Interesting Facts

In a survey that examines the good each country does for humanity as well as what it takes away, Britain has ranked 4th. (The Good Country Index placed Sweden first, Denmark second, and the Netherlands third, but the UK came above France and Germany because Britain does more “good” and less harm than more than 150 countries around the world. Britain came top for its global contribution to science and technology, thanks to the high number of journal exports, Nobel prizes and international publications it has produced,  was ranked 2nd on its global contribution to health and wellbeing, but it scored poorly on international security and peace, coming 64th out of 163 countries. Simon Anholt, who created the Good Country Index, said that while countries must serve the interests of their people it should not be at the expense of other populations.  I think we could apply that to ourselves as individuals too.)

You can be fined up to £150 for dropping litter in the UK.  (Previously fines had been set by councils, varying between £50 and £80, however now under guidelines drawn up by the Department for Communities and Local Government, litter bugs could face an on the spot fine of £100, and if they do not pay up within a designated period it could increase to £150. Fear of being fined shouldn't stop people from littering.  A wish to live in nice surroundings should be enough.)

Alice in Wonderland celebrates her 150th birthday. We will start reading the book in the English Book Club in Second Life. Oh and it's Thanksgiving Day in the US.  

Bees contribute more to the British economy than the Royal family. (According to research carried out at the University of Reading, the overall value of the contribution of our busy bees is £651 million a year, which is £150 million more than the Royal Family brings in through tourism. In fact 85 per cent of the UK’s apple crop and 45 per cent of our strawberry crop relies on bees to grow. These two crops alone brought in £200 million to Britain in 2012. Unfortunately honeybee colonies have slumped in the UK from 250,000 in the 1950s to fewer than 100,000 today. In Germany everyone seems to have their own beehive.)

According to a survey by Topcashback.co.uk, Brits are paying out around £150 a year for subscriptions they no longer use. (The worst culprit is gym membership, followed by newspaper or magazine subscriptions, and TV and music streaming services like Netflix, or Spotify. Most people take out a free trial period, and then forget to cancel.   I'm actually subscribing to a newspaper and I keep meaning to cancel it!) 

There are an estimated 100 to 150 chick sexers in the UK, but the industry is struggling to recruit trainees. (It takes up to 3 years to train to be a chick sexer, where you have to learn to spot 'minuscule differences' to determine whether a chick will grow up to be a rooster or a hen. After training you are expected to be able to sort between 800 and 1,200 day-old old chicks an hour, that's between three and five seconds per chick, achieving an accuracy of around 98 per cent. Once trained the pay is £40,000 per annum, but an industry spokesperson said "'I think the problem is the job itself. You are spending hours every day staring at the backside of a chick. That is not seen as being attractive." I guess you could end up being the butt of a few jokes.)

It's estimated that in the UK parents pay 45 million pounds a year too much for school uniforms because of restrictions on suppliers. (The Office of Fair Trading has called for the practice of buying uniforms from restricted suppliers to be scrapped after estimating that parents across the UK who have no choice of where they buy school uniforms are worse off by around £45 million per year. It has been estimated that compulsory school clothes and other items cost around 150 per cent more from "designated" retailers than they do in supermarkets. Most children wouldn't mind, but school uniforms are designed to be ugly.)