Eudajou

18/12/2020

Eudajou's report on air quality in London Bloomsbury. Spectacular fluctuation in the concentration of four different pollutants. Data from the first two weeks of December. Data from OPAQ.

05/09/2020

I would like to thank our reader community for the amazing support we received over the course of the hot summer months! Eudajou will not disappear completely, but we may not report every pertinent European issue with such regularity as you hopefully got used to over the season. Check out for some other sources to keep yourself well informed! I wish everyone a fun but safe return to work/studies and will always remember this rewarding summer with Eudajou! :D

26/08/2020

A surge in the number of detected coronavirus cases is making school reopening and return to work after vacation more stressful across Europe. Nevertheless, European leaders do not intend to reimpose lockdowns and plan to resort to measures of social distancing instead to avoid an overwhelming burden on public health institutions but at the same time cut back on economic costs of plummeting economic activity and unemployment.

A surge in the number of detected coronavirus cases is making school reopening and return to work after vacation more stressful across Europe. Nevertheless, European leaders do not intend to reimpose lockdowns and plan to resort to measures of social distancing instead to avoid an overwhelming burde...

19/08/2020

The Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) is the EU’s system to regulate permissions of the use of the environment. The regulation has been approved in the 96/61 Council and Parliament Directive and is based on the best available technology (BAT) principle that sets up a specific standard for member state authorities. The comprehensive objective of the directive is a prevention and reduction of pollution for a high-level protection of the environment.

The Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) is the EU’s system to regulate permissions of the use of the environment. The regulation has been approved in the 96/61 Council and Parliament Directive and is based on the best available technology (BAT) principle that sets up a specific stan...

17/08/2020

After the contested electoral victory of incumbent president of Belarus Alexandre Loukachenko, the EU decided to impose sanctions on 14 August against leaders of the country that they believe are responsible for a violent repression of ongoing demonstrations.

After the contested electoral victory of incumbent president of Belarus Alexandre Loukachenko, the EU decided to impose sanctions on 14 August against leaders of the country that they believe are responsible for a violent repression of ongoing demonstrations. The announcement was made by Swedish for...

13/08/2020

The role of environmental impact studies is to identify, describe and assess direct and indirect effects of construction and development projects on people, flora and fauna, soil, air, water, climate, land, materials and cultural heritage as well as on the interaction of these. Environmental impact studies are an important tool and procedural guarantee for the lawmaker to have access to essential environmental information before deciding whether to approve a development project.

The primary sources of law regarding environmental impact studies is the 85/337 European Council Directive. Later, this was updated by the 97/11 Council and Parliament Directive that also harmonised the regulation of environmental impact studies to the 92/62 EC Directive on Integrated Pollution Prev...

11/08/2020

World leaders met in a video conference on 9 August to arrange financial aid for Lebanon, where an ammonium nitrate explosion devastated the port of Beirut on 4 August, leaving some 150 people dead and several thousand injured. Donations totalled some EUR 252.7mn.

World leaders met in a video conference on 9 August to arrange financial aid for Lebanon, where an ammonium nitrate explosion devastated the port of Beirut on 4 August, leaving some 150 people dead and several thousand injured. Donations totalled some EUR 252.7mn. The conference was opened by presid...

10/08/2020

Eudajou Consulting Challenge - The problem

Help us identify and solve the troubled media firm Eudajou’s business problems in finance, marketing or operations, or possibly try yourself in all three areas.

Submit a pitchbook consisting of a maximum of 6 slides individually or in teams of unlimited by 30 August and present your business solutions to a panel of juries formed of Eudajou’s executive team.

Finance – Eudajou posted a pre-tax loss of EUR 22.5 in the first quarter of its 2020/21 business year due to an accrued amortisation of its website editor subscription that had to be written off. The firm has not generated any sales revenue as it offered all of its products – access to articles and visualisation webinars – for free. How could Eudajou become profitable in the long run? How should it fill its currently empty balance sheet? Should it adopt a different pricing rule? Should it take on debt?

Eudajou’s balance sheet as of 1 July 2020

Current assets
Cash 0
Accounts receivables 0
Marketable securities 0
Property plant and equipment 0
Intangible assets 90
Accumulated amortisation (22.5)
--------------------------------------
Total assets 77.5
Liabilities 0
Accounts payables 0
Short term debt 0
Long term debt 0
Equity 77.5
Capital 90
Retained earnings (22.5)
-----------------------------------------------
Liabilities and equity 77.5

Eudajou’s income statement as of 1 July
Sales 0
Costs of goods sold 0
Gross profit 0
Selling and administrative costs 90
Operating income -22.5
Interest expense 0
Income before taxes -22.5
Income tax expense 0
Net income after taxes -22.5

Operations – Below is a summary of the number of Eudajou’s employees in the first quarter of the 2020/21 business year.

