Hello friends, myself Dr. N. S. Kartikar, Assistant Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Valachandra Institute of Technology, Solapur. Now we are going to see the presentation on Welding of Plastics Part 2. At the end of this session, students will be able to understand the need and importance of welding of plastics. Students will be able to apply welding techniques in real time. The content for the presentation goes as follows. Introduction, need of welding of plastics, classification of plastic welding, external heating category, one of the type we will discuss, hot gas welding, internal heating category, we will discuss one of the type ultrasonic welding. Let us see, initially in the introduction the discussion about plastic material, need of plastic material products and the plastic part manufacturing particular categories. As we know the plastic material is the advanced material which is hydrocarbon polymer material because of many advantageous properties of the same nowadays is used for many wide applications. The advantageous properties like that can be easily moldable, it can be reshaped, it is having non-corrosive property, non-magnetic properties and it is also a bad conductor of electricity and so on. So with this particular n number of advantages properties, the plastic material is going to be used as a product material in many cases. Now let us see the plastic part manufacturing is going to be there by two means. One is a particular product rather the part can be manufactured as a singular element that will fulfill the need of the required as per the requirement. In the second case as we know there are limitations for manufacturing a singular product by its geometry size and other specifications. With the same limitations we are going to discrete a product into number of small elements in which those particularly elements are required to be manufacturing separately and after all it is required to assemble together for the expected working of that product. Thus the need of welding of plastic is in the areas like in the assembly case, in the repair and maintenance, in packaging for joining dissimilar materials and many a times to fulfill the need of situation. Joining of plastics can be go with the different means like mechanical joining in which the various fasteners like nut, bolt, screws, pins, rivets, keys are used for joining the two distinct plastic material elements. The second case the adhesive bondings different adhesives are used for joining the two distinct plastic elements and the third one which we are going to discuss in detail that is about the welding. At this stage of this session I am going to ask one question to you. Are you able to recall or share some of the applications of welding of plastic joints which you had used or seen earlier anywhere in real time? Just think about and enlist. I hope you had enlisted the list of various product where you have found the number of applications of welding in plastic elemental material. Let us go with classification of plastic welding. Welding process are categorized by heating method that is used. Two general categories are there external heating and internal heating. External heating it rely on conviction and conduction to heat the weld surfaces. For example, hot tool, hot gas, extrusion, implant induction, implant resistance welding and so on. In internal heating it rely on conversion of mechanical energy into heat through the surface friction. Further divided into internal mechanical, internal electromagnetic heating, ultrasonic, friction, laser welding and so on. Let us see one of the subtype initially hot gas welding. This is similar to oxyacetylene welding of metals. The only difference is that open flame of oxyacetylene welding is replaced by a stream of hot gas. This layer nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen or carbon dioxide is heated by an electric coil as it passes through a welding gun. The process invented in the mid of 20th century uses a stream of heated gas usually air to heat and melt both the thermoplastic substrate material and thermoplastic welding rod. To ensure welding take place adequate temperature and pressure must be applied to the rod along with the use of the correct welding speed and gun positions. These are the some of the images, photographs for hot gas welding. You can observe in the first image look at to the cursor that in the right hand the welding gun is hold through which the hot air or hot gas is applied to the base material as well as the filler material which is hold into the particular left hand. The filler material is normally present in the form of wire itself. So, likewise the particularly weld run that means filler material is going to filled into the cavity of two distinct elements. Manually many a times this process is continued for the fulfillment of welding joints. Advantages easy to use thermoplastic can be welded easily whereas limitations are slow manual process cannot be used in mass production. It can be fabricate the pipelines, pond liners, wide varieties of vessels, small items like a chemical tanks, water tanks, heat exchanger, plumbing fittings and so many. Let us go with the second subtype of the welding ultrasonic welding. This method uses mechanical vibration to form the joint. The vibrations are of high frequency. The parts to be assembled are held together under pressure between the oscillating horn and an immobile anvil and are subjected to ultrasonic vibrations of frequency 20 to 40 kilohertz at right angle to the contact area. Alternating high frequency stresses generate heat at the joint interface to produce a good quality weld. Ultrasonic welding is divided into two major groups near filled and far filled. Near filled the distance between the horn and the weld interface less than 6 millimeter whereas far filled the distance between the horn and the weld interface is greater than 6 millimeter. This is the conceptual setup diagram of ultrasonic welding the image number one where you can see that ultrasonic welding consists pneumatic piston which is connected to the transducer further connected to the controller in between the sonotrode and horn the booster is there and everything is controlled and monitored through the power supply unit. On the anvil you can see the two distinct elemental plastic material pieces are kept over here yellow and pink. This sonotrode tip and horn is going to directly contact with this plastic material jobs with the frequency with the rubbing action the heat is generated you can see in the image number two how the particularly heating zone will be visualized is like this. This is the third image example of particularly welding setup and likewise high frequency generates the heat energy and converts the solid state plastic into the plastic state plastic and under a pressure there will be a fusion and joint can be fulfilled. Ultrasonic welding advantages used in mass production because the welding time are relatively short and also applicable for both amorphous and semi crystalline thermoplastic can be used to bond dissimilar material whereas limitations horn size is limited to design constraint the process and tool must be adopted to the material to be welded applications food packaging computer components challenging and critical applications is the standard disposable butane a lighter etcetera references for this presentation are as follows thank you.


