Women and girls may be lured into prostitution by adverts placed in Jobcentres, MPs were warned today. A charity which helps females rescued from the sex trade said the Government was acting as a 'pimp' by accepting ads for strippers, escort girls, lap dancers and adult show hostesses.

Director of the Poppy Project, Denise Marshall, told the Commons' Home Affairs Select Committee: "Because no-one is monitoring it, you don't know who is using it, and when you are offering £20 an hour to be a webcam stripper to a 17-year-old, the chances are they may be naïve," she said. Outside the hearing, Ms Marshall said: "It's the Government as pimp. It's just dreadful. The jobs included stripper, webcam stripper, adult show hostess, lap dancing and work with an escort agency. I'm appalled that the Government is giving women entree into the commercial sex industry."

THE DWP INSISTED THAT IT WAS LEGALLY OBLIGED TO CARRY THE VACANCIES AFTER A TEST CASE BROUGHT BY THE ANN SUMMER SEX SHOP CHAIN IN 2003. A HIGH COURT JUDGE RULED THAT JOBCENTRES MUST CARRY ADVERTISEMENTS FOR LEGAL WORK IN THE "SEX AND PERSONAL-SERVICES INDUSTRIES".

Global fertilizer demand is rising 5 percent a year, LEAVING A 1.2 MILLION-TON POTASH-PRODUCTION SHORTFALL. THE GAP MAY LAST UNTIL 2012, according to Uralkali. Fertilizers using potash, the common name for potassium chloride, improve crop yield as they help plants absorb nitrogen, use water and sunlight more efficiently and fight insects and disease.

The shortage is adding to a food crisis of "emergency proportions," United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said April 14. GRAIN STOCKPILES FELL TO ABOUT 53 DAYS' WORTH LAST YEAR, THE LOWEST LEVEL SINCE RECORD-KEEPING BEGAN IN 1960.

The price of rice, the food staple for half the world, has more than doubled in a year as China, Vietnam and Egypt curbed sales to safeguard domestic reserves. Meat consumption is rising as incomes increase in emerging markets, boosting demand for feed grains.

Mariann Fischer Boel, the agriculture commissioner, released figures showing that the cost of many staples had gone up by more than the value of basic commodities used to make them. Bread increased 10 per cent between February 2007 and 2008, while the near-doubling of the price of wheat should have led to only a 3 per cent rise, the Commission said.

"Energy, transport and labour costs have risen. But it is possible that somewhere along the food chain someone may be doing well out of this. WE ARE NOT DRAWING CONCLUSIONS; WE ARE JUST PRESENTING FACTS."

Milk and cheese increased by a third and eggs by 17 per cent over the same period. That should have led to a 12 per cent rise in supermarkets, but the increase was 15 per cent. The price of cooking oils and fat were up 12 per cent rather than the 8 per cent accounted for by ingredients. Overall, prices that should have risen 5 per cent grew 7 per cent. Governments have been struggling for ways to control surging prices, which have led to disgruntled voters. The 450m citizens of the European Union in 2005 spent €927bn ($1,440bn, £733bn) on food, according to latest figures from Eurostat, the biggest outgoing after housing for most families.

David Nason, assistant secretary for financial institutions, said the Fed could even use its proposed "macro-prudential" authority to order banks, hedge funds and other entities to curtail strategies that put financial stability at risk.

The proposed new powers - outlined in a Treasury blueprint published last month - require legislation and may never be authorised. But policymakers see the plan as offering a template for future regulation.T he blueprint envisages giving the Fed roving authority to collect, analyse and publish market data from a wide range of institutions, from banks to hedge funds.

"The market stability regulator must have access to detailed information about all types of financial institutions," said Mr Nason. Hedge funds are uneasy about this proposal. However, MANY EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANKERS ARE EAGER TO ACQUIRE THE KIND OF MACRO-PRUDENTIAL POWERS THE TREASURY WOULD LIKE TO GIVE TO THE FED.

"The country is in its most precarious situation since the end of the famine a decade ago," said the paper from the Washington-based Peterson Institute for International Economics. Stephan Haggard, who wrote the paper with Marcus Noland, said the sharp increase in world prices for commodities had sent ripples through the communist state's economy. The authors are specialists in reclusive North Korea's trade with the outside world.

