What exactly is happening to this world??

While reading the article "Why food prices could tumble soon" in the Economic Times today I found some very interesting facts. They are:

• In Trading Places, a great American comedy, where Murphy makes a fortune in concentrated orange juice futures, gave birth to the famous "Eddie Murphy Rule". It reveals the secret of trading.
• Though Egypt is a small oil producer, it is an important gateway for oil (through Suez Canal and the 200-mile long Sumed pipeline, which connects Red Sea and the Mediterranean). The Protests in Egypt could affect and thus divert tankers around the southern tip of Africa, adding 6,000 miles to transit and thus shoot the oil price.
• Argentina is experiencing dry conditions due to La Niña, a coupled ocean-atmosphere phenomenon that is the counterpart of El Niño. And the neighbouring Brazil is affected by heavy rains. 2012 is near!!
• Brazil is a large producer of high-quality Arabica. Floods there have driven coffee's price to multi-year highs.
• Brazil's floods could also affect the sugar's price all over the world as it accounts for 60% of global sugar exports.
• Ivory Coast has banned exports of cocoa (40% of global exports) and cocoa has scaled a 33-year high.
• Australia is also hit by floods and they contribute to 2/3rd of seaborne supply of coking coal, a very important industrial input.
• Between 1965 and 1998, global population rose from 3.3 billion to 5.9 billion. A rise of 2.6 billion or almost double in just over a quarter century. Today we stand at around 7 billion and Indian contributes more than 17% to it.

These facts just tell that we still do not have control over this world even though we do have some many remote controlled devices all around us.

WikiLeaks Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize - TIME

WikiLeaks Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize - TIME: "The Norwegian Nobel Committee keeps candidates secret for 50 years, but those with nomination rights sometimes make their picks known.

Snorre Valen, a 26-year-old legislator from Norway's Socialist Left Party, told The Associated Press he handed in his nomination in person on Tuesday, the last day to put forth candidates. 'I think it is important to raise a debate about freedom of expression and that truth is always the first casualty in war,' Valen said. 'WikiLeaks wants to make governments accountable for their actions and that contributes to peace.'"

Nalanda misses trophy scholars | The Telegraph

Nalanda misses trophy scholars | The Telegraph: "Two of India’s finest intellectual-academicians — Ramchandra Guha and Pratap Bhanu Mehta — passed up offers to accept the vice-chancellorship of Nalanda International University (NIU), Bihar’s flagship knowledge project.

Charge of the NIU will formally be handed over to Nobel laureate and chairperson of the NIU Mentor Group, Amartya Sen, by Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on February 5.

Only last month, artist Subodh Gupta, himself a product of Patna Arts College, had told this reporter during a private visit to Bihar that much as he’d like to, conditions in the state do not inspire him to set up an arts facility."

Facebook launching third party commenting platform

Facebook launching third party commenting platform: "Facebook is soon launching a third-party commenting system, that will power the comments on large online publications.
This new technology could see Facebook as the engine behind the comments system on many high-profile blogs and other digital publications. The company is actively seeking major media companies and blogs to partner with it for its launch"

How Washington misreads Turkey | Global Post

How Washington misreads Turkey | Global Post: "I'm going to type a word.

Islamist.

What images come to mind?

Now I'm going to type a phrase.

Most dynamic city in the world.


What does it make you think of?

Can you reconcile the two?

Think Islamist, and you probably imagine some un-democratic place with a stagnant, corrupt economy and women encased from head to toe in black cloth. It is joyless and puritanical in the pejorative sense, with innate hostility to America and the West.

Dynamism probably makes you think of New York, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Rio and Mumbai — places where anything-goes-capitalism has revived after a period of recession.

Well, according to a recent Brookings Institution report the world's most dynamic city is Istanbul, whose Islamist former mayor, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is now Turkey's Prime Minister."