Search Results for: Brazil

But even though the Lava Jato task force was officially disbanded in 2021, Pierpaolo Bottini, partner at São Paulo-based Bottini & Tamasauskas Advogados, and a former director of the Economic Criminal Law of the Brazilian Institute of Criminal Sciences, said this abuse of crypto has been highlighted in cases he is defending. …

Japan may become a significant market for the halal food sector in future, predicts the Japan Halal Association, whose members are looking ahead to sustained growth once the Covid-19 pandemic ebbs. Faslin Mohammed Lafir, head of halal certification and international relations, of the Japan Halal Association, stressed that the country’s Muslim population is around 120,000 individuals at present, with an estimated 10,000 Japanese converting to the religion every year, boosting potential halal sales.…

Fraud in the global halal food sector is emerging as a widespread problem. A series of scandals have rocked the industry worldwide, and shone a spotlight on the difficulty of eliminating non-halal practices from increasingly large and complicated food supply chains. …

Higher education institutions are being warned they could be a target for money laundering, with fees being financed by the proceeds of crime, including corruption, which might also buy property, cars and other items for students.

The problem has been highlighted in a series of reports.…

The Polish can manufacturing and filling industry continues to attract attention from major buyers and investors from around the world, aware that this strong and innovating national sector is able to rely on a strong, reliable workforce.

Global beverage giant PepsiCo, for example, has been drawn to the Polish can manufacturing industry.…

The Bangladesh food industry is increasing its efforts to export halal foods to Muslim majority population countries. A senior government delegation is planning to visit Turkey and Indonesia this year to gather facts and advice on improving Bangladesh sales in these countries of halal food.…

Britain’s open register of beneficial ownership was groundbreaking worldwide but its effectiveness as a bulwark against money laundering is being debated, even as both the European Union (EU) and the US move ahead at varying pace to replicate the system. The question of whether BO registers should be open or closed is one that is being discussed in countries around the world.…

The relationship between the USA textile industry and its counterparts in Latin America has never been straightforward, given the US exports fabrics and fibre to its neighbours as well as importing apparel, but the Covid-19 pandemic has increased complexity in this relationship.…

After a tumultuous first semester fuelled by Covid-19 and a tight and polarised presidential election, Peru’s clothing and textile sector is now growing at pre-pandemic levels. Hence, the capital Lima’s chamber of commerce (Cámara de Comercio de Lima) projects growth between 10% and 15% in textile and clothing exports by the end of 2021, compared to what was reported in 2019.…

An anticipated surge in supply and demand for renewable diesel, fuel that is chemically identical to its fossil fuel predecessor, is likely to cause major disruption to the American vegetable oil market and industry, notably soy.

With the US government and certain states regarding renewable diesel as a swift way to further reduce carbon emissions and meet Paris agreement climate change targets, the prospects for major additional purchases of soybeans within the American domestic market are very real.…

Brazil’s larger companies operating digital textile printing services have experienced a sharp recovery since social distancing restrictions imposed by Covid-19 waned, with many companies now investing in new equipment to move forward. But the country’s troubled politics – with far-right President Jair Bolsonaro earlier this month (September) saying he would refuse to recognise decisions made by the country’s Supreme Court – are limiting how much commercial risk textile firms are prepared to make.…

London and New York-based WPP, the world’s largest advertising group, has agreed to pay USD19.2 million to resolve charges laid by the USA’s Securities & Exchange Commission that it breached the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). The SEC alleged WPP allowed overseas subsidiaries to bribe clients and breach accounting controls.…

London and New York-based WPP, the world’s largest advertising group, has agreed to pay USD19.2 million to resolve charges laid by the USA’s Securities & Exchange Commission that it breached the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). The SEC alleged WPP allowed overseas subsidiaries to bribe clients and breach accounting controls.…

INTRODUCTION

In a global textile and clothing market that is increasingly integrating design with functionality, the potential of luminescent yarns is becoming ever more apparent. The focus of groundbreaking research and development, there is widening diversity in this segment from luminescent coatings on yarns to those that integrate LEDs (light-emitting diodes).…

Brazilian textile company Dalila Têxtil, based in the southern city of Jaraguá do Sul, in Santa Catarina state, became a global name after creating fabrics capable of destroying the protective outer layer of the Covid-19 virus. The company’s anti-viral finishing uses silver particles to attract the virus, causing it to bind to sulphur groups on the surface around the virus, creating a reaction that stops the virus from binding to the host cell and blocks its replication.…

FOOD and drinks companies from across the European Union (EU) are now able to apply for research funding from the European Union’s (EU) Horizon Europe programme, which has a budget of around EUR95.5 billion. This spending will last until 2027, with companies generally needing to form international consortia focused on food, ingredients and packaging projects to secure funding.…

Even though life has been increasingly lived online during the Covid-19 pandemic, there is still a significant market for hardware surveillance devices, including those that are covert, with recording devices hidden in everyday objects, such as pens, watches, even water bottles.…

The Angolan government has been implementing several measures to improve the weak reputation of its higher education system, such as stricter accreditation and assessment laws, with some experts saying these changes need to be implemented more comprehensively.

Since the current President João Lourenço took office in 2017, after almost 38 years under José Eduardo dos Santos’ command, the country has undergone significant change.…

With the United Nations security council backing the reappointment of António Guterres as UN secretary general for another five years, it is time to ask whether the global body’s political leadership needs a major overhaul.

The answer surely has to be ‘yes’.…

The under-developed system of higher education of African archipelago country São Tomé & Príncipe is growing slowly amidst expanding demand, being assisted by international projects and funds.
One major potential initiative that may cause significant progress, however, involves this Lusophone country being chosen by the Pan African Institute for Development (PAID) to host a future International University of Development Sciences.…

Brazil’s Chief Justice Luiz Fux refused to acknowledge the death of the sprawling Lava Jato (Car Wash) corruption probe in a historic full court session on April 23, declaring: “This is not the end of Car Wash.” 

However, he might have been forgiven for accepting that these investigations were at an end.…

The narcotics trade was a prime motivator to enact global anti-money laundering regulations to curb dirty money flows. Over 30 years later, drug trafficking is still considered the largest transnational crime by international law enforcement agencies. It is worth an estimated USD344 billion-a-year, according to Interpol, followed by counterfeiting crimes (USD288 billion) and human trafficking (USD157 billion).…

INNOVATIVE confectionery and sweet bakery companies will be able from next month (July) to explore applying for research funding from the European Union’s (EU) Horizon Europe programme, which has a budget of around EUR95.5 billion. This spending will last until 2027, with companies needing to form international consortia focused on food, ingredients and packaging projects to have the best chance of securing funding.…

A PUBLIC inquiry in British Columbia, Canada, has increased concerns about how auto dealers maybe exploited by criminal networks to launder dirty money. Purchasers can be prepared to pay high prices for vehicles in cash, with dealers struggling to identify the source of these funds.…

PEACE appears to be breaking out between the European Union (EU) and the UK on one side the USA over an aircraft subsidy-prompted trade war that had led to billions of dollars of duties being levied on food and drink exported between these countries.…

Anti-money laundering specialists may be focusing on how crypto-currencies and online transactions pose an increasing ML/TF risk, especially with Covid-19 encouraging ecommerce, but the reality is that cash remains the money launderers’ best instrument for moving dirty money.

That is the conclusion of Gabriel Hidalgo, a managing director at risk specialists K2 Integrity, in New York: “Cash is king for ML; it continues to be king; and on the majority of levels, illicit actors will continue to use cash,” he said.…

It takes minutes for any Brazilian on Instagram to be bombarded with ads of modern companies selling exquisite items from tofu tikka masala stew to cauliflower risotto. But these are not from restaurants heavily impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic and now use social media to survive.…

THE REPUTATION of the Caribbean’s major cigar production centres – Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua – has dominated global markets for years. But the entire region’s balmy and moist climate and rich soils are ideal for growing cigar wrapper and filler leaf.…

The Amílcar Cabral University, the only public university in Guinea-Bissau, one of the world’s poorest and politically fragile countries, is looking to expand its educational services and attract more funds, trying to overturn past student dissatisfaction with its work.

After nine years leaning on a public–private partnership with the Lisbon, Portugal-based Lusófona University, the UAC (Universidade Amílcar Cabral in its Portuguese acronym), ended in 2013 after the government jeopardised the agreement.…

EUROPE’S confectionery and sweet bakery association CAOBISCO has been pressuring the European Union (EU) to resolve a long-running trade dispute with the USA over aircraft manufacturing subsidies causing Washington to impose tariffs on European food exports. These include 25% duties on exports from the EU (including the UK) of raspberry, strawberry, apricot, peach and other jams; cherries and peaches; sweet biscuits from Germany; waffles and wafers from Britain and Germany; and an additional 25% on these jams when exported from Germany and France.…

The International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) has released a white paper saying that the accounting profession needs to learn from the challenges of Covid-19, investing in boosting communication skills. This will enable accountants to be more effective pro-active trusted partners with their clients, able to adapt to flexible and remote working even after the pandemic subsides.…

THE NEW campus of the University of Cape Verde (Uni-CV), which has cost almost USD60 million to build and should open next March (2021), is expected to attract more national and international students and researchers to this island country. The launch of this modern facility has been delayed from July (2020) because of Covid-19, but it is hoped the March opening will stick.…

IT goes without saying that can manufacturers and fillers have to comply with regulatory controls specifying how they make and fill cans, but maybe the biggest compliance challenge for the industry is following the world’s multifarious rules on food labelling. 

Canners and fillers with contracts to supply labelled cans have to take special care given these labelling rules do not just vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, (or even within jurisdictions), these regulations are a very dynamic topic – they change, often. …

LATIN America has been hit particularly hard by the Covid-19 pandemic – with Chile, Peru, Brazil and Colombia in the top-20 of countries regarding cases per million people – and its paint and coatings market and industry has faced a similarly rough ride.…

A WORLD Trade Organisation (WTO) disputes panel will assess whether import restrictions created by the European Union (EU) to reduce the use of carbon-intensive biofuels comply with global trading rules.

The Indonesian government is challenging portions of the EU’s renewable energy directive (RED) linked to EU guidance limiting the indirect land use change (ILUC) of biofuel feedstock cultivation.…

The Internet has hardly developed a reputation for honesty, but blockchain technologies where different computers log transactions in separate units, connected to a web of entries (blocks), are tough to falsify.

Of course, blockchain’s most high-profile use has been to underpin the reliability of cryptocurrencies, but the principle of this unchangeable and autonomous web of ledgers has so many potential uses – the tobacco sector has been exploring them.…

Cigarette sales could be boosted by the growing challenges faced by vaping products, according to senior figures from the industry speaking to TJI. Certainly, the days when vaping products received a relatively clear pass in marketing restrictions are over in some jurisdictions.…

Textile industry innovators are seeking to create and improve naturally coloured cotton, that can reduce or even remove the need for manufacturers to add dyes that can be expensive and generate significant levels of pollution.

Natural coloured cotton is not new, with Liv Severino, head of Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária (Embrapa), the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation, a state-owned research corporation affiliated with Brazil’s ministry of agriculture, livestock and food supply, noting evidence that human clothes were made from such fibres in the Andes 5,000 years ago.…

One year ago, there were few options in the Brazilian market of non-meat alternative products. But brands have started luring beef-crazy Brazilians into buying several plant-based meat substitutes, chiefly hamburgers. And some of the country’s biggest meat packers are now exploring this relatively small, but promising category.…

THE UNITED Nations’ Food & Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has proposed creating a permanent ‘observatory’ monitoring cocoa markets, assessing value and costs, to help chocolate sales revenues be more equitably distributed throughout supply chains.

In a report called a ‘Comparative study on the distribution of value in European chocolate chains’, the FAO said such “objectified and cross-checked data” would aid “a multi-stakeholder discussion” at national and global levels on revenue sharing.…

The executive director of International Sugar Organisation (ISO) wants his body “to work more with the confectionery sector”, as it strives to debunk junk science that derides the nutritional value of sugar. José Orive told Confectionery Production that ISO wanted to succeed in presenting “scientific evidence-based information” about sugar’s health impact so the reputation of confectionery products is not “blackened with funky fake data”. …

While Argentina’s textile industry is poised for growth over the next few years, the expansion of its use of digital printing will probably lag as companies recover from a deep recession in 2020 caused by Covid-19 and underlying economic weakness, executives said. …

AS governments worldwide loosen lockdowns imposed to impede the spread of Covid-19, energy companies are assessing their health and safety policies to ensure workplaces are not new infection hotspots, protecting workers and hence production.

These changes come as energy industries downscale workloads to reflect a collapse in demand for their output.…

THE COVID-19 crisis has severely depressed sales of personal care products within Latin America and it is unclear when the market will pick up.

In Argentina, for example, a coronavirus-induced lockdown has pushed the economy deeper into recession, slashing sales of most unessential beauty and personal care products.…

AS a key part of the food production supply chain, the international can manufacturing and filling industry has largely stayed open, with some exceptions, during the Covid-19 crisis, not just in developed economies, but also in key emerging markets such as the BRICS countries.…

WHEN a crisis such as the Covid-19 pandemic hits a supply chain as complex as the clothing sector, financing problems can gum up commercial relationships, so in the short term, governments, along with regional and international organisations, need to step in.…

There is, however, much less protection in Latin America. In Brazil, the country’s justice and public security minister Sérgio Moro left the job in April accusing President Jair Bolsonaro of interference with federal police work. By doing so, he effectively became a whistleblower himself, but his suggestions on the topic are far from being the law of the land.…

• 1MDB SCANDAL IN MALAYSIA SEES USD BILLIONS STOLEN AND HIDDEN

Malaysia 1MDB scandal is one of the largest money laundering cases ever, worldwide, with Malaysian courts considering charges over how at least USD4.5 billion was stolen and then spent or laundered from Malaysian sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad by former Prime Minister Najib Razak and his associates.…

THE TREND towards consumers buying confectionery made with natural ingredients is gathering pace, with research from Germany-based international food ingredients-maker Döhler saying that worldwide more than 50% of confectionery consumers now want a “healthier” product and more than 60% “value natural ingredients”.…

THE ROLE of whistleblowers in the Americas has been given special attention in since last August, when an intelligence officer lodged a complaint with the Intelligence Community Inspector General about a phone call by President Donald Trump to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky pressuring him to open an investigation into alleged corruption by former vice-president Joe Biden.…

Brazil’s graft-busting justice minister Sergio Moro has resigned from President Jair Bolsonaro’s government, accusing him of meddling in federal police efforts to fight corruption for political gain. Moro stood down April 24 after Bolsonaro fired the federal police chief, Maurício Valeixo, because newspaper, Correio Braziliense claims an investigation into fake news and anti-democracy protests was homing in on the President’s son, Carlos Bolsonaro.…

AFRICA is commonly hailed as the world’s next big focus of economic growth, but for the civil aviation industry, this prospect will require significant investment in new intra-African routes and related airport and ATC infrastructure. It will also require governments to remove immigration barriers preventing African air travellers flying to other countries on their home continent.…

For almost six years the federal prosecutors, policemen and judges of Brazil’s Operation Car Wash (Lava Jato) were hailed as anti-corruption heroes. Their spectacular raids and testimonies led to scores of politicians and businessmen jailed throughout Latin America, and especially in Brazil.…

Airbus is to pay out EUR3.6 billion (USD4 billion) under a trio of deferred prosecution agreements (DPAs) with British, French and United States authorities that were simultaneously agreed by national courts January 31 as part of a global resolution over bribes to clinch civil and military aircraft sales.…

WITH Middle East dairy sales expanding steadily, dairy suppliers from around the world are targeting its consumers, hoping to gain a foothold in an increasingly diverse marketplace that is often open to innovation.

Dairy Industries International attended the 4th Global Dairy Innovation Congress MENA 2020, held in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), from January 20-21, where participants were encouraged by sales projections as from market researcher Euromonitor International that the Middle East (and Africa) dairy market should expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of more than 3% between 2019 and 2023.…

GLOBAL and regional public policies promoting environmental good practice and fighting climate change have long encouraged the growth of renewable energy production. And with concern about global warming sharpening, these goals – pushed by international and regional organisations and development banks – are here to stay.…

RETALIATORY duties imposed by the USA in a trade dispute with the European Union (EU) over aeroplane subsidies will, argues Italian farmers union, Coldiretti, shrink Italian food exports to the US by 20%, with the Italian speciality cheese sector being the hardest hit.…

AFTER 20 years of negotiations the European Union (EU)-Mercosur trade deal, which has boosted hopes for increased textile trades with Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay is at risk of being blocked ahead of its ratification.

Furious about ongoing deforestation and wildfires in Amazonia, EU countries, including influential countries France and Ireland, have warned that they are ready to block the deal because of alleged breaches by Brazil of its international environmental commitments.…

RUSSIA’S dairy industry has been trying to develop its size and sales while its government’s restrictions on European Union (EU) dairy imports remain, but there are questions about how well producers would cope with imports once these sanctions are, eventually, lifted.…

AFTER 20 years of negotiations the European Union (EU)-Mercosur trade deal, which has boosted hopes for increased can and associated materials trades with Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay, is now at risk of being blocked ahead of its ratification.

Furious about ongoing deforestation and wildfires in Amazonia, EU countries, including influential countries France and Ireland, have warned that they are ready to block the deal because of alleged breaches by Brazil of its international environmental commitments.…

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) fourth anti-money laundering directive had not even been implemented before Panama Papers revelations on massive tax evasion highlighted critical gaps in the bloc’s regulatory framework, especially regarding cryptocurrencies and prepaid cards. The result was directive (EU) 2018/843 of May 30, 2018 commonly known as the fifth anti-money laundering directive.…

THE TRADE in knitwear between the European Union (EU) and the Mercosur bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay is likely to intensify under a new trade deal between the two regional groupings.

The agreement, which now needs ratification, will phase out all EU duties charged on industrial goods (including knitted clothing and inputs) over 10 years.…

AN INCREASING number of so-called ‘digital doppelgangers’, faked digital identities, designed to bypass financial anti-fraud systems, are being traded online via the darknet and even the open internet, according to David Décary-Hétu, Assistant Professor at the School of Criminology at the University of Montréal, Canada.…

More than one in five or around 56 million people who accessed public services in Latin America and the Caribbean last year paid a bribe, according to the latest 18-country survey from Transparency International. The police notched up the highest bribery rate (24%), followed by other public services such as utilities (19%). …

Described by environmental campaigners as “the elephant in the COP21 negotiations room” when climate change proposals were agreed in Paris during 2015, today – the electrification of shipping is moving ahead apace.

From inland ferries to cargo barges and cruise ships, vessels are being built or retrofitted with renewable power propulsion sources, curbing the shipping industry’s major emissions.…

THE TRADE in food and drink between the European Union (EU) and the Mercosur bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay is likely to intensify under a new trade deal between the two regional groupings. The agreement, which now needs ratification, will phase out Mercosur duties on 93% of EU exported food and drink product types, including those on wine (27%); spirits (20% to 35%); soft drinks (20-35%); chocolate (20%); biscuits (16 to 18%); canned peaches (55%).…

CONTINUOUS dyeing technology is being refined and improved and offering finishers worldwide the chance to improve their output efficiency, while reducing chemical, water and energy usage. However, emerging markets finishers can struggle to find the investment costs required to install this top-line cutting edge dyeing machinery.…

A EUROPEAN Union (EU) trade deal struck with South America’s Mercosur group of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, will open this emerging market to EU confectionery exporters, but Europe’s sugar sector fears increased Brazilian sugar exports. The agreement, which now needs to be ratified by both sides, will phase out Mercosur duties on EU exports of chocolate and sugar confectionery of 20%; biscuits (taxed at 20% to 35%); liquorice extract – 8%; and confectionery-making equipment – 14%.…

THE EUROPEAN metal packaging sector will be hoping that the newly negotiated European Union (EU)-Mercosur trade deal is ratified quickly, given it scraps import duties imposed by Brazil and Argentina on such exports of between 12% and 35%. These are the key markets in the South American trade bloc, that also includes comparative minnows Uruguay and Paraguay, whose protective duties shadow their larger Mercosur neighbours.…

BRAZIL’S textile industry has welcomed the new trade deal between the Mercosur bloc (of which Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay are fellow members) and the European Union (EU) which was announced on June 28.

With existing tariffs having impeded trade in fabrics, yarn and fibre between the two blocs in the past, Renato Jardim, the superintendent of industrial and economic policy for Brazilian Textile and Apparel Industry Association (ABIT – Associação Brasileira da Indústria Têxtil e de Confecção) told WTiN.com:…

THE EUROPEAN automobile manufacturing sector will be hoping that the newly negotiated European Union (EU)-Mercosur trade deal is ratified quickly, given it scraps import duties imposed by Brazil and Argentina on EU automobile exports of 35%.

This agreement has been welcomed by the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA), which noted that the South American trade bloc, which also includes Uruguay and Paraguay, is home to around 270 million people, where 3.3 million new cars were sold during 2018.…

EUROPEAN Union (EU) importer of liquid fuels should benefit from a trade deal struck between the EU and the Mercosur bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay. The agreement will phase out all EU duties charged on industrial goods over 10 years.…

As an industry much maligned for its heavy carbon footprint, the oil and gas sector is increasing its use of sustainable materials and manufacturing methods making textiles used for its protective clothing. This segment has also been focusing on improving the comfort and aesthetics of this apparel.…

EUROPEAN Union (EU) exporters of paints, varnishes and other coatings should gain market share in South America through a trade deal struck between the EU and the Mercosur bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay. The agreement, which now needs ratification by both sides, will phase out all EU duties charged on industrial goods (including paints and coatings) over 10 years.…

A EUROPEAN Union (EU) trade deal struck with South America’s Mercosur group of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, should boost trade between the two blocs of industrial minerals. The agreement, which now needs to be ratified by both sides, will phase out all EU duties charged on industrial goods (including minerals and mineral items) over 10 years.…

Brazilian beef exports to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) saw an increase of 439.84% year-on-year in the first half of 2019, according to figures issued by the Dubai-based Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce. Brazilian beef sales to all Arab countries were up 47.62%.…

THE TRADE in textile finishing chemicals and products made with them between the European Union (EU) and the Mercosur bloc of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay is likely to intensify under a new trade deal between the two regional groupings.

