WCA March 2013

The report warns that Russia will join these counterparts in the “slow relative declines” of their economies. China, it says, “will probably have the largest economy, surpassing that of the United States a few years before 2030.” In general, the NIC foresees, the health of the global economy “increasingly will be linked to how well the developing world does – more so than the traditional West.” According to the report, in addition to China the developing nations that will become especially important to the global economy include Brazil, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, South Africa and Turkey. ❖ Mr Shanker noted one remarkable development anticipated by the NIC: spreading affluence, leading to a larger, better-educated global middle class that has wider access to communications technologies like the Internet and smartphones. “The growth of the global middle class constitutes a tectonic shift,” the study says, adding that billions of people will gain new individual power as they climb out of poverty. “For the first time, a majority of the world’s population will not be impoverished, and the middle classes will be the most important social and economic sector in the vast majority of countries around the world.” Global mortality study Another new report, summarised in the British health publication Lancet (13 th December), makes an interesting companion piece to Global Trends 2030. Published 13 th December, Global Burden of Disease Study 2010, from a health research organisation financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation at the University of Washington, examined global mortality patterns over the past 20 years. Health experts from more than 300 institutions contributed to the report, which measured disease and mortality for populations in more than 180 countries. A dramatic shift was identified: infant mortality declined by more than half between 1990 and 2010; and malnutrition – the No 1 risk factor in 1990 for death and years of life lost – has fallen to eighth place. But, while developing countries made big strides (the average age at death in Brazil and Paraguay, for example, rose to 63 in 2010, up from 28 in 1970), the United States stagnated. Between 1990 and 2010, American women registered the smallest gains in life expectancy of women in all other high-income countries. The two years of life they gained were fewer than in Cyprus, where women gained 2.3 years, and in Canada, where women gained 2.4 years. The slow increase dropped American women to 36 th place in the report’s global ranking of life expectancy, down from No 22 in 1990. Also on 13 th December the World Health Organization issued a statement saying that, while some of the estimates in the Global Burden report are similar to those reached by United Nations agencies, others differ substantially. WHO cautioned that all comprehensive estimates of global mortality must rely heavily on statistical modelling because only 34 countries – representing about 15 per cent of the world’s population – produce quality cause-of-death data. Dorothy Fabian – Features Editor

❖ For its new iMac computers, Apple is employing a process that welds the front and back aluminium parts of the product to create an extra-thin unit. The method, known as friction-stir welding, softens but does not melt or distort the materials being joined. Friction-stir welding, which uses heat and pressure to join metals and alloys, was invented by the Welding Institute in the United Kingdom in 1991. Since then, the US Office of Naval Research (ONR) has invested heavily in modelling, tools, and specifications for the process. ONR researchers have employed the process to fuse everything from steel and aluminium to nickel and bronze. Dr Thomas Killion, director of transition at ONR, told R&D Magazine (7 th December): “The importance of our continued investment in this area has paid off in advances in this technology, which is being used by a variety of industries today.” In addition to applications in the aerospace, automotive, and railway industries, friction-stir welding — with its clean precision and leeway for unconventional welds — has the potential to open new avenues in ship design. For the Navy, it could provide an affordable, efficient way to create ship hulls from stronger and lighter materials, such as titanium, that are also resistant to corrosion. A newly energy-independent US can look forward to a bright future – but as the No 2 economy behind China Every four years, following the presidential election, the US National Intelligence Council (NIC) publishes a report intended to aid policymakers worldwide in their long-term planning on key issues of global importance. The forward-looking document draws on expertise from outside government on factors such as globalisation, demography and the environment. The latest instalment, Global Trends 2030: Alternative Worlds, was released in December. As noted by Thom Shanker of the International Herald Tribune , this product of four years of intelligence-gathering and analysis “presents grounds for optimism and pessimism in nearly equal measure.” Most notably, it sees the US ceding to China the position of No 1 economic power, but expects America to remain an indispensable world leader, benefiting from its domestic oil and natural gas supplies and new technologies to tap them. (“US Forecast as No 2 Economy, but Energy Independent,” 10 th December). The NIC, which reports to the director of national intelligence and has responsibilities for long-term strategic analysis, sees the US as perhaps even becoming a net exporter of fuel. Global Trends 2030 also looks for a decline in economic strength for countries reliant on oil for revenues. (The full report is available free at www.dni.gov via PDF as well as for most content platforms and e-readers). Other important demographic trends anticipated by the NIC are aging populations in Europe, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, which could slow their economies further. Global trends

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Wire & Cable ASIA – March/April 2013

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