Preview of Cat2222's blog at TravelPod. Read the full blog here: www.travelpod.com This blog preview was made by TravelPod using the TripAdvisor™ TripWow slideshow creator. Entry from: Shigatse, China Entry Title: "The Friendship Highway" Entry: "Sunday 18th July At 5.30am we packed our tent away and were confronted by some very grumpy people who'd slept (or not, as the case appeared to be) on the truck. We left camp at 6am, had breakfast on the go and drove back the way we came along the bone-shaking road, then headed along the 'Friendship Highway' towards Shigatse. The scenery along the journey was all pretty stunning with green agricultural areas on the plateaus, the occasional snowy peak and the brown/orange/yellow/green/purple Himalayan mountains all around. Not much else to report really, I think I've turned into a bit of a rock geek as on the trek I was attracted by some sparkly gold and silver rocks and on this journey there were some purple rocks in the mountains which I found quite nice too!! I think Adam may have also turned Pimba into a rock freak -- I looked into the cab to see him playing air guitar and drumming the dashboard, it was hilarious!! I don't think he's ever heard rock music before so Adam put a bit of Van Halen on for him!! It's interesting to see the differences in the countries as you go through them -- India was generally grubby with lots of rubbish everywhere, Nepal was a lot cleaner in comparison and Tibet on first impression appears to be ...
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Monday, December 12, 2011
Authors@Google: Peter Nowak
Peter Nowak visits Google's Waterloo office to present his book "Sex, Bombs & Burgers". This event took place on March 11, 2010, as part of the Authors@Google series. The talk will focus on the main theme of the book, which is how the military, porn and food industries have been the biggest drivers of technology over the past century. The links between these three are not immediately clear, but they are all rooted in humanity's basest instincts. In essence, my book is about how the worst parts of human vice have resulted in some truly incredible achievements. Peter Nowak is the senior science and technology reporter for CBC News Online. He has been writing about technology for more than a decade and his work has appeared in many top newspapers in Canada and around the world, including The National Post, The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, The Boston Globe, The South China Morning Post, The Sydney Morning Herald and The New Zealand Herald. He won the 2009 Canadian Advanced Technology Alliance award for excellence in reporting, and was named the 2006 journalist of the year by the Telecommunications Users Association of New Zealand. Peter Nowak lives in Toronto.
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Wholesale Distributors Finding a New Retail Market on the Internet
Companies that traditionally wholesale their goods to commercial markets are finding a niche in retail sales, selling their wares to individuals over the Internet. Sales of goods ranging from designer jewelry to gourmet coffees are perfect for the Internet. Items that might not be able to support a brick and mortar store, with its need for regular hours, an ever-present sales staff, and lots of inventory, can easily be operated as a sideline by a wholesaler. Software that creates a retail website with online credit and debit card capability is easily accessible and not that expensive; predesigned templates make it easy to give the website a unique and professional look.
One jewelry wholesaler lives in rural New Hampshire and wholesales her jewelry to customers all over the Eastern Seaboard. She recently decided to start a website retailing selected pieces of her jewelry to individual customers via the Internet, and is pleased with the results. "I find that I am enjoying the creative process," she said. "It's fun to see what pieces will really sell and what won't. And I'm finding that items that sell well on the Internet are often successful if I feature them to my wholesale customers."
Green Mountain Coffee Roasters in Vermont is primarily a wholesaler distributing gourmet coffees to supermarkets and convenience stores in the region. Their convenience store clients make up urns of several of their blends for sale by the cup to their own customers; the supermarkets offer the beans and ground coffees as well. Their unique blends and the availability of some organically grown coffees make them a popular product over a wide range of retail markets.
And they have their own presence on the Internet. Individuals can buy any of their blends by the bag, or in prepackaged K-cup portions that promise a perfectly brewed cup of coffee. Also available, and especially popular for birthday, anniversary, or holiday gifts, are an elegant selection of samplers, gift baskets, and fine coffeemaking accessories.
The Internet has opened up a whole new set of options for wholesalers and let them into a consumer market that they might not have considered otherwise. For many wholesalers, the Internet has literally allowed regional companies to go global.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Arirang TV: Korean Coffee
Our third segment with Arirang TV. This one's on Korean Coffee. For more, go to www.eatyourkimchi.com --The Gear-- Shot on a Canon 550d and Tokina 11-16mm lens and Canon 50mm lens. Edited in Final Cut Pro. Music made in Garageband. I don't know what camera Arirang TV was using, but it's big. --Translated by-- [닉쑤] Enjoy Your Happy Life~*: nixmin82.tistory.com
Friday, November 11, 2011
What is Sustainable Coffee and How Does it Affect My Wake Cup?
