About Russian and American imperialism

By intervening in Venezuela, Washington is hitting one of Moscow’s sensitive spots: its oil revenues. The US is aiming to revive oil facilities that are no longer in operation, seeming to jettison the joint venture agreement renewed for fifteen years in November 2025 between Venezuela’s state-owned Petroleos and a subsidiary of the Russian company Roszarubezhneft

Quick Take — Peter Brabeck-Lemathe leaves Nestlé: what does it mean?

I copy an article of mine from the 1990s:

“Peter Brabeck-Letmathe was CEO (managing director) of Nestlé at the time, today he is its Chairman (chairman of the board).

There were ‘sparks’ with Brabeck during one of his visits to Milan. We were in the fruit and vegetable department of the Superstore in Corsico…

Then, as none of us had any interest in quarrelling, everything returned to order.

And Nestlé, very realistically, will end up eliminating GMOs from its products in Italy’.

The fact that as honorary chairman, Brabeck- Lemathe was no longer listened to and questioned makes one realise how much Nestlé has lost its bearings. And in fact, for years, it has been going through a deep crisis, which seems to have no end ( it had its biggest problem with water and frozen pizzas. On water it got away with it).

Drafted 27 December, updated 31 December 2025

Quick Take — Chiquita, from Sicily the first Italian production

Chiquita’s iconic bananas will be grown, for the first time, in Italy. With the bananas an Italian product, the brand starts production in the heart of Sicily together with the local agricultural cooperative Alba Bio

The banana is the last of the tropical products whose production has landed in southern Italy as a result of climate change.

“There is no shortage of unknowns. The banana is a demanding plant: it requires large amounts of water and stable environmental conditions. In an island that already faces water and climate challenges, maintaining environmental sustainability will be crucial’…

Bananas are already cultivated in Italy in Apulia.

Compiled on 30 September updated on 6 October 2025

JBS, the Brazilian meat giant to benefit from the treaty between Europe and Mercosur

Great attention should be paid to safeguard clauses and reciprocity agreements, but the EU-Mercosur agreement should not be erected as a totem against which to hurl one’s frustration at problems in the sector that actually have an entirely different origin: first and foremost, the low profitability of the land trades compared to the rest of the economy

Quick Take — Donald Trump’s grand plan to save Florida’s tomatoes: make Mexico pay

The US president has imposed a 17 per cent tariff on fruit exports from the southern neighbour to save the dwindling number of local farmers…Mexico supplies more than 60 per cent of the fresh tomatoes consumed in the United States, a clear example of how the country has gained market share in various sectors, becoming the US’s largest trading partner since the North American Free Trade Agreement came into force in 1994…Mexico’s National Agriculture Council has stated that it is the consumers who will pay, predicting a price increase of 11.5%, also because those grown in the US are of different species

Quick Take — Donald Trump’s trade wars put agriculture in crisis: the example of Michigan cherries

In 2024, the US exported nearly $506 million in fresh cherries worldwide, up 10% in value and 3% in volume from the previous year

In the first half of this year, US fresh fruit exports fell 17% in volume and 15% in value.

This was due to:

  • bad weather: the USDA predicts 41% for cherry crop loss in Michigan)
  • iCE interventions and visa delays there is a shortage of farm labour
  • trump’s trade wars. US shipments to China never fully recovered after Trump’s trade war in 2018. Sales to Canada fell 18% in volume in the first six months.

Source : Reuters