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This webpage updated 11 November 2012 - (This is the last page of this series)

You can find much greater detail for the timeframes 1550-1700 at a new website now almost finished ... THE BUSINESS OF SLAVERY... a website book also designed to bring genealogical studies up-to-date from 1530 to the present-day... as well as questions of merchant lives and activities... Click now to... The Business of Slavery (in English history).

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Merchants and Bankers
2009-2010++

Trade - an international perspective

This Merchants and Bankers Listings website is years old and is now (from 2009) undergoing a marked identity change. Its timeline material on economic history (for 1560-1930) is being moved to a website managed by Ken Cozens and Dan Byrnes, The Merchant Networks Project. This will empty many of this website's pages which have always been in series. In due course, Merchants and Bankers Listings will carry information from the Crusades on the early development of what became “capitalism” in Europe to 1560 or so. As well as a conglomeration of data on modern developments, mostly on modern/technical industry, computing, and for the future, today's climate change problems. The editor's view is that in the context of climate change, the views of Merchants and Bankers (and Economists, politicians), the keepers of matters economic, are due for a considerable shake-up. If this website can encourage the shake-up, and help inform it reliably, well and good. -Ed

The Merchant Networks Project

	The history websites on this domain now have a companion website on a new domain, at Merchant Networks Project produced by Dan Byrnes and Ken Cozens (of London). This website (it is hoped) will become a major exercise in economic and maritime history, with some attention to Sydney, Australia.

Pessimism about Copenhagen for Christmas

PayPal - safe and secure

If you value the information posted here, and the projects of these websites in general, you may like to consider making a donation to help reduce our production costs? It would be greatly appreciated. Options include: paying via PayPal which this website uses - Ed

This website happens to feel by Christmas 2009 that the Copenhagen meeting held for world leaders regarding climate change issues/global warming was a shambles, a shemozzle and regrettably, probably the model for the future. It seems that the best the world is going to get is a patchwork quilt of badly-thought-out reactions to the issues. It seems, the world was simply not ready for any such meeting. Whether the world should have been ready is exactly the question. -Ed

Russian hackers "stole from US banks": FBI in the USA is investigating the activities of a notorious Russian computer hacker gang (Russian Business Network) amid accusations the gang has stolen tens of millions from US banks, according to Wall Street Journal. The gang has long been active in identity theft, fraud, spam and child pornography. Citigroup is supposedly one of the gang's victims but has denied such reports. (Reported 23-24 December 2009 from Guardian News)

Future by 2010?: HIV epidemic in China tipped to engulf 10 million. (Reported in Australia 21 September 2002)

2010+?: Prediction: From British physicist Stephen Hawking: The human race may be wiped out by a doomsday virus before the millennium (3000AD) is out, unless humanity sets up colonies in space: (Reported 17 October 2001).

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2010: Starvation in Urban Asia: By 2010, when half of the population of Asia/South East Asia lives in cities, hunger in Asia is predicted to be mainly an urban phenomenon, according to UN analysts. Asian states will need to boost food production significantly, it's said. (Reported from Bangkok by 9 December 2000)

June 2011: Chaos feared if Greeks choose to exit the euro. The European Union, European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund are negotiating hard about how to structure debt relief for the Greek economy. Latest reports suggest they might have come up with a temporary deal among themselves. But what the EU, ECB and IMF want will not matter unless they get the Greek government to play as well, which is not assured at all. Greeks are protesting austerity measures and wonder if there are not easier ways out of their dilemmas. On the article goes, comparing the 2002 situation of the Argentine economy. And basically, it seems, the problems of the Greek economy could spread through the EU. Greece remains with the euro as a currency only because of loans. If it bails out of the euro, when then? Europe seems very worried about the situation. (Item, Wall Street Journal in w/e Australian, 18-19 June, 2011.)

2010 and later: Prediction: From Dr Peter Adler, "There is no doubt that the big international disputes of the next 50 years, particularly in nations such as Africa, will be over increasingly depleted natural resources such as water. How we manage and distribute our natural resources will, in the future, determine our quality of life."
Dr Adler is an Hawaii-based expert in the field of environmental and natural resources dispute resolution. He is affiliate Professor of Urban and Regional Planning at University of Hawaii.