Whatever you prefer to call it, crypto, blockchain or Web 3, this new segment of the digital economy is booming across Africa. If you've been sleeping on the sector, now's a good time to wake up. According to analytics firm, chain analysis, Africa's crypto market increased in value by more than 1,200% between July 2020 and June 2021, led by especially high adoption rate in Kenya, South Africa, Nigeria and Tanzania. Africa had the third fastest growing cryptocurrency economy worldwide during that period. While the potential impact of corporate partnerships, NGOs, venture capitalists and blockchain protocols are not to be downplayed, the government remains an important actor that can stimulate or impede the emergence of Africa's Web 3 economy. Welcome to business insight and plus TV Africa, I am Justin Akadone. Before we get into the conversation of the day, here are some useful tips on how to revive a dying business. Five ways to revive a dying business. Is your business showing signs of distress or is it straight up thanking? There are simple measures you can take to bring it back from the break. Your business might be dying, but it doesn't have to mean it's over. Here are five things you can do to save your dying business and also help it thrive. One, evaluate your situation honestly. Before facetians treat a patient, they do all kinds of tests and make a diagnosis. So when you realize that your business is in serious trouble, stop. You need to take a good head look at your company to evaluate and access what's going wrong. You can't take action without knowing where to start. Second, rethink your strategy. The way you think about your failure is key to your success. After reevaluating your company, chances are you have found where you went wrong and you're ready to redefine and rethink your strategy. You have decided not to give up and you are determined to succeed. This is a great step in reviving a dying business, but it's also a hard one. Three, focus on your people. You may think that the problem is in your software, hardware or your data, but the best business are the ones that run with soul. Your most important asset are your people, your employees. When your company seems to be falling, reevaluate not just your strategy, but those who need to execute it, if necessary, get rid of those who are slowing you down and hire those who will help you revive your dying business. Four, let go of pride and fear. Rather than playing the blame game, which will get you nowhere, successful CEOs and business leaders know that admitting their faults and showing genuine humility will help rebuild and rebuke the organization. When business leaders are willing to change or stick to preconceived ideas of what they think will work, it is a recipe for disaster. And five, don't lose your passion. Now, passion is what made you start your business in the first place and it will help you to keep going. Passion may not always come with the voice of reason, but it may be the feel you need to reignite that fire. So you see, your business can actually thrive. All right, moving on, government across the continent seem to generally view cryptocurrencies with a healthy dose of skepticism. However, across the world, the new Web3 economy is giving best the myriads of opportunities and the implications for the African continent are massive. We have Rumair Dominic, certified Metivus expert joining us. Thanks for joining us on the show, Rumair. Thank you very much for having me, Jay. It is indeed our pleasure. Let's just get straight to the business of the day. How would you describe the Web3 and what excites you about it? All right, thank you very much, Jay. So talking about web theory, the one we need to actually differentiate it from all others is permissionless. And how do I mean by permissionless? So you can imagine all your content on the internet gets deleted or have you ever been in a country before and you try to assess some banking services and you could not get across to those particular banking services because you're part of the less privileged. But then there were some setting rules that actually ensured that you could not get into that place. It brings us back to the word permissionless. And you see, you can say, I said imagine if all your content gets deleted, you can say, yes, that can happen. Are you even doubt if it can happen? Okay, just imagine Donald Trump's Twitter saga. Then just also imagine that people getting their YouTube videos banned from YouTube, from Facebook and all of those things. So permissionless is actually the first word we need to think when we talk of web theory. Because web theory is the next evolution of the internet. And it is the internet of value. So when one was static and unresponsive, and you can imagine the internet as of 2000, you could only scroll. But the web 2.0 is the internet that you are used to right now, where you can like, you can comment, you can share things on the internet. But web theory, which is the next evolution of the internet? There are two key foundational things that are applicable to web theory. And that is number one, digital ownership and number two, interoperability. How do I mean by digital ownership and interoperability? So for the first time, there's actually their ability to truly own something on the internet. Digital ownership in the sense that just like you have a bar of gold underneath your pillow, or you have your international passport underneath your pillow as you are sleeping, right? But now the digital format of it, you truly have that particular type of ownership of your assets underneath your pillow. Some people might say, okay, what