The agreement, which now needs ratification by both sides, will phase out all EU duties charged on industrial goods (including dyes and other finishers) over 10 years.…

IT has been another subdued year for the beauty and personal care product market in Latin America, as the region’s economy underperforms yet again after six years of deceleration (and in some countries outright recession), keeping a lid on sales growth. …

EVERY manufacturing and agricultural industry has an impact on climate change – and the tobacco sector is no different. Faced with long-standing criticism of the health impact of its products, the tobacco industry is now facing attacks that its work generates carbon emissions and hence climate change.…

WOLLASTONITE has been described by a Canadian producer as “a white mineral for a greener world,” and it seems governments, businesses and industries agree – with wollastonite is set to see increased market growth in its traditional uses plus a new focus on its powerful qualities to help tackle climate change.…

A EUROPEAN Union (EU) trade deal struck with South America’s Mercosur group of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, will boost trade between the two blocs of non-ferrous metals and related articles. The agreement, which now needs to be ratified by both sides, will phase out all EU duties charged on industrial goods (including metals and metal items) over 10 years.…

WOLLASTONITE has been described by a Canadian producer as “a white mineral for a greener world,” and it seems governments, businesses and industries agree – with wollastonite is set to see increased market growth in its traditional uses plus a new focus on its powerful qualities to help tackle climate change.…

A EUROPEAN Union (EU) trade deal struck with South America’s Mercosur group of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, will boost trade between the two blocs of non-ferrous metals and related articles. The agreement, which now needs to be ratified by both sides, will phase out all EU duties charged on industrial goods (including metals and metal items) over 10 years.…

AFRICAN swine fever (ASF) has been squeezing pork supplies in China to a point where the country’s political leadership fears upheaval, as reflected by the country’s government influenced social media restricting ASF-related discussion. Even academic articles, if ASF-themed, now require explicit regulatory approval before publishing, informed sources in China, who requested anonymity, told just-food.  …

A EUROPEAN Union (EU) trade deal struck with South America’s Mercosur group of Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, will open this emerging market to EU drinks exporters. The agreement, which now needs to be ratified by both sides, will phase out Mercosur duties on wine of 27%; whiskey and other spirits (taxed at 20% to 35%); and soft drinks (taxed at 20% to 35%).…

American mega-retailer Walmart has settled charges imposed by the USA Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) that it violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) by failing to operate a sufficiently robust anti-corruption compliance programme as the retailer expanded rapidly internationally. Walmart has paid over USD144 million to settle the SEC’s charges and around USD138 million to resolve parallel criminal charges laid by the US Department of Justice, with the combined total topping USD282 million.…

THE INTERNATIONAL Organization for Standardization (ISO) has launched a series of standards designed to help the cocoa industry ensure its products are both sustainably harvested and processed, but also traceable across their supply chains. Its ISO 34101 series is designed to promote good environmental and labour practices in a sector that involves sophisticated confectionery companies, global commodity traders and small farmers, often in poor countries, notably in west Africa.…

IT is now two years since the International Cocoa Organisation (ICCO) headquarters moved from London to Abidjan, in Ivory Coast (Côte d’Ivoire) in July 2017, a move ICCO called a “turning point that will bear fruit in the years to come.”…

Russia has criticised Mexico at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) for maintaining anti-dumping duties on Russian steel exports, which it claims are outdated, being based on pricing assessments using data from a different country.

The Mexican government used this method for past dumping calculations on Russian steel because it is permitted under WTO rules where a government dominates an economy that does not operate as a free market.…

FOOD hazard reports relating to meat and meat products have been rising fast worldwide, according to data released by HorizonScan, a global food safety database which gathers food safety and inspection alerts from more than 115 sources in more than 70 countries.…

FOOD hazard reports relating to meat and meat products have been rising fast worldwide, according to data released by HorizonScan, a global food safety database which gathers food safety and inspection alerts from more than 115 sources in more than 70 countries.…

BRAZIL’S automotive industry sector is optimistic about the future, now that the new government of right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro has left the new Route 2030 package of industrial incentives untouched.

The President, who assumed office on January 1, had criticised Route 2030 (Rota 2030 in Portuguese) last November (2018), as a potential waste of money.…

THE FINANCIAL Action Task Force (FATF) has been given an open-ended rolling mandate for the first time, with member governments underlining its value as the world’s premier AML/CFT international organisation. This decision – made in April – follows FATF’s latest February 20-22 plenary, where important issues such as the AML/CFT records of China, Iran and Brazil were discussed as well as fighting the continuing terror finance threat posed by Islamic State.…

SUPERFRUITS offer personal care product brands lots of marketing muscle, delivering an image of exoticism, as well as offering real functional benefits.

As a result, beauty companies have been willing to trawl the world for new super fruit ingredients to give their lines a competitive edge.…

GROWING consumer and regulatory demand for more sustainability in consumer markets is redefining the packaging sector, and beauty segment is no exception. As a result, airless packaging – while sometimes expensive – offers virtues such as the ability to preserve product freshness, minimal oxidisation, low wastage and efficient dispensing, that can dovetail with greening market trends.…

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) chocolate, biscuit and confectionery industry association CAOBISCO has raised concerns that EU exporters will be unable to exploit the reduction of Japanese tariffs under the EU-Japan Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA), in force since February 1. CAOBISCO is concerned about how the deal includes rules of origin forcing its members to demonstrate how they source specific volumes of ingredients from the EU, rather than their value, which would be easier to demonstrate.…

THE EUROPEAN Commission today (March 18) gave competition law approval for France’s VINCI Airports to take over control of London Gatwick Airport from current owner Ivy Topco Ltd, a Cayman Islands registered company.

The European Union (EU) executive, acting as the EU’s senior competition authority, approved the deal which would see VINCI acquiring 50.01% of the issued share capital of Ivy Topco.…

RECOVERY in the global marine seismic survey market for oil and gas E&P (exploitation and production) is entering its third year, with the surviving leaders in the sector starting to sound more optimistic after making painful adjustments.

Business intelligence provider Visiongain (London, UK) estimated the value of the global marine seismic acquisition and equipment market at USD5 billion in 2018, far below the USD8 billion it estimated in 2014, but nearly 15% higher than in 2017.…

TRADE-based money laundering (TBML) continues to be a complex typology that is tough for law enforcement to detect and ML regulators to control.

The risk is that with Iran being subject to new USA sanctions, the use of TBML is going to grow in the short term, warn experts.…

TRADING partners with the European Union (EU) are concerned about the EU cutting the size of low duty import quotas once Britain quits the bloc, which it is scheduled to do on March 28.

The EU has released detailed plans to reduce the amount of some goods it allows into the EU, to take account of Britain exiting the single European market.…

THE WOOL industry worldwide needs to bolster its reputation for sustainability, amidst increasing siren attacks on its marketing position from animal rights and environmental activists, the 2018 International Wool Textile Organisation (IWTO) Wool Round Table, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, heard this month (December 3-4).…

The US and China at the G20 meeting in early December settled for a 90-day suspension of their bilateral trade war including a halt to any additional tariffs, but sourcing patterns are not going to become business-as-usual any time soon for China’s soybean sector.…

It is hard to avoid either a cosmetics store or an advertisement for one in Chinese cities today. A mind-boggling wave of new retailers set up by investment firms to cash in on the cosmetics and personal care boom are eagerly seeking franchisees around the country.…

THE WORLD Trade Organisation (WTO) Disputes Settlement Body (DSB) has approved establishing disputes settlement panels ruling sought by the USA on whether retaliatory duties imposed by the European Union (EU), Canada, China, and Mexico on US confectionery and sweet bakery and associated ingredient exports, imposed in response to America’s controversial steel and aluminium tariffs, break WTO rules.…

THERE are few more complex accounting issues than transfer pricing (TP), and as the world’s economy becomes more integrated and tax jurisdictions impact each other, experts such as the OECD’s Tomas Balco are increasingly in demand.

Heading the OECD’s transfer pricing unit in the organisation’s Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, Balco commands an almost encyclopaedic technical knowledge of tax.…

*Brazil has been told to reform tax breaks given to Brazil-based manufacturers of automobiles and information technology products. The World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) appellate body has ruled that they break WTO rules on giving special tax favours to domestic producers over importers.…

A BUDDY training system has been launched by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), enabling countries with significant regulatory capacity to help other states prepare for the upcoming CORSIA (Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation) scheme. ICAO has been training national officials to advise on ensuring CORSIA’s legal requirements are written into local laws and also on building the emissions data monitoring, reporting and verification systems they need to measure their airlines’ carbon footprint.…

MPs in Canada have returned to their House of Commons after the traditional summer break, when they are expected to vote on a draft law, the Cruelty-Free Cosmetics Act, that would ban the testing of cosmetics and their ingredients on annals in Canada and block the sale of personal care products that have been assessed using such techniques.…

AN INDUSTRIAL chemical used to make paints, primers, varnishes and coatings should be regarded as carcinogenic and regulated accordingly, a European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) committee has concluded. Its committee for risk assessment (RAC) said that exposure butanone oxime carried this risk as well as causing drowsiness or dizziness if swallowed and being harmful in contact with skin, could cause damage to the upper respiratory tract after a single exposure and damage to the blood system through prolonged or repeated exposure.…

The recent sight of a Chinese internet celebrity in a milking parlour in Limerick could be a hint of what the future holds for Ireland’s increasingly international dairy industry. Xiao Lu Yu, one of the ‘influencers’ who monetise Chinese social media (see https://m.weibo.cn/status/4279583182420503…

EUROPEAN Union (EU) and Mercosur negotiators went into crucial trade talks in Uruguayan capital Montevideo September 10-14, cheered on by automakers on both sides who want a deal, even though there are tough technical issues to resolve. The round is another bid to smash the deadlock over a future trade pact between the EU and the four founding Mercosur nations – Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. …

A senior figure in the American cotton industry has told just-style of his concern that Turkey’s collapsing currency and trade disputes with the US government will cause it to import less US-made cotton.

The Turkish lira – TRY has dropped in value by 45% this year – indeed last September 12, USD1 bought TRY3.43, this September 11, it bought TRY6.43.…

A new report from Transparency International has found that only 11 major exporting countries in the world significantly punish companies that pay bribes abroad. The report, called ‘Exporting Corruption’, also found that more than half of world exports come from at least 33 jurisdictions, including several European Union (EU) member states, where companies that export corruption along with their goods and services face weak consequences. …

BRAZILIAN state energy giant Petróleo Brasileiro SA (Petrobras) has settled bribery charges with USA and Brazilian law enforcement agencies, agreeing to pay an eye watering USD1.78 billion to resolve outstanding accusations.

However, USD933.4 million of this will be credited by the USA’s Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) to Petrobras, taking into account money disgorged under a previous settlement of a securities class action lawsuit in the United States.…

THE CHINESE government has directly targeted the American confectionery and related ingredients sector in its latest tit-for-tat response in the trade wars launched by US President Donald Trump. Beijing has highlighted these goods as products that may become subject to retaliatory tariffs, should the USA impose a threatened third list of duties on Chinese tech, drafted over alleged thefts of American IP.…

AN INNOVATIVE air traffic management switch from land-based ATC services using classic vectoring, to a performance-based navigation (PBN) arrangement using airliner satellite positioning and RNP-AR (required navigation performance – authorisation required) has dramatically increased the traffic capacity of El Dorado International Airport, Bogotá, Colombia.…

THE ASIA-Pacific technical textiles sector is still robust – with China’s industry continuing to grow, with bulk products still a focus. Meanwhile, more developed economies such as South Korea and Japan keep honing their output, looking for specialist niches and edges created by innovation.…

THE OUTLOOK for European Union (EU) beef, sheep and goat meat imports looks bleak, with sales tumbling, according to an EU agricultural markets 2018 and 2019 forecast released by the European Commission.

Beef exports started falling by December 2017, and this has continued into this year, with exports almost 15% lower in the first four months of 2018 year-on-year.…

THE NONWOVENS sector has always been at the cutting edge of materials production, and so established developed economy manufacturers have often had the edge. But with global markets integrating, and emerging economies becoming increasingly sophisticated, new nonwovens manufacturing bases are growing all the time.…

THE ALUMINUM Association of Canada is assessing the list of aluminium products that could be subject to retaliatory duties following the USA’s imposition of tariffs to identify lines that maybe re-exported multiple times during complex manufacturing processes. The industry group will request that these lines are reduced from the Canadian government safeguard duty list.…

ACHIEVING regulatory convergence in the USD465 billion global cosmetics industry (Euromonitor 2017 figures) is an important long-term goal, industry experts agreed at European personal care product association Cosmetics Europe’s June 13-14 annual conference 2018 in Brussels. Europe is a key market for this industry – providing EUR77.6 billion’s worth of personal care product sales last year, and supporting more than two million jobs, said Cosmetics Europe president Loïc Armand, also president of L’Oréal France.…

THE LATIN American personal care product market, buffeted in recent years by economic and political instability, looks back on track, with trouble-spots such as Venezuela being very much an exception to overall progress.

Data released by market researcher Euromonitor International has said that the region’s beauty and personal care product sales in 2017 topped USD65 billion in 2017, growing by 42.5% between 2012 and last year.…

THE INTERNATIONAL Cocoa Organisation (ICCO) has released an ambitious policy plan designed to steer the industry towards sustainability. Called the Berlin Declaration, having been released at the fourth World Cocoa Conference, of governments, farmers, traders, grinders, processors, manufacturers, researchers, trade unions, civil society organisations, trade unions, consumer organisations, it says higher farm gate prices should be paid.…

THE MALAYSIAN government has effectively scrapped the country’s Goods & Services Tax (GST) reducing its rate from 6% to 0%, effective June 1. The move follows the election of a new administration under former opposition alliance Pakatan Harapan, defeating the incumbent Barisan Nasional.…

Argentina’s auto industry had expected a near record year in 2018, but unexpected financial problems that have hit the country in the past month could push the economy into recession and dampen local demand for cars. 
These problems are a far cry from the optimism expressed on April 4, when the heads of three carmakers spoke bullishly about production and sales growth at a business conference staged in Buenos Aires by economic consultancy Invecq Consulting. …

WITH the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) about to hold a new plenary on June 27-29, jointly with the FATF-style regional body from the Middle East and North Africa (MENAFATF), the global AML body is assessing its new operational plan for terrorist financing.…

The Indian government has launched a disputes proceeding at the World Trade Organisation (WTO), protesting at the USA’s imposition of duties of 25% and 10% on imports of India-made steel and aluminium products.

New Delhi argues that the tariffs, imposed on March 23 by the Trump administration to protect and expand American aluminium and steel production, break the WTO’s General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and its Agreement on Safeguards.…

AS China’s retreat from mass market clothing production continues, Bangladesh knitters are eyeing another added value knitwear niche – sportswear. Following the industry’s success in boosting sales within the profitable lingerie segment, Bangladesh manufacturers are ramping up production in sports apparels, although some experts say that work is needed on boosting its supply chain, particularly of manmade fibres.…

TECHNIQUES for using forensic linguistics to detect fraud continue to be refined as experts debate the best and most reliable way to use such technology and practices. Indeed, specialists continue to disagree over how forensic linguistics should be used in the anti-fraud arena.…

TECHNICAL textile markets can be driven and shaped by a range of forces – from natural disasters, to technological change, economic developments and political movements. In the case of the USA, at present, the technical textile market and industry is being moved by all these influences at the same time.…

Brazil is by far the country most-named in American investigations for crimes against the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), with China trailing behind in second place, according to the latest listing from a blog, FCPA Tracker. It says industries cited in the different FCPA probes tied to Brazil include power generation, waste management, oil and gas services, food production, steel manufacturing and telecommunications.…

BRAZIL’s agriculture minister Blairo Maggi has announced his country, “the world’s second-largest producer and largest poultry exporter” wants to contest the European Union (EU)’s restrictions on poultry meat exports at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The case could set an important world trade law precedent for poultry imports, regarding the extent to which importing countries can block trades over salmonella contamination.…

Unlike the limited range of minerals used in fossil fuel production, many minerals, metallic and nonmetallic, are used in renewable energy technologies. However, production is often low and concentrated in a limited number of countries – creating potential strategic supply problems.…

EUROPEAN Union (EU) food and drink exporters could be major beneficiaries of a revised EU-Mexico trade agreement which will remove almost all bilateral tariffs left by a year 2000 deal. Under a new agreement struck in principle, Mexican import duties on EU exports of cheeses, such as gorgonzola and roquefort, and pasta (of up to 20%), will be removed, along with duties on chocolate and confectionery, (that can exceed 20%).…

THE EUROPEAN Commission has proposed stopping 20 Brazilian companies exporting meat products into the European Union (EU), following a unanimous vote at the April 18-19 European Commission special committee of member state experts on plants, animals, food and feed.

A Commission spokesperson told GlobalMeatNews the measure delisting companies from those allowed to export poultry meat “relates to deficiencies detected in the Brazilian official control system”.…

Diversity – a theme very close to Mohamed Irshad’s heart – could not be embodied by a more appropriate person than the affable, youthful-looking 34-year-old head of global internal audit – the Americas, at French multinational Schneider Electric. Irshad is an Indian national who was born and raised in Dubai, studied in India, has lived in Paris and is now based in Canada.…

TRADE in clothing and textiles between Brazil and Argentina has been growing, as manufacturers in these neighbouring South America countries rein in their comparatively high costs, according to international trade data. Brazilian textile and apparel exports to Argentina rose 4.9% to USD251 million in 2017 from USD239 million in 2016, while Brazil’s imports from its southern neighbour shot up 22.6% to USD86.9 million from USD70.9 million over the same period. …

BRAZIL’S senate is debating a bill 626/2011 that could lift an existing ban on harvesting sugarcane in the country’s Amazon region to make ethanol fuel. The proposal has been supported by Brazil’s centrist President Michel Temer but opposed by environmental groups and the Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association (UNICA – União da Indústria de Cana-de-Açúcar).…

BRAZIL’S automotive industry is awaiting the final details and presidential sanction of a 14-year incentives program called Rota 2030, that will offer up to Brazilian Reals BRL1.5 billion (USD467.4 million) in annual tax credits sector-wide to auto and auto parts manufacturers selling cars in Brazil.…

International activity to understand and potentially extract natural gas from methane hydrates has intensified since 2010 with the continuation and launch of new research and development (R&D) projects and field production tests offshore and onshore, as shown in a new overview by Carolyn D Ruppel, chief of the gas hydrates project at the United States Geological Survey (USGS).(1)…

THE EUROPEAN Commission wants to delist all companies involved in the latest cases of fraud in Brazil’s meat sector from having access to European Union (EU) markets, the EU executive’s spokesperson for health and food safety Anca Paduraru has told GlobalMeatNews.…

BRAZIL’S textile sector would contract, should the country abandon its protectionist policies, however, its added value clothing industry would perform better, an Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) report has concluded.

Noting that average tariffs levels weighted by imports are almost twice as high in Brazil as in Colombia and more than eight times higher than in Mexico or Chile, the report highlighted how around 450 tariff lines are at the maximum of 35%, including textiles, apparel and leather.…

THE IMPORTANCE of Brazil as the world’s top supplier of internationally-traded tobacco leaf and manufactured products has been waning for the past decade, with India, notably, improving its position. New statistical analysis released by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) shows that this market share fall for Brazil also represented a decline in volume sales, given the global trade in tobacco leaf and products has shrunk since 2013 – until 2016, the year for which the latest data is available.…

INDUSTRIAL minerals companies need to better manage their communications in an increasingly interconnected world, the CEO of Brazil-based Nexa Resources S.A. told this year’s Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) convention.

In comments echoed by Canadian colleagues, Tito Martins, said he felt that the industry must change the way it engages with an expanding number of potential partners, from local communities and environmentalists, as well as regulators and financiers.…

IF there is a quality that gives many Israeli companies an edge internationally, it is innovation. And this trait can certainly be said to run through the work of Israeli apparel major Delta Galil, based in Caesarea, northern Israel.

“We could not succeed if we were not innovative” said Isaac Dabah, the company’s CEO of Delta Galil, in an exclusive interview with just-style, held at his office.…

MAJOR shifts in the power of exporting countries within the meat and livestock sector in the past decade have been identified in new statistical analysis released by the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The global body has noted how India between 2006 and 2016 became a bovine meat export power house (notably in buffalo meat) with overseas sales rising from 79,400 tonnes (1.9% of world exports) to 1.2 million tonnes (18.7%) and the world’s largest exporter to boot.…

Brazil’s textile industry has reported an overall growth in sales of 3.2% for 2017, and even bigger increases are forecast for the year ahead. Latest data from the Brazilian Textile and Apparel Association (ABIT – Associação Brasileira da Indústria Têxtil e de Confecção) predicts an overall growth in revenues of 3.29% for the year 2018.…

WITH tobacco being a key driver of Zambia’s agriculture sector and a past reliable source of export earnings, a recent decline in leaf production has taken a heavy toll on this southern African country’s economy. Indeed, Zambia saw its agricultural foreign exchange earnings (of all farm-based products) fall by USD100 million in 2017, according to Zambia’s agriculture ministry.…

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) financial watchdog, the Court of Auditors, has highlighted concerns about how Chinese knitwear exporters maybe exploiting loopholes in EU customs and VAT controls to evade paying proper amounts of these taxes.

In a report on shortcomings in EU import procedures, the court noted how Chinese traders were abusing EU customs procedure CP42, which allows an importer to bring goods into one EU member state without paying VAT, because they will be sold in another EU country.…

THE RUSSIAN government has said it plans to significantly increase its beef exports from Latin American states (except from Brazil) to compensate for potential domestic supply shortages created by the existing ban on imports of meat from western countries and a recent ban on beef imports from Brazil.…

Brazilian state-controlled oil giant, Petrobras, is offering to pay out USD2.95 billion to settle an American class action lawsuit by shareholders that lost money in the massive Brazilian corruption scandal uncovered in Operation Car Wash (Lava Jato). In a statement, Petrobras has said that the payout, which still needs to be agreed by a US federal court, is intended to resolve all pending and prospective claims against the company in the US, “eliminates the risk of an adverse judgment … and puts an end to the uncertainties, burdens and costs of protracted litigation.”…

EUROPEAN Union (EU) and Brazilian textile industry associations have joined forces to draw up common proposals to put to negotiators drawing up the clothing and textile chapters of a future free trade agreement (FTA) between the EU and Mercosur group of countries, consisting of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay.…

OECD SAYS 49 JURISDICTIONS WILL AUTOMATICALLY EXCHANGE TAX INFORMATION THIS YEAR

THE IDENTITY of 49 jurisdictions that will automatically exchange tax information in 2017 under a global standard has been revealed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD).…

It has been weeks since quotas limiting European Union (EU) sugar production were scrapped on September 30, and while its impact has yet to become clear, experts agree that EU output will rise, at least in the short term. The EU executive, the European Commission is predicting that EU sugar production will increase 20% in the coming year.…

THE RUSSIAN Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance (Rosselkhoznadzor) may impose a ban on all imports of beef and pork from Brazil, the largest meat importer to Russia, in coming days over concerns about the detection of a forbidden hormone, government officials have warned.…

WHILE the Vatican City State and Holy See’s acceptance that their financial institutions could be exploited by money launderers is far more realistic than the denials of 10 years ago, a much-anticipated Italian court ruling has shown much work is needed to clear dirty money from these hallowed accounts.…

THE WORLD Trade Organisation (WTO) appellate body is considering an appeal by Brazil against a WTO disputes panel ruling that a wide range of Brazilian tax systems, designed to promote domestic production and exports, breach global trading agreements. The WTO backed Japan and European Union (EU) complaints that these discriminate unfairly against non-Brazilian competitors.…

CHINA’S imposition of temporary safeguard duties to protect its sugar industry have been challenged at the World Trade Organisation (WTO), with sugar giant Brazil arguing Beijing’s tariffs break global commerce rules. In a signal that Brazil might be considering launching a disputes case against China, diplomats for the South American country told a WTO safeguards committee meeting that the duties broke the WTO agreement on safeguards and the general agreement on tariffs and trade (GATT). …

The trial of three former high-flying football executives kicked off in New York on Monday
(Nov 13). The former president of the Brazil Football Association (CBF) José Maria Marin;
former Paraguayan president of the South America football confederation (CONMEBOL)
Juan Ángel Napout; and former president of the Peruvian Football Association (FPF) Manuel
Burga are all charged with racketeering and bribery over TV rights to the Copa América and
Copa Libertadores football tournaments.…

Contrary to common perceptions, fast fashion is not a fad in itself, indeed according to Sebastian Boger, a principal at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), this swift industrial response to changing clothing market trends is here to stay. However, Boger advised the International Apparel Federation (IAF) World Fashion Convention, at Rio De Janeiro: “There’s still a long way to go before it’s a fully sustainable industry, in terms of social, environmental and ethical pulse.”…

Multinationals and suppliers in the personal care product sector are unilaterally implementing measures to reduce their carbon footprint in the wake of the 2015 Paris climate treaty, taking steps to reduce energy use, their impact on forests and cutting water use and pollution.…

BRAZIL may be the source of just 1.6% of all nanotechnology research papers across the world according to UNESCO (the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation), but it remains a leader among its Latin American neighbours due to its National Nanotechnology Programme.…

THE BRAZILIAN arm of Brussels-based speciality chemical firm Solvay says that it is prospering in Brazil though sales of biodegradable polyamide yarn Amni Soul Eco, reflecting the demand for bio-based materials and products in Latin America’s largest country.

