December 21, 2021

POWERCHINA contribue activement au développement et au bien-être des communautés locales en Afrique centrale et occidentale.

BEIJING, 21 décembre 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Ceci est rapporté par China Report ASEAN affilié à China Report :

« Construire des projets de qualité et se faire des amis dans le monde entier”, tel est l’objectif et l’engagement de POWERCHINA, le plus grand constructeur d’installations électriques au monde, dans ses activités à l’étranger. L’entreprise participe activement à la construction des projets « Belt and Road » et a étendu ses activités de construction aux pays africains. Outre l’amélioration des voies navigables, l’approvisionnement en électricité et la construction de routes et de ponts, l’entreprise s’est acquittée de sa responsabilité sociale envers les communautés locales sur les marchés d’outre-mer.

POWERCHINA contribue à la réalisation des objectifs de développement des Nations unies en créant des emplois grâce à de nouvelles infrastructures hydroélectriques, en développant les compétences de la population locale par le biais de formations, en fournissant une assistance en matière d’éducation et de soins aux orphelins, en construisant des hôpitaux et en donnant des médicaments. Ses efforts pour répandre l’amour et l’espoir en Afrique lui ont permis d’établir une amitié sincère avec les gouvernements et les populations locales.

Cultiver les talents locaux

La centrale hydroélectrique de Djibloho, que le gouvernement de la Guinée équatoriale qualifie de « projet des Trois Gorges de la Guinée équatoriale », répond à 90 % de la demande d’électricité du pays et constitue un moteur important de son développement économique. POWERCHINA a formé des employés locaux et les a aidés à acquérir des compétences. Une formation gratuite de deux mois en chinois a également été dispensée par l’entreprise pour faciliter la communication entre les opérateurs locaux et les ingénieurs chinois, et aider les employés locaux à mieux utiliser les équipements de l’usine.

POWERCHINA staff members take a group photo with teachers and students of a middle school during a volunteer activity in Abuja, Nigeria

Soins aux enfants

Au Cameroun, le bureau de POWERCHINA a une tradition qui fait chaud au cœur. Chaque année, autour de Noël et du Nouvel An, le bureau coopère avec les sociétés membres du groupe pour organiser des activités bénévoles dans les écoles et les orphelinats des zones situées le long des routes qu’il construit. Ils réparent les salles de classe et font don de papeterie aux enfants, et chantent et dansent avec eux pour célébrer la nouvelle année.

Selon Ngangoua Serge, représentant de POWERCHINA au Cameroun, l’entreprise se soucie des groupes défavorisés au Cameroun. Depuis qu’elle a commencé à opérer dans le pays en 2010, l’entreprise a organisé des activités de dons similaires chaque année, dans le but d’apporter de l’amour et du bonheur aux enfants dans le besoin.

Soutien médical

L’entreprise a également contribué à améliorer les conditions médicales locales dans les endroits où ses projets sont situés en construisant des hôpitaux et en faisant don de médicaments et d’installations.

Le nouvel hôpital de Niefang, un projet d’aide historique du gouvernement chinois dans le pays qui sera achevé par POWERCHINA d’ici 2022, renforcera le système médical dans le centre de la Guinée équatoriale et fournira des services médicaux de qualité aux habitants de la ville de Niefang et de ses environs.

Au Cameroun, l’entreprise a fait don de médicaments et d’équipements médicaux à un centre de santé publique près du site d’un barrage qui sera construit par lui. Les médicaments et les équipements médicaux, dont le besoin est urgent, ont considérablement renforcé la confiance du centre dans la lutte contre les maladies infectieuses et le sauvetage de vies.

Le 29 janvier 2019, le bureau de la Guinée équatoriale de l’entreprise a aidé l’ambassade de Chine et l’équipe médicale chinoise dans le pays à réaliser une clinique gratuite au camp de l’entreprise pour la centrale hydroélectrique de Djibloho. La clinique gratuite organisée avec l’aide de POWERCHINA est un témoignage de l’amitié entre les deux pays et une manifestation de l’accomplissement actif des responsabilités sociales par les entreprises chinoises en Guinée équatoriale.