are the second things that enables interoperability? Interoperability is the ability for you to be able to move across one platform to another platform without permission. Okay, let's say for example, you have some content on Facebook, you have some content on YouTube, you have some content on Twitter. Now, if you have some following on Facebook, you cannot just carry those numbers that you have on Facebook and just go and use them to start on Twitter, or you just use them to start on Instagram. You need to start growing a new audience on these other different platforms. The ability for you to be able to move seamlessly from one platform to the other and be able to take all of your value, all of your assets is what we refer to as what interoperability and web theory actually enables what this particular interoperability. Because when you look at things like digital ownership, you might say, okay, maybe it's things like money that you want to own. But it actually transcends beyond owning just things like money. What if you want to own things like your certificates digitally, or you want to own your real estate digitally, web theory actually enables all of this and it has actually created a powerful new incentive mechanism for its users. Sounds very interesting. And that web theory is a community-led platform. So currently, web theory is actually enabling a lot of digital applications around Africa. What is the role that blockchain technology play in Web3? Oh, interesting. You see, that is actually one question that a lot of people confuse. Blockchain actually is an enabler of web theory. So for web theory to actually function, there are a couple of things that web theory needs, or there are some tools that web theory needs to enable its functions. Now, one of those tools that enables web theory to be able to run is token. And token can only be done on the blockchain because you need blockchains to be able to host those tokens. So the role of blockchain in web theory is in fact that it enables web theory. It ensures that web theory is able to run on decentralized platforms because blockchain is decentralized, right? And then blockchain is also able to give it transparency. Blockchain is able to give it some properties of immutability. And blockchain is also able to give it the permissionless protocol that we just said. So because of blockchain, web theory would not be possible if you do not have blockchain because blockchain is actually the key catalyst that is what's permissionless technology. So because of that particular permissionless technology, which is the blockchain, it enables web theory to try on that particular technology. Is there a difference or similarity between crypto and web 3? Yeah, it's actually foundational. Okay, let's look at it like this. Crypto is part of web theory. So when you say similarities and differences, it is part of the ecosystem. Without crypto, a lot of web theory protocols and web theory activities will not be functioning. So let's put it like this. For web theory, what are the things that are actually done with crypto in web theory? You use them to be able to raise capital. You want to have access to funding, maybe a new company on the internet and you come from a third world country and you cannot do that. Then you can be able to do what? Have access to funding that particular business idea. And how do you fund that particular business idea? In a 2022 world, you can do that using what? Cryptocurrencies. And that means that cryptocurrencies will not enable that particular concept of web theory to work to try. So it is actually intertwined, the similarities with the cryptocurrency and web theory. It is a whole ecosystem that one cannot do, that cannot do without each other. Now, cryptocurrency, you have the token side of it and you also have the non-fungible token side of it. And because web theory actually enables you to move from one particular platform to another particular platform, which is an interoperability that we just made mention of, blockchain and crypto becomes the key enabler, the key enabler for what? For web theory. So developing these skill sets in blockchain to be able to understand that particular blockchain technology first would give you a head start into what blockchain, into what web theory technologies. There is this belief that the whole essence of web theory is an effort to get everyone into cryptocurrency. How true is this? It's actually not true. The question of web theory is, it's not a function of if, it's a function of when. Just like this particular communication, before the pandemic, there's a possibility that maybe I might be in your studio right now and this is might be in your studio and having this particular interview, right? But since the particular pandemic, we've seen post-COVID practices evolve into us having this kind of interviews and it has become what? The normal. It is not actually a scheme to bring people into crypto. It is actually an evolution into the future that cannot be stopped because technology must keep evolving and the reason why players of the first world countries right now that are currently doing well with web theory technologies are doing so well is because the government of these countries actually supported policies and incentives that would ensure that these companies that are innovative towards web theory solutions, the tribe, not thinking that it is a scheme to be able to bring people into what's cryptocurrency. Let's say for example, a country like Kenya, when the mobile money M-Pesa came in, they allowed free revolution for it and that particular freedom of hands that the government gives to them