Renato Boaventura, CEO of the Brazil Rhodia Solvay Group’s ‘fibras global business unit’ told WTiN.com…

‘Colourful’,’ young’, ‘big’ and ‘clever’ are words often bandied about to describe the positive qualities of Brazil, and they certainly could be used to define La Estampa, a Brazilian textile company specialising in digital print B2B.

With a global print capacity of 25,000 metres per day, La Estampa is able to punch its weight in global digital textile markets.…

VIETNAM’S textile and clothing and textile sector is looking to sell more product into Asian markets such as South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Japan, while solidifying its traditional export bases like the US and EU, the latest trade data indicates. 

Last year, Vietnam exported USD2.28 billion’s worth of clothing and textiles to South Korea – a 7.45% gain compared with 2015, according to Vietnam customs data analysed by the Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association (VITAS). …

RESTRICTIVE quotas limiting European Union (EU) sugar production to 13.5 million tonnes have finally been scrapped, freeing producers to hit market demand. The abolition of the quotas from October 1 sees European Commission officials predicting that EU sugar production will increase 20% and reach 20.1 million tonnes for the next harvest.…

CONFECTIONARY manufacturers in India are having to grapple with their products and ingredients attracting a wide range of tax rates under the country’s new goods and services tax (GST), which started to be levied from July 1.

India’s GST Council, a body representing the central and state governments, has been deciding which goods will be covered by the zero, 5%, 12%, 18% and 28% tax rates allowed under India’s GST legislation. …

THE GLOBAL increase in commodity prices for beef and veal has dampened demand in Russia for imports of these meat products. The country’s agriculture ministry has said imports fell 18.6% this January-May compared to the same period in 2016, That was mainly due to a rise in import prices, which since the beginning of the current year have grown by almost 25%, said ministry officials.…

THE LEAGUE of Arab States’ 22 countries have imported more Brazilian textiles and clothing between January and July of 2017 than during the whole of 2016, according to the latest industry figures from the Brazilian-Arabic Chamber of Commerce (CCAB – Câmara de Comércio Árabe-Brasileira).…

TEXTILE finishers in Brazil should take heed of local consumers’ demand for complex and colourful design in fabrics, traders at SAARA, Rio de Janeiro’s biggest open-air market, have told WTiN.com.

Grassroots interviews at this market in the city’s historic centre said Brazil’s mass market fabric tastes eschew simplicity – the market, originally founded by immigrants at the end of the 19^th century, is a medley of shopfronts selling everything from sports equipment and beach chairs to makeup and plastic jewellery.…

Leather exporters in the north Indian production hub of Kanpur (in Uttar Pradesh) are facing closure of their tanneries over environmental concerns, even as they are trying to overcome the shortage of raw hides and loss of business to Brazilian companies.…

WORK is advancing on a major expansion of Santiago’s Pudahuel International Airport to cope with Chile’s rapidly-growing aviation market. But airlines feel they are bearing more than their share of the USD1 billion construction cost.

Officially known as Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport, the facility has been Chile’s gateway to the world since it opened 50 years ago.…

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) meat industry has expressed disappointment over the decision by Russia to extend by 18 months its ban on EU exports of meat and meat products, but is optimistic that producers will continue finding alternative markets.

Leaders of EU farm industry association Copa-Cogeca and the European Livestock & Meat Trading Union (UECBV) stressed to GlobalMeatNews that the European Commission, food industry companies and EU member states had successfully adapted to Russia’s actions.…

THE RUSSIAN Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance (Rosselkhoznadzor) may impose a ban on all imports of beef and pork from Brazil, the largest meat importer to Russia, in coming days over concerns about the detection of a forbidden hormone, government officials have warned.…

BRAZIL maintains high tariffs on its textiles and clothing imports to encourage foreign investment, according to a new World Trade Organisation (WTO) trade review, but data inside a detailed report suggests this policy is proving ineffective.

“Clothing, textiles, and transport equipment continue to benefit from the activity’s highest tariff protection (35%), the main tool in an apparent tariff-jumping policy to attract FDI” (foreign direct investment), said the WTO.…

THE OWNER of a major digital printing business in Brazil has predicted that the country’s finishing sector will abandon traditional colouring techniques by 2027. Marcelo Castelão, the sole owner of La Estampa, a Rio de Janeiro-based printing company, told WTiN.com: “Within five to 10 years, the cylinders will be gone.…

THE BURGEONING automotive manufacturing sector of central Europe’s Slovakia is paying close attention to an inquiry by the European Union (EU) executive, the European Commission, into how its government supports the sector. The upcoming decision by the Commission, which has powers to ensure national governments do not distort the EU’s single market by subsidising local industrial champions, could have significant implication for the future of Slovakia’s auto sector.…

THE EUROPEAN Commission has reported that wines and spirits were the subject of more new foreign trade barriers to EU exports during 2016 than any other sector. Its ‘2016 trade and investment barriers report’ said there were seven such new restrictions.…

Brazilian prosecutors have fined the parent company of Brazil meatpacking giant JBS, J&F Investimentos, a record Brazilian Reals BRL10.3 billion (USD3.2 billion) for bribing 1,900 local politicians. Payments, which will start in December, will be spread over 25 years under a May 30 leniency agreement between J&F Investimentos and Brazil’s Federal Prosecution Service (MPF). …

BRAZIL’S beauty and personal care market took a hit in 2016, as the world’s fourth-biggest beauty market struggled to emerge from its worst-ever recession amid political corruption scandals. 

The outlook is for a slow recovery this year, as high unemployment keeps a lid on purchasing power in this market of 207 million people.…

The macro-economic slowdown experienced by Latin America in recent years has thrown the brakes on what had been impressive growth in the beauty and personal care sector since the turn of the century.

Much of the region is now looking for ways to stimulate the sector, tempering ambitions by aiming for more gradual growth rather than runaway success.…

EUROPE’S nonwovens producers again served up a solid performance in 2016 against the background of (uneven and) uncertain trading conditions for the industry.

As usual, the just-published returns from EDANA, the representative organisation for the USD30 billion nonwovens industry in Europe, show some important national variations.…

THE RELEASE of a taped conversation between unpopular Brazilian President Michel Temer and CEO of giant meatpacker JBS has put the South American nation in another political turmoil only one year after its former President Dilma Rousseff was impeached.

The revelations have put heavy pressure for Temer to resign, who denies wrongdoing.…

FOUR Brazilian presidents (including the incumbent), dozens of lawmakers, nearly all governors, mayors of major cities, members of the judicial system and of the press, have been tainted with corruption allegations by the sprawling Lava Jato probe. It has had global impact as one of the biggest scandals in history.…

THE PLANNED introduction of mandatory audit firm rotation (MAFR) by the South African Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors (IRBA) has sparked widespread dissention within the country’s business and accounting communities This is despite that the reform’s goal is to strengthen auditor independence and audit quality and that there are some calls for the move to be brought forward from the current introduction date of April 1, 2023.…

REDUCING Brazil’s excessive duty tariffs through renewed European Union (EU)-Brazil trade talks is essential to increase textile exports to the Latin American country, EURATEX (the European Apparel and Textile Federation) director general Francesco Marchi has told WTiN.com.

Decisions on tariffs are central to negotiations between the EU and Mercosur – the trading block of Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay and Brazil (Venezuela was suspended from the group in December 2016).…

Argentina’s electric car market is poised to take off this year as tax cuts and the installation of charging points spur consumer demand. This month (May), the government slashed import taxes on electric vehicles (EVs), and it’s “working on plans so that the infrastructure for these cars is in place,” Guillermo Dietrich, the national minister of transportation, told wardsauto.…

Technological innovation continues to transform every step of the jeans industry from fibre blends, alternatives to indigo dyes, use of sustainable resources, and new developments in fit and finish. It was also a major focus of the Kingpins Show Amsterdam (April 19/20) denim showcase.…

Political uncertainty over US trade deals sparked by the ascension of President Donald Trump to power should be eased to avoid stifling innovation in the country’s technical textiles industry which could see it marginalised on the world stage, insiders have warned.…

A Transparency International (TI) investigation has found 3,452 properties in São Paulo, Brazil, worth at least USD2.7 billion are linked to 236 companies registered offshore, raising red flags about the use of real estate for money laundering in Brazil’s largest city. …

THE RELEASE of dozens of plea bargain testimonies from executives at Brazilian constructor Odebrecht have sparked a flood of high profile criminal investigations for illegal graft within the country’s sprawling ‘lava jato’ (car wash) corruption probe. The inquiries that started looking into shady dealing at the state-run oil major Petrobras may now have reached a climax, with judges opening investigations into eight government ministers, 12 governors, hundreds of public officials and lawmakers and all of the country’s five living former presidents.…

THE DIFFICULTIES that have surged in the diplomatic relations between the Mexican government and the new US administration of President Donald Trump have increased uncertainty within the Mexican personal care product market and industry.

With Mexico facing US demands to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), with the risk of the US imposing temporary safeguard duties on Mexican exports to protect American manufacturers, companies in Mexico are seeking to boost domestic consumption.…

THE EUROPEAN Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has launched a comprehensive study into the healthiness of consuming sugar, that could guidance telling consumers when to stop eating sugary foods, such as confectionery. An ad-hoc working group with expertise in dietary exposure, epidemiology, human nutrition, diet-related chronic diseases and dentistry will examine the issue, along with Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden, which requested the work.…

EU PROPOSES BOOSTING ANTICARTEL POWERS OF NATIONAL EUROPEAN COMPETITION AUTHORITIES

A DIRECTIVE has been proposed by the European Commission that would ensure that national competition authorities across the European Union (EU) have a minimum level of powers enabling them to enforce EU antitrust laws.…

Europe’s nonwovens producers again served up a solid performance in 2016 against the background of (uneven and) uncertain trading conditions for the industry. As usual, the just-published returns from EDANA, the representative organisation for the USD30 billion nonwovens industry in Europe, show some important national variations.…

EUROPEAN and French meat industry organisations are preparing to respond to China’s decision to lift its embargo on French exports of de-boned beef for animals. China is the second largest importer of beef worldwide: “We welcome the move in principle,” European Union (EU) farm body Copa-Cogeca’s secretary general Pekka Pesonen told GlobalMeatNews.…

THE BRAZILIAN government is taking urgent and comprehensive action to fight corruption and collusion between food inspectors and Brazil’s meat industry, an envoy to Brussels has told GlobalMeatNews.

The first secretary of the Brazilian mission to the European Union (EU), Henrique Choer Moraes, Moraes said that until now, technical analyses of the problem has not indicated risks to public health.…

This year’s Kingpins Show Amsterdam denim showcase heard that mills and consumers are driving technological innovation and design, rather than fashion houses. Recognition of the impact of social media on consumption; fabric wicking; as well as new blends and solutions devised to appeal to untapped consumer demands, were all highlighted.…

IS the Brazilian textile sector finally seeing an end to the contraction in sales and production prompted by the country’s recession? According to figures released by industry association ABIT (Association Brasileira de Industria Textil e Confecçao), the tide is turning and better times are ahead. …

Europe’s auto suppliers are pushing the European Union (EU) work harder to secure a free trade deal with the Mercosur bloc to end tariff barriers restricting the current EU exports of vehicles and parts to its South American member countries.

At present this trade with the four founding members of Mercosur – Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay – is worth a mere USD8 billion.…

INTERPOL is seeking international assistance in its own investigation into alleged frauds against the Brazilian poultry and pork industry, with a key industry association admitting the sector has been suffering from external attacks by fraudsters, GlobalMeatNews can reveal.

The international police agency has issued a ‘Purple Notice’ which means its 190 member countries are asked “to seek or provide information on modus operandi, objects, devices and concealment methods used by criminals”.…

Brazilian overseas beef meat sales are set to grow in 2017, according to projections from the Associação Brasileira das Indústrias Exportadoras de Carne (ABIEC). “Our export forecasts for 2017 are USD5.5 to USD6 billion, said Antônio Jorge Camardelli, the ABIEC president.…

After a major investigation showed evidence of rotten and poor quality meats being consumed in Brazil and exported over the last two years, Brazilian meatpacking industry associations have now spoken out – accusing the police of exaggeration in its claims.

Speaking at a press conference in São Paulo, on Monday (March 20), Francisco Sergio Turra, head of the Brazilian Association of Animal Proteins (ABPA – Associação Brasileira de Proteína Animal), said that the country’s meat production standards follow international models.…

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) and Canada’s strong branded knitwear companies may benefit from additional mutual trade after the European Parliament’s approval and resulting signature of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between the two jurisdictions.

This long-negotiated and highly contested deal, which could apply from April as far as its key duty and quota liberalisation elements are concerned, will remove nearly 99% of tariffs on all goods traded between the EU and Canada and eliminate tax discrimination.…

South Korea on March 21 lifted an import ban on chicken from BRF, a major Brazilian poultry exporter that has been at the center of a food safety scandal involving meatpackers allegedly paying off inspectors to overlook practices including processing rotten meat.…

China may have forced the European Union (EU) to grant additional low tariff quotas, improving Chinese poultry exporters EU market access – albeit just for food containing processed duck. A ruling released yesterday (Tuesday March 28) by a World Trade Organisation (WTO) disputes settlement panel has ruled that the EU had insufficiently considered China’s poultry exporting prowess when allocating these quotas in 2012.…

The European Union (EU) has suspended meat imports from four Brazilian exporters, a European Commission official has confirmed to just-food. The official would not name the companies, but noted that the ban followed Friday’s Brazil federal police announcement that four out of 21 meatpacking companies had manipulated certificates for exports to European markets.…

THE USE of airless technology in packaging is largely about zero product waste, preserving product integrity and less packaging material – and it obviously gels well with the growing trend towards sustainability. That explains the uptake in this technology led by cosmetics packaging, industry experts argue.…

KEY MESSAGES

*The nuclear industry has an ageing staff and needs to recruit new professionals as they retire

*Its strong health and retirement benefits packages could help it attract the new staff it needs

*The nuclear industry outside north America has a strong expat component, making it easier for recruit staff from abroad

INTRODUCTION

The nuclear industry sector is facing some significant human resources challenges, but new research carried out by Airswift and Energy Jobline indicates that the nuclear sector can still compete for talent.…

THE TRADE in confectionery products between the European Union (EU) and Canada is likely to increase now the European Parliament has approved the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA).

The vote – on February 15 (2017) – follows years of detailed negotiations and means that large sections of this trade deal can now come into force, maybe as early as April, as long as Canada stages its own vote in time.…

THE GERMAN paint and coatings industry is predicting that its sales will grow steadily in the coming year, as Europe’s largest economy continues its steady economic good fortunes.

The World Bank forecasts that 2017 gross domestic product (GDP) growth will be 1.6% and in 2018 it will be 1.5%.…

The German paint and coatings industry is predicting that its sales will grow steadily in the coming year, as Europe’s largest economy continues its steady economic good fortunes. The World Bank forecasts that 2017 gross domestic product (GDP) growth will be 1.6% and in 2018 it will be 1.5%.…

THE OLIVE oil industry has traditionally been dominated by some key major European players, notably Spain, Italy and Greece, but with global consumption rising, production is emerging in countries which have previously relied on imports.

International Oil Council statistics show how new production centres are being created.…

MORE than two thirds of countries rated for public sector corruption in Transparency International’s latest Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) failed to score 50, the halfway point between 0 and 100, with zero regarded as totally corrupt and 100 as unimpeachably clean.…

A JUDGE yesterday (January 17) approved Britain’s largest ever commercial crime enforcement action – a GBP497.25 million (USD616 million) plus interest and GBP13 million costs (USD16.1 million) deferred prosecution agreement with the UK’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO). Sir Brian Leveson, President of the Queen’s Bench division, agreed the penalty for Rolls-Royce, covering covers 12 counts of conspiracy to corrupt, false accounting and failure to prevent bribery.…

ROLLS-ROYCE has announced that it has reached deferred prosecution agreements (DPA) with the UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and the USA Department of Justice (DoJ), plus a leniency deal with the Brazilian government, to settle bribery and corruption claims. The agreements will see the company pay GBP671 million (USD808 million) in total, which will suspend prosecutions over alleged bribery and corruption involving intermediaries in overseas markets.…

The US auditing watchdog the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) has fined Deloitte Brazil (Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Auditores Independentes) USD8 million for falsifying audit reports, then trying to cover up the violations through more false documents and testimony. The PCAOB also banned Deloitte Brazil from taking on new audit work with in the United States until the independent monitor it appointed confirms progress on remedial benchmarks.…

THE INTERNATIONAL Confederation of European Beet Growers (CIBE) and the European Association of Sugar Producers (CEFS-Comité Européen des Fabricants de Sucre) have jointly called on the European Union (EU) to continue protecting producers with import tariffs, even as the EU negotiates 12 trade deals affecting the food industry.…

Brazil’s tumbling textile exports to Venezuela may fall further if the country is suspended from the south American trading bloc, Mercosur next month. (December, 2016) 

According to World Bank data, Brazil’s textile and clothing exports to Venezuela peaked in 2011 at USD90.3 million but have been falling steadily ever since.…

PROPOSED reforms to European Union (EU) rules on setting anti-dumping and countervailing protective duties could improve the ability of the EU to defend its auto industry and local suppliers from unfair cheap imports.

The changes would amend how the EU executive, the European Commission, calculates whether it can and should impose such duties, and if so – how high they should be.…

The Brazilian meat industry has welcomed a commercial agreement struck by their country’s government with Malaysia, that will encourage and enable Brazilian beef and chicken exports to this south-east Asian country.

Brazil’s ministry of agriculture, livestock and supply (ministério da agricultura, pecuária e abastecimento – MAPA) is now awaiting the result of a November visit of a Malaysia technical team who have inspected the country’s slaughterhouses and operators.…

A SENIOR scientist warned an international trade conference in Geneva this afternoon (Oct 24) on anti-microbial resistance that rich countries will increasingly ban the import of meat from livestock fed antibiotic growth promoters. Jørgen Schlundt, Professor of Food Science and Technology, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, noted the upcoming January 1 introduction of a ban on the use of most antobiotics as growth promoters within the United States meat and livestock sector, while the EU already has a comprehensive ban.…

PERSONAL care product and cosmetics manufacturers are continuing to invest in sustainable materials – such as responsibly-sourced cardboard and bio-plastics. Indeed, such green alternatives can boost sales in markets where consumers are increasingly concerned with the environmental impact of products. But packagers still face challenges in ensuring these meet the standards of their clients, particularly in premium sectors.…

Brazil’s Lavo Jato investigation, the biggest corruption probe in the world today is at serious risk of ending in frustration, at least to observers wanting to see Brazilian politics and business cleaned from top to bottom. Mauricio Savarese reports from São Paulo.…

Japan’s automobile manufacturers are increasingly looking to set up plants in – or, at least, very close to – their target markets, and paint companies with expertise in the auto coatings sector are following their lead.

“In 2015, the overall Japanese paints and varnishes market recorded 0.3 per cent growth, with producers struggling to remain competitive because production in Japan is pricier due to environmental requirements and higher labour costs,” said Andrius Balsys, a research analyst who monitors the paints sector for London-based market researcher, Euromonitor International.…

BRAZIL’S textile industry is upset that the summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, and custom from its 500,000 foreign visitors, has failed to give its producers a significant shot in the arm, despite needing help during the country’s ongoing recession.…

MEAT retailers in Rio da Janeiro, Brazil, have expressed disappointment that the Olympic and Paralympic Games in August and September had a weak impact on sales, although a selected band of suppliers scored extra sales.

There were indeed many visitors: the city government of Rio announced 1.17 million tourists visited Rio during the games, 410,000 of them were foreigners, with big meat consumers USA, Argentine and Germany sending more than any other country.…

BRAZIL’S exports of pigmeat are booming, with over January to July, volume sales overseas increasing 42.2% year-on-year compared to the same time period in 2016. The Brazilian Protein Association (Associação Brasileira de Proteína Animal) says that from January to July this year (2016), 413,300 tonnes have been exported, be it frozen or processed meat, including sausages.…

COTTON

Cotton maybe one of the most popular fibres for clothing and accessories because of its universality, timelessness, and availability, but this past year has shown that the fibre is not immune to volatile economic markets. World cotton production fell by 17% to 21.65 million tonnes in 2015-2016, the lowest volume since 2003-2004, according to the International Cotton Advisory Committee (ICAC).…

EUROPEAN COMMISSION LAUNCHES GLOBAL TAX AVOIDANCE BLACKLIST ASSESSMENT

THE EUROPEAN Commission has completed the first phase of an assessment designed to help the European Union (EU) frame its own blacklist of jurisdictions deemed un-cooperative over tax avoidance and evasion. Brussels has released a ‘scoreboard’ of non-EU jurisdictions judging whether they exchange information with foreign tax authorities, have preferential or low tax regimes, have close and important economic and financial links with the EU and are politically stable (and hence more attractive as a tax haven).…

Transparency International has found multinational companies in emerging markets like Brazil and Malaysia have such low corporate transparency levels that they allow corruption “to thrive”. In a new report “Transparency in Corporate Reporting: Assessing Emerging Market Multinationals – TI found 75% of companies in emerging markets scored less than 5 out of 10 on a transparency scorecard.…

South America’s cosmetics and personal care sector is looking to bounce back from a slowdown caused by the region’s macroeconomic troubles, but political pressures and regional trade alliances are driving individual country markets down divergent paths.

Over the last year, countries across the region have been buffeted by economic turmoil that has had a knock-on impact on the cosmetics sector.…

Pakistan’s textile industry is warning of serious damage to the cotton-related businesses if a new 4% import duty currently charged on raw cotton for textile manufacturers serving domestic market is maintained.

