■ ENERGY
Jamaica sells sugar firm
Jamaica’s agricultural minister said a Brazilian renewable energy company expects to buy the struggling Sugar Co of Jamaica to boost its ethanol production. Minister Christopher Tufton said Infinity Bio-Energy will take over in September. Jamaica will retain a 25 percent share in the company for three years. Officials did not cite a sale amount. Jamaican Prime Minister Bruce Golding said on Friday that the company’s six factories have lost a total of US$283 million since Jamaica bought them in 1998. Almost 13,000 workers will be let go. It is the second major investment that Infinity Bio-Energy has made in the Caribbean. It agreed last year to spend more than US$200 million to produce ethanol by next year with Dominican Republic’s Bioetanol Boca Chica SA.
■ POWER
SIEPAC nears completion
Central America plans to complete by early 2010 an electric transmission line spanning from Guatemala to Panama that would also connect into Mexico and Colombia, project director Teofilo de la Torre said. “Today we are in the final stretch to complete this beautiful project,” he said on Saturday in Villahermosa, Mexico, at a summit of regional leaders. The system will help lower energy costs for the region, he said. The Electrica de los Paises America Central project, known as SIEPAC, has been in the works for more than a decade. The electric lines will be 1,800km long and require an investment of US$400 million. Mexico will connect to the grid through Guatemala, while Colombia will be connected through Panama, de la Torre said.
■ BANKING
US$35m raised for housing
Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank PJSC and Finance House PJSC helped Sawaeed Investment LLC and Mountain Gate Property Investment LLC raise 127.8 million dirhams (US$35 million) to build a residential camp for workers. The eight-and-a-half-year project financing uses a combination of Islamic and conventional debt and equity transactions, Finance House said in a statement posted on Dubai-based business Web site Ame Info on Friday, without being more specific. The borrowers’ camp at Mafraq in the United Arab Emirates is expected to provide homes for about 7,000 workers when completed next March, the statement said.
■ EMPLOYMENT
Women 'dislike' tech fields
Women continue to lack enthusiasm for technical fields, whether in academia or the workforce, a new German study showed. The survey by Bitkom, an industrial association, said that half of new university students last fall were female. But women only make up 16 percent of students in fields such as computer science, engineering and electrical engineering. A higher percentage of female students enrolled in civil engineering — 25 percent. Additionally, mathematics courses enjoyed nearly 50 percent female enrollment. The number of women seeking apprenticeships in technological fields actually declined, from 14 percent in 2002 to 9.1 percent last year.
■ MERGERS
Indian companies merge
Subhiksha Trading Services, a food and grocery discount chain, said it bought a majority stake in Blue Green Constructions and Investment. The boards of the two companies planned to meet today to complete the merger, Subhiksha said in a statement. The merged company will be called Subhiksha Ltd and be listed on the Bombay Stock Exchange and National Stock Exchange.
As eight basketball-playing international students appealed to the Taiwanese basketball industry after they were excluded from the draft of an upcoming new league merging the P.League+ and the T1 League, the new league’s preparatory committee spokesperson Chang Shu-jen (張樹人) yesterday said the committee would tomorrow discuss the supplementary measures and whether the international students can join the draft. The students on Tuesday called for support on their right to play in the upcoming new league, after a merger involving the two leagues impacted their eligibility for the draft. The international players from the University Basketball Association (UBA), led by first pick prospect
Some foreign companies are considering moving Taiwanese employees out of China after Beijing said it could impose the death penalty on “die-hard” Taiwanese independence advocates, four people familiar with the matter said. The new guidelines have caused some Taiwanese expatriates and foreign multinationals operating in China to scramble to assess their legal risks and exposure, said the people, who include a lawyer and two executives with direct knowledge of the discussions. “Several companies have come to us to assess the risks to their personnel,” said the lawyer, James Zimmerman, a Beijing-based partner at the Perkins Coie law firm. He declined to identify
WARNING: China has stepped up harassment of foreign vessels after its new regulation took effect last month, an official said, citing an incident in the Diaoyutai Islands The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday linked China’s seizure of a Taiwanese fishing vessel illegally operating in its territorial waters to Beijing’s new regulation authorizing the China Coast Guard to seize boats in waters it claims. Chinese officials boarded and then seized a Taiwanese fishing vessel operating near China’s coast close to Kinmen County late on Tuesday and took it to a Chinese port, the CGA said. The Penghu-registered squid fishing vessel Da Jin Man No. 88 (大進滿88) was boarded and seized by China Coast Guard east-northeast of Liaoluo Bay (料羅灣), 17.5 nautical miles (32.4km) from Taiwan’s restricted waters off Kinmen,
NOT ENOUGH: Although the US is to deliver Switchblade 300s and Altius 600M-Vs to Taiwan, military leaders believe the nation needs more attack drones, a source said The Ministry of National Defense (MND) has included the funding needed to mass-produce Type-1 and Type-2 suicide drones in next year’s budget plan, a military source said yesterday. Although the US government last month approved sales of Switchblade 300 loitering munitions and Altius 600M-V uncrewed aerial vehicles to Taiwan, which are scheduled for delivery between this year and the next, military leaders assessed that Taiwan would still have an inadequate number of attack drones to bolster national defense, the source said, asking to remain anonymous. Taiwan needs to mass produce locally made attack drones, including Type-1 and Type-2 suicide drones, they