Gourmet coffee lovers have been seeing a few new terms in the
local premium coffee shop as they file past the seasonal retail
displays of roasted whole bean bagged coffees. Phrases include
eco-friendly, organic, shade grown, fair trade and certified
sustainable. Most often those beans seem to the casual buyer to
be simply more expensive than the corporate mega-brands.
But these few phrases represent far more than at first glance,
including economic and social gains for the growing regions and
farmers, harvesters and processors of green coffee beans at the
local level. Sustainable coffee means premium prices and quality
coffee due to organic farming practices, fair market payment for
beans to local growers and quality controls being adopted by the
"certified" coffee brands.
Those premium coffee prices reflect growing concerns worldwide
of paying fair wages to growers, using more expensive
ecologically friendly organic farming practices, better pay for
traditionally underpaid harvesters and processing workers and
strict quality controls being adopted for "certified sustainable
coffees."
Daniele Giovannucci consults with governments, international
agencies, and businesses on coffee markets and production
strategies to improve competitiveness and support innovative
environmental and rural poverty reduction work. Giovannucci has
authored exhaustive studies, including the 2003, "The State of
Sustainable Coffee Report - A Study of Twelve Major Markets."
http://www.cec.org/files/PDF/ECONOMY/CoffeeSurvey_EN.pdf
This study discusses coffee market forces in Europe and Japan
and the growth of sustainable coffee around the world,
estimating that fair trade, organic, and eco-friendly coffees
represent less than 2 percent of coffee consumption in developed
markets.
Another Giovannucci authored study, "Sustainable Coffee Survey
of the North American Specialty Coffee Industry," he estimates
the Global market for sustainable coffee to be approximately
5 million retail for over a million 60 kilo (about 132
pounds) bags of green coffee beans.
http://www.eftafairtrade.org/Document.asp?DocID=391&tod=21534
It is estimated that growers of certified sustainable coffees
can nearly double their income from otherwise depressed coffee
prices. So economically challenged third world countries see
small farmers adopting organic growing techniques as a ticket
out of poverty and subsistence. Corporate buyers are attracted
to sustainable growers by consumer goodwill and health concerns
related to those organically grown coffees. This leads to
dubious claims by some of the corporate coffee representatives
and has lead to the need for certification authorities.
One group, Fairtrade Labeling Organizations International (FLO)
has been active in monitoring and certifying, auditing and
verifying standards for sustainable coffees. Another, named
Transfair USA, carries on similar activities in the American
coffee market. Consumers are justifiably confused when many
terms are applied to sustainable coffees and fail to
differentiate between organic, eco-friendly, fair trade and
sustainable terms.
Premium prices are sometimes supported by certification,
labeling and monitoring by third-party organizations and
sometimes by local governments such as the "Jamaica Coffee
Industry Board." But some labeling is simply slick sales and PR
by greedy corporations seeking premium prices for average coffee
beans, so support for labeling initiatives and independent
certification is growing.
Fair Trade and sustainable coffees are seeing increasing
production in Central and South American growing regions, most
notably in Mexico and Peru. Columbia has seen some pressure and
attempts to divert production of cocaine with coffee crops for
the fair trade market with little major success to report so
far. Uganda, Tanzania and Ethiopia are big participants in
sustainable coffees in Africa while East Timor, India and
Indonesia are major supporters of sustainable coffee in Asia.
With the North American coffee market dominated by multinational
giants Sara Lee, Kraft and Procter & Gamble, little interest has
been shown in adopting sustainable coffee by major corporate
coffee producers. Meanwhile, Brazil and Vietnam, the world's No.
1 and No. 2 coffee producers, respectively are flooding the
market with poor quality beans and driving down coffee prices.
But major grocery chains are seeing demand for sustainable
coffee and may adopt fair trade and organic coffees to sell
nationwide at Safeway, Kroger and Albertson's stores. Increases
in availability, demand and awareness of sustainable coffee are
leading to more of the same in a spiraling increase for fair
trade organic and shade coffees in premium markets. Some
sustainable coffees are even finding their way into instant
coffees, but the vast majority of the sustainable market is in
premium and specialty markets.
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