FOCUS DENMARK 03/2008

Colophon

Title:
FOCUS DENMARK 03/2008

Publisher:
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark

Responsible institution:
The Trade Council

Author:
Under-Secretary for Foreign Trade & Investment Ambassador Jarl Frijs-Madsen (Editor in chief), Poul Kjar (Executive editor), Annemarie Zinck (Editor)

Other contributors:
Nigel Mander (English editor), Schultz Grafisk (Electronic edition), SaloGruppen (Print), Kontrapunkt (Design), KP2, Allan Tonning (Layout), Anders Tvevad, Scanpix Denmark (Cover photo)

Language:
English

URL:
http://www.netpublikationer.dk/um/9178/index.htm

ISSN:
1601-9776

Version:
1.0

Version/edition:
20-11-2008

Publication standard nr.:
2.0

Data formats:
html,htm,jpg,gif,pdf,css,js

Publisher category:
statslig

Copyright:
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark

Notes and other information:

Material contained in FOCUS Denmark does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Danish Trade Council or the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark.

Reproduction is authorised, provided the source is acknowledged, except where otherwise stated. Citations may be made without prior permission, provided the source is acknowledged.

Focus Denmark is printed on Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified paper from Arctic Paper, Denmark. The wood that is used for making the paper comes from sustainable forestry, which meets all environmental, social and economic standards. The forest is independently inspected and assessed according to the principles and criteria approved by the Forest Stewardship Council.

Table Of Contents

EDITORIAL

• PREPARING FOR THE CHALLENGES OF TOMORROW

• DENMARK IN THE NEWS – Paris comes to Copenhagen
• George Soros suggests Danish fix for US mortgage woes
• DANES WHO MADE A DIFFERENCE – Hans Christian Andersen
• DAZZLING DANISH DESIGN FOR LONDON’S LATEST LANDMARK
• Danish anti-spam technology judged world’s best
• WORTH KNOWING ABOUT
• Danish Patent and Trademark Office
• DID YOU KNOW… ?
• Århus and Copenhagen universities among top 100
• BOOKMARK DENMARK
• A NEW FEATURE IN THE LANDSCAPE – Denmark designates first of five national parks
• Bill Gates funding for ACE BioSciences vaccine
• Record investments in Danish shipping

• The battle for sustainable energy intensifies

• Food for astronauts and French fries cooked in water

• Danish business people come in many varieties

• Danish economy: From quickstep to slow foxtrot

EDITORIAL

PREPARING FOR THE CHALLENGES OF TOMORROW

The 19th century was a turning point in modern Danish history. Denmark suffered not only the loss of Norway to Sweden and a bit of Jutland to Germany, but also bankruptcy and famine struck the country. On top of that the navy and the merchant fleet were lost to England. Denmark was a beaten nation.

But foresighted politicians did not give up. Only a few years after the state went bankrupt the Danish government decided to massively develop the sole potential of the flat and mineral-lacking land: namely agriculture through research and development. So through the 19th century, three universities were established to restore the Danish nation through technology and science: the Technical University of Denmark (1829), the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University (1858) and the Danish University of Pharmaceutical Sciences (1892).

These three universities formed the basis of the intensive research which has brought Denmark to having one of the world leading positions in life science. Today Denmark generates a quarter of its national GDP from the food industry and the Danish economy is highly based on innovation in the food, health and biotechnological industries. Thus, it is no coincidence that it is two Danish companies, namely Danisco and Novozymes, that hold more than 70 percent of the global market for industrial enzymes and at this very moment are competing for the future multibillion markets for second generation biofuels. Nor is it just a lucky punch that Denmark today possesses one of the most promising growth environments for upcoming biotechnological companies – it’s all due to the strategic planning of the nation’s development.

And today the goal is clear. Denmark aims to create Europe’s leading life science cluster, where a combination of state of the art universities, leading global industries and political incentives continue to foster innovative solutions to our common future needs. As a part of this strategy the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University merged in 2007 with the Danish University of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Copenhagen University thus creating Scandinavia’s largest university and the brand new Faculty for Life Sciences. And from the heart of Copenhagen the vision is to attract students and researchers from all over the world. Or as they say at the Faculty of Life Science: Bring your ideas to Life! You’re most welcome.

Enjoy the read.

IN BRIEF

DENMARK IN THE NEWS – Paris comes to Copenhagen

It’s a fact of modern life that high-living heiress Paris Hilton generates attention wherever she goes. And that includes Denmark’s capital, where the 27 year old jetted in to promote her new handbag collection produced by Danish company PH Europe during the recent Copenhagen Fashion Week.

The Paris Hilton effect was in full swing from the moment she arrived. Paparazzi swarmed, the tabloids went into overdrive, and there was a prime-time TV interview with the starlet, who was clearly delighted at all the attention and responded in kind. “I love Denmark”, “Danes are exceptionally beautiful” and “Copenhagen is the hottest fashion city” she trilled, as celebrity gossip columnists rushed to wing the news around the planet.

Official tourist website http://www.visitcopenhagen.com is now even featuring ’Paris Hilton’s Copenhagen’ which details where she stayed, where she ate and where she went, so you can follow in her footsteps and ’release your inner diva’.

Whatever one’s feelings about the media’s ceaseless occupation with celebrities, their value for putting the places they visit in the global public eye is undeniable. And Copenhagen certainly grasped its opportunity when Paris came to town.

George Soros suggests Danish fix for US mortgage woes

Denmark’s mortgage credit system has recently made headlines in Financial Times, with 78 year-old billionaire financier George Soros recommending the Danish model as a solution to the US mortgage crisis.

According to Soros, US Treasury secretary Hank Paulson has already suggested the alternative of using covered bonds, a mortgage-financing method that enjoys popularity in Europe. But Soros has a more specific suggestion in mind:

“I would recommend the system of mortgage credit used in Denmark, where loan-to-value ratios and underwriting standards are strictly enforced by a single, strong regulator. These mortgages are transformed into instantly tradable bonds. Cover for the bonds is provided by both the mortgages and the credit of the financial institutions issuing them.”

Soros also points out that the standardisation of mortgages in the Danish system promotes transparency and liquidity, and that householders can prepay their mortgages at any time by buying the bonds. “This system has survived and provided affordable home mortgages since its creation shortly after the great Copenhagen fire of 1795,” he writes.

DAZZLING DANISH DESIGN FOR LONDON’S LATEST LANDMARK

For two years, Londoners have been watching an extraordinary piece of architecture gradually take shape in the leafy environs of South Kensington. Now completed and unveiled, the Natural History Museum’s spectacular new wing, designed by the Danish firm C. F. Møller Architects, is open to a marvelling public.

Londoners are quick to adopt their own pet names for iconic new buildings, this one instantly being dubbed “The Cocoon”. And that is exactly what C. F. Møller designed it to resemble, as a structure to safely and securely house the museum’s priceless collections of over 20 million insects and 6 million plant specimens.

Encased in a frame of steel and glass, the 65-metre-long, 8-storey-high cocoon is the most significant expansion at the museum since it moved to South Kensington in 1881. It is also officially the largest sprayed concrete, curved structure in Europe, the museum notes on its website, describing C.F. Møller’s design as “this amazing architectural achievement.”

The Danish firm won the commission to design the building – officially known as Darwin Centre Phase Two – in an international competition in 2001.

Natural History Museum: http://www.nhm.ac.uk
C.F.Møller Architects: http://www.cfmoller.com

Danish anti-spam technology judged world’s best

It is currently estimated that up to 85% of all the e-mail in the world is junk e-mail, otherwise known as spam. The resource consumption, lost productivity and annoyance associated with spam is enormous and not surprisingly, much effort is going into the development of effective spam-filtering technologies.

One technology company that has attracted attention is Danish software developer Solido Systems, whose spam filter was recently judged the world’s best at the annual conference on email and anti-spam, CEAS 2008, held at Microsoft Research in Silicon Valley, California.

The CEAS 2008 Spam Filter Challenge took place over 72 hours, during which time the competing spam filters were exposed to 110,579 spam mails and 27,125 benign emails. Solido Systems’ software filtered 99.88% of the spam.