ensured that mobile money payment is not very predominant in what in Kenya. When you look at an African population where you have about 70% of its population as used and then you have it raising a GDP capital of about $2.5 trillion. You can see that it is a technology that can actually scale up what we produce in the sense that connect the NFT dots now with the web theory and say African artists right now, they will be able to engage with more markets. Now you want to assess global markets because of web theory. You can assess liquid markets instantaneously without any intermediaries and then you can be able to get your ideas launched in a matter of seconds because of the web theory technology. So you can see that it is far different from just trying to incentivize people to come into cryptocurrency. It is very, very, very different from that particular conclusion. All right. Rume, so just how can Nigeria, indeed Africa, benefit from web theory? What are the opportunities really and what gaps are there to be closed in all of this? Okay. One way Nigeria can actually benefit from these opportunities is massive because it is actually able to create a lot of new jobs for the youth. Now, look at this, right? We have a great population and this is a new industry. This particular industry is also well funded. One of the major opportunities is that Nigeria or Africa as a region can create the next set of technological technocrats that would be able to power this particular type of revolution just like what we do at VRM.co. If you go online, you see that we try to bridge the knowledge gap and the skill set gap between the traditional individuals that do not know about this technology and we that know about this technology. Bringing that synergy together, we educate, we bridge that particular skill set. So we've turned ourselves into a production house. So you are looking for people that have web theory skills for today in terms of NFT, the virtual reality, augmented reality, programming, Node.js to be able to do all of those things. We have those kind of people at our beck and call that we have produced. So you can see that we are bridging the gap and now you can see that when these people that we have produced, they are working. They end in dollars, which means they end in foreign currency, which means they are adding to the GDP of the world of the country. At a point in time, the Nigerian CBN government said that if you can bring dollar into this country, they will be giving you 55,000 or more. I think the amount of dollar that is applicable for it. You can see that this particular type of incentive that are a cake is not needed. If you have a production team of web theory engineers in Africa, in Nigeria, and we are servicing the world just the same way Angela did for Facebook, they are giving raw talents to the world. Nigerian governments were ensuring that we are investing into web theory just like private individuals like us now are doing for the web theory and developing these skills. I mean, come, think of it in the next two, three years from now and you will see a booming economy where we can now call Africa a Silicon Valley or call Nigeria a Silicon Valley place. Very, very interesting, Dominic. But let me just take it one step further. Web theory and all of it, some opportunities and benefits. Can we talk about cyber security? Just how can web theory help? Interesting. Cyber security and web theory, they are very, very, very related. You see, because you are dealing with digital assets and you are dealing with digital space, you cannot under look that particular part of the cyber security. You see, there are a lot of scammers, there are a lot of bad actors on the internet. It is extremely important for you to be able to protect your digital identity online. You know, with the emergence of web theory, we have things like the metaverse, we have things like NFTs, we have cryptocurrencies, we have digital wallets. And all of this, they work in synergy to ensure that the web theory technology is what is very, very good and interactive. Now, you must ensure that you take steps to be able to protect yourself against bad actors and cyber actors online. You must ensure that you keep your private keys because your first interaction with most web theory applications will be your cryptocurrency wallets. And your cryptocurrency wallets, you must ensure you keep your private keys in a good place. You must ensure that you interact only with protocols, just because cyber security exploit us, right? That's the hackers online. They will be in some fraudulent protocol or in some malicious protocol for the smart contracts that will now say, okay, they exploit your wallet and then they are able to hack into your wallet. Remember that web theory is a function of blockchain technology and smart contracts working in synergy together. So you must ensure that you have a very good secure online security check, online security protocols while you're interacting with web theory and as we move to a future of web theory and the possibilities that are available with it. All right. We must say a very big thank you to you, Rume Dominic, for all the useful insights that you have shared. Indeed, a whole lot of Nigerians and of course, Africans have wanted to, you know, things they have taken away from all of this. I indeed have been enlightened and educated. Rume Dominic is a certified metaversum expert and he joined us to look at web theory, the new wave for Africa's digital economy. We appreciate your time, Rume. All right. That's the size of the show for this week. I am Justin Kadunil. Let's do it again next time. Bye for now.


