Month: October 2011

Above: Pictures after the earthquake and after six months of clean up efforts.

Japan suffered huge damages to its  infrastructure after the eathquake and tsunami hit back in March. The nuclear crisis has also left the country crippled, and the instability of Japan’s condition has turned away many visitors to the country. However, as Ranbor mentioned here on his blog, tourism is seeing a lift, giving light to Japan’s quick recovery.

Although I concur with Ranbor in that Japan will still face many challenges, I must disagree with his thoughts on the degree of damage inflicted on the economy. True, factors such as an aging workforce and the social welfare system are important issues in Japan, but they are nonetheless already existing issues. I think the earthquake actually helped this ailing economy.

Personally, I think that the disaster in Japan has actually created more jobs; just think, how is Japan going to repair its infrastructure now? Maybe they will take this chance to update their roads and buildings. I think that the earthquake will aid, rather than harm, the Japanese economy in the long run.

3M has recently developed a new film that is able to convert windows into transparent solar panels. The film, which converts only 20% of the electricity that would be generated from a regular solar panel, is relatively easy to install. Although the film is not as efficient, the price is expected to be only about half as much as the traditional solar panels. The product is expected to be on the market as soon as next year.

Nowadays, as people become more and more aware about environmental issues, alternative energy sources, such as solar power, are quickly becoming popular. The newly developed film could prove to be very successful. Not only does it cater towards a growing market, but it is also one of the first power generators that allows for visibility in addition to power.

Despite the fact that it is not as efficient as traditional solar panels, it has all the points of parity an alternate power source has (it generates energy with relatively little emissions). What sets it aside is that fact that the film does not take up space or obstruct visibility, and is also relatively cheap and easy to install.

As food consumption steadily increases around the world, so does world obesity rates. The health risks that obesity poses are what probably caused the Danish government to impose a “fat tax” on food high in saturated fat. Food containing more than 2.3% saturated fat are subject to a large tax at the expense of the Danish people.

Although the Danish government is acting out of goodwill to their people, the heavy tax only caused the Danish to hoard what they can and to possibly turn to alternate suppliers abroad, greatly hurting local businesses.

As with the Russian vodka problem, government intervention is not necessarily the most beneficial solution. By attempting to limit the population’s intake of these goods, they not only damage the local economy, but the people’s favour as well.

The choice to purchase “bad” food or not is entirely up to the consumer. Instead of merely raising prices to discourage people from purchasing items that have already become an essential part of their lifestyles, the Danish government should focus their efforts instead on health awareness campaigns.

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