North Korea, which even in time of good harvests is about 20 percent short of what it needs, has grown more dependent on rice imported from neighboring China since a famine in the late 1990s that experts estimate killed at least 1 million people, he said.

Its limited foreign currency reserves, and poor reputation as a trade partner, mean the rice trade is being hit and ordinary North Koreans are feeling the squeeze, Haggard said. On top of that, North Korea also lost crops and farmland last year to floods.

Researchers from the University of Michigan found that in developed countries, yields were almost equal on organic and conventional farms. IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES, FOOD PRODUCTION COULD DOUBLE OR TRIPLE USING ORGANIC METHODS, said Ivette Perfecto, professor at U-M's School of Natural Resources and Environment, and one of the study's principal investigators. Catherine Badgley, research scientist in the Museum of Paleontology, is a co-author of the paper along with several current and former graduate and undergraduate students from U-M.

"MY HOPE IS THAT WE CAN FINALLY PUT A NAIL IN THE COFFIN OF THE IDEA THAT YOU CAN'T PRODUCE ENOUGH FOOD THROUGH ORGANIC AGRICULTURE," Perfecto said. In addition to equal or greater yields, the authors found that those yields could be accomplished using existing quantities of organic fertilizers, without putting more farmland into production. THE IDEA THAT PEOPLE WOULD GO HUNGRY IF FARMING WENT ORGANIC IS RIDICULOUS.

"CORPORATE INTEREST IN AGRICULTURE and the way agriculture research has been conducted in land grant institutions, with a lot of influence by the CHEMICAL COMPANIES AND PESTICIDE COMPANIES as well as FERTILIZER COMPANIES - all have been playing an important role in convincing the public THAT YOU NEED TO HAVE THESE INPUTS TO PRODUCE FOOD," she said.

Perhaps the most crucial is the public's right to know what is being discussed before it is adopted in Brussels - A PRACTICE THAT WOULD NEVER BE TOLERATED AT NATIONAL LEVEL.

Moreover, two of the Commission amendments are highly retrogressive. The new definition of a document would mean that if an official does not register it then it is not a "document" - A RECIPE FOR ABUSE. And the obligation of institutions to give public access to the full text of documents would be limited to legislative measures - and not cover the hundreds of thousands of other documents produced and received.

The Amsterdam Treaty was agreed 11 years ago (1997) and WAS MEANT TO HERALD A NEW ERA OF OPENNESS AND TRANSPARENCY - we are still waiting for this to happen.

Terry Battersby, 53, from Manchester, has been removed from his job as head of information technology at the Brussels-based Centre for the Development of Enterprise (CDE) and placed on a short-term contract. Battersby uncovered evidence that the agency's former director, Hamed Sow, who is now the Energy Minister of the west African country of Mali, approved the award of lucrative European Union contracts to a company in which he had a financial interest.

Sow is alleged to have arranged for the CDE to back a loan of nearly £3m to a textile company in Mali, without disclosing that he owned up to 20% of the company and was receiving payments from the firm. The CDE, set up to support the private sector in poor countries, receives more than £14m a year in taxpayers' money from the EU.

Israel's Water Authority announced on Sunday that the Kinneret had dropped nearly two-and-a-half inches over the week of Passover alone. The lake is expected to fall below its "Black Line" in July. When the water level falls below the Black Line, the openings of the water pumps are exposed, making further pumping impossible. The Kinneret fell below its Lower Red Line last year, though pumping continued despite the risk of rising pollution levels. The lake is Israel's primary source of fresh water, but has been hit hard by seven consecutive dry winters.

Meanwhile, Israel this month began feeling the effects of a global shortage of staple foods such as rice and flour that has already led to rioting in some developing nations. Israeli analysts originally believed the Jewish state may not be affected by the shortages, but local media reported at the weekend that prices of rice, flour, sugar, coffee, oil and other essential foods are expected to rise by up to 80 percent in the coming days. Many grocery stores across Israel have started limiting the quantity of rice that customers may purchase.

Officials have blamed the mounting global crisis on exploding population rates that are outpacing food production, increased cultivation of crops for biofuels and natural disasters such as floods and droughts. Israeli experts insisted that Israel could avoid any serious damage to local food supplies by beginning to grow its own wheat.

Growing relief that the global economy has so far escaped the worst case scenario from the eight-month-old credit crisis has stabilised financial markets. Many central banks, faced with the twin problem of the credit crisis and rising prices, have cut interest rates to ease the flow of credit, leaving inflation issues for tomorrow.