Month Number of employees
May 2
June 3
July 4

To date, the number of contributions by the firm’s blog writers came at 65, 2, 1 and 1 respectively.
The firm does not have a physical site therefore its operating expenses are zero. It also relies on voluntary contributions therefore it does not have to pay salaries to employees. Should Eudajou change on its renumeration policy and pay for contributions to its blog to increase the number of contributions? If so, what scheme should it adopt: a fixed renumeration for blog writers or a pay per contribution method? How could the appropriate method be financed?

Marketing – During the first three months of Eudajou’s 2020/21 business year, the firm has taken a number of initiatives to raise awareness of its brand. It launched its articles with extensive social media marketing on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. It started a market research campaign trying to optimise the timing and content of publications on all sources of social media. Nevertheless, it received very few responses. Later, Eudajou launched its first visualisation webinar. Although there was a great interest in the course, the course instructor did not manage to convert participants into contributors and sourced virtually no new articles submitted by attendants. The firm also launched the Faces of Eudajou campaign that featured portray style photographs of members of the Eudajou community to create an interactive platform of interaction for Eudajou readers. However, except for one reader, only contributors participated in the initiative. The results are appalling with every new post generating less and less engagement, even after trying to include more aesthetic cover photos as illustrations instead of pictures of bar plots and donut diagrams. A similarly futile attempt has been to set up an interactive quiz for our readers to check their awareness of current affairs. What was the mistake in Eudajou’s approach in its content marketing? Were the articles too lengthy or the audience not targeted? What are the features of posts that were actually successful? How could we generate better statistics and visitor numbers in the coming months? For these questions, consult engagement statistics and publication timings on our Facebook or LinkedIn page.

10/08/2020

Eudajou consulting challenge – Call for pitchbooks and presentations
We at Eudajou have been proud to speak the truth, even at times when it was hard.
Let’s face it, our business is in trouble, but it does not have to be that way.
In fact, we could do with some help. Our revenue streams are waning, visitor numbers falling, and our posts are generating less and less engagements every time.
That’s why we are calling for all our aspiring consultant members that care about Eudajou’s future and are also interested in media counselling to participate in our first ever case study challenge!
Help us identify and solve the troubled media firm Eudajou’s business problems in finance, marketing or operations, or possibly try yourself in all three areas.
Submit a pitchbook consisting of a maximum of 6 slides individually or in teams of unlimited by 30 August and present your business solutions to a panel of juries formed of Eudajou’s executive team.
Do not hesitate to contact the organiser Gábor Ratkovics (junior) for any further information and do not forget to comment “interested” below.
Help us turn around Eudajou. Let’s get work on this together!

08/08/2020

It was ruling 240/83 of the Court of Justice of the European Union in the case General Attorney vs ABDHU that granted environment protection a constitutional status within the EU. The Court’s ruling established that environment protection is a common objective of the Community to such an extent that it can even constrain freedom of trade. Thus, the decision stated that freedom of trade is not absolute and can be limited by such fundamental objectives of the community like environment protection.

The constitutional basis of European environmental law has not been explicitly present in EU primary law in the Treaty of Rome in 1967. Article 100 of the Treaty grants the power of passing Directives to the Community in subjects that affect the operation of the single market. Meanwhile, Article 235...

06/08/2020

The European Commission has opened an investigation into Google’s acquisition of fitness tracking company Fitbit for fears of distortion of competition in health and tech markets. Google offered USD 2.1bn for the firm.

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The European Commission has opened an investigation into Google’s acquisition of fitness tracking company Fitbit for fears of distortion of competition in health and tech markets. Google offered USD 2.1bn for the firm. The Commission expressed worries that the takeover would grant Google access to...

04/08/2020

Environment has become a far more important issue today than it was at the time when European integration commenced. In fact, the Treaty of Rome that established the European Economic Community in 1957 had no clauses with environmental provisions. Today, changes in Europe are part of environmental m...

31/07/2020

European leaders decided to cut allocations to the EU’s Just Transition Fund from EUR 40bn to EUR 17.5bn in the final agreement of last week’s marathon EU summit on the block’s next seven-year multiannual financial framework and the much-debated coronavirus recovery plan. Green MEPs and NGOs denounce the move as a wrong spending cut priority of the frugal states.