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December 21, 2021

Blue California-FineCap™ Microencapsulation Platform Serves the Purpose

Rancho Santa Margarita, Calif., Dec. 21, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Blue California, the producer of natural science-based ingredients, provides FineCap™ a comprehensive microencapsulation technology platform, equipped with 20 microencapsulation technologies, to deliver active ingredients and satisfy our clients’ needs.

Microencapsulation is the process in which tiny particles of solid, liquid, or gas are packaged within a matrix to form a capsule. The capsule is coated with a protective layer to avoid degradation from exposure to environmental factors such as water, oxygen, heat, and light.

“Brands that seek to expand their products’ qualities and boost their product portfolios will find many benefits to the FineCap platform,” said Dr. Cuie Yan, vice president of encapsulation. “FineCap takes microencapsulation a step further by offering a variety of technologies and targeting customers’ specific needs in tackling active ingredients with unique characteristics, such as strong odor, taste or stability problems that challenge formulators.”

Microencapsulation systems have been widely used across multiple industries, including the pharmaceutical, food, supplement, personal care, and fragrance industries, for active ingredients like medicines, nicotine, flavors/fragrances, polyunsaturated fatty acids, probiotics, natural pigments, vitamins, antioxidants, etc. Space agency NASA also uses encapsulation technologies for spacecraft. The pharmaceutical industry uses microencapsulation often to control the release of active pharma ingredients (API).
Blue California has created the FineCap platform to serve customers’ growing demands for better performance of API, functional ingredients, dietary supplements, flavors, fragrances, cosmetics, and personal care products.

For example, FineCap protects API from degradation, unpleasant tastes or aroma, and maintains its efficacy, by controlling its release. FineCap enables flavors to thrive in food and beverages with integrity, intensity, and extended shelf-life.

In fragrances, FineCap guarantees brands to control the precise fragrance release rate, location, and duration. Personal care products benefit from FineCap by protecting the delicate top-notes and cosmetic actives from oxygen, moisture, temperature, and light deterioration. A more comprehensive look into the benefits that FineCap delivers in these product segments can be found here.

“Our comprehensive FineCap platform has been serving and supporting formulators looking to launch market-winning products with better qualities and shelf-life that consumers are seeking,” said Dr. Yan. “We’re enabling brands to quickly create products from innovative concepts, benchtop development, to pilot and full commercial manufacturing, with improved efficacy, taste, color, texture, and shelf life, along with vegan, organic, Kosher, or Halal certificate.”

The FineCap platform investment builds on Blue California’s 25-year legacy of producing botanical extracts and now natural flavors and fragrances and focuses on developing sustainable ingredients made through bioconversion or fermentation.

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About Blue California
Blue California is an entrepreneurial, science-based solutions provider and manufacturer of clean, natural, and sustainable ingredients used in food, beverage, flavor, fragrance, dietary supplements, personal care, and cosmetic products. For more than 25 years, Blue California has built a strong reputation for creating value in these diverse natural products and nature-inspired industries.

Attachment

Blue California’s FineCap™ microencapsulation technology

Ana Arakelian
Blue California
+1-949-635-1991
ana@bluecal-ingredients.com

December 21, 2021

CUAMBA SOLAR PV and ENERGY STORAGE REACHES FINANCIAL CLOSE

MAPUTO, Mozambique, Dec. 21, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Globeleq, the leading independent power company in Africa and its project partners, Source Energia, a Lusophone Africa energy developer and Electricidade de Moçambique (EDM), the Mozambican national power utility, have reached financial close on the 19MWp (15MWac) Cuamba Solar PV plant with a 2MW (7MWh) energy storage system.

The US$36 million project located in the Cuamba district, Niassa province (about 550 km west of the coastal town of Nacala) will supply electricity through a 25-year power purchase agreement with EDM. The project is the first IPP in Mozambique to integrate a utility scale energy storage system and includes an upgrade to the existing Cuamba substation.

