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World Demand (world + demand)

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Business, Economics, Finance and Accounting	50%

Selected Abstracts

Moniliophthora perniciosa, the causal agent of witches' broom disease of cacao: what's new from this old foe?

MOLECULAR PLANT PATHOLOGY, Issue 5 2008
LYNDEL W. MEINHARDT
SUMMARY Moniliophthora perniciosa (=Crinipellis perniciosa) causes one of the three main fungal diseases of Theobroma cacao (cacao), the source of chocolate. This pathogen causes Witches' broom disease (WBD) and has brought about severe economic losses in all of the cacao-growing regions to which it has spread with yield reductions that range from 50 to 90%. Cacao production in South America reflects the severity of this pathogen, as the yields in most of the infected regions have not returned to pre-outbreak levels, even with the introduction of resistant varieties. In this review we give a brief historical account and summarize the current state of knowledge focusing on developments in the areas of systematics, fungal physiology, biochemistry, genomics and gene expression in an attempt to highlight this disease. Moniliophthora perniciosa is a hemibiotrophic fungus with two distinct growth phases. The ability to culture a biotrophic-like phase in vitro along with new findings derived from the nearly complete genome and expression studies clearly show that these different fungal growth phases function under distinct metabolic parameters. These new findings have greatly improved our understanding of this fungal/host interaction and we may be at the crossroads of understanding how hemibiotrophic fungal plant pathogens cause disease in other crops. Historical summary of WBD:, The first WDB symptoms appear to have been described in the diaries of Alexandre Rodrigues Ferreira (described as lagartão; meaning big lizard) from his observations of cacao trees in 1785 and 1787 in Amazonia, which is consistent with the generally accepted idea that M. perniciosa, like its main host T. cacao, evolved in this region. The disease subsequently arrived in Surinam in 1895. WBD moved rapidly, spreading to Guyana in 1906, Ecuador in 1918, Trinidad in 1928, Colombia in 1929 and Grenada in 1948. In each case, cacao production was catastrophically affected with yield reductions of 50,90%. After the arrival of M. perniciosa in Bahia in 1989, Brazil went from being the world's 3rd largest producer of cacao (347 000 tonnes in 1988,1990; c. 15% of the total world production at that time) to a net importer (141 000 tonnes in 1998,2000). Fortunately for chocolate lovers, other regions of the world such as West Africa and South East Asia have not yet been affected by this disease and have expanded production to meet growing world demand (predicted to reach 3 700 000 tonnes by 2010). Classification:,Moniliophthora perniciosa (Stahel) Aime & Phillips-Mora: super-kingdom Eukaryota; kingdom Fungi; phylum Basidiomycota; subphylum Agaricomycotina; class Agaricomycetes; subclass Agaricomycetidae; order Agaricales; family Marasmiaceae; genus Moniliophthora. Useful websites:,http://www.lge.ibi.unicamp.br/vassoura/, http://nt.ars-grin.gov/taxadescriptions/keys/TrichodermaIndex.cfm, http://www.worldcocoafoundation.org/info-center/research-updates.asp, http://www.ars.usda.gov/ba/psi/spcl [source]

Evolution of trade patterns in the new EU member states

THE ECONOMICS OF TRANSITION, Issue 4 2005
Andrea Zaghini
F14; F15; E23 Abstract The paper analyses the evolution of the trade specialization pattern in the new EU member states. Relying on the empirical approach of the Markov transition matrices it analyses both the changes in the external shape of the distribution of comparative advantages and the intra-distribution dynamics. The new members show a dynamic trade pattern: they gained comparative advantages relatively fast in sectors in which they were lagging behind at the beginning of the transition, notably in some ,high tech' products. In addition, many specialization improvements occurred in those items for which world demand expanded at the fastest rate over the nineties. [source]

Is Price in Hong Kong That Flexible?

ASIAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL, Issue 2 2002
Evidence from the Export Sector
Using the Johansen procedure, this paper estimates and compares the adjustment speeds of Hong Kong's export volume and export price. Result of this will have profound implications on the debate of the appropriateness of Hong Kong's current exchange-rate system. Two cointegrating vectors were found in our system, with one postulating the export volume equation and another postulating the export price equation. It was found that export volume will adjust relatively fast to shocks in the export volume equation, and that export price will adjust relatively slow to shocks in the export volume equation. On the other hand, export volume will be insensitive, and export price will adjust at moderate speed, to disequilibrium in the export price equation. Based on the estimated model, we also conducted simulation exercises to highlight the impacts of the appreciation of the US Dollar and the reduction in world demand on Hong Kong's export volume during the crisis and post-crisis periods. [source]

Why microalgal biofuels won't save the internal combustion machine

BIOFUELS, BIOPRODUCTS AND BIOREFINING, Issue 1 2010
Jan B. van Beilen
Abstract Proponents of microalgae biofuel technologies often claim that the world demand of liquid fuels, about 5 trillion liters per year, could be supplied by microalgae cultivated on only a few tens of millions of hectares. This perspective reviews this subject and points out that such projections are greatly exaggerated, because (1) the productivities achieved in large-scale commercial microalgae production systems, operated year-round, do not surpass those of irrigated tropical crops; (2) cultivating, harvesting and processing microalgae solely for the production of biofuels is simply too expensive using current or prospective technology; and (3) currently available (limited) data suggest that the energy balance of algal biofuels is very poor. Thus, microalgal biofuels are no panacea for depleting oil or global warming, and are unlikely to save the internal combustion machine. Copyright © 2009 Society of Chemical Industry and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd [source]