Solido Systems: http://www.solidosystems.com

WORTH KNOWING ABOUT

As a regular new feature of In Brief, each issue will present a profile of a Danish organisation that might interest you, either as a point of contact for business activity, or to add to your knowledge of what goes on in Denmark.

Danish Patent and Trademark Office

WHO ARE THEY?
The Danish Patent and Trademark Office (DKPTO) is a department of the Danish Ministry of Economic and Business Affairs, and has many years of experience in helping businesses and authorities all over the world with their intellectual property rights (IPR).

HOW CAN THEY BE USEFUL TO YOU?
DKPTO offers a range of services to help businesses determine if their ideas are new, and to enable them to make the right IPR decisions. DKPTO also participates in capacity-building projects worldwide as well as performing contract work for other patent offices around the world.

One DKPTO service well worth a closer look is “IP Marketplace”, a unique internet-based forum for buying, selling and licensing patents. It is available in English at http://www.ip-marketplace.org

IP Marketplace shows patents for sale or licensing in 7 technology areas. Users can also list a technology that they would like to buy or license. IP Marketplace additionally features all patents issued or validated in Denmark in the last 14 days.

WANT TO CONTACT THEM?
Internet: http://www.dkpto.org (website in English)
E-mail: pvs@dkpto.dk
Tel: +45 4350 8000 (Monday – Friday 9:00-16:00, GMT + 01:00)
Fax: +45 4350 8001

BOOKMARK DENMARK

As a new feature of In Brief, each issue will highlight a selection from the wide range of upcoming conferences, exhibitions and trade fairs happening in Denmark. If there's an event in your interest area, why not bookmark it to attend? Denmark's a great place to visit!

2008

2009

A NEW FEATURE IN THE LANDSCAPE – Denmark designates first of five national parks

While national parks have long been a familiar feature of many countries, Denmark has hitherto lacked such amenities. But now the country is set to catch up fast as the first – and largest – of five national parks to be inaugurated over the next 2-3 years is officially opened in the north of Denmark.

Each of the parks to be sited around the country have been selected to preserve and maintain the characteristic features of the Danish landscape, from forests and open countryside to areas of cultivation with their hedgerows and grazing pastures, as well as lakes, coastlines and inshore waters.

Denmark’s new national parks will not have fences round them, and anyone can visit and explore them free of charge. It’s also worth noting that these parks are not museums. People live and work in them, some contain villages and urban communities, and part of the designated land is under private ownership.

Bill Gates funding for ACE BioSciences vaccine

He may no longer be the world’s richest man, but Bill Gates still has awesome amounts of cash to put to humanitarian use through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which recently invested USD 50 million in US non-profit organisation PATH’s (Program for Appropriate Technology in Health) work on diarrhoeal disease prevention.

One company to receive funding from PATH is Danish biotech firm ACE BioSciences, which is developing a vaccine against one

 of the leading causes of diarrhoeal disease, enterotoxigenic E.coli (ETEC). If the work is successful, PATH will gain the right to use the vaccine for children in developing countries, while ACE BioSciences will market it worldwide as a travel vaccine, reports Danish newspaper Fyens Stiftstidende.

Diarrhoea is the second leading cause of death in children under the age of five, killing more than 1.8 million children each year. ETEC is responsible for up to 840 million infections and around 400,000 deaths worldwide annually, most of whom are children in developing countries.

ACE BioSciences: http://www.acebiosciences.com

FOCUS ON LIFE SCIENCE

The battle for sustainable energy intensifies

BY JESPER LØVENBALK HANSEN

US President George Bush at the Novozymes’ research facility in North Carolina.

Two of the world’s greatest global challenges are the rapidly increasing need for energy and the threat of global warming. Which explains why the world’s energy companies and politicians are now turning their eyes towards the Danish manufacturers of enzymes, Danisco and Novozymes, which are developing technologies that make it possible to produce biofuel from waste

The President in conversation with Steen Risgaard, Managing Director of Novozymes (far right).

When US President George W. Bush visited the Danish enzyme manufacturer Novozymes’ research facility in North Carolina, it was to take a look into the near future. President Bush wanted to see for himself how developments are progressing for the enzymes which will make it possible to produce fuel for cars, buses and trucks from agricultural and industrial waste.

Because just like any other place in the world, US energy policy depends on biofuel replacing an increasingly large proportion of the world’s consumption of petrol and diesel in the coming years.

Biofuel is produced from biological material, where sugar is extracted and fermented to convert it into ethanol, which can be poured directly into the petrol tank. But whereas biofuel today is made from sugar cane, maize, wheat and other food crops, the aim is to make liquid fuel from plant residues and waste products. This is called ’second generation’ biofuel.

“Second generation biofuel uses residual products such as the stems and leaves from plants, essentially all the rest of the plant when we grow for example maize for food or animals,” says Lene Lang, professor of biotechnology and vice dean of Aalborg University.

The atmosphere is thus saved a significant proportion of the enormous CO₂ emissions that the transport sector accounts for today, just as problems with increasing energy prices and supply security can be solved locally by converting waste to fuel.

And that is exactly why the US government and the rest of the world are keeping a watchful eye on the Danish companies Danisco and Novozymes, which together have a 70 per cent share of the global market for enzymes. They are currently competing to be first with the enzymes that will realize the political dream of making biofuel from waste.

FROM FIRST TO SECOND GENERATION
In USA alone, biofuel already accounts for 5 per cent of the fuel market. In 2020 it will be 17 per cent. In China, India, Brazil and the EU, politicians have set similar future requirements for petrol and diesel to be mixed with biofuel.

It is an enormous and constantly developing market, which according to one of the world’s leading management consulting companies, McKinsey, will be worth between USD 75 and 140 billion by 2020.

At the present time, market growth is being assisted by direct subsidies for fuel produced from biomass. But over the coming years, political demands concerning production will be tightened.

Whereas today it is possible in the USA, EU and many other countries to receive direct financial support for production of biofuel from food crops, in a few years’ time there will only be subsidies for second generation biofuel. And that is morally, economically and environmentally the right way to go, opines Professor Lange.

“The basic fact is that we need other forms of energy than coal, gas and oil. We need renewable energy, and biofuel is one of the most important solutions,” says Lene Lange, who explains why a shift from first to second generation is important:

“If you calculate the amount of energy required to make a gallon first generation biofuel – from planting, fertilising and harvesting to the finished biofuel – it is hardly worth doing today. We use almost as much energy as we extract in ethanol. At the same time, it is naturally an enormous problem that at a time of increasing food prices and lack of food, we are making biofuel from our agricultural products,” says Lene Lange, who asserts that biofuel will only provide a real solution for the future when it becomes possible to produce competitive biofuel from waste and residual products.

READY IN YEAR 2010
That day is coming, say the directors of the two enzyme manufacturers, who are both confident that the scientific code for producing second generation biofuel has already been cracked.

Managing director of Danisco, Tom Knutzen, says that since 2001 Danisco has been able to produce bioethanol from residual products, and that now it is only about refining the processes so that production becomes financially cost-effective.

That message is echoed by Steen Risgaard, managing director of competitor Novozymes: “We will be ready in 2010. Then we will have a process that makes it possible to produce bioethanol from the resi duals of the maize plant – that is the stem and leaves. And it is financially cost-effective.”

Claus Felby, research scientist at the life science faculty of the University of Copenhagen, is similarly optimistic in relation to both second generation biofuel and the future market. He points out that although the focus today is on developing fuel for cars and trucks, it is very different markets that await Novozymes and Danisco.

“Right now the car industry is giving the market the development momentum it needs. But in the long term it is about fuel for aircraft and ships, and replacing oil in the chemical industry. It is these enormous markets that are the real target,” says Claus Felby.

But it needs politicians to set requirements for those industries, otherwise the development process will be too slow, says Claus Felby.

“It is crucial that we understand the long-term challenges we are facing. If we continue as now, nature will set clear limits for us before long. So we had better make a start ourselves before we lose control,” says Claus Felby, who explains that the political focus is also very much on energy and security policy.