2010 is the year set in China by forestry administration as target date for halting "the shifting sands of Longbaoshan". Some 70km north of Beijing, the area is in the path of advancing desert. (Reported 17 June 2000)

2010: NASA in the US is reported in early 2000 to have projected a more concerted SETI search in space - is there any entity out there?

2010: Predictions: The Aral Sea in Central Asia may dry up entirely by now. Due to a large irrigation scheme for cotton gone wrong; where pesticide residues for the cotton are let into the sea by water, and as the sea dries, the pesticides now poison part of the population. (The world's fourth largest inland sea. Australian TV news, 9 May 2001)

24 December, 2011: According to standard interpretations of the "Long Count" of the Mayan Calendar, the world will now end. (James/Thorpe, p. 491) (Bye bye)

2012: About 40 per cent of the world's coral reefs will be dead by about 2012. By 2030, another 20 per cent will die. According to Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network (speaking in mid-2001). By 2001, some 27 per cent of coral reefs are already dead. There is an irrevocable loss of 11 per cent of coral reefs. The world-wide coral-bleaching phenomenon of 1998 was also destructive. The Indian Ocean is particularly at risk. See: Al Gore (former US vice-president), his Foreword to report, Status of Coral Reefs of the World: 2000:
(From The Australian Magazine, 12-13 May 2001)

2014: Burma and drugs: Burma's Foreign Minister, Win Aung, claims lately that his country, which is a massive producer of heroin and amphetamine-type stimulants, could eliminate its narcotics problem by 2014 - one year inside the target date set by the Association of South-East Asian Nations to rid the region of drugs. Mr Win Aung devoted his entire speech at yesterday's ASEAN (13-nations including Australia) post-ministerial conference to a wide-scale defence of the Burmese Government's so-far much-criticised efforts to combat the drug trades within its borders. He has claimed that cultivation of opium has fallen from 151,200 acres in 1997-1998 to only 90,437 acres in 1999-2000. A 15-year plan is in place to totally eliminate the cultivation, production and abuse of narcotics by 2014. (Reported 29 July 2000)

2015: Prediction of April 2003: By 2015, the population of Tokyo will be 26.4 million.

2015: Prediction of October 2003 that cites Lagos and Cairo will be the first African cities to become megacities, that is, with a population of more than 10 million.

2015 predictions: A US study aimed at predicting global trends by 2015 had found that it is almost impossible to predict what kind of nation China will become. The study was conducted by US National Intelligence Council (NIC), titled, Global Trends 2015. (Reported 23 December 2000)

2020: Alignment of the planets happens this year: prediction.

Sickness in 2020: By the year 2020, non-communicable diseases are expected to account for seven out of every ten deaths in the developing regions compared with less than half today. Source: The Global Burden of Disease, Harvard University Press, 1996. Some experts claim that "by 2010, 66 million fewer people [will be alive] in the 23 countries with the most severe [AIDS] epidemics. Source: Confronting AIDS: Evidence from the Developing World, a report of the European Commission and the World Bank.

Worry re New Millennium Message: What Does The Future Hold For You?
From the Jehovah's Witnesses at Lost Worlds' own front door, during December 2000. Yes, we are visited too by these God-botherers!
Gee, just consider here the immense scope of just a few of the problems we humans face.
Pollution: Industrialized lands are "causing environmental damage on a global scale and widespread pollution and disruption of ecosystems". If present trends continue, "the natural environment will be increasingly stressed". From Global Environment Outlook, 2000, UN Environment Program
Sickness: By the year 2020, non-communicable diseases are expected to account for seven out of every ten deaths in the developing regions compared with less than half today. Source: The Global Burden of Disease, Harvard University Press, 1996. Some experts claim that "by 2010, 66 million fewer people [will be alive] in the 23 countries with the most severe [AIDS] epidemics. Source: Confronting AIDS: Evidence from the Developing World, a report of the European Commission and the World Bank.
Poverty: "Nearly 1.3 billion people live on less than a dollar a day, and close to one billion cannot meet their basic consumption requirements". Source: Human Development Report 1999, United Nations Development Program
War: "Violence within [various lands] could reach unprecedented levels... generated by ethnic, tribal and religious [divisions]... such violence will form ... the most common type of conflict in the next quarter century... killing hundreds of thousands each year". Source: New World Coming: American Security in the 21st Century, US Commission on National Security/21st Century.

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By 2020: A billion people worldwide will be aged over 60. (From a magazine).

