Fisherman Peter Schneider knows the floods come each year and says they are good for business — but few other people see any benefit as experts warn of more high water to come. ”We fishermen have always lived with that. We’re happy when the floods come, because it can only be good for the fish,” he said in his village close to the Oder River, which forms the border between Germany and Poland.
Assets held by the world’s richest people rose by 11,4% last year, a study showed, but a slowing world economy might put a brake on the lavish expansion rate in coming years. Soaring commodity prices and equity markets and rapidly expanding emerging economies caused the global pool of wealth to expand to ,2-trillion at the end of 2006.