“Globally, there is a great desire to be self-sufficient in energy, and so a tremendous need has arisen for technologies that can both reduce the global environmental impact and energy dependency,” says Claus Felby.

Global warming and the increasing global demand for energy is accelerating the development of new technologies for renewable energy. Second generation biofuel made from agricultural waste such as the stems and leaves of maize will reach the market very soon thanks to enzymes produced by Novozymes and Danisco. Photo: Scanpix Denmark.

Chateaux du pill: Red wine tablet prolongs your life

BY JESPER LØVENBALK HANSEN

The Danish undergrowth of biotech companies is sprouting up. Fluxome Sciences is one of many new companies focusing on the booming biotech niche for health and nutrition – they aim to sell red wine in tablets

Fluxome Sciences is entering the booming market for nutraceuticals – a biotech niche for health and nutrition products with a documented disease-preventing effect. Fluxome Sciences produces pure resveratrol, a substance normally found in grapes that helps prevent coronary disease. Photo: Scanpix Denmark.

People in southern France live longer and have a lower incidence of cancer and coronary heart disease. In scientific circles, they employ the term “the French paradox”. Because the secret of the French is not that they exercise more or eat more healthily than anyone else – they just drink a lot more red wine.

“The connection between red wine and health exists, and we call it the French paradox. Because although the French apparently eat just as much fat and unhealthy food as we do here further to the North, they live longer and have fewer problems with diseases such as coronary heart disease. One can simply say that consuming relatively large amounts of red wine has a beneficial effect,” explains Steen Andersen, CEO of one of the many small and relatively new Danish biotech companies, Fluxome Sciences.

Manufacturers of dietary supplements have also long known how to make dietary supplements with the substance resveratrol, which is the active substance that gives red wine its image as a healthy drink. But while the existing capsules and tablets on the market have been produced from grape extracts, Fluxome Sciences has created its product in a laboratory.

“We have a technology platform that enables us to design microorganisms, so that we can copy and produce nature’s own substances in pure form. We have developed a process where we can artificially produce resveretrol of 99% purity,” says Steen Andersen.

But why not just drink a lot of good red wine?
“That I can also recommend – and it should be wine made from the pinot noir grape, which is the grape that contains this active substance resveretrol. But if you want to use red wine as a dietary supplement, you need to consume amounts which the health authorities for other reasons would probably not recommend,” says Steen Andersen.

NUTRACEUTICALS: A BOOMING MARKET
The development from idea to finished production proceeded quickly for Fluxome Sciences. The red wine tablet concept was the brainchild of one of the company’s directors and founders, Professor Jens Nielsen of the Technical University of Denmark. In 2002, he started a company as a supplementary occupation to develop the idea of a red wine tablet, and in 2005 Fluxome Sciences was ready to list on the stock exchange. Today the company’s declared objective is to become a world leader in development, production and marketing of nutraceuticals.

“Nutraceuticals are ingredients that exist in the borderland between the food and the pharmaceutical industry. They are products with a documented preventive effect in relation to disease, in this case cancer – which the consumer takes either as dietary supplements or as foods to which nutraceuticals have been added,” explains Steen Andersen, who sees nutraceuticals as one of the biotech niche markets which at present easily attract venture capital.

According to Steen Andersen, this is because the life science industry in general and the market for nutraceuticals in particular will develop rapidly in the coming years. He points out that whereas the food industry is growing by 4-5 per cent annually, and the pharmaceutical industry has a growth rate of 5-6 per cent annually, the new biotech niches such as nutraceuticals are seeing annual growth rates of 20 per cent.

CHARTING THE DANISH BIOTECH BOOM…

Source: Danish Biotech

…AND THE VENTURE CAPITAL DRIVING IT

Source: Vækstfonden

The reason why nutraceuticals are doing so well is, in Steen Andersen’s view, because dietary supplements and health products are faster and therefore less cost-intensive to develop, since the products are not subject to the same strict requirements from authorities as pharmaceuticals. That is why it is easier to attract venture capital to new, promising products.

Steen Andersen also points out that nutraceuticals are a consumer-driven market that fits very well with current trends: “We want to live for ever, and today we take our health in our own hands. It is a market in rapid growth, where we are sitting on a winner.”

UNDERGROWTH OF NEW BIOTECH START-UPS
In July, one of Europe’s largest venture capital funds, Seventure Partners, put EUR 13 million into Fluxome Sciences. At the time, Isabelle de Crémoux, who is General Partner and Head of the Life Sciences team at Seventure Partners, explained that the investment in Fluxome Sciences was due to a generally high level of confidence in the Danish biotechnology market.

“We have a very strong interest and relationship with the Danish life sciences community, and have active investments in Santaris Pharma and Vivostat, making Seventure the most active international investor in Danish biotech. We believe there is great science and innovation in Denmark, which combined with excellent management and high-quality R&D personnel makes it a very attractive country in which to grow emerging businesses and create significant value.”

“And Fluxome Sciences is a very promising company with a strong R&D pipeline and an exciting first nutraceutical product in resveratrol,” said Isabelle de Crémoux.

The growth of modern biotechnology is a global trend. According to one of the world’s largest accountancy and consultancy companies, Ernst & Young, which publishes the annual “Beyond Borders: Global Biotechnology report”, modern biotechnology is the major new growth market to emerge after the IT industry’s total dominance through the 1990s. Figures from Ernst & Young show that despite a general decline on the capital market from 2001, when the IT bubble burst, the amount of capital available for biotechnology has grown by 117 per cent in the USA and 72 per cent in the EU in the period 1998-2007.

For Denmark, the percentage increase is much higher. An analysis conducted by the Danish investment company Vækstfonden shows that venture capital available for investment in Danish biotech has increased from less than half a billion in 1998 to between six and 12 billion DKK annually in the period 2001-2007.

It is also reflected in the number of new biotech companies that are sprouting up. From 2000 to 2002, between 12 and 18 new Danish biotech companies came into being each year, and overall the Danish biotech industry has mushroomed in the last 20 years from 20 to 120 active biotech companies. It puts the Danish biotech cluster in the top flight, and among Europe’s three most important biotech centres together with London and Basel.

Bringing science to life

BY JESPER LØVENBALK HANSEN

The story of Copenhagen’s 150 year old agricultural university – which today is called the Faculty for Life Sciences – is also the story of Denmark’s development from a bankrupt agricultural state to a bioscientific stronghold

During the last 150 years Denmark has developed from a bankrupt and starving nation to a world-leading food exporter. Photo: Scanpix Denmark.

We want to live longer and better lives, but one sixth of the world’s population are eating themselves to death while another sixth are starving. We know that we must protect the environment and conserve resources, but we consume more than ever before in history. We are focused on wellbeing and the good life both now and in the future, but how will it be created?

These are some of the dilemmas and questions that researchers and students are attempting to answer at the University of Copenhagen’s Faculty for Life Sciences. So explains the faculty’s dean, Per Holten-Andersen:

“Life science is the science of everything to do with living. It is our food, our lifestyle and welfare. For example, the food industry today is as much an experience industry as it is production. In our part of the world we rarely eat only because of hunger, just as we now use land for a lot more than food production. There is an enormous economic potential in our land and nature,” says Per Holten-Andersen, who points out that it is no coincidence that the life science industry is one of the world’s most rapidly increasing growth markets.

To strengthen the Danish life science environment, three of Denmark’s oldest universities merged last year and created a new cross-disciplinary faculty. The dean of the new faculty, Per Holten-Andersen, was previously the head of Denmark’s Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University, which for 150 years has occupied the same buildings in Copenhagen that the Faculty for Life Sciences now occupies.

