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  • Federal Government approves Cubbie farm sale to Chinese-led consortium

    Federal Government approves Cubbie farm sale to Chinese-led consortium

    3
    Cubbie Station

    A giant pump on Cubbie station. Picture: David Martinelli Source: The Courier-Mail

    TREASURER Wayne Swan last night approved the sale of Australia’s largest privately owned farm and water user to a Chinese-led consortium.

    The decision to approve the sale of Cubbie farm in Queensland followed a green light from the Foreign Investment Review Board.

    As part of the conditions for approval, Cubbie will be managed and operated by Lempriere. The farm, which went into receivership in 2009 with debts of $300 million, holds around 50 water licences and uses 500,000 megalitres of water a year – more than the capacity of Sydney Harbour.

    Bitter cross-border disputes have marked its history, with NSW farmers in the nation’s food belt arguing they have been deprived of water because of the failure of Cubbie and the Queensland government to release flows from its massive upstream dams.

    Heritage listed wetlands in NSW have also suffered from the refusal of Cubbie to release environmental flows into the Murray Darling system.

    But Mr Swan last night said water management would not be affected by the sale.

    The $320 million cotton station has been under administration for three years, with the government unable to find an Australian buyer.

    A consortium negotiating the sale will be 80 per cent controlled by Chinese textile company Shandong RuYi.

    Cubbie Farm

    <div class=”iframe-alt”>(Frame content direct link: <a href=”http://maps.google.com.au/maps?q=cubbie farm&hl=en&ll=-28.873539,150.644531&spn=4.722998,10.865479&sll=-33.796924,150.922433&sspn=2.095212,2.771301&t=h&hq=cubbie farm&radius=15000&z=7&iwloc=near&output=embed”>http://maps.google.com.au/maps?q=cubbie farm&hl=en&ll=-28.873539,150.644531&spn=4.722998,10.865479&sll=-33.796924,150.922433&sspn=2.095212,2.771301&t=h&hq=cubbie farm&radius=15000&z=7&iwloc=near&output=embed</a>.)</div>

    Australian family-owned wool group Lempriere will hold 20 per cent.

    Mr Swan said the approval was only given on the condition that RuYi sell down its stake to 51 per cent within three years.

    The government also secured “undertakings” from the consortium to offer jobs to all current employees as well as “arms length” management of cotton sales and water extraction and use, which would continue to be subject to government regulation.

    Homestead

    Homestead

    Cubbie Station in far southwestern Queensland. The station’s airstrip, accommodation and utility facilities.Source: Supplied

    “The government welcomes foreign investment in Australia and continues to ensure that investments are consistent with Australia’s national interest,” Mr Swan said.

    Deputy National Party leader Barnaby Joyce demanded Mr Swan reveal the shareholder list of the Chinese company, accusing it of being an arm of the Chinese government: “I absolutely and utterly disagree with this. I’ve got no problem with the Chinese being clever. I’ve got an issue with our government being stupid.

    “What this says is that the Foreign Investment Review Board is in a mess and is simply not interested in protecting the national interest.”

    Dam

    Dam

    Some of the huge dams on Cubbie Station, just west of Dirranbandi. Picture: Lyndon MechielsenSource: News Limited

    However Opposition Leader Tony Abbott appeared to back the sale to the Chinese-led consortium.

    “I can appreciate a lot of people would be dismayed but look the (FIRB) would have carefully looked at it, they would have looked at what investment the Chinese are bringing in, what improvements the Chinese intend to make – are the Chinese going to be an active contributor to the local economy.”

    Irrigation

    Irrigation

    Cubbie Station in far southwestern Queensland. Irrigation channels in a freshly planted crop.Source: Supplied

  • Gunns announces massive $900m loss

    Gunns announces massive $900m loss

    ABCUpdated August 31, 2012, 9:19 pm

    Tasmanian forest products company Gunns has reported a net loss of $904 million for the past financial year.

    This compares to an almost $356 million loss for the previous 12 months.

    The company blamed the costs associated with a major restructure and the state of the export woodchip market, which forced significant write-downs of forestry assets and its pulp mill project.

    Gunns told the stock exchange that underlying earnings for the period were nearly $30 million, down from nearly $42 million in the previous 12 months.

    It listed its net tangible assets at the end of the year at just over $24 million.

    Gunns also warned that earnings were likely to be materially less for the current financial year.

    The company has been in a trading halt for almost six months, which will continue until it can provide more detail about proposed capital raising.

    Matthrew Torenius from Shadforth Financial Group says the company’s earnings have been hit hard by falling demand for its woodchips.

    “What we’ve seen in a deterioration in the woodchip market, both the combination of the high Aussie dollar and also the supply of woodchips coming out of Australia and other countries have meant prices have really dived,” he said.

  • Carbon release from collapsing coastal permafrost in Arctic Siberia

    Carbon release from collapsing coastal permafrost in Arctic Siberia

    Posted: 30 Aug 2012 07:53 AM PDT

    A new study shows that an ancient and large carbon pool held in a less-studied form of permafrost (“Yedoma”) is thaw-released along the approximately 7000-kilometer desolate coast of northernmost Siberian Arctic.