“This policy will have a long term impact on the cotton consumption in Pakistan and the whole value chain will be affected,” Asif Inam, vice chairman of All Pakistan Textile Mills Association (APTMA), in Karachi told WTiN. …

Brazil will continue to challenge the USA for the position of being the world’s biggest meat producer and exporter over the next 10 years, with chicken leading the way, Brazilian government forecasts indicate. It says that Brazilian meat production in 2025/26 will be 29.8% higher than in 2015/6 – amounting to 7.8 million tonnes in additional production – resulting in 23.6 million tonnes of output.…

Bangladesh is mulling controls over foreign investors in the country’s growing poultry industry after local rivals have said they fear being swallowed by overseas companies.  

The country’s state minister for fisheries and livestock Narayon Chandra Chanda said that there was concern that Bangladesh poultry farmers could lose trade if competition was unchecked: “We’re still observing … There should be a guideline,” he told GlobalMeatNews without giving further details.…

Paint and varnish manufacturers in Japan experienced a disappointing 2015, with sluggish purchasing from the construction and automotive sectors translating into meagre 0.3% growth over the fiscal year. Analysts predict that growth will pick up in the short term, in part as a result of a spike in demand from the construction sector ahead of Tokyo hosting the 2020 Olympic Games – although industry players are concerned about the longer-term outlook for the sector.…

The emergence of Brazil as a major economic power and highly promising market of 200 million inhabitants is luring Mauritian textile producers to foray further in Latin America’s largest national market. Indeed, despite Brazil’s ongoing economic recession, Mauritian textile and clothing exports to the country have more than quadrupled since 2012, according to trade promotion body Enterprise Mauritius.…

SUPPLIERS to auto manufacturers are releasing increasingly innovative technology to help brands reduce interior noise in their vehicles.

Luxembourg-based automotive interiors supplier International Automotive Components (IAC) Group, for instance, is expanding its operations to produce lightweight injection molded inner dash insulation that enhances interior acoustical performance.…

SHANGHAI-based microfibre and fabric accessories maker Pactics Group is set to open a new factory in Cambodia using innovative digital heat-transfer ‘sublimated’ printing – that allows brightly-coloured high quality prints on fabric.

The new factory, under the company’s ‘Raytecs’ division, will be located in Cambodia’s capital Phnom Penh-based produce women’s activewear, swimwear, apparel and other sublimated printed premium products: “We are a boutique manufacturer of sublimated activewear, apparel and premium sublimated products,” the group’s president and owner  Piet Holten told WTiN.…

The European Union (EU) needs as free hand as possible to prevent the Chinese steel industry seizing more market share with the support of the Beijing government, according to leaders of AEGIS Europe, an alliance of 30 manufacturing associations. In its strongest warning yet about Chinese dumping, overcapacity and illegal subsidies, AEGIS spokesman Milan Nitzschke told a Brussels press conference yesterday (July 11): “China is not a market economy and therefore cannot be granted Market Economy Status (MES) by the European Union” (EU) in its anti-dumping calculations.…

China is keeping alive unproductive “zombie” steel plants then dumping the products on the European Union (EU) market, the Spanish author of two key reports adopted in the European Economic and Social Committee yesterday (July 14) told Steel First. “Not only the steel industry, but the whole European industry, will suffer if the market economy status is unconditionally granted to China,” said Andrés Barcelό Delgado, referring to the debate over anti-dumping calculations for Chinese exports that is ongoing in Brussels.…

MEAT suppliers in Lebanon are anticipating significantly increased sales as Ramadan winds up this week. Hovig Kozobiokian, managing partner of Dekerco, a meat and food importer in Beirut. He estimated demand increases by around 50% to 60% for round cuts during Ramadan, with often a spike in demand in the last week for the Eid El-Fitr festival that ends this holy month.…

BRAZIL’S JBS, the giant meatpacker and meat processing company, has been arguing it has not been harmed by raids carried out by Brazilian police earlier this month, dubbed ‘Operation Sepsis’, part of the country’s ongoing ‘Lavo Jato’ corruption investigations.

Brazilian media has reported that on July 1 federal officers searched the São Paulo home of Joesley Batista, CEO of J&F Investimentos, the parent company of JBS.…

BRAZILIAN companies are looking to break into international ethical personal care product markets supplying sustainable cosmetics inputs from the Amazon forest, leveraging an innovative government project.

This ‘Structuring Project for Amazon Forest-Based Cosmetics’ scheme, launched in 2013 by the Brazilian Micro and Small Business Support Service (Servicio Brasileño de Apoyo a las Micro y Pequeñas Empresas – SEBRAE), is amassing information and data to help companies identify useful natural ingredients and advises on processing, manufacturing and marketing the resulting products.…

HAVING a strong reputation for sustainable practice is increasingly a strong marketing card, for the confectionery sector as much as any other consumer industry. But with its extended international supply chains, demonstrating a high regard for environmental good practice is not always easy for the confectionery sector.…

BRAZIL’S fragrance sector has struggled as the country continues to struggle through an economic recession that started during 2013, but the industry hopes it has turned the corner and sales are now recovering. In 2015, for the first time in 23 years, Brazilian cosmetics, toiletries and fragrances sales fell, dropping 8% year-on-year, according to the Brazilian Industry Association of Toiletries, Perfumes and Cosmetics (ABIHPEC – ‘Associação Brasileira da Indústria de Higiene Pessoal, Perfumaria e Cosméticos’).…

BRAZIL’S fragrance sector has struggled as the country continues to struggle through an economic recession that started during 2013, but the industry hopes it has turned the corner and sales are now recovering. In 2015, for the first time in 23 years, Brazilian cosmetics, toiletries and fragrances sales fell, dropping 8% year-on-year, according to the Brazilian Industry Association of Toiletries, Perfumes and Cosmetics (ABIHPEC – ‘Associação Brasileira da Indústria de Higiene Pessoal, Perfumaria e Cosméticos’).…

A decline in exports has ended the boom years for the Colombian cosmetics sector, but the country still holds high hopes of establishing itself as a major regional player.

Colombia’s cosmetics and personal care sector has been thriving for well over a decade, as economic growth has fuelled a strong domestic market and the country established itself as an export hub for the north of South America.…

A DUTCH specialist in digital printing has told a major textile conference in Brazil that its textile finishing sector should embrace this technology, despite its higher costs. Rene Wolferink, application specialist at the Netherlands’ SPGPrints was speaking at the International Abit Congress, staged by the Brazilian Textile and Apparel Industry Association (ABIT – Associação Brasileira da Indústria Têxtil e de Confecção), staged in São Paulo on June 1 and 2.…

The global meditech textiles market is expected to witness the highest growth – 4.6% from 2015 to 2022 – within the general technical textiles industry, according to an October 2015 report from US-based market research firm Grand View Research (GVR).

With the overall global technical textiles market valued at USD148.5 billion in 2014, and growing at a rate of more than 4% annually, this meditech segment is expected to be worth USD16.4 billion in 2016 and USD19.2 billion in revenues by 2020, according to India-based Future Market Insights (FMI), another market research company.…

The goal of uniting Europe under a single sky of system-wide ATM interoperability, once an improbably futuristic idea, was given a tangible push forward at the SESAR Global Demonstration held in Rome on June 8 and 9. The two-day event, which took place at the Prototype Systems Centre of Italian civil aviation authority ENAV (Ente Nazionale per l’Assistenza al Volo), spotlighted the ways that System-Wide Information Management (SWIM) can simultaneously and seamlessly streamline ATM operations.…

Global biolubricant sales should reach USD2.97 billion by 2020, according to US research firm MarketsandMarkets, with hydraulic fluids driving the sector. The US market is the fastest-growing region, while Europe retains the largest market share (around 45%).

However, although research and development projects have unveiled and unleashed the vast growth potential for this sector, the struggle remains to develop sufficient quantities of raw material to enable industry to replace fossil oil-based lubricants in a cost-effective manner.…

HIGH tech sales specialists are advising Brazil’s textile sector to keep refining their ecommerce strategy to boost their competitiveness in a tough market.

Paulo Renato Macedo, innovation director at Tropos Lab, a consulting company for entrepreneurs based in Belo Horizonte, north of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, said while “creativity, quality and brand keep being important,” adopting new electronic marketing was essential for the textile and clothing sector in Brazil.…

BRAZIL’S textile sector needs to look to boost exports by producing quality products to survive the current recession, a major industry conference has been told. Brazilian textile and yarns makers must invest, innovate and globalise if they want to ride out the recession, said the majority of speakers addressing the International ABIT Congress, organised by the Brazilian Textile and Apparel Industry Association (ABIT – Associação Brasileira da Indústria Têxtil e de Confecção), staged in São Paulo on June 1 and 2.…

THE EUROPEAN nonwovens industry has been pushing ahead, maintaining consistent growth above increases in GDP for the whole economy, increasing its international collaboration, and the successfully exploring new markets. And while it is rarely prudent to make anything more than short-term predictions about cost and tariff problems, such difficulties faced by the European nonwovens sector seem have been pushed into the background. …

THE UNITED States Trade Representative (USTR) has highlighted its continuing concern about intellectual property rights violations in the pharma sector, citing claims that 20% of medicines sold in India are fakes.

In its annual ‘Special 301 Report’, the USTR said it notes “its particular concern with the proliferation of counterfeit pharmaceuticals that are manufactured, sold, and distributed in trading partners such as Brazil, China, Guatemala, India, Indonesia, Lebanon, Peru, and Russia.”…

In 2015, North America’s manufacturing capacity for nonwovens (regarding the United States, Canada and Mexico) grew from 2014 by 2.4% to reach about 2.77 million tonnes, according to a spokesperson for the US-based Association of the Nonwoven Fabrics Industry (INDA). The United States dominates supplies in the region, making up 91% of capacity.…

Brazil’s economic and political crisis is delaying plans to develop its nuclear power industry, experts say. This could be a lost opportunity to help the country reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 43% below 2005 levels by 2030, and 37% below 2005 levels by 2025 as committed by the government at the United Nations’ 21st Session of the Conference of Parties (COP21), in Paris last December (2015).…

Argentina’s automotive industry is poised for a rebound in 2017 after production slumped by 38% over the past four years, say experts encouraged by the performance of the country’s new government.

“We see Argentina’s car market turning the corner now,” said Neil King, the London-based head of automotive research at Euromonitor International, a research firm.…

EUROPEAN confectionery manufacturers and the Indonesian government have agreed that they need to work together to ensure that 100% of all palm oil is made sustainably in future. At an April debate hosted at the European Parliament by British conservative MEP Julie Girling, Indonesia’s ambassador to the European Union (EU) Yuri Thamrin said: “We are ready to consider good cooperation projects with our partners in Europe to attain 100% sustainable palm oil and overcome all impediments.”…

Brazilian textile businesses need to prioritise sustainability certification to compete in the face of slumping domestic consumption and increasingly demanding consumers, say local industry analysts.

The Brazilian textile and apparel industry association, Associação Brasileira da Indústria Têxtil e de Confecção (ABIT) is pushing for companies to embrace its Green Stamp (Selo Verde) eco-label as a nationally recognised scheme.…

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) has chiselled a new template for international organic food trade deals with its new agreement with Chile. The deal involves EU regulators recognising Chilean exports as organic when produced and controlled under Chilean controls; and Chilean regulators accepting EU food exports as organic in Chile when produced under EU organic rules.…

The UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has refused to deny claims that it is extending a criminal investigation into allegations of bribery and corruption at luxury car and aeronautical engine maker Rolls-Royce by examining fresh allegations of wrong-doing in Nigeria. The SFO probe was launched in December 2013 to look into possible bribery and corruption by the company’s aerospace division in China and Indonesia, and the investigation was already extended at last December to take in Rolls-Royce activities in Brazil.…

EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström refused to confirm earlier reports suggesting Commission negotiators had agreed to remove beef from negotiations for Mercosur, the trading bloc that includes Brazil and Argentina.

In response to questions from members of parliament, Commissioner Malmström said, “I will not confirm what is in and what is not in the offer because we are still finalising it.…

In Argentina, investor optimism has swelled since the arrival of a conservative government in December, but sales of cosmetics and personal care products have taken a hit as soaring inflation cuts consumer spending power.

Argentina fell into a recession this year after four years of slow growth, and a spate of economic reforms by the new President Mauricio Macri has sped up the inflation rate to nearly 40% from 26% in 2015.…

NORTH America’s textile sector – of which technical textiles comprise nearly 70% production by value in the USA and just below 50% in Canada – has grown slowly when compared with global production. And growth within the industry in North America will further slow by 2020 due to competition from the Asia-Pacific region and Western Europe, according to industry analysts at Euromonitor. …

In less than a year, Brazil had three different civil aviation ministers, and Brazil’s ambitious airport development plans have been harmed. One of the trio – Mauro Lopes – is a member of the Chamber of Deputies that voted for the motion to impeach President Dilma Rousseff over allegations she warped government accounts.…

BOOMING inflation is driving consumers in Argentina to switch to chicken and pork and away from pricier beef, a mainstay for decades.

Argentines ate an annualised 56 kilogrammes (kg) of beef in the first quarter [OF 2016?], down 5.9% from a year earlier – the sharpest decline in six years, according to data from the Argentina’s meat industry and trade chamber CICCRA (La Cámara de la Industria y el Comercio de Carnes y Derivados de la República Argentina).…

How to remain competitive in the face of falling meat consumption is the main challenge facing the meat and livestock industry today, Pekka Pesonen, secretary general of European Union (EU) farmers’ organisation Copa-Cogeca, has told GlobalMeatNews.

In an exclusive interview held as the EU body launched its #livestockcounts #enjoyagrifood campaign, promoting quality European meat consumption, Pesonen said: “We must ensure the added value of eating high quality meat as part of a balanced diet is communicated effectively to the consumer.”…

A COST of maintaining nuclear generation capacity of between 95 GWe and 105GWe in the European Union (EU) until 2050 and beyond will cost between EUR350 and EUR450 billion over the next 35 years, the European Commission has concluded. (That is between USD398 billion and USD511 billion at current exchange rates).…

THE EUROPEAN Commission has announced that it will negotiate new bilateral aviation safety agreements for European Union (EU), with China and Japan. The EU already has struck such deals with the USA, Canada and Brazil. They involve cooperation over airport and air traffic management safety, plus testing and maintenance of aeronautical components, ensuring safe air operations and flight crew licensing.…

THE COMMITTEE of European Sugar Users (CIUS) has called on the European Union (EU) to take urgent action to prevent EU confectionery and sweet bakery manufacturers facing a sugar supply crunch this summer. In a strongly worded message, the industry group has said that duties and levies should not be imposed on supplies of beet and cane sugar and the EU’s cane sugar ‘CXL’ duty should be scrapped immediately.…

THE EUROPEAN Association of Sugar Pro­ducers (CEFS) and the European Federation of Trade Unions in the Food, Agriculture and Tourism sectors (EFFAT) have called for the European Union (EU) to push for a global agreement ending all subsidies and other trade-distorting policies affecting the sugar sector.…

Experts predict artificial intelligence-based technology may underpin anti-money laundering (AML) measures within the next decade. With artificial intelligence (AI), or cognitive computing, services already providing significant applications in the financial crime prevention industry, several companies have begun developing and commercialising AI-based technology for AML.…

BRAZIL may have emerged the world’s largest sun care market in terms of sales in 2014, pushing past the United States (US), according to market researchers Euromonitor International. And the country may retain its suncare crown – sales are expected to continue growing between 2014 and 2019, albeit at a slower pace compared its growth between 2009 and 2014. …

Automotive industry experts seem to agree – past concerns that tough environmental laws could force auto-manufacturing from a green jurisdiction to a country or region with laxer controls, no longer see to apply.

In doing so, industry specialists are backing the conclusions of a new report from the world’s largest think-tank, the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD), which said following tighter environmental rules can be good business.…

Sports gear, geo textiles, flags, souvenir clothes, you name it. Every part of Brazil’s textile industry is waiting to see if they will win or not with the Rio de Janeiro summer Olympic Games from August 5 to 21 – but concern is growing that the event will not deliver a much needed boost in sales. …

A report released yesterday (Mar 10) by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD) has advised textile manufacturers to support government efforts to tighten environmental rules, saying they are unlikely to cause a loss of business.

The report is an attempt to dispel the widely-held view that tighter environmental rules increase costs and damages business – especially in emerging market manufacturing hubs.…

Manufacturers of insecticide impregnated textile products, including mosquito nets and special clothing, are among the few commercial winners in the current healthcare facing Brazil through the Zika virus outbreak. Stores have not only reported a boom in sales in the country’s northeast – the epicentre of the crisis – but also in wealthier southern states such as São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, which have been less affected.…

TAIWAN’S sportswear and functional textile exports are to be boosted by the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in August this year, according to a forecast by the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER).

The think tank has observed that demand for sportswear and functional textiles remained strong, even while orders for other textile categories were being cut.…

British engineering firm Rolls-Royce has been dragged deeper into Brazil’s Petrobras corruption mire with fresh questions arising over its links to Brazilian entrepreneur Julio Faerman, charged last month with bribery, money laundering and tax evasion. Faerman was one of 12 charged in ‘Operation Black Blood’ for an alleged bribery scheme between the state-owned oil company Petrobras and Dutch contractor SBM Offshore.…

Playing the blame game with worldwide known fashion brands has become a key strategy at Brazil’s labour and employment ministry, stopping the country’s textile and clothing sector from exploiting vulnerable workers, government inspectors have told WTiN.

They say that the high impact and publicity raids on manufacturing plants over the last five years are finally leading to businesses becoming more responsible over the hiring of workers to toil in poor conditions for little pay.…

Brazil’ biggest money laundering and corruption scandal kicked off at a petrol station that sits only two kilometres away from the National Congress of Brazil. And it still has a lot of fuel to burn.

When the Federal Police of Brazil raided a currency exchange booth at this fuel retailer on March 17, 2014, it began dismantling a political party financing and personal enrichment scheme that defrauded state-run oil giant Petróleo Brasileiro SA – more commonly known as just Petrobras – by at least USD2 billion in current figures.…

Innovative protective coatings have always been marked on their ability to deliver a function with excellence. However, there is real marketing gold where companies can demonstrate that coatings deliver a range of protective functions at the same time, such as waterproofing, insulating, and protecting aesthetics.…

THE EUROPEAN Commission has signalled it will be probing the possible abuse of bilateral double taxation treaties forged by European Union (EU) member states with non-EU countries, to detect tax avoidance.

The Commission has opened a formal investigation into how Luxembourg has taxed McDonald’s, assessing concerns that it allowed the US fast-food giant to avoid paying tax on its EU royalties in the Grand Duchy.…

Vegetable oil companies are rightfully concerned about the reputation of key feedstocks such as soy for good environmental and social sustainability. Bad news stories about poor pay, pollution and virgin land clearances can knock consumer demand for products and that is bad for business.…

Uruguay’s meat exports are rising, with growing production, aggressive promotions and wide access to global markets boosting sales despite a slump in Russian sales. Exports of offal, meat and byproducts increased 8.2% to USD659 million in the year through May 9, compared with USD609 million year-on-year and rose 16% in volume terms to 171,401 tonnes from 147,868 tonnes over the same period, according to the country’s National Institute of Meat (INAC – Instituto Nacional de Carnes).…

Indian buffalo meat exports have risen by 10% to USD4.78 billion in the financial year ending March 2015, according to provisional data released by India’s Directorate General of Commercial Intelligence and Statistics on Friday (May 8).
The results backed the findings of an April report by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), entitled ‘Livestock and Poultry: World Markets and Trade’, which concluded: “Larger [beef and veal] shipments from India … [have] more than offset declines by Brazil, Uruguay, and the United States.”…

American pharmaceutical industry officials and trade groups remain cautiously optimistic that intellectual property (IP) negotiations with India can be resolved to the benefit of both nations’ medicine sectors. For now, however, India remains on a so-called ‘priority watch list’ of nations the US is urging to address key IP protection concerns.…

Sri Lanka’s government remains positive about the possibility of regaining its Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+) concession status from the European Union (EU), which would probably boost the country’s knitwear exports. This privileged trade access status might help the country’s clothing industry overall achieve an ambitious target of earning USD8.5 billion from exports by 2020.…

Following a period of recession-induced stagnation, business in the US body care product industry is back with a vengeance. Driven by a combination of seasonal and demographic factors, Americans spent just over USD2.9 billion, USD9.23 per person, on body care products in 2014.…

The UK may still be a world-beating performer for developing offshore wind energy, but more still can be done onshore, as demonstrated by China’s wind-power growth, the Global Wind Energy Council’s (GWEC’s) secretary general Steve Sawyer has argued. Indeed, unveiling GWEC’s, Global Wind Report: Annual Market Update 2014, in a webinar April 1 from Istanbul, Sawyer noted that the UK at 813 megawatts (MW) of installed capacity produces more offshore wind energy than the rest of the world combined, with Denmark “a distant second”.…

Despite Paraguay’s past difficulties in effectively fighting money laundering, the country has been introducing new regulations to boost its controls; however their reforms’ implementation have been hampered by lack of political will.
Located between Argentina and Brazil, Paraguay is a key country in the struggle against money laundering and financing of terrorism in South America because its porous border is used by drug cartels to smuggle drugs, among other illicit items, into the two region’s biggest markets for cocaine and marijuana.…

TO discover the best intelligence on money laundering, sometimes it is best just to ask the money launderers. Take China. There are numerous ways of getting dirty money out of China. The most common include smuggling a satchel of banknotes to Hong Kong (where Chinese Yuan Renminbi (CNY) is convertible), where it is washed through an over-priced (for quick transaction) purchase of real estate in the city, several Hong Kong real estate agents told the Money Laundering Bulletin.…

Pakistani meat exporters are optimistic that the Iranian government will lift an import ban imposed in early 2014 on Pakistan-produced meat following a meeting on Wednesday (April 22) between the country’s trade ministers.
Khurram Dastagir Khan, Pakistan’s commerce minister and Mohammed Reza Nematzadeh, Iran’s minister for industry, mines and trade met in Tehran at a scheduled session of the Pakistan Iran joint trade committee.…

MYANMAR will soon be importing more high quality pork and beef products following discussions in March between Myanmar’s Meat Industry Board and representatives of meat producers from the United States, Japan and Brazil, the Meat Industry Board (MIB) told globalmeatnews.com.
High quality meats have been imported to Myanmar in low quantities in the past, said U Win Sein, vice-chairperson of the Myanmar Livestock Federation.…

The European Commission looks set to resist a World Trade Organisation (WTO) dispute over European Union (EU) poultry product tariffs brought by the Chinese government. A spokesperson the Commission’s trade directorate general told globalmeatnews.com that contested EU changes to its duty regime were in “strict compliance with WTO rules”.…

Denmark’s ministry for food, agriculture and fisheries (MFAF/ministeriet for fødevarer, landbrug og fiskeri) is investigating whether meat (and dairy) products sourced from the offspring of cloned farm animals have found its way onto supermarket shelves in the country. With the products in contention imported mainly from North America, the investigation could lead to stricter product labelling laws in Denmark.…