European leaders decided to cut allocations to the EU’s Just Transition Fund from EUR 40bn to EUR 17.5bn in the final agreement of last week’s marathon EU summit on the block’s next seven-year multiannual financial framework and the much-debated coronavirus recovery plan. Green MEPs and NGOs d...

30/07/2020

Are you proud of your awareness of European current affairs in 2020 July? How well have you followed Eudajou’s stories this month? Try our Great July Quiz to find out!

This interactive multiple-choice quiz is there for you to reflect on events and people that have been trending in July and for us to boost our visitor analytics numbers before the end of the month.

The questions are solely based on our stories published recently. Because of the virus situation, we made this open book, feel free (in fact you are encouraged) to use any of our resources 😉.

Please share or comment your results (numerical mark out of 100) so that we see our top followers. We are sure they are worth sharing.

Link to the quiz (opens in new tab): https://forms.gle/z6HupozqjsSZGzpt8
(Quiz by Gábor Ratkovics Junior)

30/07/2020

New content in our long neglected business section!

Investigations on the German financial services company Wirecard’s accounting fraud revealed that the London-based professional services company EY provided a false draft audit opinion to the firm one week before its collapse. The draft opinion stated that Wirecard’s financial statements were compliant to German commercial law applicable to corporations and provided a fair assessment of the value of the firm’s net assets and financial position.

Investigations on the German financial services company Wirecard’s accounting fraud revealed that the London-based professional services company EY provided a false draft audit opinion to the firm one week before its collapse. The draft opinion stated that Wirecard’s financial statements were co...

29/07/2020

It is our people that make up Eudajou. Our contributors are experts in their fields. In this snapshot, meet our international law specialist Mathias Baudena who has just published an article on the problems associated with the lack of a binding dispute resolution system in the WTO. Mathias – a law student at LSE – is standing in front of Himeji castle in Japan. He is also interested in the increasing role of Japan within the World Trade Organisation, which he discusses briefly in his analysis. Link to the article: https://www.eudajou.org/post/removing-binding-dispute-settlement-within-the-wto-why-it-affects-more-than-just-weaker-states

29/07/2020

--- First piece of Eudajou's brand new contributor Mathias Baudena! ---

2020 marks the World Trade Organization’s first year without a binding dispute settlement system. The USA has forced this change upon the international community, believing it would benefit more from imposing its own trading rules rather than being bounded by the WTO’s consensus rules. Eudajou's international law expert Mathias Baudena challenges this view and reveals to what extent both weak and strong trading states benefit from a consensus, rule-oriented system.

2020 marks the World Trade Organization’s first year without a binding dispute settlement system. The USA has forced this change upon the international community, believing it would benefit more from imposing its own trading rules rather than being bound by the WTO’s consensus rules. This articl...

28/07/2020

Some ninety journalists of Hungary’s primary news site index resigned collectively on 24 July following the removal of the site’s chief editor Szabolcs Dull. The announcement triggered a mass demonstration in Budapest Friday evening with thousands of protesters standing up for the freedom of the press in the country.

Some ninety journalists of Hungary’s primary news site index resigned collectively on 24 July following the removal of the site’s chief editor Szabolcs Dull. The announcement triggered a mass demonstration in Budapest Friday evening with thousands of protesters standing up for the freedom of the...

27/07/2020

Be as motivated as Edin every Monday! Edin - a former editorial intern at the Financial Times - wrote a high-performing article on the impact of lockdowns on global oil markets. He is a good example to demonstrate that our contributors are all experts in their respective fields. Link to the article: https://www.eudajou.org/post/european-jet-fuel-prices-slowly-pick-up-despite-weakened-global-demand

25/07/2020

The world’s largest palladium and nickel manufacturer Norilsk Nickel received an USD 2.1bn fine from Russia’s environment authority for a fuel spill caused by the collapse of an oil tank in late May that emitted 21,000 tonnes of diesel in two rivers inside the Arctic Circle. The company’s controlling shareholder and Russia’s richest individual Vladimir Potanin announced the firm may change its dividend policy as a result. Sanctions against Norilsk may mark the beginning of Russian industrial companies that have so far lobbied successfully against environmental penalties to put sounder environmental risk standards in place.

Norilsk Nickel the Russian-based palladium and nickel manufacturer was fined for USD 2.1bn by the Russian environmental watchdog Rosprironadzor for a fuel spill that caused serious water pollution and an environmental disaster in two rivers in Syberia in May. The fine that makes up a third of Norils...

