Word: sectoral
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...year commitment. These moves are necessary to attract managers with big hearts but significant time constraints. "It's not a question of whether we wanted to professionalize or not," says Willo Brock, director of Habitat's Europe and Central Asia office and a former management consultant, "but like any sector with a lot of competition, if we didn't give these people a good experience then next year they'd sign up with VSO." Back home in the luxury of Western Europe, volunteers have been encouraged to post their thoughts on the company intranet. According to Aart Roos, the response...
...insurance industry as a director of consultants Sustainable Finance. Insurers, however, insist that that's changing. With the growth of carbon-trading markets in Europe and the U.S., and the increasing likelihood that businesses' carbon footprints are likely to be taxed in the future, polluting companies and certain sectors are beginning to look like less attractive investments. For the past year, German giant Allianz has been assembling a team solely dedicated to renewable energy investments, headed by David Jones, Shell's former head of wind energy. The company estimates it will have €500 million invested in renewable-energy infrastructure...
...Tangier and increasingly Rabat have become booming real estate markets with the arrival of house-hunting pensioners in recent years. French transplants remain the largest group, but Italian and German seniors are also getting in on the rush - and the British contingent is becoming active in the higher-end sector. But as in any hot market, increased activity means rising prices. "Certain properties in beach areas have increased from €100 to €300 per square meter in three years," says Alteresco. Annual rise across the board, he estimates, has ranged from 80-100% over the past few years. That...
...Consumption has lagged. That's because household income has stagnated, due to wage austerity, the rise of part-time and temporary workers, and near-zero interest rates. Total private-sector consumer income (wages, interest, self-employed income, etc.) was lower in 2004 (the latest year for which figures are available) than in 1997. The main source of any income growth has been government transfer payments, such as social security and health care, but these programs are being cut back to reduce the budget deficit. As households have dipped into their savings, so consumption has lagged. The household-savings rate...
...Future reforms must tackle Japan's "dual economy," i.e. an efficient export-oriented sector but woeful inefficiencies in large parts of the domestic economy, such as food processing, home construction and many service sectors. A chief cause of this weakness is insufficient competition, either from homegrown firms or from imports. Japan has initiated many reforms in recent years to induce efficiency and profitability. These range from the financial "Big Bang" to a series of accounting reforms. There have also been a lot of mergers, acquisitions, and spin-offs. Some have led to greater efficiency, but others to less competition...