THE MIDDLE Eastern halal meat market is anticipating significant growth in the next few years, driven by rising populations and rising consumer awareness about food content. However, the lack of a common global halal standard is hindering the market’s potential, given that the region is heavily dependent on imports from non-Muslim countries.…

Sales of women’s fragrances in Brazil already generate an impressive USD4 billion in retail value annually (in 2014), according to market researchers Euromonitor. But doubts on continued growth in the segment started to be voiced when the country’s economy started declining two years ago.…

CHINA has been cracking down on beef smuggling with a string of arrests being announced by police. State news agency Xinhua reported last month that officials from China Customs had arrested 33 suspects involved in a nationwide smuggling ring, involving the illicit sale of USD32.6 million’s worth of beef from the United States.…

Tokyo-based Mayekawa Manufacturing Co is in talks with officials of India’s Andhra Pradesh state government to bring Japanese technology to the state’s large poultry industry. N. Chandrababu Naidu, the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, visited Japan in November and met with representatives of Japan’s largest poultry processing machinery manufacturer.…

EGYPT’S USD1.23 billion oils and fats market has still to recover from the country’s post-revolutionary environment following the January 2011 uprising that ousted President Hosni Mubarak. Since then, Egypt’s economy has been on a downward trajectory, affecting consumer demand across the board.…

THE LATIN American paint and coatings sector has been facing tough times in the past year, with sluggish overall economic performance depressing demand for the industry. Even, last summer’s World Cup football fiesta in Brazil, did not give the region’s largest market any motive to celebrate.…

THE TRADE agreement currently being negotiated between the European Union (EU) and the USA could bring significant opportunities for paint machinery manufacturers if the two parties agree to align their technical standards.
The European Commission, which is negotiating the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) on behalf of the EU, has said it would like to close the gap between the two sides regarding technical regulations affecting the marketing, use and conformity assessment of machinery, as well as electrical and electronic products.…

Volkswagen Brazil’s new EUR200 million from the European Investment Bank (EIB) may not be enough to help the German automaker recover its long-standing position in Latin America’s largest market, a senior auto expert has warned. VW’s Brazil market share dropped from 22% in 2004 to 17% last year, which puts them behind leaders Fiat and in a struggle with Chevrolet to keep the second position in South America’s key market, according to Brazil’s automotive industry association – Associação Nacional dos Fabricantes de Veículos Automotores (ANFAVEA).…

Bangladesh’s demand for cotton is booming, creating significant opportunities for international suppliers of cotton, according to textile industry experts at the opening of Bangladesh’s first Global Cotton Summit (March 20-21) in Dhaka. Muhammad Ayub, president of the Bangladesh Cotton Association (BCA) said at the conference that in the last decade, demand of cotton in Bangladesh has risen from 3 million bales to 5.5 million bales.…

THE RISK of being kidnapped is a significant concern for those travelling for business to unstable and dangerous regions of the world. Yet, travellers can reduce these risks by following preventative measures and making smart plans, say business security experts. Elizabeth Machuca reports from Mexico City.…

SOUTH America’s personal care product sector has been is facing tougher times than usual – with some countries experiencing weaker sales last year and others faltering this year.
The region’s largest market Brazil is facing a rocky 2015, with a general slowdown in Brazil’s economy, expected to shrink by 1% in 2015.…

MEXICO represents a powerful investment opportunity as the second largest consumer of ‘beauty and personal care products’ (BCP) in Latin America, after Brazil. While a relatively mature BCP market makes growth a creative challenge, the country is increasingly popular as a location for BCP production facilities.…

THE ITALIAN government has been breaking ground in its attempt to make its biofuels sector more sustainable, but ongoing discussions at the European Union (EU) on how much member states can subsidise biofuels are impeding Italy’s progress.
In 2014, Italy become the first EU member state to set national blending targets for conventional and advanced biofuels.…

AN INTERNATIONAL regulatory cooperation pilot involving medicine regulators sharing real time assessments about generic medicines is now in full flow. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) is leading the initiative, building on the European Union’s (EU) experience of cooperation between national regulators.…

INDUSTRY leaders, researchers and scientists wound up a three-day international poultry show and seminar in Dhaka on Saturday (February 21), vowing to improve food safety to help create a substantial Bangladesh processed chicken export sector by 2018.

The president of the World’s Poultry Science Association (NOTE SPELLING IS CORRECT – ‘WORLD’S’), Bangladesh branch Moshiur Rahman said local producers are planning to start exporting frozen chicken in between two-to-three years’ time, mainly targetting the Middle East, where millions of ex-patriot Bangladeshis live.…

A long-running dispute between the European Union and Brazil over taxes on cars imported into Brazil has entered a critical final stage with a decision by the World Trade Organization (WTO) to set up a panel to consider the dispute. The row is not as straightforward, however, as an argument about allegedly punitive and illegal taxes.…

A long-running dispute between the European Union and Brazil over taxes on cars imported into Brazil has entered a critical final stage with a decision by the World Trade Organization (WTO) to set up a panel to consider the dispute. The row is not as straightforward, however, as an argument about allegedly punitive and illegal taxes.…

WHILE the global nonwovens industry maybe booming through investments, acquisition of new sites, expansion of capacity, more customers and exhibitions all over, the same optimism cannot be applied to emerging market former starlet Brazil. Despite its huge market with 200 million inhabitants, the nonwovens sector of South America’s economic powerhouse is looking for another deep loss of steam in 2015.…

Concerns that India’s beef export industry might wither under the new Hindu nationalist BJP-led government have proved unfounded as between April and October 2014, India exported USD2.66 billion’s worth of buffalo meat, a rise of nearly 16% over the same period in previous year.…

Chile has exported more than 7,000 heifers to China in its first major export of live cattle, which has just arrived at its destination, and the government hopes this might be the start of developing a long term beef livestock export trade.…

AS concerns continue to emerge about the extent to which common security measures such as passwords can be breached, biometrics are gaining attention across a range of services and law enforcement teams preventing fraud.

Isabelle Moeller, CEO of the London and Sydney-based Biometrics Institute, stressed to Fraud Intelligence that “biometric authentication has the potential to ease the burden of security given its simplicity and usability, particularly when compared to username and password.…

THE FACIAL skin care market in Chile has enjoyed double digit growth for over a decade, and is expected to continue expanding. Although this market is expected to grow at a slower rate this year, market research firm Canadean Ltd has forecast an average annual growth rate of 11% between 2013 and 2018.…

Central America’s increasing exposure to money laundering is at least being recognised by the governments on the region, who are working both individually and collectively to combat the problem.

The region has strengthened cooperation, for instance. A key initiative is the Central American Integration System (SICA), a regional political organisation which coordinates government actions for Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Belize and the Dominican Republic regarding certain policy development and programmes, notably improving law enforcement.…

THE EUROPEAN Medicines Agency (EMA) has released guidance on the maximum amount of three phthalates that should be allowed in pharmaceuticals, because of safety concerns. These plasticisers – diethyl phthalate (DEP), polyvinyl acetate phthalate (PVAP), and dibutyl phthalate (DBP) – can be used to make medicine capsules.…

Tax evasion drained a record USD991.2 billion in illicit financial flows from developing economies in 2012 – facilitating crime and corruption, according to a new study by Global Financial Integrity (GFI), a Washington DC-based research and advisory organization. “To put this in perspective, the cumulative total of official development assistance to the developing countries in this report… was just USD809 billion,” said a GFI note.…

ADAPTIVE licensing methods such as that proposed by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) are indeed useful in the development of medicines for rare diseases, Martin Andrews, the senior vice-president at GSK Rare Diseases, has told the World Orphan Drugs Congress 2014.…

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) seems to have sparked a regulatory trend with its REACH chemical control system, with more and more countries in Asia adopting REACH-inspired chemical management laws. Thus textile finishing units, companies and suppliers will have to pay increasingly close attention to chemical regulations in Asia-Pacific countries such as China and South Korea.…

Oil and gas companies are facing increasing risks related to corruption. However, there are numerous ways in which a business in the sector can avoid being exposed to graft. And new laws are tackling such problems more effectively. Jonathan Dyson reports.…

Beef and poultry production in the European Union (EU) have been growing steadily this year, putting the sectors on track for further growth in 2015, says a new report released today by (Wed Oct 8) the European Commission.
Its directorate-general for agriculture and rural development says the EU beef sector has seen impressive growth after a two-year slump, with beef and veal production likely to increase by more than 134,000 tonnes by December 31 to 7.6 million tonnes for all of 2014, compared to 2013.…

COUNTRIES lacking systems engineering capacity to boost their air traffic management by following international blueprints have been offered practical policy implementation kits by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO).

The launch was a highlight of ICAO’s first Global Aviation Cooperation Symposium (GACS), staged at its Montréal headquarters to assess synergies between technological developments across the civil aviation sector.…

International airports worldwide are working hard to install biometric border controls that they hope will speed passenger movement, while maintaining, or even enhancing security.

A key example of such new installations has been at Ireland’s biggest hub Dublin Airport, where since April 2013, travellers arriving at the 74-year old airport – which handles more than 20 million passengers per year – have had the option of passing through biometric identification gates in the airport’s immigration hall.…

Two years ago Brazil was so worried that its main airports would not be ready for the 2014 World Cup that its government froze plans to build and renovate 270 airfields nationwide. Now that the football fiesta is over and the concessions running key hubs has delivered good results, South America’s powerhouse looked set to start focusing on airports and airfields in smaller cities, especially those that are not state capitals.…

Tiny Paraguay is now the world’s eighth top beef exporter says US government figures, ahead of meaty superpowers such as Argentina (11th), but their aim is to be number five by 2020 and have 20 million head of cattle available in that year alone.…

THE CONCLUSION of a Transatlantic Trade & Investment Partnership (TTIP) currently being negotiated between the European Union (EU) and the US could have serious adverse consequences for the EU suckler cows sector, European experts claim. A new study presented yesterday (Wednesday) in the European Parliament in Brussels argues US-sourced beef imports could increase in volume and fall in price.…

THE EUROPEAN meat market is not in crisis following the embargo imposed by Russia on meat from the European Union (EU), a European Commission expert has told globalmeatnews.com.

Looking at price levels and producers’ margins, Dr Kai-Uwe Sprenger, market officer for animal products at the European Commission’s directorate general (DG) for agriculture, said that there are no significant variations in these two areas so far.…

Sourcing trends in fast fashion in Europe and north America are in flux, being affected by the economic downturn, changes in consumer behaviour and growing awareness of industry practices, especially in the wake of the Rana Plaza collapse in Bangladesh last year.…

As farms and agricultural organisations face changing accounting demands from legislatures and financial institutions around the world, accountants face greater pressures to develop specialised agricultural knowledge.

Indeed, accounting services provided to the farming industry within the European Union (EU) are becoming increasingly important, notably because of reforms to the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), experts have told Accounting & Business.…

A potential bonanza of new projects may be offered to Chinese construction companies following the set-up of a new development bank with lots of cash for infrastructure projects. This July marked the launch of the so-called ‘BRICS Bank’, a new multilateral development bank, operated by Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.…

Brazilian booksellers teamed up at São Paulo’s international book biennial from August 22 to 31 to lobby its government to help protect them against Amazon’s physical and e-book sales service, now serving South America’s largest economy.

Amazon launched its physical books service on August 21 with 150,000 titles available, the vast majority on Brazilian Portuguese.…

PRODUCTION at Venezuela state oil company Petróleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA) has slumped under mounting financial pressures, building during the past 15 years when revenues have been tapped by its socialist government to fund social programmes, diplomatic initiatives and other non-commercial policies.…

Brazilian fashion has been focusing on sustainability – not just from the environmental standpoint but also from the stance of social responsibility, according to Rafael Cervone, CEO of Texbrasil, the Brazilian Fashion Industry Internationalisation Programme.
Many Brazilian companies are looking to Brazilian cultural roots in the way of inspiration.…

The global market for halal food is expected to grow from USD698 billion in 2012 to reach USD830 billion in 2016, according to Malaysia’s department of Islamic development, and manufacturers in its country and neighbouring Thailand are competing to service this demand.…

INDIA’s new government may impose a 20% anti-dumping duty on saturated fatty alcohols from Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand – an important raw material for shampoos and cosmetics. Administrative proceedings that may spark the creation of this tariff started in this February, before the May general election, which brought the current BJP administration to power.…

Regulators participating in the International Cooperation on Cosmetics Regulation (ICCR) met in Ottawa, Canada for their annual meeting (July 8 – 10) to discuss how member countries could better harmonise regulatory requirements and standards, promoting trade, among their cosmetics and personal care industries.…

IN the 1970s and 1980s, the governments of Latin America and the Caribbean did not have a comprehensively robust reputation for sound financial management. Many Caribbean island states had newly emerged from colonialism, finding their way as independent countries. And many Latin American countries were riven by social discord, even civil war, with many under military rule.…

WHEN American personal care product giant Johnson & Johnson opened its shared-services centre in Prague during 2006, it employed 12 people and provided only in-group procure-to-pay services. Currently this Johnson & Johnson finance centre is the largest of the five centres the company operates worldwide in terms of staff numbers as well as the scope of services it provides to internal business partners.…

THE ORGANISATION for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) has secured agreement from its 34 rich world member countries to apply a new single global standard on automatic exchange of tax information. Endorsed by G20 finance ministers, the standard obliges countries and jurisdictions to obtain all financial information from their financial institutions and exchange that information automatically with other jurisdictions annually.…

Latin America’s cosmetics and personal care products sector has boomed as consumers take advantage of their rising disposable incomes. The region (including Mexico) accounted for 17% of global sales in the beauty and personal care industry, according to market analysts Euromonitor International in 2013. …

THE EUROPEAN Commission has revised guide prices for a range of poultry imports – if the value of exports exceed these levels, the European Union (EU) can impose additional duties on their sale.

Under the new rules, which should come into force in July, the EU has set a representative price for 100 kilograms of frozen chicken legs coming from Brazil at EUR135, while 100 kg of frozen boneless cuts coming from Argentina have been given a guide price of EUR294; from Brazil EUR220.50; Chile EUR315.70; and Thailand EUR254.60.…

IN 2012, after years of delays, Brazil instated a new money laundering law, finally bringing this economically vibrant and influential country more or less in line with international standards.  Two years later, what difference has it actually made?    

Brazil’s first official money laundering law (Law 9613) was enacted in 1998.…

Global steel transformation giant Bekaert is awaiting a European Commission decision on whether its plans to acquire Pirelli Tyre’s steel tyre cord business can go ahead. Bekaert expects a ruling this month (July) on the USD350 million deal to expand the company’s share of the global market from Brussels’ competition directorate general.…

While Brazilians have been happy with the success of their FIFA World Cup party, the prospects of the country’s confectionery industry are rather more mixed.

Sales of sweet confectionery have been soft as consumers turn away from sugary snacks in favour of healthier snacks.…

Even during the desperate economic times currently afflicting Venezuela, quality personal care products remain vital to its consumers: “Beauty is part of the culture,” said Jean Clauteaux, president of L’Oréal’s Venezuela section. Unlike neighbouring markets, he said a key characteristic of Venezuelan consumers is their strong demand for high-end products.…

A NEW agreement at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to reduce many of the formalities facing exporters could give fresh impetus to cosmetics companies engaged in world trade, although some business leaders say it was only one of a number of problems they faced.…

THE NEW Japan-Australia Partnership Agreement (JAEPA) agreed on April 8 allows unprecedented access to Japanese markets, but it’s not necessarily only the Australian meat producers who will profit.

This deal lowers the tariffs for frozen beef to 19.5 per cent (a cut of 19 percentage points) over an 18 year period, and for chilled beef to 23.5 per cent over 15 years (down 15 percentage points).…

The Argentine government is continuing to try and boost its anti-money laundering/combatting the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) systems, but the challenges that it faces, including a large informal economy and porous borders – especially with Brazil and Paraguay, make this a tough task.…

The Argentine government is continuing to try and boost its anti-money laundering/combatting the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) systems, but the challenges that it faces, including a large informal economy and porous borders – especially with Brazil and Paraguay, make this a tough task.…

SINGAPORE has been working hard to lose its past reputation for lax anti-money laundering (AML) controls.

Its ‘steering committee for combating money laundering and terrorist financing,’ jointly headed by the ministry of home affairs, ministry of finance, and the monetary authority of Singapore (MAS) published the country’s first ‘national risk assessment report’ on money laundering and terrorist financing in January 2014.…

The continuing excess capacity in the world’s steel industry and its drag on the sector’s economic health will again be a key focus of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development’s (OECD) steel committee when it next meets in Paris from June 5 to 6.…

THE DIRECTOR general of the European Apparel and Textile Confederation (EURATEX) has called on the European Union (EU) to keep pushing for a free trade deal between the EU and the Mercosur trade bloc, notably because it is dominated by Brazil (also including Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela), which today remains a tough market for the European textile industry.…

Beijing’s traffic-clogged streets have in the past year become used to the sight of white vans emblazoned with the words ‘China Cold Chain Pharma’ and the website www.pharma56.com. The fleet of vans is one visible product of the China Pharmaceutical Cold Chain Alliance (CPCCA), an industry alliance founded in 2011 with the official goal of “achieving effective integration” of the cold chain logistics across the country’s fast-growing but very fragmented pharmaceuticals sector.…

The increasingly fluid global market for outsourcing enables brands to switch countries for their manufacturing needs, and it is in the interest of exporting countries to make it easy for them.

Cambodia’s garment industry has been the beneficiary of sourcing shifts from more expensive countries such as China in recent years, attracting manufacturers with some of the lowest labour costs in the world, a past reputation for reasonable working conditions and favoured access to US and European Union (EU) markets.…

WHEN the Percassi family, owners of the successful make-up brand KIKO Make Up Milan, purchased in October 2013 a UNESCO-listed historic industrial site called Crespi d’Adda in northern Italy, it was not only a sign of their success, but proof of the old adage that tough economic times can be good for the beauty industry. …

REPRESENTATIVES from Europe’s sugar industry want sugar to be excluded from the current free trade negotiations between the United States and the European Union (EU). Speaking at an EU-US Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) briefing in Brussels, Oscar Ruiz de Imaña – the deputy director general of the European Association of Sugar Producers (CEFS), warned of the uncertainties in the sugar markets on both sides of the Atlantic.…

The e-book market in Latin America is trailing far behind those in Europe and the United States, frustrating editors gathered at the 40th Buenos Aires International Book Fair – ‘Feria del Libro de Buenos Aires’ (April 24 to May 12).

In Argentina, where publishers and readers seem reluctant to abandon print, the e-book market has remained stagnant over the past year.…

ALTHOUGH two-thirds of vaccine research and development (R&D) globally is carried out by European firms, manufacturers in China, India and Brazil are becoming increasingly muscular and “moving from dependency to self-sufficiency” experts at a two-day conference in Brussels on vaccine research heard last week.…

BANGLADESH’S readymade industry expects a 10-15% growth in exports for the current fiscal year ending June, Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BKMEA) acting president Mohammad Hatem has told just-style.

The first eight months of the fiscal year fetched a “morale- boosting” 16.68% rise to USD16.13 billion compared to last year’s USD13.83 billion.…

THE LVMH Group has strengthened its position in the luxury clothing segment by acquiring a majority stake in one the world’s most exclusive luxury brands, Italy’s Loro Piana. All relevant regulatory approvals were secured by December 2013, including the unconditional merger clearance by the European Commission.…

THREE of the world’s biggest marine coatings markets – China, South Korea and Japan – have a lot in common even though they face diverse market conditions across Asia, according to market analysts. China’s shipyards will power growth in the Asia-Pacific marine coatings market, but it is the major international coatings companies and their China-based joint ventures that remain in prime position to benefit, according to new research from consultancy Frost & Sullivan.  …

THE NICARAGUAN government has raised fears that the planned reopening of the US market to Brazilian beef could risk spreading foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) to north and central America. Its representatives spoke out at a meeting this week (Thursday March 26) of the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) sanitary and phytosanitary committee, in Geneva.…

NORDIC nonwoven companies Suominen, Ahlstrom and Fibertex are fast emerging from the post-2008 economic downturn fitter and leaner. This follows five years of cost-cutting and market re-alignment projects that included unit divestments, strategic acquisitions, and increased use of automation to reduce costs and strengthen profitability.…

THE EUROPEAN Parliament has approved a new target for CO2 emissions from cars in the European Union (EU) of 95g CO2/km in 2021, but the European Commission is already plotting tighter controls. Welcoming MEP’s vote, European Union (EU) climate action Commissioner Connie Hedegaard said: “It is clear that long-term clarity is important for the car industry.…

NEGOTIATIONS for a renewed International Agreement on Olive Oil are intensifying in Madrid. The agreement runs out at the end of this year and its member jurisdictions, of which the European Union (EU) is the biggest, are working to forge a new agreement by December.…

CANADIAN rapeseed oil and European olive oil stand to benefit the most from the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) concluded between the European Union (EU) and Canada last October (2013) experts predict.

The reason is that these are the two main products with major trade significance between the two when it comes to oils and fats, stressed an EU official.…

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) RASFF food safety alert service has warned of e-coli being detected in Brazilian meat cargoes exported to Europe. Dutch customs officials rejected three consignments of chilled beef from Brazil after discovering they had been contaminated with shigatoxin-producing Escherichia coli.…

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) and Brazil are to boost their cooperation over health controls in their trade in meat and livestock, said a joint communiqué released after a summit meeting in Brussels. Both sides said they would boost “longstanding bilateral relations” and “raise the level of communication, cooperation and engagement to solve sanitary and phytosanitary issues in line with the principles, regulations, rights and obligations” set out by the World Trade Organisation (WTO).…

A NEW World Trade Organisation (WTO) agreement cracking down on trade-based red tape, inappropriate fees and bad practice could have a significant and beneficial impact on the plastics industry if implemented in full, say experts. WTO officials may warn that it could take between three and five years for member countries to ratify this agreement on trade facilitation, but they argue changes should be worth the wait.…

THE WORLD’S tobacco trade is not always a straightforward affair, being held up by export and import licence applications, port dues, quality checks, corruption and unusual red tape. A new World Trade Organisation (WTO) Agreement on Trade Facilitation, struck last December, is designed to ease some of these difficulties.…

Sri Lanka’s apparel and textile sector exported a record USD4.3 billion in 2013 and its Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF) has predicted overseas sales will continue rising this year.

Its president Noel Piyatilake told just-style said the industry is targeting an ambitious mark of USD6 billion exports by 2020, making Sri Lanka one of the world’s top 10 apparel exporting countries.…

TALKS between the European Union (EU) and Brazil to forge comprehensive air transport agreement have begun, with the aim of swiftly finalising a formal deal. Officials from both sides met in Brazil on January 30 and 31. They wanted to make enough progress for politicians to anoint an agreement in principle at the EU-Brazil summit on February 27, in Brussels.…

RECENT scandals involving the mis-selling of financial products, the rigging of the LIBOR interest rate for interbank lending, insider fraud, and bribery and corruption throughout and beyond companies’ supply chains are costing organisations dearly both financially, reputationally and legally.