Good afternoon all, my name is Dahio Kallig, I'm chair of the UK group in the Institute and I want to welcome you to this session with the Alliance Party. This is one of a number of webinars we've held with the parties in Northern Ireland to get their views on Brexit and in particular on the Northern Ireland protocol. Regrettably, for personal reasons, Naomi Long can't be with us this afternoon, but I'm delighted to welcome the deputy leader of the Alliance Party, Dr Stephen Farrie, who is the MP for North Down. He has a lot of experience in international affairs, a lot of experience in politics in North Down. He was a member of one stage in the executive before it fell, and he took a very strong role indeed in against Brexit and was strongly in favour of remaining in the European Union, and he has been very active in Parliament and Westminster, not least of Northern Ireland questions, trying to ensure that the pro-remain voice is still heard in Westminster and that those politicians in Northern Ireland who are opposed to what's happening by the British government on the protocol, he takes a strong stand on that, and he's one of the few voices from Northern Ireland who takes that view. This webinar is on the record. Dr Farrie will talk for maybe 20, maybe 25 minutes and then he will take questions. If you're asking a question and you have an affiliation, please let us know, and we will endeavour to have Dr Farrie answer as many questions as possible. We land at two o'clock. Dr Farrie, it's a great pleasure to welcome you to the institute and I hand it over to you. Well, thank you very much, chair, and good afternoon to all of our guests. First of all, I'll just apologise on two fronts. First for Naomi, who has had some very urgent difficult family developments this morning, so she's had to withdraw a short notice, so I'm stepping in at that short notice, so apologies for any ooms and errors as I'm sort of working my way through this from a standing start. And secondly, you may notice my voice is a little bit croaky and recovering from illness this week, so this is actually my first day back, and it's a non-COVID-19 illness, so other illnesses apparently are still available. So with that, I'll kick off. And I suppose in terms of approaching the protocol, close to the simplest thing to say at the outset is that we in the Alliance Party can be probably described as protocol pragmatists or protocol realists in the sense that we aren't particularly enthusiastic about the protocol, but we understand why it exists and why it is necessary and that we have to make the best of it. We certainly know that it brings many challenges for Northern Ireland and it's far from a perfect solution to the very particular challenges posed by Brexit, but it also provides some comparative opportunities to us as well, which we need to capitalise upon and hopefully we'll come to that in a moment. And I stress I say comparative because there's nothing compared to both the UK and Ireland being both part of the European Union, and in any situation where that was broken up, there's always going to be some degree of difficulty that's posed from that and an economic hit. This is essentially a situation where Northern Ireland is maybe in a better position, relatively speaking, to other parts of the UK, but not to the terms that it is still an economic challenge for us. That brings me to the very outset that just to briefly go through a little bit of history of this, but not to overly dwell on history, but to say obviously we approach this as a pro-European party. We've always been a pro-European, it's very much part of our DNA and that we see ourselves part of the wider European and global movement. In Northern Ireland terms, the last party is a cross-community party, so we don't take a particular stance on the constitutional question, but we will have members who have a broad range of different perspectives in that regard, but we are essentially founded around making Northern Ireland or this place, this region, wherever it will be in the future work and to build integration, promote reconciliation and to ensure people have opportunities and prosperity. So the European Union has been very important to Northern Ireland in a number of respects, obviously the economic opportunities like every other part of the European Union have been of crucial importance, but on a political level and almost in a constitutional sense as well, the European Union has been extraordinarily helpful and the fact that both the UK and Ireland were part of the European Union essentially allowed the Good Friday Agreement to proceed and to be successful in the sense that it allowed borders to essentially wither away and that provided a very important context to the Good Friday Agreement. A lot of people may accurately say that the European Union is barely referenced inside the document on the actual pages. It is very much in the background context to the peace process and to the agreement itself and in essence it has respected and reflected that Northern Ireland is still a divided society where a contested space in the sense that there's a overarching constitutional question and the only way which Northern Ireland can work is through sharing and interdependence. So Northern Ireland benefited from the three-stranded approach to the Good Friday Agreement, the internal power sharing, the North-South cooperation on the islands and the East-West collaboration inside the context of the UK but also including Ireland as well in a much broader framework and all three of those legs of the stew that stood in harmony with each other but it was that development of the single market and the further consolidation of the customs union that allowed borders to essentially disappear in that context and it allowed essentially what is the the the fund that the trade-off inside the agreement to bed down where Irish nationalism in the broader sense formally recognised Northern Ireland as an entity for the first time within the Good Friday Agreement but there was a very important quid pro quo in the sense that