Monthly Archives: April 2011

Output from Japan’s factories suffered a record fall during March in the wake of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan on 11 March, according to Japanese government figures.

Output figures and GDP forecasts in the post-credit crunch era should carry a health warning. Such is the tentative nature of the global recovery that the slightest blip is poured over by economists and governments desperate to justify a fiscal squeeze…

The cost of US energy supply accidents over the past decade are estimated to exceed $50bn, mostly from oil spills and electric power outages, academics have estimated.

The UK government has unveiled “a significant change” in its procurement process with the appointment of a chief procurement officer who will be responsible for centralising state procurement.

UK manufacturing production surged during the first quarter of 2011 yet, at the same time, showed signs of a slow down, according to a survey conducted by the Confederation of British Industry.

Coca Cola, the world’s largest soft-drinks company, has announced that sales have grown across the globe during the first quarter 2011 despite geo-political unrest and rising commodity prices.

A Dutch company has teamed up with academics to develop a methodology to help companies estimate how much CO2 emissions are reduced if they roll out used IT hardware rather than new.

Despite the fact that short-term oil and gas supply and demand remains relatively balanced, oil prices have gone up in anticipation of “supply shocks”, experts have warned.

When it comes to sustainable procurement it could be argued that sometimes it’s hard to see the wood for the trees – and now a dispute between two major sustainability groups could make the task a whole lot more difficult.

The world’s largest car manufacturer, Toyota, expects that “production normalisation” following the Japanese earthquake and tsunami could occur by November this year.