Wars by 2020?: "Violence within [various lands] could reach unprecedented levels... generated by ethnic, tribal and religious [divisions]... such violence will form ... the most common type of conflict in the next quarter century... killing hundreds of thousands each year". Source: New World Coming: American Security in the 21st Century, US Commission on National Security/21st Century.

From New Millennium Message: What Does The Future Hold For You?
- from the Jehovah's Witnesses at Lost Worlds' own front door, December 2000:
(Ever noticed that Christian fundamentalists are always discussing wars and rumour of wars, as they fear from reading The Book of the Apocalypse, while the fact is, anyway, there are always, all the time, independent of one's preferred ideology, somewhere in the world, wars and rumours of wars... ? More fool, humanity? -Ed)

2025: Australian population is predicted in mid-2000 to reach 25 million, though the population might also be contracting.

Prediction for November 2026: End of the World scenario? In the 1960s, commentators on population projections (Heinz von Foerster and colleagues) in the journal Science predicted an end of the world scenario due to excess population, by, say November 2026. (Reported by The Sunday Telegraph, Sydney, on 30 June 2002 in Science column by Graham Phillips).

2030: Climate change now threatens China's food supply: Global warming will cut China's annual grain harvest by up to 10 per cent (some 30-50 million tonnes of grain), placing extra demands on the country's shrinking farmland and threatening its notion of food security, according to head of State Meteorological Administration, Zheng Guogang, speaking to an agricultural forum. Meaning, China would need an extra 10 million hectares of farmland by 2030. Fighting new insect pests and disease would be more expensive. Ground water evaporation will probably increase, making any drought conditions worse. China had exceeded its likely quota of available arable land by the end of 2006, some 120 million hectares or more. Increasing urbanisation in China has been chewing up arable land, as well (8 million hectares have been lost to cities since 1966). Rainfall may drop 10-30 per cent. Corn and rice production will suffer more than wheat production. Glacial sources for some of China's rivers have been shrinking. And weaker winter harvests may means extra risks of inflation. (Reported Sydney Morning Herald, 24 August 2007)

2030: Humanity will make contact with intelligent life on other planets by 2030. According to noted sci-fi writer, Arthur C. Clarke, reported on 30 December 2000.
(Incidentally, here is "Clarke's Law" on technology: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic".)

2030: Australia by March 2007 produces about 217,000 gigawatt hours of electricity per years. By 2030, Australia will need about 360,00-gigawatt hours annually, an increase of 67 per cent. The 2007 value of the Australian energy supply business is about $110 billion and about $100 billion in future extra investment will be required. Governments will be needing to apply a stable regulatory environment, is 2007 thinking, in terms of planning, building, development timing, locations, fuel-type and size of power-generation units. According to Energy Supply Association Australia, which wants to see a national policy pitched at 2050. (Weekend Australian, Special report on Climate Change, 24-25 March 2007)

2030, approx: Predictions by 2000 that in Australia, social life will be dominated by the older generation, Seniors. Seniors will control money and investments, marketing to Seniors will be a product of the baby-boomer generation for the baby-boomer generation. Younger generations, tremble.

2030: Population: Two billion more Third World People are predicted to present themselves by 2030. (Boston Globe, 4 August, 1994)

2040: Arctic ice to be gone by 2040 say scientists: From San Francisco is a report that global warming will melt the Arctic's during summer by as early as 2040. This will have serious environmental, commercial and strategic outcomes, say scientists at US National Snow and Ice Data Centre at University of Colorado in Boulder. There may well be a slow but steady decline of Arctic ice (as measured September-to-September), with a “dramatic tipping point” arising about 2020-2025, after which ice will retreat four times faster than previously. Supercomputers have been used for modelling work on the problem. By about 2040, perennial ice would only be found on the north coasts of Greenland and Canada.. The mode of opening new shipping routes will benefit Canada and Russia, but wildlife will presumably suffer. (Sydney Morning Herald, 13 December 2006, see recent issue of journal, Geophysical Research Letters)

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2042: Projection on population of Australia for 2042 is 25 million. In 2002 the Australian population was 19.6 million.