  • Heavy rain causes chaos as summer confirmed as wettest in 100 years

    Heavy rain causes chaos as summer confirmed as wettest in 100 years

    Train derailed and people forced from homes by latest instances of bad weather in extraordinarily damp year

    Cumbria train derailment

    A commuter train on its way to Sellafield nuclear plant was derailed when it hit a landslide caused by torrential rainfall. Photograph: Network Rail/PA

    Forecasters have confirmed what many suspected: summer 2012 in England and Wales has been the biggest washout for a century. The Met Office said it had been the one of the dullest on record, one of the coolest, and the soggiest since 1912.

    As if to illustrate the point, Cumbria was hit by heavy rain and flash flooding on Thursday, , forcing people to leave their homes and causing a train carrying about 100 passengers to derail.

    A landslide is thought to have caused the derailment of the two-carriage train, which was travelling towards Sellafield nuclear plant. No injuries were reported.

    While the month is not quite over, Met Office figures up to 29 August make grim reading. Not only has this summer experienced just 399 hours of sunshine, it has also been cool, with a mean temperature of 14C (57F), some 0.4C below the long term average.

    The Met Office does not expect summer rainfall (currently at 366.8mm) to exceed the 384.4mm seen in the summer of 1912, and Scotland has escaped relatively lightly with 357mm.

    This will come as cold comfort to millions of Britons who have endured the damp weather. It is shaping up to be the fourth wettest summer since records began in 1727.

    Torrential rain on Wednesday night forced people in Cumbria from their homes and about 20 elderly men and women were moved to an emergency shelter at Egremont market hall after a power cut.

    Egremont and the Calder valley were the worst affected parts of west Cumbria, with 15mm of rain recorded in just 15 minutes at Calder Hall, and a total of 52mm recorded between 10pm and 4am on Thursday.

    Passengers on the derailed train were on their way to work at Sellafield when it ran into the landslip at 6.45am. Despite the large amount of mud and debris on the tracks, the train stayed upright.

    Alan Isles was on board. He described how fellow travellers screamed out as the train hit the landslide, sending debris flying over the carriages.

    Isles, from Workington, said: “As we were coming round a corner, there was no deceleration at all and we suddenly felt a large impact. A lot of people screamed out as the train derailed and many were disorientated. We were worried about rolling over, but luckily we didn’t. The staff were great and took control straight away.”

    A second train sent to the scene to transport the stranded passengers to Sellafield also encountered a landslide and had to return to Nethertown. Passengers were escorted to the nearest road for their onward journey.

    Network Rail said the derailment, about a mile south of St Bees station, happened in a remote area with no easy road access. Engineers spent the day removing rubble and carrying out repairs. There will be an investigation by the Rail Accident Investigation Branch.

    Following the severe weather, Cumbria fire service said it received more than 100 calls for help, mainly involving requests for sandbags. A spokesman said: “Some people have had to be evacuated and many have made their own way out of their flooded houses.”

    Cumbria police said drains were unable to cope after the river Ehen and several becks in the Egremont area burst their banks.

    Emma Jane Taylor said floodwater began entering her St Bees home shortly before midnight on Wednesday. “We’ve had heavy rain here before, but it’s never been this bad. I alerted some neighbours, but within 30 minutes it was through my front door and coming up through my floorboards. At the moment you can paddle across my floor.”

    Earlier this week the rear of a four-storey house in Egremont collapsed into the river Ehen after heavy rain.

    Forecasters say Friday will bring largely dry and fine weather for England and Wales, turning cloudier in the north and west later.

  • US report on reasons for no longer supporting Israel

    US report on reasons for no longer supporting Israel

    • Israel, given its current brutal occupation and belligerence cannot be salvaged any more than apartheid south Africa could be when as late as 1987 Israel was the only “Western” nation that upheld diplomatic ties with South Africa and was the last country to join the international boycott campaign before the regime collapsed;

    • The Israel leadership, with its increasing support of the 700,000 illegal settlers on the occupied West Bank is increasing out of touch with the political, military and economic realities of the Middle East;

    • The post Labor government Likud coalition is deeply complicit with and influenced by the settlers’ political and financial power and will increasingly face domestic civil strife which the US government should not associate itself with or become involved with;

    • The Arab Spring and Islamic Awakening has, to a major degree, freed a large majority of the 1.2 billion Arab and Muslims to pursue what an overwhelming majority believe is the illegitimate, immoral and unsustainable European occupation of Palestine of the indigenous population;

    • Simultaneous with, but predating, rapidly expanding Arab and Muslim power in the region as evidenced by the Arab spring, Islamic Awakening and the ascendancy of Iran, as American power and influence recedes, the US commitment to belligerent oppressive Israel is becoming impossible to defend or execute consistent given paramount US national interests which include normalizing relations with the 57 Islamic countries;