the Irish nationalist identity was recognised and that there was that freedom on the islands to to do many many things without really any inhibitation and that was of crucial importance to allowing things to develop. Obviously our peace process has been so we say 30 fraughts even with over the past 20 years even before we got to the context of Brexit through many difficulties around identity issues around preeds, flags, how we deal with the legacy of the past, various differences between the political parties over things like language rights but things did more or less stumble through in the main but it is a fair criticism to say that we've put a lot more in terms of building reconciliation and providing an integrated society so that the full potential of the Good Friday Agreement has not yet been fully realised along comes Brexit up until now obviously both the UK and Ireland moved in harmony in relation to the relationship with the European Union and even in terms of something like Schengen we're both staying out at the same time obviously both within the Single Market Customs Union the EU itself at the same time but Brexit itself was the great disruptor in all of this and the fundamental difficulty posed is that Brexit was trying to provide a very simplistic populist solution, a black and white solution into a society such as Northern Ireland that up until now has only really survived through various shades of grey and indeed some some constructive ambiguities and the notion that a Brexit, a particular a hard Brexit which obviously must entail some degree of an economic interface or a border if you want to call it that wouldn't cause disruption was always going to be misplaced and we've been wrestling with that conundrum ever since as to exactly where that line on the map was going to be drawn we would have much preferred a situation where there never needed to be any line on the map drawn anywhere in these islands or any hardening of any existing line on the map but that is the consequence of the decision around Brexit and that does bring some very profound political economic and social implications and may in turn provide some fairly serious constitutional implications as well and we've been wrestling with those problems ever since 2016 I mean our party initially was running a almost like a three-stranded approach in terms of a hierarchy of responses and our first preference was that we would reconsider Brexit in its entirety let the people of the UK take the opportunity to reconsider if they seriously did want to do Brexit particularly in light of some of the developing situations that we've seen since 2016 that never really got much traction unfortunately the second option was to for the whole UK to work closely aligned with the Singapore customs union again that was sadly rejected so we were in then to a special deal for for Northern Ireland whether it was called the backstop or the the data version of the protocol there was always going to be what I need for that special arrangement for Northern Ireland once all other options were essentially ruled out of off the table due to the decisions taken by the Conservative government and for for many years they're at their allies in the DUP so we approached the protocol in the sense that we didn't want it to happen but we recognize why it exists and why it needs to be there but in essence and in saying that we also recognize that if you had to make a choice not that we wanted to make a choice the only realistic and viable place where you could manage the interface in these islands was going to be down the RAC not across the land border you're talking essentially a choice between seven RNC crossings versus over 250 land crossings you're talking about a far greater volume of move a number of movements on the island compared to what happens across the RAC and in all circumstances the only place in which you could ever do the the SPS IQ food checks was going to be down the RAC anyway because the precedent had already been set in terms of the movement of farm vehicles and live animals previously anyway and there's no prospect of treating the island of Ireland as separate animal health zones in any event so that was probably the absolute clean assurance it's noticeable that they do something like shine or sing them who's one of the the so-called intellectual golf managers of Brexit even he recognizes that when it comes to SPS interface the only place that could happen is down the RAC so in terms of where we go from from here we essentially want to turn the protocol as much as possible from a solid line down the RAC into a dotted line with as few dots as we possibly can and in parallel we then want to see action taken to ensure that we fully capitalise upon the opportunities that are posed to us by by brexit um the or sorry by the protocol not the predator to correct yourself on that one um the probably the signature suggestion that we have made over the past 12 months and it's something we're going to renew over the coming weeks is that there should be a UK EU veterinary agreement we think that the the trade and cooperation agreement itself is obviously a zero tariff zero quota deal but in terms of non non-tariff barriers it actually is a fairly minimal agreement and we have seen a situation because the UK is determined to have this fiction of its its own sovereignty and directory autonomy where they didn't go down the line of having a effective agreement as part of the trade and cooperation agreement we see that as a major oversight and first of all it penalizes all UK and the food exporters into the European Union and we'll probably see more and more evidence over the coming weeks that also inhibits um EU um exporters into the UK as well so in terms of the wider picture this is something that we believe is a is a necessity but in terms of the RAC interface um where there is the will to try to eliminate veterinary checks as much as we possibly can through some sort of a spoke arrangement um ultimately the cleanest way of doing this is through a veterinary agreement um and it is absurd