“As the Veterinary and Agricultural University, we chose to merge with the University of Copenhagen and the Danish University of Pharmaceutical Sciences and create Scandinavia’s largest university. One of the reasons we did so was because Copenhagen has one of the world’s largest concentrations of pharmaceutical, health and food industries and one of the most highly trained workforces in this field. So Copenhagen already has a very strong brand in life science,” says Per Holten-Andersen, who thinks that the university merger consolidates Copenhagen as “one of Europe’s largest life science clusters” which today represents one of the cornerstones of the Danish economy. A status that has been achieved not least because of the food industry, comprising giants like Arla Foods, Carlsberg and Danish Crown, which collectively accounts for 25 per cent of Denmark’s GDP and employs a quarter of the nation’s workforce.

A BEATEN NATION
The fact that Denmark was to get a number of strong universities in food, agriculture and health at an early stage in its history is due to what Per Holten-Andersen describes as “political due care” at a time when the country was forced to its knees. Because, as in so many other places in the world, the country’s modern history is actually founded on the smoking ruins of a catastrophe.

During the 1800s, Denmark lost Norway and the southern Swedish regions of Skåne, Halland and Blekinge to Sweden. The Danish navy and merchant fleet were seized by England and finally Denmark was vanquished by Germany, which also took a geographical bite out of the country. Denmark was a beaten nation.

“Denmark had just lost very large areas of land, the state was bank rupt, and we were plagued by famine with a very high mortality. The country was in a situation where we couldn’t supply ourselves with food. We reached a low point in those years,” explains Per Holten-Andersen.

Politically it was decided to get the country on its feet again through massive development of the sole potential of the flat and mineral-lacking land: namely agriculture. So through the 1800s, three universities were established to restore the Danish nation through technology and science: the Technical University of Denmark (1829), the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University (1858) and the Danish University of Pharmaceutical Sciences (1892).

“From a political perspective, it was a visionary act to open three universities, and it quickly delivered results,” says Per Holten Andersen, who adds that from the end of the 1800s Denmark had again became self-sufficient in food. “And today Denmark produces food for 30 million people, but we are only five million,” says Per Holten-Andersen.

THE NEW COPENHAGEN SCHOOL
Although the food industry is the flagship of the Danish life science cluster, the refinement of food in Danish agriculture is closely associated with the parallel development of the Danish pharmaceutical and life science industry. According to Per Holten-Andersen, the Danish welfare model with its free education and free health insurance has nurtured a growing domestic market in the medico and healthcare industry, which has catalysed the development of pharmaceutical pioneers such as Novo Nordisk, LEO-Pharma and Lundbeck.

At the Faculty for Life Sciences, research is currently conducted in everything from food and drug development to climate challenges, sustainable energy and the economies of developing countries. The work is both about looking at economic opportunities in new markets and helping to solve a number of the problems the world is facing.

The Faculty of Life Sciences offers 17 masters degrees in seven overall categories: 1) animal, ethics and welfare, 2) climate, energy and environment, 3) food and health, 4) plants and natural resources, 5) politics, economics and developing countries, 6) forest, rural and urban development, 7) biotechnology

And that is the foundation on which the relatively new Faculty for Life Sciences will build. There is also a need for visions – and Per Holten-Andersen has them.

“My personal ambition is to help create Denmark’s international university par excellence, which is a world leader in several fields. The university will acquire a completely new business profile and business collaboration compared to previously. It will have one of Europe’s most attractive campuses and study environments, located in one of Europe’s most attractive capitals. The realisation of this can make Copenhagen into an international research and educational metropolis, that can lead one’s thoughts back to the ’Copenhagen School’, centred around the Bohr Institute in the 1920s and 1930s,” says Per Holten-Andersen.

Food for astronauts and French fries cooked in water

BY NADIA LOUISE KRISTENSEN

With a helping hand from the world of technology, a number of Danish companies and universities are learning to understand and adjust foods so they become healthier and safer. In Denmark, foods are being developed for, among others,
a very special target group – namely astronauts.

No way can we have foods that make crumbs – because crumbs float around and cause havoc in the machinery. And foods must have a long shelf life – because the target group has no shopping mall close by. These are just two of the requirements NASA stipulated to the Danish dairy giant Arla Foods, when the company was commissioned to formulate foods for NASA’s astronauts. The weightlessness that astronauts experience in space also means that their bodies age faster and their muscles atrophy.

“Simply stated, there are two options for improving the physical condition of astronauts: exercise and food. There are limited opportunities for exercise in space, but we can do something about food, and milk is perfect in this context. Milk contains lots of protein, calcium and vitamins that are important for optimising the functioning of the body in space. Our challenge was to make products that compensate for the problems astronauts encounter when they are in space,” says Henrik Jørgen Andersen, who is head of research at Arla Foods.

Out of the project grew four products, two of which have already been on a trip into space. Yogurt in several taste variants, Milk bites, that look like small balls of marzipan and provide the same nutrition as a large glass of drinking chocolate, and a chocolate milk powder that contains D vitamins, calcium, fibres and yogurt with beneficial lactic acid bacteria. One of the challenges Arla met was to make the right coating for Milk bites so that they make no crumbs – but the coating recipe is a secret. All the products consist of 100% milk and can keep for at least two years at room temperature.

INTEREST FROM ARABIA
It is not only astronauts who can benefit from the products. Many elderly people suffer from the same problems as astronauts and cosmonauts: osteoporosis, muscle and joint problems, and intestinal diseases. Furthermore, several Arabian countries have shown interest in the space yogurt because it keeps well in hot climates.

“We have learned something about how we can develop products for risk groups –young people who do not drink enough milk, and elderly people who get problems like osteoporosis. This time it was the vision of food for astronauts that provided the development momentum, but it could just as well have been another group,” says Henrik Jørgen Andersen.

The dairy giant still supplies foods to NASA and is now also collaborating with the European space organisation to develop a milk component that can strengthen the immune system in people subjected to stressful environments, like astronauts in space.

Arla Foods is also part of the NanoFOOD consortium, a collaboration between Danish companies in the food industry and research scientists at the University of Aarhus. One of its focus areas is to develop foods by means of nanotechnology, an area of research in which Denmark has made significant advances – not least because universities have been quick to establish their own research centres.

’Nano’ usually relates to something much smaller than the naked eye can see, that requires highly specialised manipulation tools. With nanotechnology, foods can be studied at the very smallest scale – to the benefit of quality, shelf life and our health. The taste and consistency of foods turn out to be determined by what happens at the nanoand micrometre scale. For instance, nano-sized salt crystals have been synthesised that have the same taste strength as much larger amounts of ordinary salt. Nanotechnology can also be used for example to encapsulate important nutrients in food, so they taste better or are more easily taken up by the body.

FROM FOOD TO IMPLANTS
At Arla Foods and other food companies, the technology is used to improve the understanding of foods.

“We use nanotechnology to get a better understanding of individual food components. We are learning why they taste, feel and look as they do. And with that understanding we can become better at producing foods that consumers want,” says Henrik Jørgen Andersen.

So far it has created fertile ground for something very different to human food. In collaboration with the NanoFOOD consortium, Arla has discovered that milk proteins applied to implant surfaces improve the likelihood of an artificial hip being successfully implanted without rejection problems. In the long term, they also hope that milk proteins can be used to ward away bacteria in, for example, toothpaste.

But nanotechnology has more potential uses than understanding foods and using them for other purposes. It can also be used to make food healthier, so people with a sweet tooth can be satisfied without developing rolls of fat.

It can be part of the solution to a welfare problem that WHO has already dubbed an epidemic: obesity. The population of both Europe and USA is growing – not upwards but outwards. More than 50 percent of Europeans are overweight or obese, while in the USA the figure is 64 percent. But despite campaigns and warnings of lowered life expectancy and poorer life quality, French fries, chocolate and soft drinks are still going into our shopping trolleys and then into our stomachs.

It doesn’t just mean larger clothes sizes and less years to live – it also has major economic consequences. In Denmark alone, obesity costs the healthcare sector DKK 1.5 billion annually.

Imagine a future where chocolate is healthy due to the use of nanotechnology. Photo: Scanpix Denmark.

NOT JUST ’LIGHT’
One of the companies working with nanotechnology is Aarhus-Karlshamn, a Danish/Swedish manufacturer of speciality vegetable fats. The company’s production includes fat for chocolate.