    • Gross Israeli interference in the internal affairs of the United States through spying and illegal US arms transfers. This includes supporting more than 60 ‘front organizations’ and approximately 7,500 US officials who do Israel’s bidding and seek to dominate and intimidate the media and agencies of the US government which should no longer be condoned;

    • That the United States government no longer has the financial resources, or public support to continue funding Israel. The more than three trillion dollars in direct and indirect aid from US taxpayers to Israel since 1967 is not affordable and is increasingly being objected to by US taxpayers who oppose continuing American military involvement in the Middle East. US public opinion no longer supports funding and executing widely perceived illegal US wars on Israel’s behalf. This view is increasingly being shared by Europe, Asia and the International public;

    • Israel’s segregationist occupation infrastructure evidenced by legalized discrimination and increasingly separate and unequal justice systems must no longer be directly or indirectly funded by the US taxpayers or ignored by the US government;

    • Israel has failed as a claimed democratic state and continued American financial and political cover will not change its continuing devolution as international pariah state;

    • Increasingly, rampant and violent racism exhibited among Jewish settlers in the West Bank is being condoned by the Israeli government to a degree that the Israel government has become its protector and partner;

    • The expanding chasm among American Jews objecting to Zionism and Israeli practices, including the killing and brutalizing of Palestinians under Israeli occupation, are gross violations of American and International law and raise questions within the US Jewish community regarding the American responsibility to protect (R2P) innocent civilians under occupation;

    • The international opposition to the increasingly apartheid regime can no longer be synchronized with American claimed humanitarian values or US expectations in its bi-lateral relations with the 193 member United Nations.

    For full report and astonishing list of authors.

    • Israel, given its current brutal occupation and belligerence cannot be salvaged any more than apartheid south Africa could be when as late as 1987 Israel was the only “Western” nation that upheld diplomatic ties with South Africa and was the last country to join the international boycott campaign before the regime collapsed;

    • The Israel leadership, with its increasing support of the 700,000 illegal settlers on the occupied West Bank is increasing out of touch with the political, military and economic realities of the Middle East;

    • The post Labor government Likud coalition is deeply complicit with and influenced by the settlers’ political and financial power and will increasingly face domestic civil strife which the US government should not associate itself with or become involved with;

    • The Arab Spring and Islamic Awakening has, to a major degree, freed a large majority of the 1.2 billion Arab and Muslims to pursue what an overwhelming majority believe is the illegitimate, immoral and unsustainable European occupation of Palestine of the indigenous population;

    • Simultaneous with, but predating, rapidly expanding Arab and Muslim power in the region as evidenced by the Arab spring, Islamic Awakening and the ascendancy of Iran, as American power and influence recedes, the US commitment to belligerent oppressive Israel is becoming impossible to defend or execute consistent given paramount US national interests which include normalizing relations with the 57 Islamic countries;

    • Gross Israeli interference in the internal affairs of the United States through spying and illegal US arms transfers. This includes supporting more than 60 ‘front organizations’ and approximately 7,500 US officials who do Israel’s bidding and seek to dominate and intimidate the media and agencies of the US government which should no longer be condoned;

    • That the United States government no longer has the financial resources, or public support to continue funding Israel. The more than three trillion dollars in direct and indirect aid from US taxpayers to Israel since 1967 is not affordable and is increasingly being objected to by US taxpayers who oppose continuing American military involvement in the Middle East. US public opinion no longer supports funding and executing widely perceived illegal US wars on Israel’s behalf. This view is increasingly being shared by Europe, Asia and the International public;

    • Israel’s segregationist occupation infrastructure evidenced by legalized discrimination and increasingly separate and unequal justice systems must no longer be directly or indirectly funded by the US taxpayers or ignored by the US government;

    • Israel has failed as a claimed democratic state and continued American financial and political cover will not change its continuing devolution as international pariah state;

    • Increasingly, rampant and violent racism exhibited among Jewish settlers in the West Bank is being condoned by the Israeli government to a degree that the Israel government has become its protector and partner;

    • The expanding chasm among American Jews objecting to Zionism and Israeli practices, including the killing and brutalizing of Palestinians under Israeli occupation, are gross violations of American and International law and raise questions within the US Jewish community regarding the American responsibility to protect (R2P) innocent civilians under occupation;

    • The international opposition to the increasingly apartheid regime can no longer be synchronized with American claimed humanitarian values or US expectations in its bi-lateral relations with the 193 member United Nations.

    For full report and astonishing list of authors.

  • ‘Weird chemistry’ by microbe is prime source of ocean methane

    ‘Weird chemistry’ by microbe is prime source of ocean methane

    Posted: 30 Aug 2012 11:13 AM PDT

    Up to four percent of the methane on Earth comes from the ocean’s oxygen-rich waters, but scientists have been unable to identify the source of this potent greenhouse gas. Now researchers report that they have found the culprit: A bit of “weird chemistry” practiced by the most abundant microbes on the planet.