110218 jenta

One Earth Caf

SYDNEY, Feb 11 AAPAustralia will encourage Japan to scrap its agricultural import tariffs, but will not insist on it during free-trade negotiations, Trade Minister Craig Emerson says.

Both countries have declined to provide details of high-level talks between Mr Emerson and Japan's Trade Minister, Banri Kaieda, in Sydney on Friday.

Japan is keen to safeguard its heavily subsidised farm sector, which it protects with tariffs of 800 per cent on imported rice and up to 250 per cent on wheat imports.

In early January, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said he wanted 2011 to be the year Japan began "opening up the country" to the rest of the world.

But trade negotiations between Australia and Japan have dragged on since their first round in Canberra in 2007.

On Thursday, diplomats from both sides met in Tokyo for the 12th round of meetings in what could potentially be one of Australia's most lucrative free-trade agreements.

"Our side has reported to me some very e n c o u r a g i n g development s i n t e r m s

of engagement from the Japanese side,"

Mr Emerson told reporters at a joint press conference with Mr Kaieda in Sydney on Friday.

"It's a continuat ion of the newfound momentum in the negotiations."

Mr Kaieda was hopeful about striking an agreement, but neither minister would say when that might happen.

"Of course, there are still challenges that need to be overcome," Mr Kaieda told reports.

Mr Emerson stipulated that he welcomed changes to Japan's import tariff system, but said it was not a sticking point in trade negotiations.

"We are seeking only to encourage the reform process," he said.

"But I have long taken the approach that reforms that are worth pursuing in a country should be pursued in their own right.

"If that, in time, allows more Australian agricultural producers an opportunity to compete, then that is a good thing."

The next round of formal talks will be held in Canberra in April.

Japan is Australia's second-largest export market and its third-largest source of foreign investment.

CANBERRA, Feb 9 AAPAustralia's national broadband network (NBN) will cost 24 times as much as South Korea's to deliver just one-tenth the speed, a report by London-based researchers says.

The coalition has seized on the findings to accuse the federal government of being fiscally blind.

L ab or, howeve r, h a s que s t ione d t he methodology of the report.

The Economist Intelligence Unit has stirred debate by comparing Australia and South Korea's technological ambitions.

Australia's plan to deliver broadband speeds of up to 100 megabits per second to households will cost 24 times as much to deliver only one-tenth the speed, it says.

The repor t notes how Asia's developed economies want broadband speeds of 1000 megabits, or one gigabit, a second.

But it fails to mention how Australia's NBN Co, the firm building the network, is also aiming for that speed in the longer term.

Comparing the two nations, it notes how Australia is spending 7.6 per cent of annual government revenue on the NBN, versus one per cent in South Korea.

The opposition's broadband spokesman Malcolm Turnbull said the report showed how the government had developed a complete blind spot to fiscal responsibility.

"There's no country in the world that is spending as much on broadband as Australia, no

government," he told parliament.Mr Turnbull calculated that Australia was

spending 100 times as much on broadband as the US was with its wireless equivalent.

"Whether it's 65 times or 100 times, the difference is gigantic and right around the world this project is being criticised as fiscally irresponsible," he said.

Broadband Minister Stephen Conroy said comparing sparsely populated Australia with South Korea was flawed.

"Invest ment in Aust ral ia's road , ra i l , telecommunications and utility infrastructure faces vastly different factors than countries such as South Korea," his spokeswoman said.

"We know that with Australia's population density, there aren't the incentives for the private sector to provide the universal high quality broadband infrastructure that all Australians need."

Still, the government continues to face pressure even from political supporters of the broadband network.

The Australian Greens want NBN Co to be subject to freedom of information requests, with the party's sole lower house MP Adam Bandt promising to

put an amendment to parliament this week.Labor previously has argued the company

needs to protect its commercial interests but the government is unlikely to get much sympathy from the coalition, which has vowed to back the Greens on transparency measures.

CANBERRA, Feb 8 AAPStrong demand for Australia's coal and iron ore from Asian heavyweights China and India is expected to continue for at least the next 15 years.

But this doesn't mean the mining sector is going to corner the labour market in the coming decades, a Treasury official says.