“If people were to eat healthily, they would stop eating chocolate all together, but that is unlikely. One third of chocolate consists of fat, and by understanding the structure we have the opportunity to change it and make chocolate, if not healthy, then less unhealthy,” explains head of research at Aarhus-Karlshamn, Karsten Nielsen. According to Karsten Nielsen, consumers have become a demanding group. That is also why ’light’ products are on the decline because they don’t really taste the same and are often filled with additives.

“If for example we can get water to behave differently instead of making a new additive, we can then make chocolate with less fat that tastes the same and fulfils consumers’ requirements,” says Karsten Nielsen.

But according to Leif Schauser, secretariat director of the Nano-FOOD consortium, the great challenge is to convince the critical and demanding consumer that ’nano’ is not a new additive or a new genetically modified product. This is despite nano being simply an expression of a very small size.

“The biggest challenge is the population’s overall acceptance of using technology. There are two trends. Food should be as healthy as possible, and as natural as possible – and those two things do not always go together. Preferably, food should be both healthy and natural. The trend in the industry is therefore to go for natural ingredients. Because consumers mean everything when we produce these foods,” says Leif Schauser.

Full speed ahead in relaxed style

BY INGE KJÆRGAARD

To many, Denmark means Hans Christian Andersen, the Little Mermaid, open sandwiches and an indefinable kind of social cosiness Danes call hygge. But Denmark is also Maersk, Vestas, Grundfos, Danfoss, and a lot of small- and medium-sized enterprises. A lot of people ready to do business with you. So what are they like, and what should you prepare yourself for when sitting down at the table with the Vikings from the cold north?

Danes may appear unstructured, when in fact they are not. Don’t underestimate them in negotiations – they know what they are doing. Illustration: Lars Chrois.

Forward, friendly, informal, unstructured, humorous. A foreigner’s description of a Danish businessman or businesswoman depends on the person’s own frame of reference.

“You typically make assessments from the cultural platform you stand on yourself. So opinions will differ widely, depending on whether you ask a Chinese, an American or a Saudi how they perceive Danish business people,” says Anne-Marie Søderberg.

She is professor of intercultural communication and management at Copenhagen Business School; her research interests include national identity and cultural analysis.

There are nonetheless some common characteristics which broadly categorise Danes, opines one of Denmark’s most well-known sociologists, Henrik Dahl.

“What strikes foreigners most about Danes is that we are quite anti-authoritarian. We have some very informal rules regarding how we socialise, while other countries have very formal rules about who can talk to whom, and how you dress,” he says.

Distances are small within power structures in Denmark – in both politics and management. One can see it in leadership style and the way managers dress.

“It is all very informal. But even so, productivity is fairly high. We are industrious – secretly. Unstructured appearances can deceive foreigners – because things are actually quite structured,” says Henrik Dahl.

COSMOPOLITAN VS. DANISH
Anne-Marie Søderberg thinks that Danish businesspeople are gradually shifting towards being cosmopolitan rather than Danish.

“The younger generation has travelled a lot, stayed abroad to study and worked abroad, perhaps in an overseas subsidiary of a big company they work for, so they are used to being among foreigners. Danish workplaces are also becoming more multicultural”, she says.

But Henrik Dahl thinks that Danes are still very Danish. Many companies have to instruct their staff concerning dress code when they travel abroad to conduct business.

“Danes have a tendency to think that their way is the best way. From an unreflected Dane’s viewpoint, foreigners are seen as rather odd and so may not always receive sufficient respect,” says Henrik Dahl.

Danish business people come in many varieties

Friendly, conflict-shy, prepared, not so prepared, flexible, not so understanding. These are some of the words the foreign businesspeople Focus Denmark has spoken to use to describe Danish businesspeople. The impressions are far from unequivocal – it all depends on the eyes that see.

A DEAL IS A DEAL

The Danes are unique to themselves, thinks Konstantin Fomin. He is a Russian director in Per Aarsleff, a company that specialises in foundation engineering and pipe renovation, and he conducts business with Danes on a daily basis.

“Danes are very different to other Europeans. I often meet businesspeople from Central Europe and they are very different – even Germans are different from Danes”, he says and continues: “If you do business with a Dane, you can be sure that a deal is a deal. You can really count on them. In many other countries you have to make sure you get things in writing.”

He thinks however that it can be a bit difficult to gauge their reactions in a negotiation situation.

“They do not quite show whether they are happy or unhappy, whereas other nationalities display their emotions more,” he says.

Konstantin Fomin thinks that the era of spending lots of time wining and dining with business acquaintances is drawing to a close – and that is certainly echoed by the Danes. They want to get down to business and sort out the paperwork. But it doesn’t signify any lack of respect for the culture.

“I think they are very flexible. If for example there is a national holiday, they show understanding for our traditions and are happy to participate,” he says.

FULL SPEED AHEAD

Prepared, focused and determined. That is Martin Fischer’s view of Danish businesspeople. He has lived in Denmark for seven years, is originally from Switzerland, but has lived in many countries including 10 years in the USA.

“When Danes go into a negotiation, they know what they want. They have prepared well and have their act together. And they are very focused about reaching their objectives,” says Martin Fischer, who works for Polycom – the world’s leading company in unified communication solutions.

There are pros and cons to the Danish approach, he thinks. The advantage is that they know what they are talking about, but on the other hand they can become a bit too focused and forget to listen to the people sitting across the table.

“Culturally, Danes are not always so understanding of others. They often go full speed ahead – like they do at home. But that is not necessarily the way to do things when you conduct business abroad,” he says.

Martin Fischer lived in the USA for many years, and sees a significant difference between American and Danish businesspeople.

“In Denmark, there is trust in the state to take care of you if things go wrong. It’s not like that in the USA – if things go wrong, you really fall. So there is a much more personal approach to things – as an individual you have to fight your way forward – and that makes Americans somewhat tougher businesspeople,” he opines.

HUMOUR TO SMOOTH OVER DIFFICULTIES

Maarten van Engeland is director of ISS Facility Services A/S, which operates in the cleaning and catering sector. He was born in Holland, but has lived in Denmark for 30 years.

“As a Dutchman I have had to get used to Danes generally not having too much regard for authority. You might think that Danes lack respect, but they don’t. To Danes, their word is their bond and they are very capable. Compared to foreign businesspeople they do not always seem particularly well-prepared at meetings. So some probably underestimate the Danes’ capabilities,” says Maarten van Engeland.

He thinks Danes are very convivial and good at socialising together. A nice meal is always a good idea, but the time and place are important.

“It should preferably be at a time that suits them. In other countries you dine out with businesspeople morning, noon and night. But Danes cherish their spare time, and rarely invite business associates to their homes, as one does in many other countries,” he says.

He describes himself as a very direct businessman, and in that respect he thinks he differs from most Danish businesspeople.

“Danes are more esoteric and indirect. They prefer to use humour to say the things they don’t like to say. They smooth things over and say ’We will work something out’,” he opines.

NO CHEATING

Straightforward, open and friendly. These are the words Hai Li from China applies to Danish businesspeople. He works for Vestas Aircoil in China, and his boss is Danish.

“If there is something they want to ask, they ask directly, and that saves a lot of time. In China, as in many other countries, people are not so direct,” says Hai Li.

Although Hai Li works closely with Danes, he has not adopted the direct approach to communication – neither with Danes nor local people.

He actually considers it is an advantage to refrain from directness, since many Chinese do not like it.

Hai Li thinks it is easy to do business with Danes when there is good trust, but recognises that it takes a little time to build.

“It requires a few meetings – to observe how you work and speak – and to gain trust. But Danes are very open people and good listeners. And they are willing to make changes if your idea is good,” he says.

Something Hai Li thinks is both good and bad about Danes is the speed with which they sometimes make decisions. It means that changes can be made quickly – but occasionally he thinks that they forget whether they have all the facts in their hands.

Hai Li emphasises one important point to note when doing business with a Dane: “You must not cheat a Dane. They become angry if they discover it,” says Hai Li.

