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DEBT' CANCELLATION: IS JUNE 11, 2005 A NEW START FOR AFRICAN COUNTRIES?

Dear reader,

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So, a very good new for debt laden African countries. G-8 (in fact G-7 because Russia had not yet given its approval) finance ministers took the formal decision on June 11, 2005 to wipe out US$ 40 billion of debts owed by 18 of the world's poorest countries.

The happy elected African countries are: Benin, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Madagascar, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Senegal, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. Other beneficiary countries are from Latin America: Bolivia, Guyana, Honduras and Nicaragua.

Even if the decision is for the time being a formal one, (that needs to be endorsed by the forthcoming G-8 heads of states meeting scheduled for July 6-8, 2005 at Gleneagles, UK), it represents a tremendous breakthrough.

New Start For Africa? Would G-8 Quickly Implement Cancellation? No Yes View Result Free Web Polls proextender

Indeed, June 11, 2005 will stands in history as the date when the richest industrial countries of the world "contemplated" the possibility to cancel debts owned by the poorest countries of the world. That is the end of a taboo.

Remember, for three decades running we have been told that such occurrence was not conceivable, because it would create a prejudice against countries that had always practiced good governance and taken relevent economic measures to service debts.

Yet, the formal decision of June 11, 2005. From now on the subject could never be ignored or pushed aside again. For that reason alone, June 11, 2005 represents a new start for African countries.

UK's finance minister, Gordon Brown, the mind master behind the historic decision declared: "The issue was no longer whether rich countries could provide a package big enough to speed up development in the world's biggest continent, but how quickly it could be delivered."

Let us hope that the momentum would not died out in the labyrinth of procedures and political fights between G-8's leaders.

Indeed, as you may know, there is, right now, a political row ragging about 2007-2013's European Union budget. France's Chirac and Germany's Schroeder would like to see the end of the famous rebate obtained in 1984 by UK's Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher that amounts now to about Euro 4.5 billion a year and could reach Euro 7 billion in year 2007. UK's Blair is adamantly refusing to accept a review of the rebate without full debate on EU's budget dedicated to Common Agricultural Policy. No doubt that if the squabble drags on it would have some negative impact on quick implementation of the debt cancellation's decision.

WHAT ABOUT OTHER AFRICAN COUNTRIES?

Further, one notices that only 14 sub-Saharan African countries out of 48 are listed to profit right away from the decision. What about the others, which are as debt stricken as the elected ones? When would their cases being considered?

The left over countries felt the efforts consistently made to servicing debts are not recognized. No doubt that from now on, there will be some kind of ill-will from some countries to comply with the rules and promptly service debts.

Declared Kenyan Planning and National Development Minister Peter Anyang Nyongo:

"Those faithful in servicing their debt like Kenya are being ignored while HIPC (Highly Indebted Poor Countries) who have failed to service the debt are getting more attention. This is not good for Africa." He goes further stating:

"If countries with economic potential like Kenya are forgiven their debt, it will help to pull up the other countries in the region to grow their economies. Concentrating on HIPC countries is not a very progressive thing to do."

JUNE 11, 2005 WOULD BE A FRESH START ONLY IF ADDITIONAL LOAN PACKAGES ARE MADE AVAILABLE TO DEVELOPING

Is that true? Would the economic situation in African countries improve just because all African debtors get debt cancellation?

In previous deliveries the problem had been analyzed to reaching the conclusion that additional loans to developing are an absolute necessity if one is really concerned about alleviating poverty in sub-Saharan African countries.

Let us hope G-8 heads of states meeting at Gleneagles, UK (July 6-8, 2005) would agree to the decision taken by finance ministers on June 11, 2005 and lay down non procedural agenda to first effectively deliver the debt cancellation to the beneficiary countries; and, second, consider the cases of other debt burden African countries.

However, if African countries themselves do not follow-up with developing strategies that really create wealth for all, they will be turning in circle to come back to square one within few years time.

And then, it would be difficult if not impossible to convince the international community to provide again debt relief to Africa. For more on the matter please read previous deliveries.

Business Opportunities

FOWL BREEDING AS BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY - PART X: - THE BREEDING OF RATITES AS ALTERNATIVE TO CLASSIC LIVESTOCK - B- CONTINUATION TO THE INTRODUCTION TO EMU BREEDING

Starting from issue N° 73, another kind of fowl is discussed that is different from the ones considered in previous deliveries. They are called Ratites and have the particularity to run. They are not flying bird. They run and run fast. Ratites are represented by two families: the Ostrich and the Emu that produce flesh similar to four legs' animals.

The emu breeding industry is gathering momentum and is poised to become a substantial domestic and export earner for countries that would enter the fray.

EMU BREEDING'S PARTICULARITIES

Emus are monogamous animals. One male and one female used to pair for life. The female begins to breed between 18 months and three years of age, and may continue to produce eggs for more than 15 years. It is the male who incubates the eggs which hatch in about 50 days. The emu grows to full size within two years standing five to six feet tall and weighing as much as 150 pounds (68.7 kg). With powerful legs similar to the ostrich, it can run up to 40 mph. An emu lives about 30 years.