In the US, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) lies in wait for wrongdoers; in the UK it is the 2010 Bribery Act.…

THE EUROPEAN Commission has called for significant globalisation of Internet governance. It has released a detailed policy paper that suggests a clear timetable over the next two years for globalising the currently US-based ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) and its associated IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority).…

Canada’s higher education sector has welcomed a comprehensive strategy released by the Canadian government for recruiting more foreign students into its institutions.

Announcing a new International Education Strategy on Wednesday (Jan 15), the country’s international trade minister Ed Fast accepted that Canada could profit more from the lucrative global international student market.…

Indian buffalo meat exports to Vietnam have doubled in volume and tripled in value within a year as Chinese traders use the southeast Asian country for channelling their meat trade to bypass an official ban on direct imports, globalmeatnews.com has been told.…

BRAZIL’S taxes on imported products, meant to encourage domestic production, has curbed imports of motor vehicles from the European Union (EU) and in some cases even moved research and engineering jobs from Europe to Brazil, an EU official has told wardsauto.com.  …

BRAZIL-based textile industry conferences in 2014 will focus on innovation, with the country’s fabric sector seeking to trade up to higher end products.

Fairs such as Première Vision, have been growing in size. The bi-annual event was staged this month in São Paulo from January 21-22, with a follow up meeting from November 4 to 5.…

SPANISH meat producers secured increasingly healthy prices in 2013 as the country crept out of recession in the second half, figures from its ministry of agriculture, food and the environment (MAGRAMA) show.

Category E pork (55% – 59% leanness) rose by 11.4% on 2012 to average EUR1.936 per kilo, 10.3% greater than the European Union (EU) average, peaking at EUR2.171/Kg.…

The European steel association Eurofer has welcomed the striking of the new global trade deal by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) which should ease import and customs procedures that can slow the delivery of steel and steel products to export customers.…

The global steel industry continues to faces significant financial difficulties, exacerbated by excess capacity and restrictive trade policies, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development’s (OECD) steel committee, following a two-day meeting in Paris ending today (Friday).

The situation is so dire that “the financial performance of the industry could be viewed as worse now than during the crisis of the late 1990s,” according to a statement from committee chairman Risaburo Nezu.…

The global steel industry continues to faces significant financial difficulties, exacerbated by excess capacity and restrictive trade policies, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development’s (OECD) steel committee, following a two-day meeting in Paris ending today (Friday).

The situation is so dire that “the financial performance of the industry could be viewed as worse now than during the crisis of the late 1990s,” according to a statement from committee chairman Risaburo Nezu.…

BRAZIL will host not only the 2014 FIFA World Cup, but also the 2016 summer Olympic Games, and the resulting significant infrastructure projects are boosting its paint and coatings industry. “These events are having a very positive effect on the Brazilian paint and coatings industry,” said Fabio Humberg, spokesperson for the Brazilian Coatings Manufacturers Association (ABRAFATI).…

BRAZIL will host not only the 2014 FIFA World Cup, but also the 2016 summer Olympic Games, and the resulting significant infrastructure projects are boosting its paint and coatings industry. “These events are having a very positive effect on the Brazilian paint and coatings industry,” said Fabio Humberg, spokesperson for the Brazilian Coatings Manufacturers Association (ABRAFATI).…

EVEN if the heated political debate over the reform of the European Union’s (EU) common agricultural policy (CAP) has cooled off in Brussels after the final agreement reached in September, the European Commission is still thrashing out the practical rules on how the policy will be implemented.…

BRAZIL, Russia, India, and China are eager to boost biofuels production, with their governments laying out energy targets and detailed plans to achieve them. And while each country has made progress, manufacturers in all the BRICs countries can still struggle with irregular feedstock supplies and spotty regulation.…

While grappling with chronic shortages of many consumer staples, Venezuela is now looking to boost its supply of medicines and strengthen national healthcare system through its role in as president of the South American trade block, Mercosur.

The government journal El Correo del Orinoco, reported last month that Esperanza Briceño, president of the Rafael Rangel National Institute of Hygiene, would work with Mercosur members to “guarantee medicine access for the entire population.”…

WINNERS AND LOSERS

RETAIL

WINNERS

ASOS

Fashion retailer ASOS showed online convenience and price are still a winning combination with shoppers. The UK-based online retailer continued its impressive trajectory this year, announcing pre-tax profit had reached GBP54.7m (US$88.3m) for the year ending 31 August, compared to GBP40m in the same period of last year, with retail sales jumping 40% to GBP753.8m, up from GBP537.9m last year. …

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) has launched formal talks at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) with Brazil over claims it imposes discriminatory taxes helping the Brazilian automotive and electronics sector. Brussels claims these companies are benefiting from unfair and illegal advantages by taxing them at special low rates when they operate in Brazilian free trade zones.…

THE EUROPEAN Research Council (ERC) will be able to recruit top young scientists from South Korea following an agreement signed by the European Commission and the South Korean government last Friday (Nov 8) in Brussels.

The agreement will make it easier for South Koreans to join research teams led by ERC grantees and be funded by the ERC for six to twelve months.…

THOSE who have spent some time walking Chinese supermarket aisles in the past decade will have noticed astonishing changes in the local diet. Increased sales of dairy products and meat are driving demand for soy as an animal feed ingredient, and demand for higher-end consumer products such as ice cream, and confectionery are increasing palm oil requirements.…

You’ve only got to read the annual reports of the major oil and gas companies to know that sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) are part of the industry’s stock-in-trade these days. No company that values its global reputation or cares about its standing with foreign governments is going to ignore them.…

AUSTRALIAN beef exporters are nervous about a decision by the Russian government – confirmed directly to globalmeatnews.com – that it is planning to lift the existing ban on imports of US beef. It has been banned since this February (2013), with the official reason being the use of beta agonists in US beef production – and since then, Australian exports of high-end (chilled, not frozen) high value beef exports to Russia over the last 10 months have soared.…

ALTHOUGH Colombia’s pharmaceutical sector has enjoyed growth over the past few years, new price controls could disrupt the sector’s expansion if they are poorly planned, industry representatives claim.

Their concerns focus on the reaction to maximum price controls on medication recently approved by the government.…

THAILAND’S new tax incentive scheme, due to take effect in just over a year, is provoking mixed reactions from tax experts and foreign investors.

As the country looks to move away from low-cost, low-value, environmentally damaging manufacturing industries towards those that might foster a sustainable, knowledge-based economy, Thailand’s Board of Investment (BOI) has drawn up a new investment promotion policy that will go into effect in January 2015.…

E-books now look more like evolution than a revolution in Spain. Overall sales of books were Euro EUR2.47 billion last year, down 10.9% on 2011 and 28.9% below 2008. E-book sales were EUR74.3 million, just 3% of the sector, representing 54,714 copies sold.…

EUROPEAN Union (EU) and Canadian confectioners can look forward to increasing their trans-Atlantic trade once a new free trade agreement between the EU and Canada comes into force, probably in 2015.

The EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), announced on October 18, will remove most tariffs for confectionery and sweet bakery products imposed by both sides on each other’s exports.…

PRODUCERS of confectionery mixing machinery around the world continue to improve their machines, but generally opt for incremental improvements in sanitation and multi-purpose functions rather than creating entire new products.

Dutch confectionery equipment producer Tanis Confectionery, plans to unveil new mixing technology at Germany’s Interpack processes and packaging trade fair in May, Leo Tanis, CEO of Tanis Confectionery told Confectionery Production.…

MASSIVE open online courses (MOOCs) are not a threat to bricks-and-mortar universities as some in Europe fear, a conference organised yesterday (Thursday) in Brussels by the Academic Cooperation Association (ACA) and the European University Association (EUA) heard.

One reason that should reassure universities is the difference between the students who study on campus and those who choose to study through MOOCs.…

THE INCREASING complexity of mobile telecommunications networks and the companies that operate them highlights why telcos should leverage their user and performance data to optimise service. But with companies having to operate second and third generation services while rolling-out LTE 4G systems, this optimisation planning is no simple task, especially as it also has to include boosting monetisation while keeping customers happy with core services.…

Any market and industry benefits from supply diversification, so major textile and clothing companies can take heart from continued innovation amongst fibre and fabric producers over sourcing. This extends, for instance, to sourcing material from unusual places such as milk and fishing nets, while creating more opportunities for traditional sources such as flax.…

SENIOR figures within the global cotton industry are considering promoting sales of their fibre proactively for the first time, as price shifts are allowing synthetics to seize more market share. Kevin Latner, president of Cotton Council International, argued at the International Cotton Advisory Committee’s (ICAC) 72^nd plenary session, in Colombia, for the industry to persuade consumers that cotton is a sustainable and quality fibre.…

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) food and feed safety rapid alert network (RASFF) has warned of continued detections of salmonella contamination of imported meat and meat products across Europe. In most instances, consignments were exported from other EU member states. It reported six salmonella meat contamination cases between October 21 and 24 for instance.…

HIGH tech innovators in sportswear and outdoor equipment are developing fabrics and garments that do more and perform better, from health monitoring to slowing the effects of aging. Many inventions spring from unlikely source materials, for instance waste milk. And for sports, manufacturers have to be especially clever – ensuring their innovations avoid creating uncompetitive advantages that break sporting rules.…

ACCORDING to World Bank data on Brazil, air transport measured in passengers carried jumped from 32.3 million in 2003 to 94.6 million passengers in 2012. And airport infrastructure has failed to keep up with this rapid growth in demand. Adding the extra 600,000 tourists which the Brazilian Institute of Tourism expects to visit the country during the 2014 FIFA World Cup and Brazil’s creaking airports could struggle to cope.…

A SIGNIFICANT set of acquisitions by Brazilian meat major JBS has been given European Union (EU) regulatory approval by the European Commission. Acting as Europe’s international competition regulator, the Commission approved JBS’ purchase from Brazilian food processor Marfrig Alimentos of Netherlands-based Columbus Netherlands BV also known as Zenda) and six Brazilian-based companies that together form the Seara group.…

SEPTEMBER 12, 2013: MULTINATIONAL companies are less worried about the risk of having to pay bribes to ‘buy business’ than they are about lower level corruption affecting their routine operations. Despite concern, only half of them have safeguards in place.

These findings in a new survey from global risk consultancy Control Risks and the Economist Intelligence Unit are at odds with international enforcement efforts focused on “classic” corruption, i.e.…

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has authorised the European Commission to reopen negotiations with Brazil on forging an open-skies deal. The vote follows the failure of an original round of negotiations, launched in 2010, to secure an agreement. But with Brazil now seeking a broad based trade deal between its Mercosur bloc and the EU, prospects for an aviation agreement look brighter.…

THE BRAZILIAN government will not push ahead with further airport privatisations while it considers the impact of its first five sales, the country’s civil aviation secretary Wellington Moreira Franco has announced. He said remaining airports will stay with state-owned manager Infraero, while the five privatised airports are monitored: São Paulo’s Guarulhos and Campinas-Viracopos airports; Brasília International; Rio de Janeiro’s Galeão airport and Belo Horizonte’s Tancredo Neves.…

More academic papers are now available for free than in paid-for peer reviewed journals, according to a study released yesterday (Wednesday) by the European Commission’s directorate general for research and innovation.

“This new research suggests that open access is reaching the tipping point, with around 50% of scientific papers published in 2011 now available for free,” Brussels said in a statement.…

BANGLADESH is planning to import 200,000 tonnes of cotton annually from Uzbekistan in a new multi-annual deal to be finalised shortly. Negotiations are underway to set its terms in a Memorandum of Understanding between the two governments, Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) president Atiqul Islam told just-style.…

BRAZIL is an innovative technical textile producer, declares a report from a senior São Paulo’s business school the Getúlio Vargas Foundation (FGV), despite the sector experiencing teething problems as it expands. Looking at the Brazilian textile sector as a whole, the study estimates that 77% of investment into the sector during 2012 was used to buy innovative machinery – and the technical textile sector especially has a lot of demand to meet.…

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) food and feed safety rapid alert network (RASFF) has warned of a spate of problems involving salmonella contamination of imported meat and meat products. In some instances, consignments were exported from outside the EU, and others, within it.…

THERE was much fanfare in Managua in June when Nicaraguan officials granted a concession to build a USD40 billion canal, which would challenge the great Panama Canal. The unlikely builder: a Chinese businessman, Wang Jing, chairman of China-based Xinwei Telecom Enterprise Group and president of the newly established Hong Kong Nicaragua Canal Development Investment Co.…

IN signing up to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development’s (OECD) multilateral agreement on tax information transparency, Singapore has moved to address a major paradox that applies to its banking, business and financial operations.

Singapore scores exceptionally highly in global anti-corruption indexes – in 2012 it was ranked fifth by Transparency International out of 176 nations, behind only Denmark, Finland, New Zealand and Finland, for its lack of perceived corruption.…

To meet apparel and textile brands’ desire to move into fast fashion, manufacturers have begun to embrace new production processes that improve efficiency and performance. Apparel and textile manufacturers have been slower than many other manufacturing industries to embrace supply chain improvements in speed, but are now succumbing to pressure from brands moving into fast fashion retail.…

Venezuela’s cosmetic craze is renowned throughout the region. A beauty culture exists that – besides boosting sales – has produced six Miss Universe winners, six Miss World winners, six Miss Internationals and one Miss Earth. But despite the extra attention given to personal care in this Andean nation, residents have recently been hard pressed to find the most basic of necessities, such as soap and shampoo.…

WHILE it is hard to generalise about a region as diverse as Latin America, the truth is that many of its consumers are more concerned about personal appearance than is typical elsewhere in the world, and that is good news for the personal care product industry.…

The Brazilian textile manufacturing industry may come under threat as neighbouring Peru eyes up opportunities for expansion in Latin America’s biggest textile market. Peru currently exports USD102 million in textiles and apparel to Brazil annually (in 2012), and these exports have been increasing annually by 15% on average since 2010 according to the Brazilian Textile and Apparel Industry Association (ABIT).…

THE ORGANISATION for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) has released detailed reports on 13 countries, mostly key financial centres, highlighting some shortcomings their providing tax information with foreign tax authorities. Particular problems were underlined with the British Virgin Islands (BVI), where there where “difficulties obtaining and exchanging information for tax purposes” from July 2009 to June 2012, with a “significant proportion” of responses to tax information requests being “incomplete”.…

CHINA’S tobacco growers are set for a bumper crop of subsidies this year (2013), which will see state payments to leaf growers pass Chinese Yuan Renminbi CNY15 billion (USD2.44 billion) for the first time, up from CNY14.7 billion (USD2.39 billion) paid out in 2012.…

The chairman of the influential steel committee of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) has told steel-making countries to ease off subsidising the sector to fight overcapacity.

In a statement released after a two day meeting of the committee in Paris, Risaburo Nezu noted that: “Excess capacity is one of the biggest challenges facing the steel industry today.”…

THESE are brighter days for oil and gas technology entrepreneurs as investors ranging from business angels through venture capitalists, private equity firms and the corporate venture wings of exploration and production (E&P) majors show renewed appetite to back bright ideas with global applications.…

THE INDONESIAN Textile Association (API – or Asosiasi Pertekstilan Indonesia) has told WTiN that the Indonesian government is considering revamping its policy programme designed to boost investment in the sector. He added that the industry is also looking to improve its own competitiveness by focusing increasingly on higher value products.…

POPULAR models in the Brazilian car market are likely to vanish from the streets in Latin America’s largest nation as new safety standards come into play. Brazilian automotive experts have said that the upcoming car safety law, which will be enforced from the start of 2014, will make popular models such as the Volkswagen Kombi, still commonly driven in Brazil, unfit for driving and too costly to upgrade.…

A COMPREHENSIVE Brazilian government plan to boost Brazil’s textile industry has been delayed because the programme would have included protective duties that could put the country in breach of its World Trade Organisation (WTO) free trade commitments.

A meeting of 313 textile industry and government representatives on June 19 in the capital Brasilia failed to back a proposed ‘competitive tax regime for the textile sector’ (RTCC, is its Brazilian acronym).…

RECENT technical advances and headline projects show how companies with market leadership in high voltage direct current (HVDC) and Ultra HVDC (UHVDC) are pushing the envelope of what these technologies can do.

Since Sweden’s ASEA (now part of Swiss multinational ABB) installed the world’s first commercial HVDC link, under the Baltic Sea to the Swedish island of Gotland in 1954, it has become the technology of choice for transmitting current over very long distances on land or subsea.…

The United States will express concerns about foreign government subsidies that fuel excess steelmaking capacity worldwide at Monday and Tuesday’s (July1-2) Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development’s (OECD) steel committee. The US and other key steel-making countries are scheduled to meet in Paris for two days of talks.…

THE ELECTION of tobacco magnate Horacio Cartes as Paraguay’s President cy was mired by scandalous accusations of corruption, and now experts say he will do little to confront the country’s flourishing contraband cigarette trade.
Mr Cartes, 56, is a business tycoon and newcomer to politics who owns more than 20 companies, including Paraguay’s largest cigarette manufacturer Tabacalera del Este (Tabesa).…

THE CHANGES made in 2012 by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) to global anti-money laundering and terror finance guidance might have been agreed by consensus, but governments are responding in a wide variety of ways. Some jurisdictions considered to be leaders in anti-money laundering (AML) and combating the financing of terrorism (CFT) practice are taking time to respond, while others have taken advantage of the new recommendations to revamp their AML laws and regulations.…

A CENTRE-left Portuguese member of the European Parliament (MEP) Nuno Teixeira has raised concerns about the safety of Brazilian beef after learning that two shipments of Brazilian beef meat have been blocked in the port of Rotterdam after testing positive for the presence of Ecoli bacteria.…

THE WORLD’S 49 least developed countries have been given another eight years to implement the intellectual property protection rules demanded by the World Trade Organisation (WTO). This means that their governments have the freedom to choose whether to protect trademarks, patents, copyright, industrial designs, geographical indications and other rights, potentially harming pharma companies.…

The privatisation and expansion of the Brazilian airport sector has proved to be a significant opportunity for the American civil aviation sector, which has been vying for opportunities in Brazil’s air navigation, airport and airport-related services. These opportunities are set to increase with the United States Trade and Development Agency’s (USTDA) having brokered a US-Brazil Aviation Partnership, signed last April and now being rolled out in earnest.…

may be a big concept, but the road to making personal care product packaging greener is made of small incremental steps that can both provide green marketing benefits and reduce costs.

Recent innovations include reducing the size of containers, while maintaining the volume of product they hold, alongside innovations in using renewable resources and keeping packaging waste out of landfills.…

SUSTAINABILITY may be a big concept, but the road to making personal care product packaging greener is made of small incremental steps that can both provide green marketing benefits and reduce costs.

Recent innovations include reducing the size of containers, while maintaining the volume of product they hold, alongside innovations in using renewable resources and keeping packaging waste out of landfills.…

is traditionally a major supplier of biodiesel to the European Union (EU) market, but trade flows have reduced sharply in the past year and could fall further with an anti-dumping duty soon expected. An additional anti-subsidy countervailing duty may also be imposed on the Southern Cone nation.…

Drinks packaging design has always been about communicating with consumers – whether it is broadcasting a brand image or delivering information. And with new technologies aiding communication in many ways, interaction is a key theme with international beverage packaging designers today.…

AFTER many false starts and delays, Pakistan appears to be finally ready to expand its bagasse and biomass co-generation output by persuading the 83 sugar mills in the country to start production of electricity on commercial basis. The government is planning incentives such as an attractive upfront power purchase tariff and help in capital financing.…

A growth in alleged steel smuggling into Colombia has sparked concern by steel workers unions, who have successfully pressured the government to take action against illicit trades. The Colombian authorities are investigating recent steel imports from China and Mexico, fearing they may have breached the country’s trading laws.…

DESPITE the presence of anti-fraud legislation, fraud and corruption are an everyday part of life throughout South America, where fraudsters are unlikely to be convicted, let alone penalised.

“Penalties don’t really have an effect on fraudsters,” said Fernando Gamiz, an analyst at the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE), with over 20 years of experience working on South American fraud.…

The Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission (CICAD), a technical agency of the Organisation of American States (OAS), is playing an increasingly influential role in the Americas in terms of fighting drug-trade linked money laundering. Specifically, CICAD has a central role in the unfolding of the Hemispheric Plan of Action on Drugs 2011-2015 which was adopted by the OAS in 2011, and includes key anti-money launderingAML components.…

US confectionery industry chiefs have accused an American sugar lobby group of crying wolf with its claims Brazil’s annual USD2.5 million sugar subsidies depress world prices by up to 30%. A recent American Sugar Alliance report slammed Brazilian government programmes saying they give Brazil sugar exporters an unfair advantage

But the USA’s National Confectioners Association (NCA) told just-food that not only do American sugar growers receive USD3.5 billion-a-year in subsidies, US legislation guarantees a minimum price for sugar, forcing consumers and businesses to pay almost double the world price.…

THE ECONOMIC and social chaos that has riven Greece in the past few years appears at last to be subsiding, but one part of the healing process is accepting want went wrong in the first place – and new revelations do not make encouraging reading.…

Emerging markets, with their major outsourcing sectors, offer an excellent marketplace for operational software vendors.

This is especially the case as American and European markets mature.

In China, textile and clothing manufacturers are not known for their heavy IT investment, but the financial crisis of 2008 has slowly pushed them into adopting management software such as ERP and PLM to cut costs through optimising their operations, said Patrick Hu, sales director at the Huansi International Group, a Hong Kong-based software vendor specifically targeting Chinese manufacturers.…

BRAZIL’S growing economy has given many Brazilian motorists purchasing power they have never had before. This – plus effective social welfare policies and an end to past hyper-inflation – has grown Brazil’s middle class, which is now about 54% of the 196 million population, according to the country’s presidential office for strategic affairs.…

WITH the Brazilian government actively deterring automotive imports and working to encourage the construction of auto plants on Brazilian soil, domestic and international car companies are setting up new plants in Brazil at a steady clip.

The country is already the world’s seventh largest automotive producer.…

A COMPLEX international supply web supporting an illicit business of tobacco counterfeiters, losing European Union (EU) governments Euro EUR50 million in duties, has been unveiled in a German court. Details were revealed in a case at the Berlin-Moabit criminal court convicting a German-Russian co-national to nine years jail.…

IS the suitcase or manila envelope full of cash still a favoured means of exchange between briber and bribed, or has bribery become so sophisticated that such basic methods are now foresworn? It would appear so – at least, third parties are now readily employed to obscure a bribe trail.…

BRAZIL’S government is betting its domestic automotive manufacturing sector will recover its production after output declined 1.9% for all vehicles (barring agricultural vehicles) in 2012 compared to 2011, according to Brazil’s National Association of Automotive Vehicle Manufacturers (ANFAVEA).

With overall industrial production in Brazil falling 2.7% last year (2012), the Brazilian Institute for Geography and Statistics (IBGE) said “vehicles exerted the highest negative influence on the overall index, pressed by the decrease in the production of approximately 80% of the products surveyed in this sector, highlighted by the smaller production of trucks, tractor trucks for trailers and semi-trailers, chassis with motor for trucks and buses, diesel motors for trucks and buses, car pieces and vehicles for transportation of goods.”…

WHILE Latin America has not seen the growth witnesses by emerging markets in Asia, their paint and coatings sectors are still strengthening, and can build on a higher historic levels of prosperity than most Asian countries.