Once operational, the Cuamba Solar plant will supply enough power for 21,800 consumers, and over the life of the project is expected to avoid the equivalent of more than 172,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions. First power is expected to flow in the second half of 2022.

The Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund (“EAIF”), a member of the Private Infrastructure Development Group (“PIDG”) provided US$19 million in debt funding, with PIDG’s Viability Gap Funding (VGF) grant facility providing US$7million to enable an affordable tariff, fund essential grid upgrades and an energy storage system for EDM. CDC Plus, the technical assistance facility of CDC Group, has contributed a US$1million grant towards the battery energy storage system.

Olivia Carballo, a Director at Ninety One Ltd, the managers of EAIF, commented: “This is a pioneering project for EAIF and PIDG. We congratulate Globeleq, Source Energia, EDM and Mozambique on reaching a key milestone in deploying more solar technology to the northern grid, and on installing Mozambique’s first grid-scale battery energy storage system.”

Sarah Marchand, CDC Director, CDC Plus, said: “We are delighted to support one of sub-Saharan Africa’s first grid-scale battery energy storage systems through this grant for the battery storage system. In line with CDC’s ambition to catalyse more storage solutions across the continent, CDC Plus will also offer support to capture and disseminate learnings around the battery component’s operational, economic, and development impact.”

“With the ongoing challenges due to the pandemic, I am proud our team has achieved financial close, and we can begin building the first solar and energy storage facility in the country. We fully support the Mozambican Government in their initiatives to support the Paris Agreement and provide its citizens with reliable and clean alternative energy options,” added Mike Scholey, Globeleq’s CEO.

EDM’s Chairman, Marcelino Gildo Alberto said: “This project is a demonstration of EDM’s commitment to provide sustainable solutions to speed up energy access to Mozambicans. In compliance with the Government’s Five-Year Plan to introduce 200MW of renewable energy, EDM is at the forefront of the energy transition in line with the Paris Agreement.”

“We are very pleased to make another contribution to the Mozambique Energy sector and look forward to supporting the future growth of the industry in the country. Our thanks go to our project partners and funders for their unparalleled patience and commitment during the development phase,” said Pedro Coutinho, CEO of Source Energia

The project will require approximately 100 workers during construction, many of whom will be hired from the local community. The Spanish company Grupo TSK has been appointed as the project EPC contractor and will immediately commence mobilisation of its construction team. E22, part of the Spanish Gransolar Group, will supply the complete battery energy storage system. Globeleq will oversee the construction and operations of the power plant, supported by Source Energia.

Logo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/612609/GLobeleq_Logo.jpg

December 21, 2021

African Scientists Slam CDC Recommendation on Johnson & Johnson Vaccine

Scientists and health advocates in Africa say they’re deeply disappointed by a statement from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.

The CDC last week recommended the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines ahead of the J&J, because of concerns the J&J shot could, in rare cases, cause blood clots, or thrombosis.

The J&J vaccine is one of the most widely used in Africa, because it’s a single dose shot that doesn’t require ultra-cold storage. The South African health department has reassured people that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is safe.

In a statement, the CDC said it was expressing a “clinical preference” for other vaccines over J&J.

“This updated CDC recommendation follows similar recommendations from other countries, including Canada and the United Kingdom,” the CDC said. Still, the CDC said “receiving any vaccine is better than being unvaccinated.”

But health authorities in Africa say the CDC recommendation has done “irreparable” harm to their vaccination efforts. They say that the CDC’s linking of the J&J vaccine with rare, but potentially fatal, side effects will spark widespread rejection of the vaccine on the continent, where other vaccines are mostly unavailable.

Fewer than 6% of people in Africa are vaccinated and the World Health Organization describes Africa as “one of the least affected regions in the world.”

“I’ve been inundated with calls from people saying, ‘You’re poisoning us’ and ‘We don’t want to take this’ and ‘We’re getting second-hand vaccines; we shouldn’t be getting the J&J, we should only be getting the Pfizer,’” said Barry Jacobson, president of the Southern African Society of Thrombosis. “The CDC, by putting out this statement, has made people scared about taking the J&J booster, and they shouldn’t be.”

