The US Call Center Worker and Consumer Protection Act is to be introduced today in the House of Representatives.

The bill would ban federal grants or guaranteed loans to American companies that move call center jobs from the US overseas, and require the list of companies that offshore call center work to be made available to the public.

It also requires call center employees to disclose their location to US consumers, and requires that call centers transfer consumers to a call center in the US upon request.

French water utility Veolia Environnement has announced plans to divest several of its UK assets as part of its restructuring programme.

The €5 billion of assets it will sell include three UK-regulated water companies and its 50 per cent stake in public transport company Transdev.

The three companies are Veolia Water Central, Southeast and East—known until 2009 as Three Valleys Water, Tendring Hundred and Folkestone & Dover. Together, the companies have a combined turnover of £269 million and serve more than three million customers.

Uranium Energy Corp has announced the completion of its acquisition of the Workman Creek uranium project, previously announced on 8 November, 2011, from Cooper Minerals, Inc.

"The Workman Creek Project represents the company's fourth project in pro-business and mining-friendly Arizona,” said President and CEO Amir Adnani. “This acquisition further demonstrates management's commitment to expanding and diversifying our project portfolio at a viable cost for long-term growth."

The government of Afghanistan has launched tenders for the exploration and exploitation of four project areas containing gold and copper deposits.

The deposits lie in the provinces of Badakhshan, Ghazni, Sar-I-Pul and Balkh, and Herat, and contain gold, copper-gold, copper and copper respectively.

The tender process for each project is expected to culminate in the granting of a mining agreement with associated exploration licences and, subject to the satisfaction of certain conditions, will lead to the granting of the requisite exploitation licences.

The Boeing 787 Dreamliner arrived yesterday in Beijing, marking its debut in mainland China.

The arrival of the all-new jet marks the start of a six-month worldwide ‘Dream Tour’.

The aircraft will be in China, one of the world’s fastest-growing aviation and travel markets, until December 11, with stops in Beijing, Guangzhou and Haikou.

The tour will give Chinese customers, partners, government officials and media the opportunity to experience the new jet first-hand, Boeing said.

French power utility EDF has announced plans to construct a 900 MW supercritical coal-fired power plant on the Rybnik site in Poland.

The project, worth around €1.8 billion, will involve the replacement of the four oldest units at the Rybnik plant with a single, more efficient one.

EDF said the advantage of the supercritical technology is its capacity to achieve the highest net efficiency in the market—equivalent to 45 per cent.

According to Department of Labor data released yesterday, the retail industry added nearly 50,000 jobs in November, the second highest increase since September 2007.

However, the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) warned that new regulations could impede the continued pace of job growth.

The Department of Labor figures show that the retail industry added 49,800 jobs in November, raising the total of US retail jobs to 14.7 million. The retail industry has added nearly 200,000 new jobs this year alone, averaging 14,000 new jobs each month.

DS Waters of America, Inc., one of the country's largest providers of bottled water products, is to acquire the Colorado assets of Deep Rock Water Co.

Deep Rock has been in business since 1896. In addition to its bottled water products, it also provides coffee services and water filtration to its customers.

Investec has agreed with the European Investment Bank (EIB) to establish a €100 million renewable energy funding facility to promote clean energy generation and energy efficiency initiatives in South Africa.

Investec and the EIB are to be equal partners in the programme, with each contributing €50 million.

The Credit Managers’ Index remained largely unchanged for the third consecutive month, according to the latest figures from the National Association of Credit Management.

The index did drop slightly, from 53.7 in October to 53.5 in November, which would not ordinarily be great news, but as September’s data was particularly strong, it is no bad thing that October and November remained pretty much the same.