And the industry is more robust than many.…

Venezuela’s steel industry and investors are hoping the country’s Interim President Nicolás Maduro will break with the policies of his late predecessor Hugo Chávez, which have severely buffeted a once largely private and highly profitable sector.

“The disaster of the industry is a combination of policy and mismanagement,” explained analyst Robert Bottome, director of the Caracas-based VenEconomy Publications Group.…

CHINA is poised to promote the collection and utilisation of fly ash generated from coal power plants.

The government urban mining plan, which comes into effect on March 1, overhauls an existing fly ash management strategy that has been in place for almost a decade, said a communiqué from the powerful National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).…

AFTER years of promises, the Ghanaian government, with some help from Brazil, is ready to make good on its pledge to equip Ghana with a second international airport. Construction under the government’s USD174 million plan to upgrade Tamale Airport, in northern Ghana, to enable it to better handle the international traffic for which it was designated in 2008, should begin this summer, according to Bernard Nyavor, the passengers director of Ghana’s Kotoka International Airport (KIA), in the capital Accra.…

Strengths:

China has a booming e-commerce sector, and growing online drinks retailers are building more warehouses nationwide. They need to balance ‘just-in-case’ and ‘just-in-time’ demands and also the need for flexibility versus low inventory. Negotiating these logistical pressures is vital in this huge yet highly fragmented market.…

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) should be the second supplier of pork to the Japanese market, up from the fourth place now, once a planned EU-Japan free trade agreement (FTA) is in place, Jean-Luc Mériaux, secretary general of the European Livestock and Meat Trading Union (UECBV) told globalmeatnews.com…

THE LEADERS of India’s 160-million plus Muslim community that dominates the country’s meat trade is complaining of persistent harassment by Hindu hardliners.

Zafarul-Islam Khan, president of the All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat (AIMMM), a Delhi-based religious organisation AIMMM, told globalmeatnews.com that on the pretext of saving cows, deemed sacred by Hindus, activists harass people working in buffalo abattoirs.…

Mossi & Ghisolfi, an Italian petrochemical multinational with headquarters in the northern city of Tortona, has commenced operations at a second generation bio-ethanol demonstration plant that uses rice straw and the common giant cane ‘Arundo Donax’ as a feedstock.

The plant is located in Crescentino, about 120 km southwest of Milan in Italy’s Piedmont region.…

THE EUROPEAN Commission has put forward an action plan aimed at creating a lasting remedy for Europe’s troubled olive oil sector which has suffered a near-calamitous loss of profitability in recent years. Unveiled last June, the plan follows a sequence of temporary and not wholly successful boosts to the sector in the form of injections of private storage aid between October 2011 and May last year.…

THE USA’s Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) has settled a bribery case with Indiana-based pharmaceutical Eli Lilly & Company, where the company has agreed to pay more than USD29 million in fees, penalties and charges. Lilly was charged with violations of America’s Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) over alleged bribes by its subsidiaries to foreign government officials in Russia, Brazil, China, and Poland, in return for business.…

THE CHINESE government is drafting a new five-year anti-corruption plan for 2013 to 2017, which is expected to increase supervision of lower-ranking Communist party cadres. To be finalised and published before June, the new plan, said a Politburo statement is likely to “intensify supervision of officials’ adherence to various disciplines…” The statement backed more “limits and supervision of officials’ power and campaigns to promote a clean work style at grassroots levels…”

Other recent international fraud news:

*Global law enforcement representatives and football executives have met for the first time at a conference held to combat match fixing frauds, which generate millions of dollars of illicit gambling revenue for organised crime syndicates.…

DECLINING demand from the USA and European Union (EU) for Bangladesh knitwear has not dampened the world’s second largest clothing exporter from aiming high. Rather, Bangladesh is planning to more than double its current knitwear exports, to USD20 billion by 2020, seeking out new markets.…

Colombia’s clothing export sector is eyeing Europe as a key market for diversifying its sales away from a reliance on the United States and neighbouring South American countries. Senior industry officials speaking at the major Latin America textile and apparel trade fair, Colombiatex, staged last week in Medellin, said they would pro-actively seek out European sales.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

GHANA is particularly vulnerable to climate change according to recent studies, putting its vital cocoa and oil palm industries under threat. The International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), based in Bogotá, Colombia, released a study in September 2011, which claims that much of Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire will be too hot for cocoa production by 2050.…

BY CARMEN PAUN IN BRUSSELS

IN a move which critics might claim animal welfare is being given priority over human safety, the European Union (EU) is about to implement a marketing ban on all cosmetics which have been tested on animals since March 11, 2013.…

BY TRICIA OBEN, IN DOUALA

THE GROWTH in the Cameroon personal care product sector in the past few years has been phenomenal. Imports of cosmetic products alone grew by more than Central African Franc XAF10 billion (United States Dollar USD19.1 million) in 2011, up from XAF31 billion (USD 62 million) in 2010, according to figures supplied by Cameroon customs.…

BY MARK ROWE

For decades the car industry in the developed world has expanded remorselessly. But a recent flurry of academic papers has come to the conclusion that the West (and other rich countries such as Japan and Australia) may have hit a plateau known as ‘peak car’.…

BY JONATHAN DYSON, IN ADDIS ABABA

THE TOBACCO market in Ethiopia is set for significant growth over the coming years, due to rising incomes and a range of measures designed to reduce the volume of contraband cigarettes being consumed in the country.…

BY JONATHAN GILBERT, IN BUENOS AIRES; AND CARMEN PAUN, IN BRUSSELS

The World Trade Organization’s (WTO) dispute settlement body discussed today in Geneva a complaint lodged by the European Union (EU) against Argentine import restrictions which is harming EU auto and auto-part exports.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has approved detailed poultry trade agreements with Thailand and Brazil that will tighten EU import rules, calming concerns that previous agreements were too vague and were being exploited by exporters. The new deals are supposed to fulfill commitments made by the EU at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to allow certain amounts of processed poultry meat from both countries into Europe.…

Latin America’s robust economy and fascination with beauty has made it a very lucrative region for cosmetics and perfume companies.  However corruption, weak border control and smuggling networks are helping to make the piracy of cosmetics and perfumes into a pervasive problem, causing major loss of revenue to both governments and companies alike.…

BY ROBERT STOKES

STANDING firmly in the middle of the Wi-Fi, cloud, and M2M revolutions has delivered explosive growth for Openet, an Irish based global leader of real-time transaction management software and services.

The middleware firm’s story and strategy neatly illustrates challenges facing operators and the solutions that innovation can provide.…

BY MARK GAO, IN BEIJING

China is starting to indulge the art of genetically modified (GM) food production, with potential long-term benefits for its oils and fats sector. But it is more likely to boost imports of soybean and palm oil in the short-term to make good shortfalls in supplies of bio-based oils and fats.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has confirmed key beef exporters Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay will be excluded from the European Union’s future GSP low import duty regime for emerging markets, as they are now too rich to benefit. Brussels has released a list of countries that will qualify for this special status and the Brazilians, Argentines and Uruguayans are not included, along with middle-income countries such as Venezuela, Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan, Malaysia and others.…

BY MARK GAO, IN BEIJING

Having long vowed to produce 95% of its food needs locally, Beijing has been forced to look more to grain imports as demand for grains grows. This is most strikingly so in soybeans, which the country imports from Brazil and the US to feed the 600 million pigs it slaughters every year.…

BY CARMEN PAUN IN BRUSSELS

THE EUROPEAN Commission is hoping that the recent overhaul of the European Union’s (EU) Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP) will increase the flow of rare earth metals and aluminium oxide into the EU. Concerns persist about supplies of these important industrial minerals.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A THIRD series of pre-operational demonstration projects across Europe designed to encourage the take-up of environment-friendly air traffic management systems has been announced by the Single European Sky ATM Research Joint Undertaking (SESAR JU).

This series of AIREIII (Atlantic Interoperability Initiative to Reduce Emissions) demonstrations on aircraft emission reductions will, said a SESAR note "show that it is possible to fly more environmentally friendly trajectories with commercial flights, using current technologies."…

BY JONATHAN DYSON, IN ADDIS ABABA

A NEW airport in Ethiopia is to become the main international hub in the country. With rapidly growing traffic at Addis Ababa Bole International Airport over recent years, plans are underway to build a major new airport that would supersede Bole as the country’s main international airport, while Bole itself would be expanded.…

BY CARMEN PAUN, IN BRUSSELS

EVER since the European Commission announced last month that it would stop subsiding food-based biofuels from 2020 and support the production of secondary biofuels based on waste matter and algae, Europe’s biofuel sector has been preparing to fight for survival.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has today approved a shake-up of its special low duty system for poor exporting countries, which is expected to change tariffs paid on steel and iron and relate ore paid on its entry into the EU.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has today approved a shake-up of its special low duty system for poor exporting countries, which is expected to change tariffs paid on a wide range of industrial minerals paid on their entry into the EU.…

BY ALAN OSBORN, IN LONDON

Professor Guido Rasi, executive director of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), has told Manufacturing Chemist of his concerns about the availability of medicines in the European Union (EU).

Speaking in his office at EMA headquarters in London’s Canary Wharf, Professor Rasi said EMA wanted "to see what role we can play and what counsel we can give in respect of the problem of the (drug) shortages."…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has today approved a shake-up of its special low duty system for poor exporting countries, which is expected to change tariffs paid on a wide range of metals paid on their entry into the EU.…

BY LEAH GERMAIN, IN EDMONTON

CANADIAN beef producers have welcomed the resumption of work at the XL Foods Inc. Lakeside plant, which had been closed in September, following an E-coli outbreak. The Brooks, southern Alberta, plant received a new operating licence from Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) last week.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

PAINT and coatings companies using nanoparticles in the European Union (EU) will not have to contend with a special nanotechnology environmental health law after the European Commission opposed creating such legislation. This follows a long review, where some environmentalists have pushed the idea, citing the unusual behaviour of nanoparticles, notably how they migrate within consumers’ bodies.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has streamlined the EU’s special low duty system for poor exporting countries, which will increase tariffs for some EU textile finishing chemical imports. Ministers backed a new generalised tariff preferences (GSP) system, with special low duties henceforth "concentrated on least developed, low income and lower middle-income countries…"

This means richer emerging market paint exporting countries such as Russia, Malaysia and Brazil will attract higher EU tariffs for their exports from January 2014, with India and China likely to follow suit soon.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

PLASTICS companies using nanoparticles in the European Union (EU) will not have to contend with a special nanotechnology environmental health law after the European Commission opposed creating such legislation. This follows a long review, where some environmentalists have pushed the idea, citing the unusual behaviour of nanoparticles, notably how they migrate within consumers’ bodies.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, IN NEW DELHI

INDIA will become the largest exporter of beef in the world in 2012, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has concluded in its latest report ‘Livestock and Poultry-World Market and Trade 2012’. The fact creates a rather ironic situation as cows are considered holy by India’s majority Hindu population and killing them can actually lead to a seven years prison sentence.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has today approved a shake-up of its special low duty system for poor exporting countries, which is expected to change tariffs paid on a wide range of meat paid on their entry into the EU.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

The EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) Council of Ministers for agriculture has upheld a ban on EU meat producers using the growth promoting drug ractopamine and on the import of meat from cattle treated with it. This overrode a decision by the UN’s global food standards body the Codex Alimentarius Commission to allow its use under strict limits.…

BY KITTY SO

Confectionery consumers worldwide are moving away from the traditional, sugary lollipop to other sweets, driven by health concerns and greater spending power. Market researchers say they are flocking to innovative, functional soft candies offering health benefits while consumers with more money turn to chocolates.…

BY ROBERT STOKES, IN MALAGA

12 SEPTEMBER 2012

SPAIN’s ailing book industry has seen things go from bad to worse throughout 2012 as the country moved centre stage in the Eurozone crisis, government austerity measures hit hard, and unemployment hovered around 25%.…

BY TENZING LAMSANG IN THIMPHU

BHUTAN is a small Himalayan nation striving to strengthen its financial infrastructure and transparency while pursuing happiness as an economic policy goal for some 710,000 inhabitants living in a parliamentary constitutional monarchy.

For a perspective on progress, Accountancy Futures talked to Jigmi Rinzin, a hugely influential Bhutanese and Asia accountancy voice as: a member of the Bhutanese parliament serving on several economic committees including the Public Accounts Committee (PAC); former chief auditor at Bhutan’s Royal Audit Authority (RAA); and secretary general of the Asia Regional Association of Public Accounts Committees (ARAPAC).…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS, IN CALGARY, AND PACIFICA GODDARD

But while the USA offers a degree of complexity within its states, drinks companies face much sterner logistics challenges in Latin America, Marcelo Nascimento, spokesman for leading New Zealand-owned but international system supplier of carton packaging and filling machines for beverages, SIG Combibloc, which has been focusing on Brazil.…

BY JONATHAN DYSON, IN LA PAZ

STRONG growth in Bolivia’s personal care market is attracting an increasing number of both international and domestic cosmetics brands, capitalising on rising demand for products across all consumer demographics. This market success can be linked to the country’s overall economic growth in recent years, which has seen GDP rise about 5% per year since the country’s indigenous socialist president Evo Morales came to power in 2006.…

BY WANG FANGQING, IN SHANGHAI

THE BEIJING University of Agriculture (BUA) has welcomed the success of a groundbreaking project to develop a more robust domestic meat and livestock industry by using cloned animals China’s first two genetically modified Qingchuan calves carrying adipocyte fatty acid-binding protein were recently born at an experimental base at the university.…

BY SHEENA ROSSITER, IN SÃO PAULO; RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, IN NEW DELHI; HELEN CLARK, IN HANOI; AND WANG FANGQING, IN SHANGHAI

WHILE the focus on emerging markets for the big international clothing brands has often been to view them as outsourcing opportunities, the truth is that there are a lot of people with a lot of money in these countries.…

BY ROB GILHOOLY, IN TOKYO

Junsaku Koshihara kneels on the tatami mat floor and shows off some of the colourful textiles handcrafted at his family’s atelier in Ome City, north-western Tokyo. Hand-dyed using special hake brushes on hand-woven silk, one shows mandarin ducks sitting on a wind-swept pond sprinkled with cherry blossoms; in another, a red wooden bridge zig-zags across a lake of purple and white lilies.…

BY SHEENA ROSSITER, IN SÃO PAULO; RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, IN NEW DELHI; HELEN CLARK, IN HANOI; AND WANG FANGQING, IN SHANGHAI

THE GROWTH in outsourcing has been maybe the most important trend in the clothing and textile sector in the past decade, with emerging market countries offering increasingly reliable and sophisticated services.…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

OUTSOURCING textile and apparel production is a necessary step along the supply chain for many large international brands, which – more than often – have long-standing relationships with manufacturers abroad. These partnerships have to start from somewhere, though – and with economic development continuing to grow in the BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India, China) and other emerging market countries, there are many third-party companies and services that can help international buyers choose the right manufacturer.…

BY SHEENA ROSSITER, IN SÃO PAULO

WITH Europe and north America’s economies continuing to perform poorly, the importance of large emerging markets as growth areas for the international nonwovens sector is growing, especially as their middle-classes expand. Brazil is a case in point, middle class demand for nonwoven consumer products is helping attract the foreign direct investment required to develop new plants and distribution networks.…

THE GOAL of making sustainability reporting a norm for companies worldwide was boosted by an agreement forged at the United Nations Sustainable Development Conference (Rio+20) in June, but ultimately, national governments will still be responsible for this key policy area.

The investor-led Corporate Sustainability Reporting Coalition (CSRC) led the charge for a deal at the Rio de Janeiro meeting that included solid international commitments on expanding sustainability reporting, and some green activists will doubtless have been disappointed by the result.…

BY CARMEN PAUN, IN RIO DE JANEIRO

THE WORLD’S energy ministers are pondering policy responses to ‘The Future We Want’, a document summarising recommendations from the United Nations (UN) Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) which ended June 22 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.…

BY JONATHAN GILBERT, IN BUENOS AIRES

ARGENTINA’S protectionist economic policy and controls on imports are causing difficulties for car manufacturers across South America. Auto production is falling in the country – to a certain extent, because parts are being held up at customs – and overseas producers have taken action by cancelling exports.…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

THE LAST decade has seen significant developments, initiatives and legislation towards integrating biofuels and other environmentally-friendly fuel alternatives into transport and the aviation sector. But while renewable fuels are projected to have a significant stake in fuelling aircrafts going into the future, traditional kerosene jet fuel still maintains a tight grip on the industry.…

BY CARMEN PAUN, IN RIO DE JANEIRO

AGRICULTURE ministers worldwide are digesting the details of the agreement struck at the United Nations (UN) Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which stressed the need for livestock production systems to be more sustainable.…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

WHILE cities such as Milan, Paris, New York City, and London have historically been seen as the global ‘fashion hubs’ – acting as meeting spots for high-end designers, fashion shows, luxury retail outlets and fashionistas – the rise of fast fashion has been diffusing that concentration a bit; making cutting-edge trends more accessible to the rest of the world.…

BY LEAH GERMAIN

BRAZILIAN airport officials are meeting with US trade and development representatives to discuss a new partnership designed to create new export opportunities for US businesses while helping improve Brazil’s civil aviation infrastructure.

The US-Brazil Aviation Partnership was launched in April and focuses on familiarising Brazilian aviation officials with US technologies, best practice and regulatory approaches regarding airport modernisation.…

BY JONATHAN DYSON, IN LIMA

A GROWING demand for personal care products in Peru, paired with the country’s rising GDP (6.9% in 2011, and forecast to grow another 5.5% in 2012), is creating significant new opportunities for both international and domestic cosmetics brands, who are reaping the benefits of Peru’s strong economic growth.…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

AS global demand continues to grow for oil and gas, and energy prices increase – with companies drilling deeper; sending oil rigs out further out to sea; and exploring new regions with extreme climates – industry coatings are undergoing much development and innovation.…

BY MARK ROWE

FOR products that are marketed for their ability to sooth and generate the feel-good factor, the sustainable sourcing of cosmetics ingredients causes plenty of headaches for manufacturers and suppliers. The industry is in a period of transition, in which several of the world’s multinationals are engaging in a step change in how they go about sourcing the oils they need, and the public wants.…

BY CARMEN PAUN, IN RIO DE JANEIRO

THE AIRPORT and civil aviation industry wants sustainable development goal to be established on mobility and transport when a new set of United Nations sustainable development goals (SDG) are agreed by 2015. Its call has come after world leaders meeting at the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development conference Rio+20 in Brazil last week decided to replace the current millennium development goals, which expire that year.…

BY KITTY SO

FORD, Fiat, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Toyota, Mazda, and Hyundai: the list of car manufacturers switching to bioplastics for internal components is full of heavyweights and growing.

Attracted initially by environmental benefits, car makers and their suppliers now ask what added functionality they can get from non-compostable, bio-based materials.…

BY LEE ADENDORFF, IN LUCCA

The Politecnico di Milano, one of Italy’s leading technical universities, has announced that from the beginning of the 2014 academic year, all Master of Science and PhD courses will be taught exclusively in English. The switch to English at the expense of Italian however has met with opposition from some of the institution’s professors, and 285 have signed a petition to the Rector.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPE’S confectionery industry is fighting rearguard moves at the European Parliament to delay the abolition of European Union (EU) quotas on EU sugar production. A report from French conservative MEP Michel Dantin on the new EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has proposed that the quotas stay until 2020 – they are currently to be phased out by 2015.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

ACCOUNTING giant Ernst & Young has claimed nearly half of chief financial officers worldwide – still struggling with the global economic crisis – would undertake unethical and potentially illegal actions to protect their companies.