that the UK um is more or less adhering to the exact same standards as the European Union but is forgoing the opportunity to have that formally recognized as part of an agreement and in essence it's punishing itself as a whole but also creating huge difficulties down in the RAC as a consequence of that and so we see that as being a major uh gap that does need to be addressed and we hope probably more and hope than expectation we think that the the new incumbent to this trust uh take who's taken over from a different frost um should take the opportunity to have a reconsideration of that and even if they end up putting in place only a temporary agreement for a couple of years that at the very least will buy us some time to consider whether we can develop a more workable the spoke option just for the RAC situation. What we do have the problem at the UK is determined to try to develop as many free trade agreements with the rest of the world to try to slowly compensate for what's lost with the European Union and once they maintain this regulatory freedom to do those with as much freedom as they can though with effective agreement they can still make a number of deals anyway so it wouldn't entirely be mutually exclusive. Also we very much welcome what happened in terms of the breakthrough in medicines before Christmas that's something we've been working on very strongly over the past number number of years the first one in calling for the greatest period itself and then calling for a bespoke solution. In that regard we have always recognized the European Union were determined to reach a solution on that issue and they weren't going to allow themselves to be painted under a corner on that very particular point. The third issue I want to highlight is around governance which is perhaps an area that hasn't really got as much attention in the negotiations at present compared to some other issues and by that I don't mean the issue around the European Court of Justice which is very much a red herring that hasn't really been an issue for any local stakeholders here in Northern Ireland but was more of an issue for David Frost and Brexit extremists and that some sort of outlawed at 19th century version of sovereignty but even then we've seen the British government softening its position in the past few weeks which is welcoming that regard but what I do mean is around this issue as to how Northern Ireland elected representatives can have some consultant of input to the development of EU law in relation to areas of the of the key that will apply to Northern Ireland. We recognize that there is no perfect solution in this regard as Northern Ireland is outside the European Union and that there are limitations from in terms of what the EU think is possible and also perhaps more significantly we're seeing a problem with the UK acting as a key keeper wanting to be the vehicle for discussions with the European Commission rather than Northern Ireland having its own voice in that regard but we feel that the proposals in terms of seats for Northern Ireland in terms of joint committees and joint assault of working groups and sort of hyper super consultation exercises probably don't go far enough in terms of addressing that particular issue and I think it's one of the areas if you are saying that the protocol been betting in that we need to have some more formal means of addressing that democratic deficit so we can actually give the protocol legitimacy in terms of just to conclude with this chair in terms of the bigger picture in terms of the politics of where we we now are on this one I think things can go in two ways we have two potential futures ahead of us one is where we bed down the issues around the protocol we sort out the issues and the negotiations over the coming weeks and the protocol may provide a workable means for the foreseeable future for Northern Ireland devolution to be successful for Northern Ireland to benefit from access to the signal market for goods and also to benefit from its wider membership in the EU or sort of the UK economic area and it provides a very observable physical stability and as an aside from that the way unionism has reacted against the protocol in such vociferous terms and turned what could have been portrayed initially as an economic irritant turned that into a constitutional crisis it's been incredibly short-sighted and in the sense that if I was a unionist I would say that the protocol isn't exactly where we wanted to be but it provides a means for managing the Brexit that we wanted in relation to to to Northern Ireland and our job is to make this to make it work and this brings into the to the second scenario if we see a situation where the DUP pull out of the assembly over the coming weeks or even if the assembly limps on and there's another standoff after the the assembly election if we see a situation where the UK government continue to play some very irresponsible politics around Brexit and use Northern Ireland as their play thing in that regard and that includes a reckless triggering of article 16 which is not justified whatsoever in terms of our viewpoint in the sense that this essentially provides further negotiations but in a much more unstable environment and that will that will lead to a much more uncertain situation for Northern Ireland so unpacking the protocol in a vacuum could see the assembly unravel and it will also shall we say fuel the current constitutional debate ever further in the sense that while obviously people had their own different constitutional aspirations prior to 2016 the constitutional question was largely parked in Northern Ireland in terms of being an active political debate it wasn't something people thought was going to be a life issue for for many years that has been changed dramatically in the past few years largely fueled by the protocol fueled by Brexit and also the standoff around Irish language and the assembly and other some other issues so if we see further instability and if we see a situation where more and more people are led to give up on the on the notion of