By Dave Harcourt •
January 15, 2010
While Brisbane’s waste removal system battles to discard perfectly good mangos, this contrasts starkly with the difficulties and opportunities associated with agricultural produce gluts in poor communities in rural Africa.
Brisbane Mangoes
So good is the mango harvest this year, that residents of Brisbane’s suburbs are battling to get rid of their excess mangos.
Apparently some trees are dropping up to 60 mangoes overnight. If these are simply placed in rubbish bins they are too heavy for the mechanical garbage trucks and get left on the street. Normally there would be a $24 fee to get a garbage truck to come back and empty the bin, but the City Council has agreed to waive this cost so long as residents first remove the mangoes. The Council has also removed the charge for dumping mangoes at the city’s transfer stations.
So in Australia the fuss is about getting the mangoes to the dump and not about the waste of food or the loss of income opportunities, that bother the African.
By Amiel Blajchman •
October 29, 2008
US Firm Better Place is working with Australian power company AGL and investors Macquarie Capital Group to develop a $667 million Australian electric car charging network.
Under the plan being developed, Better Place will use its scalable model (currently adopted in Denmark and Israel) to build the electric vehicle network, AGL will deliver electricity from renewable resources and Macquarie will help raise the investment dollars needed.
Electric vehicle networks would be developed in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane, each with between 200 000 and 250 000 charging stations. As well, switching stations will be built in each city and on the highways in order to allow drivers to have their batteries automatically replaced.
While this project is being developed solely by private companies, it has received some high-level attention and support in Australia, with the State of Victoria’s Premier John Brumby noting:
The Victorian Government supports any initiative that will have positive outcomes in reducing emissions in the transport sector and welcomes this innovative approach to help make broad adoption of [electric vehicles] in Australia possible