23/07/2020

An intelligence and security committee of the UK’s Parliament has published a report on Russian influence operations in the UK on Tuesday 21 July. Among the findings of the report that took nine months to prepare is that the British government failed to take the appropriate steps to investigate whether there was Russian interference in the Brexit referendum of 2016 or not. The ISC concluded that the threats directly posed by Russia to the UK includes the undermining of democratic norms, cyber-attacks supported by organised crime as well as illicit finance through London’s financial hub.

An intelligence and security committee of the UK’s Parliament has published a report on Russian influence operations in the UK on Tuesday 21 July. Among the findings of the report that took nine months to prepare is that the British government failed to take the appropriate steps to investigate wh...

21/07/2020

As European leaders gathered to discuss the block’s new multiannual budget over the weekend tensions and divisions between interest groups remained apparent. However, after four days of intense negotiations an agreement has been reached on the size, design and conditions of the commission’s recovery fund that aims to revitalise the European economy from the post-covid economic shock. Divisions emerged between the so-called frugal four and large beneficiaries of the scheme under the leadership Spain and Italy, while Eastern European countries including Hungary and Poland were wary about possible sanctions of non-compliance to fundamental European rights that may include the right to block recovery aid by the vote of a qualified majority of countries. For an overview of the main points of conflict and a roundup of the negotiations, follow our summary below.

After four days of intensive negotiations on the EU’s fiscal response to the economic downturn of the coronavirus pandemic , heads of member states have reached a deal on the size, design and conditions of a planned multibillion-euro rescue package as well as other elements of the EU’s next EUR ...

18/07/2020

New piece in our corporate law suits coverage.
Apple has won a case against the European Commission at the second highest court of Europe. The ruling stated that the Commission did not show to the requisite legal standard that the tax practices of Ireland constituted illegal economic advantage to the iPhone maker. The judgement may block further attempts of the Commission to scrutinise other low tax arrangements on the grounds that they are not conform to the block’s state aid rules. The decision might be subject to an appeal within two months and ten days and the final verdict is to be issued by the European Court of Justice.

The EU’s second-highest court in Luxembourg ruled that Apple does not have to pay back EUR 14.3bn in taxes to Ireland as requested by the European Commission in a judgement that jeopardizes Brussels’ attempts to open up low tax arrangements for multinationals to regulatory scrutiny within the bl...

17/07/2020

“Guys thanks for the articles but who cares when Faces of Eudajou has so many great models?”
We know. And it is great that you would like to meet other members of the Eudajou community.
Today, we have Eudajou’s chiseled jaw founder Luca Matteucci at the seaside mediating about high level strategic changes of Eudajou's media business. He has every reason to be happy after having sourced a second new contributor to the Eudajou blog.

16/07/2020

Paschal Donohoe, the former Irish finance minister was elected leader of Eurogroup that assembles finance ministers from eurozone economies on 9 July. The 45-year-old politician outlined a plan to press ahead with a new wave of digital taxes on US-based tech giants despite OECD negotiations grinding to a halt due to the withdrawal of the US. In addition, the newly named president plans to set the common position of eurozone economies on the EU’s EUR 750bn coronavirus recovery plan as a bridge between Northern and Southern countries. Replacing outgoing Eurogroup chief Mário Conteno in his position, Mr Donohoe takes on the role in the time of an unprecedented health and economic crisis, topped by the possibility of a no-deal Brexit next year.

The Irishman Paschal Donohoe was elected as new the new chief of eurozone finance ministers after a final round of vote in which Mr Donohoe beated Spain’s Nadia Calvino on 9 July. The vote consisted of a secret ballot in which nineteen eurozone countries were eligible to vote. The Irishman replace...

15/07/2020

Don't forget that we are eagerly waiting for your photo submissions under our new Faces of Eudaojou campaign. This picture shows our reader and webinar attendant Lili Ratkovics enjoying some table pleasures while reading our article "Roquefort and Parma ham in danger: The UK reopens talks on products of protected origin". Check out the article (link: https://www.eudajou.org/post/roquefort-and-parma-ham-in-danger-uk-reopens-talks-on-products-of-protected-origin) and send us your creative snapshots today!