Currently, emus are mostly bred in monogamous pairs with a ratio of 1 male for 1 female and sometimes 2 females for 1 male - the latest being against the native behaviour of the animals and disturbing during the period of eggs' incubating.

Anyway, either ratio requires the retention of excessive males in the flock. Males that are not productive consume feed and capital resources that could be used to manage more females to producing more eggs and growing chicks.

In addition, at long last, owing to the lifetime of the pairs (30 years), monogamy progressively triggers flock's genetic degeneracy.

Therefore, researchers had explored artificial insemination technology with the aims of improving genetic stocks, boosting productivity and controlling (and lowering) production's costs. For more on the matter click here

Consequently, one could consider two kinds of breeding operations:

1- Natural (mating) breeding operation with a ratio of 1 male to 1 female or 1 male to two females. 2- Artificial insemination breeding operation that permits to considerably lower the ratio of male present in the flock and boost productivity.

In the near future, Africabiz Online forthcoming consecutive deliveries will deal with both kinds of breeding operations in tropical areas' conditions. For more on this issue click here

MORE ON FOWL BREEDING

1- Poultry Breeding and Genetics by R.D. Crawford 2- The Dollar Hen: The Classic Guide to American Free-Range Farming. by Milo M. Hastingd, Robert Plamondon 3- Small-Scale Poultry-Keeping: A Guide To Free-Range Poultry Production. By Ray Feltwell 4- The Encyclopedia of Farm Animal Nutrition by M.F. Fuller, et al 5- The Mating and Breeding of Poultry by Harry M. Lamon, Rob R. Slocum. 6- Modern Livestock and Poultry Production by James R. Gillespie

7- Success With Baby Chicks: A Complete Guide to Hatchery Selection by Robert Plamondon. 8- The Classic Guide To Poultry Nutrition: Chickens, Turkeys, Ducks, Geese, Gamebirds, and Pigeons. By Gustave F. Hauser 9- The Strange History of The Ostrich In Fashion, Food and Fortune. By Rob Nixon 10- Ostrich's Avian Incubation: Behaviour, Environment and Evolution. By D. Charles Deeming

Control Your Desktop

MALWARE, SPYWARE AND TROJAN HORSES COULD BECOME REAL NUISANCE AFTER REMOVAL

In several deliveries:16, 24, 34, 37, 39, 54, 63, the fundamental question of computing's desktop security had been raised to sounding warning against downloading and using freeware that may be packed with spyware, Trojan horses and adware.

Every day the threats' level of worms and malicious spyware's invasion increase. People who thrive in producing these electronic beasts have a prolific imagination and attacks are now conducted by waves to swamp and break down antivirus and spyware fighters' defense.

Therefore, even if you have Sentinels and Gatekeepers installed like the excellent ZoneAlarm from zonelabs.com or AVG Antivirus, you may be infected one day if you are not vigilant; because there is always time discrepancy between the time of an attack and the one when patches are made available by Sentinels and Gatekeepers' producers - sometimes up to 10 hours.

Indeed, right now, E-mails are dispatched by hackers trying to let you believe that your mail account would be suspended, that your account is temporally closed for security reasons or that you have extended the storing size allocated to your account. Etc. Be very careful not to download and open these tricky E-mails. They can create havoc into your system. Take the precaution to install an E-mail filter as ePrompter. It is free and very efficient.

If you let these weird Emails into your mail system and your Sentinels or Gatekeepers are caught out of guard, you are "willingly" installing worms, spyware etc.; allowing people behind the trickery to take control of your computer and do whatever they like with it. Use it as a mail server for instance to dispatch million of spams around the world; or just play with files on the hard disk retrieving sensitive information and data such as credit card numbers. Etc.

If you succeed removing the intruder using popular spyware removal tools, you may find yourself in bigger trouble. Indeed, when "expelled" from your system, the attacker may not leave alone. It can drag out Dynamic Link Library (DLLs) and or remove vital Registry's entries that are necessary for instance to connect to the Net.

Forums abound of such occurrences and people crying for help.

Click the More link below to read about what to do when confronted to the nuisance caused by Spyware, Malware and Trojan Horses after you removed tem from your system.

Freebie Of The Month

UNDERSTAND AND CONTROL WEIRD FILES EXTENSIONS

Have you ever come across weird files extensions? I have encountered few in my computing life. And believe me it is frustrating not to know how to handle the stuff. Since I discovered FILExt, the file extension source, the frustration is over.

FILExt is a detailed database of file extensions and programs that use them. FILExt is not a general support site. A search on the database might result in multiple possibilities; it will be up to you to determine which, if any, of these are the program/format you require information about. That is the reason many of the links on FILExt site will open a new browser window to let you have constant reference to the FILExt data.