Trea su r y 's execu t ive d i r ec to r of i t s macroeconomic group, David Gruen, says that even though China and India have been growing rapidly for the past few decades, they remain at the early stages of the economic development.

"Their standards of living relative to that of the developed world are currently lower than was Japan's standard of living in the early 1950s relative to the developed world's standard of living at that time," Dr Gruen said in a speech on Monday.

In his address to the Scenario Development Forum for Skills Australia and the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, released by

Treasury on Tuesday, Dr Gruen said it seems most likely that Australia's terms of trade will be significantly higher on average over the next couple of decades than before the current mining boom.

"Australia is currently experiencing the largest sustained boost to the terms of trade in our history," Dr Gruen said.

This is having a profound impact on the Australian dollar, which is currently 35 per cent above its average over the 27 years since it was floated in December 1983.

High resource prices, combined with a high exchange rate, are driving demand for both labour and capital out of non-resource parts of the economy and into mining and construction.

But he said while this is a relatively recent phenomenon dating from the beginning of the mining boom - around 2003/04 - the decline in manufacturing employment is a continuation of a trend that has been evident for several decades.

At the same time, it is the services sector

that has accounted most for a rising share of employment, not the mining industry, and makes up over three-quarters of jobs in the economy.

"Even if the terms of trade remain high, it

seems likely that growth in the number of people employed in the service sectors will continue to outstrip growth in the number employed in mining and construction," Dr Gruen said.

3 Friday, 18 February 2011

SYDNEY, Feb 8 AAP Recent f loods in Queensland and northern NSW will have helped pesky cane toads hitch rides on waterways into new areas of inland Australia, an expert says.

Rick Shine, Professor of Evolut ionar y Biology at Sydney University, said although some of the warty pests will have drowned, others will have made the best of the situation.

"The toads will be carried down by the floodwaters, of course, into arid areas... the toads will happily catch a ride," Prof Shine told

AAP on Tuesday."They are fantastic stowaways. I'm sure that

there'll be cane toads turning up in bits of Australia (where) they haven't been present before.

"There's no way that they're going to survive there long-term but they may survive long enough to do some damage."

Since being introduced to Queensland in the 1930s to control beetles attacking crops of sugar cane, cane toads have spread across Queensland and into the Northern Territory.

In recent years they've been spotted in parts

SYDNEY, Feb 6 AAPExposure to common household mothballs can be lethal for children who have a not-so-rare genetic condition, experts have warned in a call for a nationwide ban.

These babies can experience a massive breakdown of their red blood cells within hours of coming into contact with clothes or a blanket stored in mothballs, they warned.

It is the chemical naphthalene which gives mothballs their distinctive smell and it is known to pose a serious health threat to children with a glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficiency.

This is thought to be about one in every 20 Australian children of Asian, African, Middle

Eastern or Mediterranean descent."Affected babies can develop massive

haemolysis within hours of exposure to clothes stored with mothballs containing naphthalene," said Professor William Tarnow-Mordi, Director of the WINNER Centre for Newborn Research at the University of Sydney and Westmead Hospital.

"It has long been known that this results in severe jaundice which may lead to ... profound brain damage, for which the cost is either a lifetime of dependency and very expensive care, or death."

Prof Tarnow-Mordi said while research was underway to determine the exact figures, there were at least three cases in the past

of Western Australia and NSW, including a satell ite population in Sydney's south at Taren Point.

Prof Shine said the species had evolved, with the toads on the frontline becoming more "athletic".

"If you radio track toads around Townsville, they move a bit less than 10m a day, if you do it up around Darwin, they move an average of 100m a day but often a kilometre or even two," he said.

"You've got a very, very rapid evolution of a toad that stays on the roads rather than going into the bush because you can go quicker that way.

"(It) runs in straight lines, runs every night the conditions are good, they've really evolved into a remarkable dispersal machine.

"Any gene that's arisen that says `go round

in circles' has stayed in Queensland."Despite this, it's unlikely they will spread

into southern Australia because of the cooler climate, Prof Shine said.

And the native species under threat from cane toads, including snakes, quolls and freshwater crocodiles, have also evolved - learning to avoid them and becoming resistant to their poisons.

Prof Shine said there was a high mortality rate among these native species when cane toads first moved into an area but they soon evolve and repopulate to coexist with the pests.