15/07/2020

Macron's new government, EU recovery plan, coronatourism, Brexit talks - what issues have caught your attention in July? Join us for a live discussion in the first of our monthly newsroom series and interact with other members of the Eudajou community. Sign-up available in the link below: https://doodle.com/poll/tbyam5qpm3xnb4fw

14/07/2020

Incumbent president of Poland Andrzej Duda was re-elected in the second round of the country’s on Sunday. Obtaining 52.11% of the vote, Mr Duda came confidently ahead of his centre-right opponent Mr Trzaskowski. Backed by Poland’s ruling party, the re-elected president is a defender of Poland’s traditional values. His re-election may imply the removal of obstacles ahead of Law and Justice’s radical or legislation restricting rights of the community.

Incumbent president of Poland Andrzej Duda has won another term on Sunday in the second round of the country’s presidential elections. The turnout came at 68%, with some 51.21% of the votes supporting Mr Duda. Andrzej Duda has been backed by Poland’s ruling Law and Justice Party. His challenger ...

13/07/2020

Do you realise that consuming media can be a social activity? Have you ever wondered who else is reading Eudajou or who was behind the lines?
If yes, our new campaign Faces of Eudajou is for you.
Send us a picture of you demonstrating how you engage with Eudajou or how you consume our media to be featured on our facebook or instagram site.
This first picture shows our lead journalist Gábor Ratkovics in front of what he would like Eudajou's headquarters to be in ten years.
Follow Gábor and send us a snapshot boosted with some creativity.
Let us celebrate our diversity.

12/07/2020

Want to check your understanding of concepts covered in Eudajou Visualisation Academy's first webinar? Check out our EUD101 - Elementary Data Visualisation in R sample exam.

11/07/2020

Thanks to all of you who attended yesterday’s workshop of Eudajou Visualisation Academy. It was brilliant to experience how vibrant Eudajou's community was and we are really looking forward to similar events like this.

Although data visualisation is as much of an art as a science, as a summary of the key takeaways on how to produce visually appealing bar graphs in ggplot, follow the steps below.
1. Prepare and import data.
2. Open new script and call required libraries.
3. Add a ggplot object and a geom_bar together with aesthetics specified.
4. Make visual improvements to your plot. (fill colour, reordering, legend, axis flips)
5. Add descriptions (title, subtitle, axis labels, caption) using labs command.
6. Export your plot.

Do not forget the opportunity to become a certified Eudajou data vizard by submitting an article of a topic of your choice that we will publish on our website. Benefit from extensive social media marketing and a platform generating impressive visitor numbers. If you are not ready yet, check back later for our upcoming webinars.

If you need further help with installing R or Rstudio or would like to ask for tips how to find reference data, do not hesitate to contact us.

Finally, we would really appreciate if you could take some time to fill in this short (2 minute) survey to share your feedback with us.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdn5X27aGAw3n9Lj9PikaTIKsdEg-csz5ClS34juqwM0lwZDg/viewform?usp=sf_link

09/07/2020

Big picture reading about French politics. Hope to get our readers from France back.

Following LREM’s defeat in local elections, president of France Emmanuel Macron unveiled his new cabinet with a second major reshuffle during his mandate. With a newly named prime minister and new appointments at the ministries of internal affairs, justice and environment the president aims to change the direction of governance and policy making to regain support for LREM ahead of presidential elections in 2022. While restructuring can help capture votes, the party will have to come up with innovative ways to address key challenges, notably recent anti-establishment and trade union protests, a surge in green movements, a reform of the pension system as well as the economic downturn of the coronavirus pandemic. Analysts view the restructuring as an attempt to reposition the party to the right.

President of France Emmanuel Macron unveiled his new cabinet after a reshuffle following disappointing results of his party LREM in local elections. The restructuring of the government is a key step for the party to change its direction and gain popularity ahead of the 2022 elections. Mr Macron’s ...

07/07/2020

The head of Ukraine’s central bank Yakiiv Smolii resigned on 1 July 2020. The outgoing chief joined a long list of senior government staff that have been removed or quitted their positions voluntarily after debates with the Zelensky administration. Although certain believe there has been no political pressure behind Mr Smolii’s decision, soon after his departure the National Bank of Ukraine pulled out of a bond placement that was purchased the previous day. Foreign creditors including the EU and the IMF are calling for Ukraine to clarify how it is going to ensure the independence of its central bank that is considered as central for future economic and financial reforms on which prospective loans will be conditioned.

Yakiiv Smolii the governor of the National Bank of Ukraine announced his resignation on 1 July. Soon after his departure, the finance ministry of the country was forced to sell bonds that were purchased the previous day with a substantial margin. The sales of the funds that also benefited from favou...