Fight for your rights

BY JESPER LØVENBALK HANSEN

Research and invention is happening like never before, and intellectual property rights represent a constantly increasing share of the value of many companies. That puts correspondingly increased demands on the international patent systems, which according to experts should be revised as quickly as possible.

The times when the bulk of a company’s market value was in physical assets such as buildings, fixtures and machinery, have passed. Today, the market value of many companies mainly comprises intellectual property assets, in other words proprietary patent-protected inventions and brands, which are to an increasing extent sold, shared and exchanged between companies.

This trend is seen in the number of patents, which is rising by between four and five per cent annually worldwide, and which in 2006 reached more than six million active patents globally. It is also seen in the increasing numbers of violations and cases of copying, as well as the close attention both industry and governments pay to intellectual property rights (IPR).

“The patent system is the mechanism which ensures exploitation of society’s resources in the best possible way, so as to get as much innovation as possible for the cheapest possible price,” says Peter Lotz, head of the department of industrial economics at Copenhagen Business School, about the logic behind the international patent system.

Patents are not only the important contract between inventor and society, which ensures an individual or a company the right to earn money on new ideas for society’s common benefit and development. Patents are also a vibrant market where innovative companies gain a constantly greater share of their earnings. So explains Lars Pallisgaard Olsen of the Danish IPR firm Zacco, which advises companies on securing, protecting and trading their intellectual property rights.

“For many medium-sized and large companies, sales of patents and licences to use patents today represent a very large share of corporate earnings. Novo Nordisk is one of the Danish companies that generates a large proportion of its overall revenues from sales of patents and rights, and a company such as Rank Xerox has for many years earned more on licences for its products than from selling copying machines, which was their original business area.”

NEED FOR BETTER REGULATION
The rapid inflation in patents on a global level does however have a drawback: the constantly increasing number of patents worldwide puts enormous pressure on the authorities that have less and less time to process the often complicated applications. So says Lars Pallisgaard Olsen of Zacco, who prior to joining the Danish IPR firm, worked for eight years handling cases at the European Patent Office in Frankfurt.

“The danger is that too many patents are issued on too loose a basis, because there is not enough time or staff to go through the applications. It is bad business for everybody since a patent issued on the wrong basis subsequently costs a lot of time and money fighting over rights.”

The European Parliament draws attention to the same issue in a report from January 2008, which was commissioned by its Science and Technology Options Assessment panel.

The report ”Policy options for the improvement of the European Patent System” concludes that the world’s industries, in their pursuit of innovation and dominance, are pressing more and more patents through an ever more rapidly growing and impenetrable system. The international patent systems – and the European system in particular – thus seriously need to be tightened up. Otherwise there is a risk of serious consequences for innovation and welfare in the EU.

“It is difficult for both large and small companies to manage in a world that is gradually becoming extremely rights-restricted. They have to use too many resources on the process, and they become more and more afraid of risking their skins with a new product,” comments Peter Lotz on the report from the EU Parliament, to which he himself contributed.

There is a pressing need to standardise and centralise the patent system so that it becomes faster, easier and more secure for industry and inventors to get their patents through the system.

“Innovation creates growth. And if we didn’t ensure the inventor or the manufacturer their rights, we would not see any innovation,” says Lars Pallisgaard Olsen.

Denmark among the leaders in bicycle traditions leaders in bicycle traditions

BY MARLENE LYHNE SØRENSEN

Well helped on its way by high taxes on cars, abundant cycle lanes and flat terrain, Denmark has developed into one of the biggest bicycling nations in the world. More than two billion kilometres are covered annually. But bicycle culture is under pressure.

The sleet slaps against the car window as we roll through the streets of Copenhagen. Mr. Miri is sitting in the passenger seat, staring out in disbelief at the dark figures steering their two-wheeled iron horses around the slushy snow drifts in the bicycle lanes, heads bent and defiant feet on the pedals.

“Why don’t they just buy a car?” he exclaims with a wide-eyed look.

Mr. Miri was born in Iran but has lived most of his life in USA and Canada, where the bicycle is not exactly a widely-used means of transport.

But the picture is different in Denmark – one of the world’s leading bicycling nations. Danes cover more than two billion kilometres on their bikes every year. In Denmark, bicycles account for 18 per cent of all trips taken, while in the UK the figure is only one per cent (see chart 1).

How is the difference explained? Why do Danes have such a passion for the bicycle compared to most other European populations?

The first bicycles, known as velocipedes, came to Denmark in 1860 and in the following decade the tall and unsteady penny-farthing was introduced. This was reserved for the wealthy classes as an exclusive and daring toy, but from 1890 developments started to gather pace. Comfortable rubber was put on the wheels and the construction became more user-friendly and safe, which made the bicycle a continuously more widespread means of transport in Danish everyday life.

On the first bicycles, the front wheel was slightly larger than the back wheel, but soon the wheels were given identical diameters, the frame was improved, the drive chain was introduced, and in 1895 the crossbar became a modern feature.

Promoted by the economic upswing and urban sprawl, the bicycle now became an affordable investment and a practical means of transport, especially for the many who had moved out to the suburbs of Copenhagen. For postmen, who hitherto had worn out their shoe leather on the sidewalks, the bicycle became an attractive alternative. All over the country, especially in the expanding railway towns, one bicycle factory after another sprouted up to meet the strongly growing demand. And many women swung themselves onto bicycle seats and whizzed off with the wind in their skirts. On bicycle posters of that period, the woman is depicted as a tribute to the free-born, independent woman, who in high-neck trouser suit, laced boots, and with bulging feminine forms, became a measure of value for the era’s many bicycle enthusiasts.

“In countries such as France and England, the bicycle continued its hobby status for the wealthy. But in Denmark, the development of cycling was greatly helped on its way by the country’s flat terrain and relatively short travel distances,” says Lotte Ruby, head of press at the Danish Cyclists Federation.

On old bicycle posters the woman is depicted as a tribute to the free-born, independent woman, who in high-neck trouser suit, laced boots, and with bulging feminine forms, became a measure of value for the era’s many bicycle enthusiasts.

IMPORTANT HABIT FOR HEALTH
The Danish Cyclists Federation was founded in 1905 and ever since has fought to promote the interests of cyclists in Denmark. Things went well in the early days, when riding paths were made into cycle lanes, and the car was still the province of the wealthy.

But in the 1960s, the bicycle experienced its first setback. Motoring was booming, people had more money in their pockets and moved into more spacious homes, and large car parks were constructed in the cities.

In the 1970s came the backlash. New members started flowing into the Danish Cyclists Federation with a shared desire to limit the spread of the automobile, which threatened to muscle its noisy way into the most attractive squares in the cities. Their demands were helped by the oil crisis of 1973, which made petrol- and diesel-powered transport an increasingly expensive alternative.

Car taxes went up and up, as did the population’s wish for more cycle lanes and parking space for bicycles. In some places, politicians were warm to the idea. In towns especially, millions of kroner were invested in creating better conditions for cycling, and today it is widely acknowledged that bicycles are not only environmentally friendly, but also help keep down body weight and strengthen public health. About 9 per cent of women in Denmark are severely obese, while for women in the UK it is 23 per cent.

”Cycling is one of the most important habits for our health,” says one of the country’s leading sport and exercise experts, Professor Lars Bo Andersen of the Institute of Sports Science and Clinical Biomechanics at the University of Southern Denmark.

“Studies show that those who cycle to work on a daily basis, have a 30 per cent lower mortality rate than those who do not cycle,” says Lars Bo Andersen.

A CYCLE CULTURE UNDER PRESSURE
But cycling is a habit on the ebb. In recent years Danes have apparently become more inclined to take the car, as soon as the bicycle wheels encounter a steep hill or a shower of rain. People are generally wealthier, more families have two cars, and according to figures from the Danish Road Directorate, Danes covered 3.2 billion km by bicycle in 1990, while the figure dropped to 2.3 billion km in 2006 – a decrease of almost 30 per cent.

Only in the capital Copenhagen and in other larger cities, which have invested in better conditions for two-wheel traffic, are there more people who cycle.