By 2050 - In July 1999, UN reaffirmed idea to bring world population growth to a halt by year 2050. On population generally, and while estimates vary, we find the following: Humanity arose about 100,000-50,000 years ago. When people were hunter-gatherers, the world population was possibly about 10 million. About the time of Jesus, world population was around 300 million. It took until about 1800 for world population to reach one billion, 1930 for two billion, 1960 for three billion, 1974 for four billion. By about 2000, population was 6.1 billion. Seven billion may be reached around 2012. It is estimated by Carl Haub, a demographer at Population Reference Bureau in Washington DC that to 2000, about 106 billion people have been born.

Year 2050 Prediction: An Australian research station has been involved in research which suggests that the hole in the ozone layer might disappear by 2050. (Reported in The Australian newspaper, 5 December 2000)

2050: Australia's Great Barrier Reef at risk: By 2050, the Barrier Reef will lose most of its coral cover. Tourism and fishing industries will suffer greatly. The prediction comes from researchers on coral bleaching at Centre for Marine Studies, Queensland University, Professor Hoegh-Guldberg and his economist father, Hans. Loss of coral could cost the economy AUD$8 billion and more than 12,000 jobs even by 2020. Seafood will have to come from aquaculture, not fishing. (Sydney Morning Herald, 21-22 February, 2004)

UK by 2050: Blair unveils Britain's 2050 vision on climate change. The British government has proposed mandatory reductions in carbon emissions (by 60 per cent as comparing 1990 levels to 2050), taking the lead in Europe's efforts to slow the pace of global climate change. It is proposed to conduct five-year "carbon budgets" with their outcomes being reviewed annually. Blair and his government hope their Bill will become law by 2008. Wide topics discussed in related matters in Britain include more investment in renewable energy sources, encouragement of new fuel technologies, rafts of taxes, fines on polluting industries and new manufacturing standards (as for light bulbs, and more reduction of energy-use via better standby functions for electronic equipment). (Sydney Morning Herald, 15 March 2007)

By 2050, India will begin to overtake population of China, India to then have population of 1.5 billion. As predicted by 2000.

Year 2050? - On 19 May 2004: At a Sydney Futures Forum, Australian author Tim Flannery warns that Australia is to see "devastating environmental change" and "possibly ghost cities". Perth in Western Australia especially may face a lack of water. Flannery is the author of a book on the impact of humans on Australia, The Future Eaters.

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Future?: The world is aging so fast that the elderly will soon outnumber the young for the first time by mid-century (2050?) with profound implications for financial and labour markets as well as politicians, says the UN Nations Population Division. (Reported 2 March 2002)

Year 2050: ....changes will affect a world population expected to increase from about 6 billion people today to about 9 to 10 billion by 2050. In spite of technological changes, most of the world's people will continue to be subsistence or small-scale market agriculturalists, who are similarly vulnerable to climatic fluctuations as were the late prehistoric/early historic societies. Furthermore, in an increasingly-crowded world, habitat-tracking as an adaptive response will not be an option.
(From a website reviewing book on climate change by H. H.(From a website reviewing book on climate change by H. H. Lamb, Climate History and the Modern World.):

By Year 2051, the population of Australia could be 28 million, it is predicted by 26 January 2002, when the population is currently 19,157,000.

Year 2050: Pakistan by 2050 will be world's third-most-populous nation, with about 350 million people.

Saving the earth can't be left up to God, the faithful are warned: A consortium of religious leaders in Australia has formed to issue a statement (named Common Belief) on spiritual duties and attitudes that the faithful should adopt in terms of environmental challenges. However, Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, Dr George Pell, has refrained from comment, though he has earlier said that “pagan emptiness” and Western fears of the uncontrollable forces of nature were leading to “hysteric and extreme claims” about global warming. Anglican bishop of Canberra and Goulbourn, George Browning, said, “If Christians believe in Jesus they must recognise that concern for climate change is not an optional extra but a core matter of faith.” ... the church's commitment to eradicate poverty was an empty dream without address of questions of climate change. Bishop Browning added in the practical area, for less reliance on heating and air-conditioning, use of energy-saving lights, use of rain tanks and grey water systems. The more general message for Christians is that they should become responsible stewards of God's creation and quickly tackle relevant questions of environmental care. Almost by definition, Christians are answerable to God for the way their actions will affect future generations. The groups concerned are Australian Evangelical Alliance and Australian Christian Lobby in association with the Climate Institute, and are Anglican, Greek Orthodox, Baptist, Salvation Army, Lutheran, Catholic, Uniting Church, plus Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Jews. (Reported Sydney Morning Herald, 5 December 2006)

About Year 2090: Climatologists predict global warming of between 1.5C and 5.9C this century, with the effects most severe in Russia, where Moscow by late July 2001 was experiencing a heatwave involving the deaths of 1000 Russians and Ukrainians (many of them also drunk) trying to find comfort in pools, river and lakes.