Japanese inflation, which hit a decade-high in March triggering one of the biggest ever sell-offs in yen bonds on Friday, is a case in point. "IF THE GLOBAL ECONOMY HAS STRUGGLED OUT OF THE FRYING PAN OF THE CREDIT CRUNCH, IT SEEMS DESTINED TO FALL INTO THE FIRE OF HIGH INFLATION ... High inflation is cruel to the owner of financial assets," said Tim Bond, head of global asset allocation at Barclays Capital.

Dr. William Gray, who once said that pro-global warming scientists are "brainwashing our children," claims that Colorado State University will no longer promote his yearly North Atlantic hurricane forecasts due to his controversial views.

Gray contends that global warming is all a hoax contrived BY SCIENTISTS HUNGRY FOR RESEARCH FUNDING, MEDIA PROFESSIONALS THIRSTING FOR PULITZER PRIZES AND FOREIGN POWERS SEEKING TO CREATE A SINGLE WORLD GOVERNMENT. In fact, he says, the warming cycle will soon end, and the earth will begin a period of temporary cooling.

BP's pre-tax profits rose 48 per cent in the first quarter to $6.6 BILLION (£3.3 BILLION) while Shell increased its profits 12 per cent to A RECORD $7.8 BILLION (£3.9 BILLION). The increase has been driven by the rising oil prices, which the companies have passed on to consumers in the form of higher petrol and diesel costs.

He said the priority was to feed the hungry by closing a $755m (£380m) funding gap for the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) this year. He urged donor countries to make more money available now. The WFP believes 100 million people are currently going short of food. It says only 62% of the $755m it needs to feed them has been pledged so far, and, of that, only $18m (£9m) has actually been received.

"We consider that the dramatic escalation in food prices worldwide has evolved into an UNPRECEDENTED CHALLENGE OF GLOBAL PROPORTIONS that has become a crisis for the world's most vulnerable, including the urban poor," the UN said in a statement after a meeting of agency heads in the Swiss capital Berne. "The challenge is having multiple effects with its most serious impact unfolding as a crisis for the most vulnerable," it went on.

THIS INCREASES THE CHANCE THAT THE 1 JANUARY 2009 DEADLINE FOR THE DOCUMENT TO COME INTO FORCE ACROSS THE EU WILL BE DELAYED, ACCORDING TO EUOBSERVER.

Libération journalist Jean Quatremer says: "Some of you have asked me what would happen if Ireland, the only country to hold a referendum on the Treaty, voted no on 12 June. I think that an Irish no vote would not have the same impact as the French no had. The Danes voted no in 1992, and the Irish voted no to Nice in 2001. Well, the member states concocted some derogations for them and they then voted yes. A small, geographically peripheral country can only become more politically peripheral, not block the EU.

Brutally put: EUROPE WITHOUT FRANCE OR GERMANY MAKES NO SENSE, WITHOUT IRELAND OR DENMARK, IT DOES. The Union survives very well without Norway, Iceland, and even Switzerland..."

A senior European government source is quoted saying: "Changes that enter into force with the Treaty are more far reaching than people think." However, Waterfield notes "THESE ARE CHANGES THAT WILL ONLY BECOME APPARENT AFTER THE NEW EU TREATY HAS BEEN RATIFIED, BYPASSING ANY POSSIBILITY OF PUBLIC SCRUTINY OR ACCOUNTABILITY TO THE DECISIONS TAKEN."

Meanwhile, in an interview with Le Soir, Valery Giscard d'Estaing does not rule himself out as a future EU President. He also says he does not see the link between NATO and European defence. He says: "I don't really see the link between these two questions! WE NEED TO GIVE EUROPE A DEFENCE CAPACITY. Europe has a currency, a market, the beginnings of citizenship: it must have a defence, like all the other great human organisations.

Poland has indicated it would support a boost in Europe's defence activities, including setting up the bloc's own military planning headquarters. "We are in favour of a much stronger role for European defence, and that would include a military headquarters," said Polish Defence Minister Bogdan Klich

A piece in Le Monde argues that the EU Foreign Minister, who will also be a Vice-President of the Commission, could emerge as the strongest position in the system. It notes: "Everything will depend on the personality chosen and the shape of his future diplomatic service."