With the ability to lay 30,000 eggs in one night, eradicating the cane toad is difficult, but Prof Shine said his team is f inding vulnerabilities in the toads' biology.

three years of babies with G6PD deficiency suffering brain damaging.

One had a known link to naphthalene, and there was also one death.

He said there was unanimous agreement among neonatal clinicians at an expert gathering late last year that warnings carried on mothball packets offered "insufficient protection".

T h e V i c t o r i a n a n d N S W p o i s o n s information centres each receive around one report per week of a child exposed to naphthalene in mothballs.

Joined by fellow medical experts in a letter published in the Medical Journal of Australia, Prof Tarnow-Mordi said Australia should ultimately follow the lead of the European Union which banned the supply of al l naphthalene products in 2008.

There were "less tox ic" products -

camphor, sandalwood or lavender - available for warding off moths and so the "risk-benef it ratio for naphthalene provides st rong just i f icat ion for its withdrawal", he said.

"We are working with the Aust ralian Pest icides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) and Office of Chemical Safety and Environmental Health ... who are reviewing whether similar action should be taken in Australia," Prof Tarnow-Mordi said.

"While acknowledging the importance of raising awareness of the dangers of naphthalene, we believe that the safest course is prevention - that is, an Australia-wide ban on mothballs containing naphthalene."

Prof Tarnow-Mordi said any cases of ch i ld ren , or adu lt s , eve r h a r me d by exposure to naphthalene should be emailed to [email protected] or call 02 6210 4701.

Friday, 18 February 2011 4

Armageddon Expo 20122627SF WEB

9:00 18:00The Dome Sydney Olympic Park 1 $21.50 $11.502 $38.50 [email protected]


Japanese Tour GuideAyers Rock

Be an expert on the outback & our culture! Guide Japanese guest through Kings Cannon, Valley of the Winds, Uluru & be instrumental in creating the experience AAT Kings is celebrated for. Applicants must have a high level of fluency in Japanese & English, excellent communication skills & an appreciation of the Japanese culture

For more information & to apply, visit: http://recruitment.travelcorporation.com.au


12Friday, 18 February 2011

14Friday, 18 February 2011

?


336330

?

WEDNESDAY

?

THURSDAY

25 The Clinic


*Payee: J-Forum Pty Ltd

?

WEDNESDAY

?

THURSDAY

00 I Shouldn't Be Alive


201134()/4th March 2011 issue Dead Line: 224 / 24th February 20112011311()/11th March 2011 issue Dead Line: 33 / 3rd February 2011 ( ) Other issue ( ) How many weeks

2011 2 18 No.356

Thursday noon for the next week's issue

*Cash can be accepted at our office*Payee: J-Forum Pty Ltd

Office1 27-35 Grosvenor St, Neutral Bay NSW 2089 Australia

TEL: (02) 9909 0111 FAX: (02) 9909 0888

[email protected]. BOX : 300 Neutral Bay Junction

NSW 2089 AustraliaFAX:9909-0888

Cheque

+5% if Credit card +5%

10(Up to 10 lines)

5 with frame $5 5 Bold $5

JENTA HP (www.info-m-jenta.com/hp/) All classified Ads on the Newspaper will be uploaded on the Jenta Website.

J-FORUM GROUPJ-Forum Pty Ltd / Info-M Pty Ltd

E-MAIL: [email protected]

Printed bympd-printing the news everydayUnit E1 46-62 Maddox Street, Alexandria

Publisher


***********************

JA NEWSPublished by GoForward Australia-Japan Pty Ltd

Suite 26 / 123 Colin St West Perth WA 6005 Australia

Tel: (08) 9481 0821Fax:(08) 9481 5841

[email protected]

***********************

Dengon Net ( )JA NEWS

Weekly JENTA !

Weekly JENTA 1

( 1GST )25 $50 / 50 $100

1 $2.00

Weekly JENTA (Info-M Pty Ltd)Te l : 0 2 9 9 0 9 0 111i n f o @ w j e n t a . c o m


VIDEO JAPAN [email protected] INFO-M Pty Ltd P.O.BOX 300 Neutral Bay Jnc NSW 2089


110218 jenta

Documents