Cement Energy and Environment

r implemented all over the country in consultation with the ministry of labour. The ruling marks a shift from the present arrangement where the employees have to contribute 12% of their basic salaries while the employers have to match the contributions. The new order will mean higher retirement corpus for employees though it would result in a cut in their take-home package. But it will also qring additional burden on the companies. The judgement will impact 5.87 cror.e members of the EPFO whose corpus of over Rs3.7 lakh c~ore will also see a huge increase. Courtesy: The Hindustan Times, New Delhi, July 20, 2011 International Country Profile [China] TOP10 LIST OF ANNUAL CEMENT CAPACITY RELEASED A recent report from CEMfocus.com revealed that the top ten cement producers in China comprise 817.4 million tpa (34%) of the total 2405 million tpa cement capacity in 2010. CNBM is the market leader with a capacity of 200 million tpa (8.3%), followed by Anhui Conch with 150 million tpa (6.2%) and Jidong with 89 million tpa (3.7%). Sinoma Cement, Shanshui, Huaxin, CRC, Tianrui, TCC (China and Hongshi make up the rest of the list. The top 11 - 20 companies combined, including BBMG, Jinyu Group, Lafarge, Yatai and Asia Cement, produce -9.5 per cent of China's cement capacity. In total , the top 20 comprise 43.5 per cent of the total capacity. The only foreign producers within the ranking beside Holcim (which has a 39.9 per cent participation in Huaxin) is Taiwan Cement Corporation. Other major foreign cement producers in China include Lafarge, CRH, HeidelbergCement, Asia Cement Corp., Taiheiyo, ltalcementi, Cimpor and Cemex. Courtesy: World Cement, August 2011, P12. [Iceland] FREELANCE CHARTER FOR CONSTITUTIONAL CHANGE Illustration: Chaitanya Chandanlceland is set be the first nation to use social media for bringing constitutional change. On July 29, the Iceland Constitutional Council, a group of 25 citizens, submitted to parliament the world's first crowdsourced constitution. Parliament is expected to ratify the draft without any changes. The council prepared the draft by integrating feedback from hundreds of people online. Since April , Icelanders have been commenting on the council's Facebook page as well as interacting with its members on Twitter, YouTube and Flicker. The draft constitution, which gathered 16,000 comments, was ready within four months and after 16 revisions. Oxford Dictionaries Online defines "crowdsourcing" as the practice whereby an organisation enlists a number of freelancers, paid or unpaid, to work on a task or problem. Courtesy: Down to Earth, August 16-31, 2011, p57 15 FACTS ON SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA 1. Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) comprises the 34 countries lying to the south of the Sahara. 2. Africa is home to the world's longest river, The Nile (6695 km), as well as the world's largest desert, the Sahara (8.6 million km 2 ). 3. The Democratic Republic of Congo is the largest country in SSA. 4. On 9 July 2011, South Sudan became the newest country in the world when it split from Sudan. 5. In June 2011, the Dangote Group was awarded 'Africa Business of the Year' by African Business magazine. 6. Of the 163 countries ranked in the Environment Performance Index, seven of the 10 lowest performing countries are in SSA. The highest-ranking SSA country is Djibouti, at no. 75. (By comparison, the US comes in at no. 61.) 7. At 155 215 573, Nigeria has the eighth largest population in the world and is the most densely populated country in Africa. 8. In Africa, South Africa uses the most electric power per person (4809.0 kW/h); Ethiopia uses the least (38.4 kW/h). 9. South Africa has the highest carbon dioxide emissions in Africa at 414 6419 t, whilst Comoros has the lowest at 88 t. 41