Thursday, July 26, 2012

Make Vit. D Fortification a Rule

The Government must Ensure Milk is Fortified with Vitamin D in India; An Easy Solution to Counter Rickets, Osteomalacia and other bone Diseases

Consider this: A 2008 National Rickets Survey found that 197 out of 20,000 children had rickets and further concluded that around 550,000 children are suffering from rickets. Rickets (in children) and Osteomalacia (in adults) are similar in nature. Both are bone-weakening diseases and lead to deformities. Incidence is high among children as their bones are weak in their growing age, and curing requires considerable calcium and vitamin D. Why Vitamin D is important is because calcium cannot be absorbed by the body unless there is sufficient Vitamin D in the body. While exposure to sunlight is the best method for the body to naturally create Vitamin D, the dark skins of Indians ensures that enough Vitamin D is never created within the body.

Milk is considered an important source of this vitamin. But the milk that Indians consume normally is so highly adulterated that the question of nutrients comes much later. Add to that the problem of milk incontinence, which many Indians suffer. Curd is a good substitute source – but not everybody takes that. Also, breast milk is extremely low in Vitamin D, resulting in new born children suffering the most.

A few developed countries have drafted laws that solved these problems. In US, it’s imperative for all milk producers to fortify their milk with Vitamin D. The Office of Dietary Supplements, US government, has asserted that children need 600 International Units (IUs) of Vitamin D to stay healthy. Vitamin D fortified milk alone can provide 115-124 IUs of the vitamin per cup, which will be around 20% or more of this requirement. Countries like US and Canada have made sale of raw milk illegal. Given that the number of people suffering from bone-related diseases is high in India, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs should immediately force packaged milk producers to add vitamin D during pasteurization.


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Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Who Should be The Next Captain?

In these Good Times, nothing seems Wrong with The Indian Cricket Team. But one thing that cannot be Ignored is selecting and preparing The Next Rung, Particularly The Captain of the team

For the first time in Indian cricket’s recent history, if the master blaster Sachin Tendulkar were to announce his retirement tomorrow, apart from the general calls for postponing the retirement, there’ll be no sleepless nights for any fan.

However, the team has played a lot of cricket continuously since the last ten months, which has become a major reason for some senior players asking for permission to be rested for the West Indies tour, including Dhoni. Who could, then, take up Dhoni’s mantle in the future? We present our extremely radical top choices in reverse priority; that is, the last one is our topmost choice (and all, assuming Dhoni has gone on a paid vacation to Honolulu):

Yuvraj Singh: Frankly, the changed Yuvraj Singh has the captaincy on a platter and can lose it only if he throws it away (or if Virender Sehwag refuses to play under him). Despite being the Man of the Series in the 2011 World Cup, Yuvraj’s performance in the current IPL tourney as a captain hasn’t been that impressive. Maybe one could attribute that more to the lack of quality within the team than on Yuvraj himself. Strengths; changed calmer attitude, supreme commitment to stay there and win the game, and seniority. Weaknesses; borderline case of self-belief; that is, it could all crash the day he has a string of bad scores. Yuvi is our third choice for captain.

Gautam Gambhir: The Delhi born lefty is undoubtedly our second choice. His biggest pluses are his relative youth, ‘in-it-to-win-it’ killer attitude (he said it first), individual passionate commitment, and of course, his ability to single-handedly win a match with his batting. His negative traits are his lack of patience (he’s gotten out quite inanely in the past), uncontrollable anger, ergo, lack of team handling skills in critical situations (shouts at fellow team members; no can do). One should remember that Gambhir led India to a successful New Zealand tour where India won by 5-0 last year.

Virat Kohli: If the BCCI wishes to radically do what South Africa did in 2003 (when it made Graeme Smith the captain when he was just 22), then it should make the 22 year old Virat Kohli the captain and go off to Honolulu and join up with Dhoni for a while – given the acrimonious debate that will arise post the appointment. Virat became famous when he played for Delhi against Karnataka in the Ranji Trophy on the day of his father’s death (shows his unquestionable resolve towards cricket).

