EIGHT ENDENGERED KIWI BIRDS DIE IN NEW ZEALAND ZOO

 

Tragedy has struck the New Zealand zoo: eight highly endangered Rowi Kiwi bird, like the one pictured above, have died this week. 

Conservation efforts have been dealt a severe blow, and curators and biologists alike are concerned at how quickly all eight birds perished. 

The Kiwi, is a native species of New Zealand and is also its national symbol.  They are a flightless bird, like other native species, but one whose numbers are very, very small. 

The birds became ill with a respiratory infection, which quickly claimed their lives, notwithstanding the efforts made by the zookeepers and veterinarians. 

The Kiwi's destiny is tied to conservation efforts.  Only 70,000 of them remain, after decimation from non native species introduced by colonists decades ago.  Of the Kiwi species, the Rowi subspecies, the one zookeepers were trying to breed, has extremely low numbers, estimated at less than 400.  Of these, nearly 150 were produced through the efforts of conservationists.  

Most of the Rowi Kiwis born in captivity do so after intensive programs to increase their numbers prompt scouts to scour the  South Island for Kiwi eggs which are then brought to incubators, thereby greatly increasing their chances of hatching.  Stoats, rats and ferrets are known to decimate the eggs laid by the Kiwis.  

The illness that killed the Kiwis is believed to be a fungal infection which ensued after a gut parasite left the chicks debilitated. The fungus had been inhaled in the conservation habitat, since it is present in bark that is used as a medium for the zoo nests.  Usually the bark poses no problems, but in this instance it has turned deadly. 

Source : france 24/ 10.1.13

 

WELL FARGO TO PAY 860$ MILLION AS PENALTY FOR SELLING HOME LOAN PACKAGES TO GOVT CONTROLLED MORTGAGE GIANT FREDDIE MAC: BUT IS IT ENOUGH TO STOP BANKING FRAUD?

 

Wells Fargo, one of America's largest banks, has been ordered to repay 869$ million to Freddie Mac for selling the govt. controlled mortgage administrator loan packages that were fraudulent, or obtained fraudulently.

Th California based bank agreed to pay the sum to defray the huge liabilities created by the fraudulent mortgages to Freddie Mac.  

Citigroup too, agreed to repay Freddie Mac 395$ million for similar reasons.  

The issue at hand, is the widespread fraud and misrepresentation carried out during the sale of mortgages or mortgage packages to Freddie Mac.  The mortgages sold to Freddie Mac, under Federal Law, must have some guarantees that protect the agency from acquiring mortgages that can default.  Some of these guarantees stem from the due diligence the banks must exercise in requiring applicants to disclose their true ability to repay the mortgage and the bank's own duty to verify the veracity of the disclosures made by the applicants.  

Everyone knows by now, that the major banks and some smaller ones, were all guilty of obtaining mortgages by creating false paperwork, accepting paperwork in which there was no disclosure of the applicant's ability to repay the mortgage and so forth.  The mortgages were then bundled and resold as investment packages, securities and derivatives, causing the collapse of the market in 2008. 

Although no one has to date ended up in court to face jail time or any similar punitive measures, this is the first step to bring at least a measure or accountability to those banks that so easily broke every banking rule when obtaining mortgages.  

Banks now live in an era where money is no longer made the traditional way.  Today banks rely on fees, whether those fees are tacked onto services for accounts, or credit cards, or refinancing and mortgage applications. Without a proper set of legislation to curb the ease with which existing regulations are overlooked or disregarded, there is no guarantee that banks will not repeat the actions that led to the last economic meltdown.  In that sense, not much has changed.  

Partial source : France 24/ 10.1.13