“If the bicycle is not thought into all traffic planning right from cycle lanes to tax system, then the good cycling habits crumble away,” says Lotte Ruby of the Danish Cyclists Federation, who points to the example of the Netherlands, where bicycling is far more integrated in traffic policy initiatives, and where a lot more people cycle than in Denmark.

Malene Freudendal-Pedersen, knowledge analyst in Sustainable Cities at the Danish Architecture Centre, applauds Danish cycle traditions, but also warns that they could disappear if the politicians are not careful:

“People will always choose the means of transport which is the quickest and most practical, and which they have grown accustomed to. It is no good if the car nearly always has first priority in traffic policy,” says Malene Freudendal-Pedersen, who adds that it is a favourable time to promote bicycle culture, since the environment and global warming have risen to the top of the international agenda.

“In New York, more space is now being provided for cyclists. It is symptomatic of a greener profile in many big cities,” she says.

“If bicycle culture withers, it will hit public health hard,” comments Professor Lars Bo Andersen. “If you look at the effect of cycling in relation to the development of cardiovascular disease, certain types
of cancer and diabetes, the 30 per cent less kilometres travelled by bicycle (in Denmark, Ed.) since 1990 corresponds to around 1,500 more deaths annually.”

Among school children however, enthusiasm for cycling appears to be intact. About two thirds of all 15-year-olds cycle to school – in England it is less than two per cent in the same age group.

“When school children cycle, it is because it is the quickest and easiest of the alternatives they have, unless the distance is very short, or their parents sacrifice their time to transport them,” says Lars Bo Andersen.

Chart 1: Bicycle share of trips in Europe, North America, and Australia (Percent of total trips by bicycle)

Sources: Australian Bureau of Statistics (2007); Netherlands Ministry of Transport (2006); Department for Transport (2005); OECD (2005); European Conference of the Ministers of Transport (2004); European Union (2003); U.S. Department of Transportation (2003); German Federal Ministry of Transport (2003)

COPENHAGEN IS A MODEL FOR NEW YORKERS
To limit the thundering traffic, Copenhagen Municipality – which will host the UN Climate Change Conference in 2009 – aims to make the Danish capital the world’s leading city for bicycles, and will invest DKK 250 million in improving conditions. Today 36 per cent of Copenhageners cycle to work; the target is at least 50 per cent by 2015. According to Copenhagen Municipality, reaching this target will spare the environment 80,000 tons of CO2 annually.

As a feather in Copenhagen’s cap, New York City’s park manager Adrian Benepe has recently cited the Copenhagen bicycle traffic system as a model for New York.

“My objective is to create conditions for cyclists in my city that are as good as in Copenhagen. It is a giant task, because although New Yorkers are discovering the bicycle as a means of transport, our bicycle culture still leaves much to be desired,” said Adrian Benepe to Danish newspaper Børsen, when he visited Copenhagen in September.

After about four years in Denmark, Mr. Miri from Iran is also discovering the benefits of the bicycle. He has started a juice bar in the centre of Copenhagen and has stopped taking his car to work. Instead he takes the train and supplements it with a city bike for the last section of the journey from the railway station:

“With the biking lanes and the city bikes, the system is already in place. I only have to contribute a little bit of muscle power which I guess is good for me. Taking the car is much more stressful,” says Mr. Miri.

VOX POP (COPENHAGEN)

“We cycle because it is the easiest option”

HANS CHRISTIAN CLAUSEN, 27
(Anja Dyhr Rasmussen , 27 + Asta 10 months)
I cycle 3-4 kilometres daily, unless the weather is very bad, when I take a bus or a local train. The provisions made for cyclists here in Denmark are quite good, it’s the cheapest way to get around, and I get the benefit of some exercise. My Christiania bike cost me 16,000 kroner, but I can transport my kid, girlfriend and guitar amplifier in it.

NINA FRANK, 33
I cycle 10-12 kilometres daily. It is fast and easy, and I don’t need to go to a fitness centre after work. We have just sold the car – it is all too troublesome having a car in Copenhagen, and it costs a lot of money. I take the Metro on those occasions when I need to be very presentable, and don’t want the wind in my hair or my make-up running.

JESPER THOMSEN, 38
I cycle to and from work – about ten kilometres daily. Because of the traffic in the city, the bicycle is the quickest means of transportation, and the exercise is an extra bonus. When it rains I do however take the car.

JAKOB ALVI KHAN, 30
I cycle every day. It is easier and more flexible. But having said that, I do use the bus when
it rains. A car is too troublesome and too expensive.

EVA LILJA JENSEN, 47
In the summer, I sometimes cycle 30 kilometres daily. Otherwise it is about four kilometres daily travelling to and from work. It is the easiest option, because with a car it is completely impossible to find a parking place. On a bicycle it is also easier to look at shop windows on the way – that is quite nice.

TOBIAS STÆRBO, 22,
I cycle about five kilometres daily, even in rain or snow. In Copenhagen it is the easiest way to get around. I am a musician and have transported virtually everything on my bike, even a keyboard.

Denmark: A nation of winners – and good losers

BY POUL KJAR

At this summer’s Olympic Games Denmark scooped seven medals, including Gold in a very dramatic sailing event which symbolised the Danish winner mindset. But the relaxed Danish competition mentality also gained medals in China – reflecting a society where losing is not a catastrophe.

Despite a dramatic start with a broken mast, Denmark’s 49’er crew, Martin Kirketerp and Jonas Warrer, won Gold at the Olympic Games in Beijing. Photos: Scanpix Denmark.

With a tally of seven medals, the Olympic Games in Beijing brought Denmark one of its best results of modern times.

It makes Danes happy. Because it is not only the athletes on the water or on the cycle track that demonstrate strength to the world. The entire nation is jubilant – just as it is for any other country that wins medals. Achievements at the Olympic Games and other major sporting events tell a bigger story about a nation and its people.

Denmark’s medals at the Olympic Games in Beijing were, in line with tradition, won mainly on water – in rowing and sailing. In rowing, the Danish coxless four won gold; the ’golden fours’ have now powered to victory with changing crews in the last four Olympic Games, with the exception of Sydney in 2000, when they had to settle for bronze. But it was Denmark’s gold medal in sailing, in the 49’er event in Beijing, that particularly highlighted the Danish winner mentality and spontaneity.

The Olympic Games in Beijing also showed the Danish ability to handle defeat, reflecting a sportsmanship model and a society which focuses on winning, but at the same time teaches athletes how to cope with defeat.

But first the story and the drama of the gold medal in sailing.

FREEDOM WITH RESPONSIBILITY
Before the Olympic sailing competition started in the Chinese city of Qingdao, Denmark’s 49’er crew of Jonas Warrer and Martin Kirketerp were not thought likely to gain a place on the podium. But they surprised everybody in the opening races, and in the final they just needed to achieve seventh place out of ten starting boats to win gold.

On the day of the final, the Danes are the first to put their boat in the rough water, with wind gusts of up to 15 knots and foaming whitecaps on the waves. Jonas Warrer and Martin Kirketerp have just set the spinnaker emblazoned with the Danish flag when they are hit by a high wave. The eight metre tall mast snaps like a matchstick.

There are 20 minutes to the start, and four years to the next Olympic Games.

The Danish coach, Jesper Bank – an Olympic Games participant from 1984 to 2000 with three medals in the Soling class – is assisting the Danish 49’er from an inflatable boat, and immediately heads for the referee’s boat to ask for the start to be postponed. But the referee waves him away. So Jesper Bank gets the damaged boat and its crew towed to land, where they are met by two other Danish participants in the Olympic Games. Having grasped the seriousness of the situation, they had rapidly brought the 49’er’s reserve mast. But the damage is too extensive, and it will take several hours to get the boat ready for competition. So the question is: What now? Well, let’s see if we can borrow a boat from one of the nations that have not qualified for the finals, say the sailors, and zoom off.

Henrik Brandt, director of the Danish Institute for Sports Studies, says:

It is typically Danish that you do not necessarily wait for instructions from above, but make decisions when it is necessary. Doing so does not mean any lack of respect for rules and other people. We simply have a basic trust in giving people freedom with responsibility. We basically trust each other and are used to organising things without being told from above what to do.