He was eulogized when the Indian team won the 2008 U/19 Cricket World Cup held in Malaysia, where he led the team. Strengths; super energetic 24x7, never-say-die attitude, personal commitment and involvement in trying to win, better composure than Gauti by miles, better self-belief than Yuvi, no past controversies. astounding team management skills (he’s supremely loved by the team). Weaknesses; lack of overall experience in managing a team full of seniors. But if Graeme could, then so could Kohli. He is our top choice for captain.


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Friday, July 20, 2012

Ten years? You are Fired!

In Terms of both Content & Intent, Yunus’ ouster Elicits Controversy

The latest joke in Bangladesh after the dismissal of Dr.Muhammad Yunus, founder, Grameen Bank, from the post of MD, reads thus – In hell, every other nationality is kept in guarded cells but the one housing Bangladeshis remains unguarded. Because if anyone tries to leave, jealousy ensures that the others pull them back!

After a documentary (aired on Norwegian TV) that tried to prove how Dr.Yunus is embezzling funds (later proved wrong), Yunus seems to have become a prime scapegoat of the media and the ruling Sheikh Hasina Wajed-led Awami League. He has been accused of “making a sweeping statement against politicos”, promoting adulterated yoghurt. Above all, Sheik Hasina has called him as the one who is “sucking blood from the poor in the name of poverty alleviation.”


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Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Can he upset The Japanese?

Volkswagen has Renewed the term of its CEO, and all Eyes are on The Company as it Seeks to do to Toyota what Toyota did to GM by 2018. Can Winterkorn Indeed win his Most Coveted Prize?

2010 was surely one of the most relieving years for many companies who were browbeaten by recessionary winds over the past few years; and the largest German auto major Volkswagen is no exception. In fact, the company made all sorts of noises as the calendar year touched the end. For the less informed, even after the company had sold more than seven million vehicles for the first time in its history in a calendar year, the spotlight was on the term renewal of its CEO Martin Winterkorn. The board wholeheartedly voted in favour of extending Winterkorn’s term for another five years for its own set of reasons. Needless to mention, completing the merger with sports carmaker Porsche will be the second most important agenda of his renewed term. Second, because the first one is to displace Toyota as the world’s #1 auto major by 2018 in profitability and unit sales. Notably, the CEO now has the benefit of job security through 2016 for a term that would have expired by the end of 2011. As he is the architect of Volkswagen’s so-called Strategy 2018, the board feels that it makes a lot of logical sense if he captains the ship to that harbour. But is he indeed good enough to run the course?

Before taking control of the reins at Volkswagen AG in 2007, Winterkorn was the Chairman of the Board of Management of Audi and Porsche Automobile Holding SE. The last few years have been nothing but dynamic for this German engineer. Still, even critics accept that the appointment of the new global design chief (Walter de’Silva) is one of the most important decisions he has taken so far. For the uninitiated, de’Silva had previously overseen design at Audi, where he conceptualised the current R8 sports car and A6 sedan. And considering that Toyota has been dealing with an ageing product line-up, Volkswagen’s bet on design may prove to be a gold mine in the years to come. Even the CEO of Toyota Motor Corporation, Akio Toyoda, recently admitted at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit that the company will now be looking at making its cars look better.

Moving towards its goal to become the world’s largest auto major, Volkswagen will be doubling its capacity in China to three million units a year with two new plants. Moreover, the company will also be opening another plant in Tennessee to increase both sales and margins in North America. Even if Volkswagen is able to overtake Toyota in unit sales, profitability still remains one of the biggest challenges. While Volkswagen has been operating with an average net profit margin of 2.42% over the past five years, against the industry average of 3.46%, Toyota, on the other hand, has a net profit margin of 3.61% that beats the industry average. “Volkswagen is now trying to reduce costs and increase profit by removing many of its premium traits and also by building a US plant. They are doing this to increase volume but it could backfire because many US buyers won’t want to buy a Volkswagen if it doesn’t feel like a more up-scale option compared to Honda or Toyota,” said Karl Brauer, senior analyst, Edmunds. He also adds that it was in fact the drop in perceived quality for the Japanese automakers that has opened up opportunities for Volkswagen. A compromise on that front would not be a very good idea.


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