South Africa’s top epidemiologist, Salim Abdool Karim, maintains J&J’s vaccine is safe.

“If you had to just look at, for example, thrombosis from cases of COVID-19, it’s far higher than from what we see from the vaccine,” said Karim, an epidemiologist at South Africa’s University of KwaZulu-Natal, who previously advised the South African government on COVID-19. “So there’s no question that this vaccine has a net benefit, even in the face of these side effects.”

The CDC recommendation followed the occurrence of a rare and sometimes fatal blood-clotting issue, called thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome, or TTS, that specifically affected the brain, in people who got the J&J vaccine.

“We’ve seen thrombosis occurring with all the vaccines,” Jacobson said. “But the fact of the matter is, if one gets COVID, the risk of thrombosis is massive. It’s a much greater risk of dying of thrombosis from getting COVID than from being vaccinated and getting a thrombosis, where the risk is miniscule compared to the other group.”

Jacobson was on the safety committee that oversaw one of the world’s biggest vaccine trials, when half-a-million health workers in South Africa received the J&J vaccine earlier this year.

That trial, called Sisonke, came to a temporary halt in April when the CDC paused use of the vaccine after six cases of TTS in the U.S. After analyzing more data, the CDC gave the green light to the shot, saying its benefits outweighed its risks.

Why the CDC would now, “out of the blue,” again link the J&J vaccine with this type of thrombosis, Jacobson said, is beyond him.

“The fact that the CDC came out and said that, it shows no insight into what we face in Africa, where there’s a problem with cold-chain storage and the fact that patients can’t get to more than one vaccine,” Jacobson said. “If you look at the true incidence, it’s one in 500,000 to one in a million. You have a higher chance of being struck by lightning.”

Source: Voice of America

December 21, 2021

Organizers Say Africa Cup of Nations Will Take Place, But Workers Say Main Stadium Not Ready

The Africa Football Cup of Nations tournament is scheduled to begin January 9 at Olembe Stadium in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde.

On Monday, Confederation of African Football President Patrice Motsepe visited the 60,000-seat stadium, which is still under construction less than three weeks before the opening match.

Motsepe says construction workers are improving on the stadium and he is optimistic Cameroon will be ready for the opener.

“There is a huge commitment and a focus to make sure that some of those issues that are being put in place in the next few days, good progress will be made,” he said. “My message is to Africa and to the world that the people of Cameroon are ready to show the world the best of African Football and also the best of African hospitality. It is going to be a successful AFCON, so come January 9, there must be a kickoff.”

Motsepe’s visit came amid persistent local media reports that Olembe Stadium would not be ready.

Bulldozers dug and arranged roads at the stadium entrance on Tuesday, a day after Motsepe’s visit. Several dozen young people transported and planted trees, flowers and grass that officials say will beautify the facility.

Among the workers is 35-year-old building construction engineer Luc Eloundou. Eloundou says he is not sure the entire parking lot of the stadium will be complete within a week as requested by the government of Cameroon.

“Last month we were about 1,000 people here, but now I am seeing up to 300. Workers are not coming. Why? They work without money. Some borrow money to come and work but they don’t have their salaries. The work is much, even in more than a year we will not be able to finish the work,” he said.

Jean Fradique, technical director of the stadium, says 2,000 workers have been recruited to make sure that before a joint CAF/FIFA control mission visits, the stadium is ready for the opening match.

Fradique says workers are arranging parking spaces for cars that will bring football fans, players and match officials to the stadium. He says the huge mobilization of over 2,000 workers and several hundred compactors and construction equipment within the past two months is indicative that Cameroon is bent on finalizing construction work within one week.

Stadium construction began in March 2017. The government said the facility would be ready for the 2020 AFCON. But in January 2020, the CAF postponed the tournament for a year, saying Cameroon was not ready.

The CAF moved the tournament again in January 2021 because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Local media in Cameroon say between COVID-19 and construction delays, the tournament may be postponed yet again. For now, the CAF says the tournament is on.

Source: Voice of America