NEVER GIVE UP
Back in port at Qingdao, the Danes find the Croatian boat. They phone the Croatian delegation, which without hesitation gives them permission to borrow the boat. Shortly after they observe at a distance that the final is being started. They now have four minutes to cross the starting line, otherwise they will be disqualified. Coach Jesper Bank has sailed ahead and has informed the referee that the Danes are sailing under the Croatian flag. The referee’s stop watch indicates 3 minutes 57 seconds when they pass the start line – the field is about 700 metres ahead.

Jonas Warrer and Martin Kirketerp now take a decision which will turn out to be worth gold. They do not want to pressure the boat too much, and so avoid setting the spinnaker. Their hope is that the others will raise the stakes too high and capsize in the rough weather.

At the head of the race, Italy, Australia and Spain are vying for gold. Shortly before the line, the American boat capsizes, followed by the Brazilian boat. It means that the Danish boat with its Croatian flag is now in 8th position, only one place away from the gold-winning 7th position. And then the Danish boat capsizes. An entire nation holds its breath, until the boat is righted and sails across the line. Ten minutes later the result comes. The Austrian boat did not cross the line. Denmark is placed 7th, and so wins GOLD.

“What looked like becoming a typical Danish ’decent defeat’ turned into something which is also typically Danish in relation to our ability to manage internationally as a small nation. Instead of giving up, the Danes acted extremely fast. They improvised and it ended with a gold medal,” concludes Henrik Brandt.

A disappointed Mark O. Madsen after being defeated in the first round of wrestling. Photo: Scanpix Denmark.

“NOBODY DIED”
It was not only the Danish winner mentality that gained gold for Denmark at the games in Beijing. The Danish front-runner in wrestling, Mark O. Madsen, was a great disappointment at the Games, but triumphed in the discipline ’relaxed competition mentality’. Mark O. Madsen has won medals at the last three world championships in his weight class, and was reckoned to be Denmark’s best hope for gold.

But in Beijing, Varteres Samugashev of Russia squeezes the air out of the Dane in the first round. The referee lifts the arm of the victorious Russian – and Mark O. Madsen leaves the wrestling hall in disappointment. But to a waiting sports journalist’s question: “How do you feel?” - Mark O. Madsen replies matter-of-factly: “Fine. Nobody died”.

The answer reflects how Danish sport is historically based on voluntarism, amateur sports concepts and engaging in sport as a pleasurable spare time activity.

Henrik Brandt of the Danish Institute for Sports Studies says:

“Historically there has been widespread scepticism in Denmark against professional sports. For instance, the Danish bronze-medal football team in London in 1948 was the only one in the tournament to appear without numbers on their backs, because the Danish Football Association had the opinion that the players were ’amateurs’ and not ’circus horses’. Nevertheless most Danes very much want to win of course, but not at any price. It is not that important, although naturally there are exceptions to the rule.”

THE DANISH ELITE MODEL
Although athletes in Denmark today make a professional living from their sports, they do not drop down in Danish society if they fail to win medals, or lose motivation for practising elite sports. The Danish elite sport law has elements of the more relaxed competition mentality and has been based on the Danish welfare society model, where the state takes care of the weakest and provides unemployment benefit to people who lose their jobs.

The state elite sports organisation, Team Danmark, is thus obliged not only to develop the sporting support apparatus, but also to see to it that talented individuals get a proper education in parallel with their career. And although elite sports make increasing demands in Denmark as they do everywhere else, Danish elite athletes are generally better educated than the rest of the population.

In other words, athletes have something to fall back on if the mast breaks or a Russian gets in the way of the medal dream.

DANISH ECONOMY

Danish economy: From quickstep to slow foxtrot

BY SENIOR ECONOMIST FRANK ØLAND HANSEN, DANSKE BANK

The Danish economy has expanded rapidly in recent years – perhaps a little too rapidly. Unemployment has fallen for 36 months in a row and a shortage of labour has squeezed wage growth higher. Now, however, the outlook is for the Danish economy to get some much-needed breathing space. The slower tempo is due, in particular, to the weakness in the housing market and the impact of the global financial crisis. We do not expect the beat to pick up until 2010, when the housing market may also achieve some balance. Had the economic quickstep continued, we may have had to sit out the next dance.

The need for a slowdown is most evident when one looks at the labour market. The number of unemployed has fallen to just 1.6% of the labour force – the lowest level since 1974. From July to August the number of unemployed stood unchanged at just 45,600 persons, which may well be a turning point. It is very difficult to pinpoint the true level of structural unemployment, but the accelerating wage growth of recent years suggests that unemployment is well below the long-term sustainable level. Danish competitiveness has come under great pressure in recent years as a result of accelerating wage growth, low productivity growth and depreciation of the US dollar. Without a change of weather, Danish wage growth would most likely be elevated for a prolonged period, which would result in a substantial loss of competitiveness – and a longer and deeper economic downturn.

We consider developments in the housing market to be the single greatest risk factor for the performance of the Danish economy in the coming years. The housing market may indeed make the difference between the somewhat bumpy landing for the Danish economy that we consider the most likely outcome, and a hard landing. Official price statistics paint a picture of a housing market that is under pressure but not in real crisis. House prices nationwide have fallen by just under 4% since peaking, but there are major regional variations. Continued growth in the number of homes for sale and very modest turnover do nevertheless suggest that the limited decrease in house prices to date will not be enough to bring the market into equilibrium. We therefore expect the coming years to bring further declines in house prices. House price deflation has historically proved relatively persistent – once sentiment has changed, it can be hard to bring buyers back into the market, and so there is a risk of the downturn becoming self-perpetuating. A longer and harder landing in the housing market could drag the rest of the economy down with it.

Surprisingly perhaps, Danish consumers are still optimistic about their own financial situation. While the many negative news stories – not least about the financial crisis – have caused Danes to take a very pessimistic view of the country’s economy in a year’s time, their assessment of their own economic situation is largely unchanged and positive. This view is perhaps not entirely misplaced, as unemployment remains at a record low, tax cuts may be on the cards, and the fall in house prices has only eroded a modest amount of the home equity of the average homeowner.

COMPANY PROFILES

In the next issue of Focus Denmark

ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT

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In 1997 Samsø was chosen to become Denmark’s green energy island. The aim was to make the island self-sufficient with renewable energy by 2008. The islanders did even better: today the island’s collective CO₂ emissions are less than zero, with surplus wind turbine power exported back to the mainland. That the islanders’ aim has been more than achieved is largely due to local man Søren Hermansen, whose great commitment persuaded the islanders to invest their own money. One of his most important arguments was that by focusing on a green profile, the island could be kept alive, at a time when many other Danish island communities are wasting away. So far, it is working – environmentally interested foreigners are flocking to Samsø. And Søren Hermansen has been hailed as an environmental hero by Time Magazine. Other Danish local communities are following suit. Read more about them in the December issue of Focus Denmark.

RESEARCH AND WORK IN DENMARK

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The December issue of Focus Denmark will introduce you to the opportunities for research, studying or working in Denmark. Denmark offers an active business life and high-quality research and development environments. PhD programmes are offered at universities, which have established a PhD school, at research institutions and in industry. Danish company culture is non-hierarchical and encourages open dialogue between management and staff. Denmark’s most important competition parameter is knowledge and this is reflected in both the working facilities and the focus on personal and professional development.

IT AND TELECOMMUNICATION

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The development of the technology behind Google’s new high performance JavaScript engine V8 took place in Denmark and was headed by a Dane, Lars Bak. In recent years Google has opened new offices in Japan, Australia and India, and has now added a research and development division in Århus, Denmark. One of the explanations is that Denmark has many talented software developers; another is the close collaboration between businesses and computer science faculties in Danish universities. Read about this and other Danish-developed IT and telecommunication software – for example the Danish companies Enigma Semiconductors and Tpack, which are well advanced in developing components for the 100 gigabit internet backbone of the future.