergency," as he noted the contaminated groundwater has breached an underground barrier and is rising toward the surface - exceeding the limits of radioactive discharge. In a rather outspoken comment for the typically stoic Japanese, Kinjo said Tepco's "sense of crisis was weak," adding that "this is why you can't just leave it up to Tepco alone" to grapple with the ongoing disaster. As Reuters notes [5], Tepco has been accused of covering up shortcomings and has been lambasted for its ineptness in the response and while the company says it is taking actions to contain the leaks, Kinjo fears if the water reaches the surface "it would flow extremely fast," with some suggesting as little as three weeks until this critical point.
Japan Finally Admits The Truth: "Right Now, We Have An Emergency At Fukushima"
Exclusive: Japan nuclear body says radioactive water at Fukushima an 'emergency' | Reuters
Japan's nuclear watchdog has said the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is facing a new "emergency" caused by a build-up of radioactive groundwater.
A barrier built to contain the water has already been breached, the Nuclear Regulatory Authority warned.
This means the amount of contaminated water seeping into the Pacific Ocean could accelerate rapidly, it said.
There has been spate of water leaks and power failures at the plant, devastated by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
Its operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), has been criticised heavily for its lack of transparency over the leaks.
Trading Forex becomes complex
During the beginning years of the Forex market, trends developed that lasted months and years. Even recently, trends have developed even though they may have reversed.
But when the Forex markets are subject to one speech by Ben Bernanke, or another Fed chairman, how is a trader to know when that will happen and how the market will react?
We've seen evidence of market manipulation in other markets, most recently Friday's bond market frontrunning. The problem with finding data of such frontrunning in Forex is that since Forex does not trade on a centralized exchange, and the market is so liquid, data about trading activity such as referenced above is not available.
But traders will attest to price moves before data releases, and large Forex traders tipping each other off (currently not illegal). Also there is a growing WM/Reuters scandal showing how Forex traders manipulated the fix rates.
The Euro
Some believe the Euro highly overvalued. Europe has a banking crisis, horrible economic data, and a deteriorating political situation. Yet the Euro continues to maintain levels near 1.32, baffling many traders. Some days, the Euro is even correlated with the S&P 500. But if you look at the daily chart of the EUR/USD it's basically hovering up and down around 1.30:
(click to enlarge)
Trading opportunities, yes. But clear direction?
Quality data that proves how difficult it's becoming to make decent returns by trading Forex are provided by Barclay Hedge Currency CTA index:
(click to enlarge)
In 2013 currency traders returned 1.62% so far for the year. In 2012 they returned 1.71%, not beating inflation. But look back in 1990 they returned 57.74%. Of course the Forex market is a different market today, but that's exactly the point. Every month Forex becomes more erratic, more random (not to be confused with volatility).
Automated Systems
Some automated algorithmic systems, may not have such problems trading, especially high frequency systems that thrive on volume and price movement rather than trends or technical analysis. These systems are now offered to investors via CTA programs, signal services, and other means (they are not only for well funded high profile traders). Automated systems will thrive in the future Forex market, especially those with some intelligence, while traders will be faced with increasing black swan events, such as Fed announcements, political crisis (such as currently in Europe) and others.
Example of Snowden wildcard
While not explicitly a market event, the revelations of Edward Snowden have the potential to significantly impact global markets, including Forex.
In the short term, the London summit mitigated financial contagion emanating from southern Europe; gave the World Bank additional resources to deal with the problem of trade finance for emerging-market exports; appeared to give the IMF more firepower and legitimacy; and seemed to catalyze coordinated fiscal stimulus to restore confidence.But only the more technical of these four achievements - the first two - stood the test of time. Everything else that was agreed at the London summit turned sour. The follow-up summits were lame. The idea of coordinated fiscal stimulus became problematic when it became obvious that many European governments could not take on more debt without unsettling markets and pushing themselves into an unsustainable cycle of increasingly expensive borrowing.
And yet, however limited the London summit's achievements proved to be, the summit process itself was not fully discredited until Snowden's intelligence revelations.
The possible outcome is so uncertain, because there is no telling how leaders will react, but it's certain that the revelations will impact negotiations. In the current environment markets are subject to heavy influence of agreements made by politicians, especially in the EU which is undergoing rapid financial reforms due to the banking crisis. In the most significant recent example, the Troika implemented a bail-in policy in Cyprus which is now being used as a template around the world, even in New Zealand.
How would a Forex trader include the potential political outcomes of such events in any strategy? The answer is that it's impossible, because there are too many variables and none of them are discreet.
Investment recommendations
To put in one sentence, trading Forex via ETFs or invidual currencies in the next few years will be more and more challenging. One exception to prudently invest in Forex ETFs is to hedge currency risk of your portfolio or business.
One alternative would be to find a Forex manager that has a substantial track record, or that uses automated algorithmic trading systems. While algorithmic systems are not risk-free, they will be able to trade the market better than human traders because they usually are analyzing data at a faster rate and look at Forex data simply as numbers, what the market really is. Also they typically trade in smaller time frames and are able to automatically deal with black swan events either by cutting losses or by capturing momentum at any time (whereas a trader may be out of the office or for whatever reason doesn't know how to capture the momentum).
The purpose of this article is to explain the challenges of manually trading individual currencies, not to recommend particular Forex investments. If you are considering investing in currencies, we suggest researching established managers and funds (there are many).