Year 2100: Sea levels to rise?: Sea levels may rise by 50cm during the next century, according to a report in Australia of 5 May, 2000. The prediction comes from ice dynamics researcher David Vaughan of the British Antarctic Survey, who has been examining Antarctic ice sheets. He says: 70 per cent of the world's fresh water is stored in the Antarctic ice sheet, the potential for rising sea levels is "massive", sea levels have risen by tens of metres in the past 10,000 years, modifying land masses. It is difficult to know if the Antarctic ice sheet is in a state of equilibrium, or not. It may still be reacting to events associated with the end of the last Ice Age.

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About Year 2100: By the end of the century up to two-fifths of the land surface of the Earth will have a hotter climate, unlike anything that now exists, a study of global warming predicts. At worst, the current climatic conditions on another 48 per cent of the land surface - including southeast Australia - would no longer exist on the planet. Some of the biggest losers regionally will probably be the tropical Andes, some parts of highland  Africa, south-east Australia, parts of the Himalayas and the Arctic. Biodiversity hotspots such as the Amazonian and Indonesian rainforests will be in severe trouble. Species will have pressure to adapt or become extinct. Perhaps one million species will be affected if not rendered extinct. In the interim, some species seem to be shifting to the poles at about six kilometres distance per year. (Sydney Morning Herald, 28 March 2007)

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- Dan Byrnes (otherwise indicated in these pages as -Editor)

Note: You will find even greater detail than is given here, for specific periods in American - English - Australian history, with regard to merchants, traders, bankers and financiers, as part of the website, The Blackheath Connection...

Stop Press: For late entries

1994: The Alliance of Small Island States - many of whom fear they will disappear beneath the waves as sea levels rise - adopt a demand for 20 per cent cuts in emissions by the year 2005. This, they say, will cap sea-level rise at 20 centimetres. (Greenhouse Timeline)

Below are items still uncollected

1970: A Boeing 747 Jumbo jet arrives at London's Heathrow Airport after its first proving flight from New York.

1938: Kuwait: First oil discovery in Kuwait, on the Arabian Peninsula.

1970: A new constitution is adopted in Rhodesia, turning the country (Zimbabwe) into a republic.

1949: Captain James Gallagher completes the first non-stop around-the-world flight. He completed the 37,742 flight in 94 hours one minute in a B-50 Superforte plane.

Merchants: 1905: South Africa: The world's largest diamond, the Cullinan, is discovered near Pretoria, South Africa, weighing in at 3106 carats.

1948: USA: NBC-TV begins airing its first nightly newscast.

1959: Fidel Castro is sworn in an prime minister of Cuba after leading a guerilla campaign that ousts right-wing dictator, Fulgencio Batista on 1 January. (By 2005, Castro is still at the helm of Cuba!)

1968: USA: The USA inaugurates its first 911 emergency telephone system in Haleyville, Alabama.

1970: Soviet Russia: Moscow says Arab nations will receive “necessary support:” from the Soviet Union in their dispute(s) with Israel.

1978: Japan and China sign US$20 billion trade pact in Beijing.

1931: India: Mahatma Ghandi is released from prison and to hold talks with government, all part of his campaign of civil disobedience.

1965: Vietnam: The military seizes power in South Vietnam, ousting the civilian government of Tran Van Huong.

2001: India: An earthquake measuring 7.7 on the Richter Scale strikes the western Indian state of Gujarat, killing 18,000 people.

1942: Japanese submarine shells an oil refinery near Santa Babara, California, USA.

Empire, 1970: Indian-Pacific Train between Sydney and Perth makes its first run.

1981: Spain: Attempted coup begins in Spain as 200 members of the Civil Guard invade Parliament, taking lawmakers hostage, an attempt that last only 18 hours and then collapses.

Haydn Washington and John Cook, Climate Change Denial. Earthscan, 2011, 174pp. (A handbook, or is that a cookbook, of information on how and why to counter the usual and often fraudulent arguments of climate change deniers. By scientists, of course)

Curt Stager, Deep Future: The Next 100,000 Years on Earth. Scribe, 2011, 284pp.

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