Northern Ireland that will lead more and more people thinking about constitutional change and there's nothing wrong with that whatsoever people take to their viewpoints in that respect but to our party point of view constitutional change is better considered and if it was ever was to happen to better to happen in the context of stable political structures in in Northern Ireland rather than something that's fairly chaotic and uncertain so the danger here is that if we see people playing fast and loose with the protocol and and Northern Ireland either from the DEP or the UK government we could see a very uncertain remainder of this year and a very uncertain few years and beyond as well so in that sense I would just conclude by saying that the next few weeks therefore I'm going to be very critical and the the consequences of getting this wrong are severe but the price if we can get this right in terms of landing the various aspects that are still causing contention could be very significant for a flourishing Northern Ireland over the years ahead so are there any other thoughts here Chair thank you very much


The Tarabah State Governor, Bukifas, has approved the celebration of the historical Wanyo International Fishing and Cultural Festival in Ibiloko government area of Tarabah State 14 years after it was last held. The Commissioner of Ministry of Heritage and Equatorism Reverend Nagombe Joseph Titus says the occasion was last celebrated in 2010 by the former governor of the state, Dambaba Suntai, adding that the governor has set up community to oversee the success of the occasion. He added that the governor, Kefas, has guaranteed the safety of participants in order for the public to have a peaceful global occasion and also use the platform to attract foreign investors to the state. According to him, the occasion reminds the people of the state and indeed Nigerians of the rich cultural heritage of the state, unity of the people and above all the tourism potential that abound in the state. It may please the people of Tarabah State to note that the governor of Tarabah State, Dr. Abu Kefas, has approved 19 and 20 April 2024 for the people of Tarabah State, Nigeria and the international communities to join us and celebrate the historic Wanyo International Fishing and Cultural Festival in Tarabah State, in Ibiloko government area of Tarabah State, Nigeria. Wanyo International Fishing and Cultural Festival was last celebrated in 2010 over 14 years during Governor Dambaba, Dambaba Suntai administration. The Wanyo International Fishing and Cultural Festival is one of the biggest fishing and cultural festivals in the entire West Africa region. Revolving the Wanyo International Fishing and Cultural Festival is one of the greatest guests of His Excellency, Dr. Abu Kefas administration. This occasion reminds the people of Tarabah State of Nigeria, the cultural heritage, unity and tourism potentials of the state, the government of His Excellency, Dr. Abu Kefas and guarantee the security of the participants and the environs in order for the public to have a peaceful global occasion.


Today is Friday, the fifth day of the first week of the COP. It's the last day for the technical negotiations. They're supposed to be rounded up today and tomorrow in order for the ministers coming in on Monday morning to finalize things. But as typically happens in the COP, almost nothing gets resolved in the first week. Difficult issues get thrown up to the ministers and it looks like that is what might happen. I'm going to spend this video log talking about one particular issue that I follow. It's called loss and damage and it has both a long and a short history in the UNFCC process. The long history is that from the very beginning of the UNFCC we have heard from some of the most vulnerable island states in particular about the need to address potentially catastrophic losses and damages which we won't be able to prevent or we won't be able to adapt to. The rich countries, the annex one countries have fought this tooth and nail. It has been a taboo subject for them. For 19 years they fought it. They didn't allow it to happen. Until last year in Warsaw at the 19th Conference of Parties the developing countries got together and formed a very strong coalition led by small island states along with the least developed countries and the African countries and all the other G77 countries very strongly aligned and pushed for this issue to be finally recognized. And they got most of what they wanted which was to recognize it and allow it to be discussed in a separate mechanism which is now called the Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage. It has its own executive committee. It started with an interim executive committee. It will go on to a full executive committee. It has a two-year work plan that goes over COP 20 in Lima, goes over COP 21 in Paris and lands in COP 22 in December 2016 possibly in Marrakesh in Morocco. The interim executive committee has come up with a work plan that's being presented for endorsement here in Lima by the COP. COP is discussing it. There are two contentious issues. One is some countries are not happy with the work plan and want to open it up. The other one is the contention about how to set up the permanent executive committee. There are various formulations and suggestions for that. They're still discussing it. They will talk about it later tonight. They'll talk about it again tomorrow. If they can't resolve it at the negotiators level then unfortunately it will have to go to the ministers next week and we shall see what happens. That's with regard to the Warsaw International Mechanism. There is another issue here which is should Loss and Damage be recognized within the Lima text for Paris next year? Again, very contentious. Developing countries want it to be in there. Developed countries don't. Again, there is no agreement on it yet. We shall see what happens at the end of this week and then what the ministers do with it next week. This is something that is still on the table and remains to be seen but the result will be.