Its latest global fraud survey said that of almost 400 CFOs questioned, 47% "felt one or more… possibly questionable actions that may help the business survive…could be justified in an economic downturn".…

BY HANA KAMARUDDIN, IN SELANGOR, MALAYSIA

Students in some Asian countries, such as Japan, Indonesia and South Korea now earn credit hours for voluntary work, an incentive that builds volunteering into the university assessment system and promotes community work as an integral part of higher education, a conference has been told.…

BY JONATHAN DYSON, IN AREQUIPA, SOUTHERN PERU

PERU’S Inkabor, one of the world’s leading borates producers, is significantly increasing its product range as it capitalises on growing demand in several key sectors, senior managers told Industrial Minerals. Speaking at its Rio Seco boric acid and borax plant in Arequipa, southern Peru, Flavio Magheri, Inkabor managing director, said that Inkabor’s sales grew by 15% in 2011, with 10% growth forecast for 2012.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL, MJ DESCHAMPS, PACIFICA GODDARD AND KARRYN MILLER

GOVERNMENTS can get things wrong – badly wrong – and alter the planet’s human and natural geography in ways that were never intended. And one of those embarrassing events is now unfolding: over the promotion of biofuels.…

BY LEAH GERMAIN

AIRPORTS must focus on creating new sources for commercial revenue at their facilities outside their core air industry service, such as food and beverage, retail and rental services, to diversify revenues in today’s competitive market, the director of economics and programme development at Airports Council International’s (ACI) explained.…

BY JONATHAN DYSON, IN LIMA

THE PERUVIAN government is facing increasing pressure to combat illegal mining following the publication of a report which says that exports of illegal gold from Peru have reached around USD1.8 billion per year – greater than the value of the country’s drug trade, which it says is worth around USD1.2 billion per year.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has told European Union (EU) customs officials not to seize generic drugs being transported across the EU, if they think they will not be diverted for illicit sale in member states. The advice follows World Trade Organisation (WTO) complaints brought by India and Brazil against the EU over seizures of generic medicines transiting the EU, which are protected by intellectual property rights if there were actually sold to EU consumers.…

BY ROBERT STOKES

ALGAE have been heralded as the universal raw material of the future for biofuels, agricultural feed, nutritional supplements, biochemicals and cosmetics. They gobble up CO2, can clean up waste water, and many will thrive in seawater when the fresh variety is usually limited to the sunnier climes where algae can be grown more cheaply.…

BY ROBERT STOKES

ALGAE have been heralded as the universal raw material of the future for biofuels, agricultural feed, nutritional supplements, biochemicals and cosmetics. They gobble up CO2, can clean up waste water, and many will thrive in seawater when the fresh variety is usually limited to the sunnier climes where algae can be grown more cheaply.…

BY KARRYN MILLER AND JEN SWANSON, IN YANGON

MYANMAR’S clothing industry looks set to grow as the country once shunned by the west starts to reform. Following pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s release from house arrest in November 2010, the government has taken steps to boost foreign relations and attract investors from abroad?although…

BY BILL CORCORAN, IN CAPE TOWN; MOHAMMED YUSUF, IN NAIROBI; AND KEITH NUTHALL

A BOOK launched at last December’s Durban international climate change conference has focused on the growing potential for sugar to be a biofuel feedstock in Africa. ‘Bioenergy for Sustainable Development and International Competitiveness:

The Role of Sugar Cane in Africa’ was written by 44 authors representing 30 organisations in 16 countries and was published by Routledge.…

BY MARK ROWE

WHEN the European Union (EU) set up the world’s first carbon trading market in 2001, the Emissions Trading System (ETS), advocates heralded a new dawn: carbon pollution could be brought under control in a way that benefited the environment while not damaging industrial interests.…

BY LEAH GERMAIN

THE UNITED States Trade Representative (USTR) has joined forces with the European Union (EU) to press Indonesia to simplify its licensing for meat and livestock imports. The US and Canada, with the support of the EU, Brazil, New Zealand, Japan and Switzerland, have complained to the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) import licensing committee, claiming that Indonesia’s tough licensing for meat and livestock imports could seriously damage trade.…

BY MARK ROWE

WHEN the European Union (EU) set up the world’s first carbon trading market in 2001, the Emissions Trading System (ETS), advocates heralded a new dawn: carbon pollution could be brought under control in a way that benefited the environment while not damaging industrial interests.…

BY ROBERT STOKES, IN MÁLAGA

JUST like El Dorado, the never-was city of gold, Latin America’s 390 million Spanish speakers, are a siren call to Spanish publishers, whose domestic market numbers just 46 million souls. There is even a side bet on 190 million Portuguese speaking Brazilians

Some publishers, lured by these big numbers, have tried and failed in the past, foundering on the reefs of censorship, economic and currency volatility, and the local business culture, though taking forever to get paid – if at all – should not have come as a shock to Spanish firms.…

BY CARMEN PAUN, IN BRUSSELS

THE EUROPEAN Commission has demanded that Mexico and Brazil provide a scientific explanation for a new ban on reproductive livestock material imports from the EU. The two countries have banned imports of genetic material from the EU over concerns related to the Schmallenberg Virus, which has been detected in livestock in Britain, Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Spain.…

BY JONATHAN DYSON, IN CANCUN

Eduardo Orendain, president of Mexico’s National Chamber of the Tequila Industry (CNIT), has told just-drinks how his sector is increasingly focused on growing non-USA exports. American consumers drink 80% of Mexico’s tequila exports, with US sales lifting 5.5% last year to 125 million litres, but Orendain said: "We realise there is a growing need to diversify our export markets," adding that there is a particular focus on emerging markets.…

BY MEGAN DETRIE, IN CAIRO

A YEAR after the break out of the civil war in Libya which ousted Colonel Muammar Gaddafi from power – but paralysed the economy – the north African country’s airports are just now beginning to reopen, with construction projects likely to resume in the coming months.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union’s (EU) executive is taking diplomatic action to oppose trade red tape restrictions on EU auto parts manufacturers exporting to Brazil and Argentina. The European Commission has raised concerns bilaterally with Brasilia and Buenos Aires and also at the World Trade Organisation (WTO), where formal disputes proceedings could be launched.…

BY STEPHEN EISENHAMMER, IN RIO DE JANEIRO

BUSINESS coaching in Brazil has been growing significantly in the past few years, with a significant escalation in the number of coaches, coaching companies and training providers. Business coaching has spread rapidly from its beginnings in the Brazilian subsidiaries of big international firms, to big national companies such as industrial conglomerate Votorantim, and even now to many mid-size businesses and the public sector.…

BY STEPHEN EISENHAMMER, IN RIO DE JANEIRO

INTERNATIONAL talent solutions company Lee Hecht Harrison (LHH) (which acquired Drake Beam Morin) in September of last year, is currently in the process of being commissioned to offer coaching solutions to Brazil’s 2016 Olympic Games Committee, on the back of LHH’s pioneering success offering coaching to Brazil’s 2007 Pan American Games Committee.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE BRAZILIAN government is tightening its gelatin production controls after pressure from the European Union (EU) about health concerns regarding this key capsule ingredient. The European Commission was threatening import restrictions on Brazilian gelatin after consumer health concerns were raised by the European Veterinary Office.…

BY MARK GODFREY, IN BEIJING

CHINA’S growing numbers of wealthier consumers are now being targeted by local brands producing meat to organic standards but at prices to match and according to a flurry of standards that can be confusing to understand.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

BRAZIL has been targeted for criticism over increased textile and clothing trade red tape in a new European Union (EU) Trade and Investment Barriers Report (TIBR) released by the European Commission. The paper includes promises by Brussels to use diplomacy to ease such problems.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

AFTER five years of work – not to mention delays and complications – the New Quito International Airport is finally poised for completion this coming October, and is set to pave the way for significant increases in trade and tourism in Ecuador’s capital city.…

BY SHEENA ROSSITER, IN SÃO PAULO; LEAH GERMAIN AND MJ DESCHAMPS

THE FIFA World Cup never fails to draw huge international crowds to whichever country chosen to play host; boosting tourism and the local economy. However, significant influxes of visitors inevitably strains airport systems – which is why Brazil’s airports are currently undergoing significant expansions to prepare to host the football tournament in 2014, as well as the 2016 summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, IN NEW DELHI, MINI PANT ZACHARIAH, IN MUMBAI, AND KEITH NUTHALL

WITH nursing qualifications and experience increasingly gaining international recognition, the opportunity for nurses to work abroad during their careers is growing. Also, the export of nurses from poorer to richer countries is increasingly common.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, IN NEW DELHI

THE INDIAN government is considering lifting its 25 year ban on issuing new asbestos mine licences, Industrial Minerals can reveal. A senior government mining official said in an exclusive interview that "the matter is under consideration"

BP Sinha, deputy director general of the Indian Bureau of Mines, based in Nagpur, Maharashtra, told Industrial Minerals that the central Ministry of Mines is exploring the possibility of reopening the asbestos mines, now mining companies have access to better technology for ensuring the health and safety of the workers.…

BY JAMES FULLER

IF evidence were needed to show how globalised the confectionery sector has become – then look at the row between Ecuador and the European Union (EU) over possible EU controls limiting levels of toxic metal cadmium in cocoa powder and chocolate.…

BY JULIAN RYALL

THERE is no single secret to creating the best soy sauce in the world, according to the head of the Japanese company that first produced the seasoning as far back as the 17th century. Rather, the secret is a combination of three things, Yuzaburo Mogi, honorary CEO and chairman of the board of directors of Kikkoman Corp.,…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

WINNERS

TUNISIA

Of all the countries disrupted by the Arab Spring revolts in 2011, Tunisia liberated itself in the swiftest and most business-friendly fashion. This key European supplier rid itself of despotic President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali on January14, and one week later, its textile and clothing sector was back at work.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has confirmed it is scrapping sugar production quotas across the European Union (EU) in 2015 when proposing a comprehensive reform of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). There have been calls from some member states and MEPs for the quota regime to be renewed, but the Commission has stuck to its guns and will continue with abolition.…

BY SHEENA ROSSITER

BRAZIL is set to extend its global leadership in can recycling with millions being pumped into the recycling process. Novelis, one of the world’s largest producers of rolled aluminium products and a global leader in aluminium beverage can recycling, has the leading hand in investment with back-to-back investment of USD360 million having been injected into the aluminium recycling industry over the past two years and in the year to come.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

Talks between Mexico and China at the World Trade Organization have failed to resolve a dispute over Mexico’s claims that China is illegally subsidising its textile and apparel producers, the Mexican government has told just-style. A spokesperson for Mexico’s ministry of economy said the two days of WTO consultations did not result in a settlement, opening the way for Mexico to request a WTO dispute panel to rule on its claims.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA

BANGLADESH will not oppose the European Union’s (EU) plans to grant Pakistan GSP+ status, just-style has been told. However, the country’s powerful clothing exporters have called on their government to press for the EU to withhold these privileges for products that are important to Bangladesh’s manufacturing industry, including some clothing lines.…

BY JILL LANGLOIS, IN SÃO PAULO

BRAZIL’S dyeing and finishing sector is working hard to maintain a commercial edge – especially through environmental good practice – while its key market, the Brazilian textile industry, faces some tough times.

Foreign competition, weak international branding and unhelpful Brazilian government regulations are weakening the textile sector in Brazil: "The industry’s deficit will hit a record USD5 billion [last] year [2011] – we’ve already had to cut 19,000 jobs…" said Aguinaldo Diniz Filho, president of the Brazilian Textile and Apparel Industry Association (ABIT).…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA

INTERNATIONAL luxury fashion brands are trying to tap India’s fast growing westerns-style clothing ready-to-wear market and at the same time improving their sourcing chains for luxury fabrics.

At an October (11) conference – ‘Dialogue on Luxury – Making India a Source and Destination of Luxury’ – held in New Delhi, big brands Altagamma, Burberry, Salvatore Ferragamo and Jimmy Choo announced their expansion plans in India and discussed strategies to make their Indian business more profitable.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA

INDIAN manufacturing giant Jindal Aluminium is investing USD160 million to set up two new plants near the southern city of Bangalore, in Karnataka.

The first unit, costing USD100 million, will have an annual production capacity of 50,000 tonnes of aluminium sheets and foils, and is expected to begin operations by April 2012.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has removed an obstacle preventing Brazil-based Braskem from becoming the largest polypropylene producer in the USA – approving its purchase of Dow Chemical’s polypropylene business. Brussels, acting as the European Union’s senior competition authority, authorised the acquisition by Braskem America, Inc, the Brazilian chemical giant’s US subsidiary.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

DOUBTS are growing about the wisdom of encouraging biofuel use in the European Union (EU) as a cornerstone of environmental policy aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The EU has painted itself into a corner with its renewable energy directive.…

BY LEE ADENDORFF

THE growth of data revenues and emerging markets contrasted with lacklustre domestic business, particularly in southern Europe, have dominated latest financial figures from the EU’s ‘big five’ telcos – Telecom Italia, Telefónica, France Telecom, Deutsche Telekom and Vodafone.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has taken another step towards focusing the European Union’s (EU) support for biofuel production on those fuels that create at least 35% less carbon emissions than fossil fuels. A key part of this process is using certification schemes to ensure that biofuels are green, taking account of the environmental impact of their production as well as use, and the Commission has now recognised seven of these systems.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE WORLD Bank has called on Latin American and Caribbean countries to reform their aviation systems and technology to boost predicted slow growth of air freight. A report predicts cargo traffic between the Latin America/Caribbean and the United States – the most important destination market – will grow 5.8% annually between 2010 and 2027.…

BY WANG FANGQING

Japanese probiotic drinks manufacturer Yakult Honsha Co. has revealed a plan to further expansion in emerging markets including India, Indonesia and Brazil. "As the population in Japan continues to shrink, we have to seek sales growth in emerging markets, where the economy and young populations are booming," said a Yakult spokesman in Tokyo.…

BY TRICIA OBEN

MATERIALS buyers from large emerging market BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) have been dominating poorer developing world countries for years now, with Indian and Chinese buyers especially, cornering the car battery recycling market in west Africa’s Cameroon, for instance.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has launched a Euro EUR1.5 million study into concerns that European Union (EU) animal welfare and food safety rules could harm the global competitiveness of EU meat and other livestock sectors.

Brussels has asked research teams to bid for a major study comparing compliance costs for EU and non-EU country meat producers.…

BY WANG FANGQING, MINI PANT ZACHARIAH, PACIFICA GODDARD and MARK ROWE

WITH average incomes in the world’s emerging markets starting to approach western levels – at least in major urban areas – drinks companies are catering to increasingly expensive and refined tastes.…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

In 20 years’ time, consumers might be looking back on today’s beverage market and laughing at the fact that people were once buying drinks just because they were thirsty.

"We’re going to start seeing a whole lot of new, nutritional ingredients popping up in our drinks soon – functionality will be the biggest theme in 20 years," said Tom Pirko, president of California-based international food and beverage advisory firm Bevmark LLC.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL, DAVE YIN and WANG FANGQING

A GOOD deal of excitement has been created by the announcement this week in the UK academic journal Nature Geoscience that significant deposits of rare earths have been found in the Pacific Ocean floor.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL and DAVE YIN

THIS has been the year where the European Union (EU) considered imposing a draconian origin labelling law that would have been a major headache for knitwear manufacturers and retailers. In the winter, the European Parliament was seriously discussing insisting on a regulation forcing knitwear and crocheted clothes and accessories imports into the EU to carry country of origin labels.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A CONSULTANTS report for the European Commission on the impact of biofuel expansion has warned that a reliance on bioethanol could damage the European Union’s (EU) fossil fuels security of supply.

Written by experts from Wood Mackenzie, Ricardo and Celeres, the paper – just released by Brussels – says that with bioethanol sources focused on Brazil and a few other countries, "there is a risk of a high degree of reliance on few sources of ethanol supply."…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

AN ATTEMPT has been made by the European Commission to end disputes between the European Union (EU) and India and Brazil over EU customs’ seizure of generic medicines destined for non-EU markets.

The problems have been sparked by muddles over regulations.…

BY GARRY PIERRE-PIERRE and KEITH NUTHALL

IT is more than 18 months since the earthquake that ravaged Haiti seriously damaged Toussaint L’Ouverture International Airport in Port-au-Prince, notably its air traffic control tower, rendering it unusable. The airport suffered structural damage to its terminal building walls and there were some major electrical faults.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

BRAZIL is the latest major emerging market country to have joined the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development’s (OECD) chemical safety data mutual acceptance system. It means regulators and cosmetics companies in Brazil will use OECD methods for non-clinical tests on their chemicals.…

BY MARK GODFREY

THE ENDLESS undulating hills of southwestern China’s Yunnan province may represent the future of biofuels in the country. These sparsely populated, red-soiled hills of pine and scrub are being touted as the place to grow feedstocks such as jatropha to make up for a clamp-down in using edible alternatives such as corn, rice and wheat.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

LATIN America is proving to be one of the most intriguing and exciting markets globally for beauty and personal care products. "The Latin American cosmetic market grew 20% in 2010, so now it is a market of US dollars USD64 million – almost as big as the north American market," said Mr Jaime Concha Prada, who recently served as president of CASIC, the Chamber of the Latin American Cosmetics Industry.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A NEW giant Brazilian company is to be created, supplying orange oils and essences to personal care product companies worldwide. This will be a joint venture of Brazilian orange juice giants Votorantim and Fischer, an initiative which has now been given competition approval for the European Union (EU) by the European Commission.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

BRAZIL and Argentina are among almost 100 countries expected to lose tariff breaks for their knitwear exports to the European Union (EU), under a planned reform of the EU’s Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) system.

The European Commission announced yesterday (May 10) it wanted to focus import duty concessions on poorer countries and so henceforth those regarded by the World Bank as high or upper middle income states would no longer qualify from January 2014.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

INDIA and Brazil have joined the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development’s (OECD) chemical safety data mutual acceptance system. It means regulators and companies in these countries will used OECD methods for non-clinical tests on chemicals. As a result, other participating countries (all 34 OECD developed country members plus South Africa and Singapore) will accept Indian and Brazilian test results, promoting their chemical exports.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

RUSSIA has been invited by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) to join its anti-bribery convention. This is despite Russia languishing at 154th out of 178 countries ranked in Transparency International’s 2010 corruption perception index. The OECD acted after its President Dmitry Medvedev signed in May legislation criminalising foreign bribery, with a significant increase in fines for companies and individuals who bribe foreign public officials to gain business advantages.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

BRAZIL and Argentina are among almost 100 countries expected to lose tariff breaks for their cosmetics exports to the European Union (EU), under a planned reform of the EU’s Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) system. The European Commission wants to focus import duty concessions on poorer countries and so those regarded by the World Bank as high-or-upper middle income states would no longer qualify from January 2014.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Chemicals Agency (ECHA) has told manufacturers of intermediate chemicals – including those used in the paint, coatings and solvent sectors – they may have to submit more information under REACH chemical control system. ECHA screened more than 400 dossiers of substances declared as intermediates and has said that 86% have not proved that this special status should apply – the agency requires less information on intermediates than standard chemical substances.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

European Union (EU) member states have been asked to approve extending import duties on US-made biodiesel after hearing evidence that US exporters had been evading special EU import tariffs imposed in 2009 by shipping via Canada or mixing it with weaker blends.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Iran are among almost 100 countries expected to lose tariff breaks for their plastics exports to the European Union (EU), under a planned reform of the EU’s Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) system.

The European Commission announced yesterday (May 10) it wanted to focus import duty concessions on poorer countries and so henceforth those regarded by the World Bank as high or upper middle income states would no longer qualify from January 2014.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

BRAZIL and Argentina are among almost 100 countries expected to lose tariff breaks for their textile and clothing exports to the European Union (EU), under a planned reform of the EU’s Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) system.

The European Commission announced yesterday (May 10) it wanted to focus import duty concessions on poorer countries and so henceforth those regarded by the World Bank as high or upper middle income states would no longer qualify from January 2014.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN Union (EU) consumer protection network RAPEX has warned three Brazil-made personal care have been subject to recalls in France because their formaldehyde content was found exceeding EU cosmetics directive limits. These included a hair conditioner with chocolate called ‘Lissage Ultime’, sold under the SOCAP Professionnel Paris brand; a ‘Nanokeratin system’ hair straightener; and a BHOME hair shampoo and styling treatment package.…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

WITH waste regulations becoming increasingly tight worldwide, and consumers’ environmental consciousness growing, the global personal care product industry has taken note of the lean towards ‘green’, and is starting to reduce packaging complexity.

This is despite leading organic products marketing research firm Organic Monitor recently releasing a not-so-optimistic report on sustainable packaging in the beauty sector – saying that although packaging has the highest environmental footprint within the realm of cosmetics products, it appears to be largely ignored when beauty companies look at sustainability.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

BRAZIL and the European Union (EU) have struck a civil aviation access deal, but not an ‘open skies’ agreement like that reached recently between the USA and the Brazilians. Instead, the EU and Brazil merely confirmed direct flight access for their respective airlines: cabotage services will be allowed for freight.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

HIGH sugar prices and tight supplies are a constant worry for confectionery manufacturers this year, and the European Union (EU) has been trying to keep these problems under control. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has estimated that global prices rose 81.4% from last July (2010) to this January (2011) and the EU has taken action.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A ROW has broken out between the European Commission and European Union (EU) food and farm federation Copa-Cogeca over its claims a planned trade deal with South America’s Mercosur would destroy Europe’s beef sector.

The Commission’s trade spokesman John Clancy told just-food such allegations were "exaggerated".…

BY EMMA JACKSON

CLOTHING and accessory consumers are fickle at the best of times, and trying to nail down their desires in the growing eco-fashion niche market is proving especially difficult as the industry moves toward environmental responsibility.

On the one hand consumers, (especially young people in mature western markets), are increasingly aware of the environmental and social footprints of fashion and textile production.…

BY WANG FANGQING, RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, MARK ROWE and PACIFICA GODDARD

THE BRICM countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and Mexico) have long been regarded as sources of cheap quality fabrics and clothes, but as they grow wealthier they are increasingly being regarded as vital international export markets.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

NATURA, Brazil’s leading producer of personal care products, from cosmetics to perfumes, including face, body and hair products, had a very productive 2010 – launching 191 new products. This included two new lines, Una cosmetics and Amó perfumes, while adding a soap category to its Ekos line, while re-launching Chronos, its anti-aging products line.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) Council of Ministers has drawn a curtain over the longest running trade dispute in the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) history – approving December 2009 deals on reducing EU banana import tariffs. These had been struck with the USA, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru and Venezuela solving complaints the EU unfairly favoured Caribbean island banana exports with quota and tariffs.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

BEING beautiful is a full-time occupation for many Brazilians, and clothing retail necessarily benefits from their dedication – as their country grows wealthier, its luxury clothing market can only grow.

In 2010, AT Kearney rated Brazil as the number one developing apparel market in the world, due to rising incomes and a youthful population (60% under the age of 30), unusually fascinated with fashion.…

BY LEE ADENDOORF, ALYSSA MCMURTRY, MAKKI MARSEILLES, and KEITH NUTHALL

GLOBAL olive oil manufacturing is on a roll, with the International Olive Council (IOC) saying 2009-10 world production was 3.02 million tonnes, a season-on-season increase of 354,500 tonnes (+13%). This would be the second best olive oil production year ever, next only to the record of 3.17 million tonnes produced in 2003/04.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A FORMAL probe has been launched by the European Commission into a planned joint-venture involving two of the world’s largest orange juice manufacturers – Brazil’s Votorantim and Fischer.

An initial investigation has highlighted "potential competition concerns" in the European Union (EU) regarding orange juice and related oils and essences.In…

BY ANDY HOLDER

IT is a truism that fraudsters are most knowledgeable about fraud – and that to learn about the problem, the best people to learn from are those who actively obtain property through deception. But that is exactly what Britain’s Professor Martin Gill does.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

PETROBRAS, Brazil’s national oil company, has been heavily investing in pipeline technology via a large-scale project to expand its pipeline network. This investment of time, energy and money has put Brazil on the cutting edge of global pipeline technology developments.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

SYSTEMIC advantages given to biofuels in the European Union (EU) through tax breaks and subsidies could take a knock this year, with the European Commission examining their indirect contribution to greenhouse gas production.

Brussels already takes account of their direct effect, through production and use emissions, and land use changes on fields used to grow feedstocks: only biofuels with a proven 35% emissions advantage over fossil fuels qualify for environment-linked tax breaks and handouts, under the EU’s renewable energy directive.…

BY JOHN PAGNI

NORDICS take their global civic responsibilities seriously – paying more than mere lip-service to requests to cut global warming emissions especially. Finland is a case in point, putting its money where its mouth is when it comes to renewable fuels.…

BY SAMI HALABI

THE KNITTING industry in Turkey is undergoing a paradigm shift as its business model moves from one that relied on margins to one that is dependent on quantity. The economic downturn of late 2008 and 2009 left the industry in a situation with stock orders down to a minimum and the industry having to adapt to a new market dynamic.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA

ATTEMPTING to symbolize the Indian essence of Toyota’s latest sedan made for India’s burgeoning auto market, a Japanese dancer performed classical Indian dance at a special launch concert in the IT hub of Bangalore. The Japanese auto giant will be hoping that the ‘Etios’ will marry high tech and Indian consumer preferences, as a culmination of a four-year-long development process that cost US dollars USD700 million and involved more than 2,000 engineers.…

BY WANG FANGQING, ALAN OSBORN

Tainted tobacco leaves generate China push to restore polluted soil

A new report has warned that Chinese tobacco plants are sucking up heavy metals from contaminated soils. The Chinese tobacco industry is challenging the findings, and analysts predict sales will not be weakened.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

INTELLIGENCE advice teams are to be posted at international airports in seven west African countries, to boost the number and effectiveness of illicit drugs seizures at their terminals. This ‘Aircop’ initiative has been organised by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the World Customs Organisation (WCO) and Interpol.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

37.40

INTELLIGENCE advice teams are to be posted at international airports in seven west African countries, to boost the number and effectiveness of illicit drugs seizures at their terminals. This ‘Aircop’ initiative has been organised by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the World Customs Organisation (WCO) and Interpol.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE ORGANISATION for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) has called for emerging market governments to act against rising obesity levels, lest they rival those in rich mature food markets. The Paris-based think-tank has released analysis in the medical journal The Lancet that claims obesity levels in Brazil, China, India, Mexico, Russia and South Africa are rising.…

BY David Haworth

Too few universities teach about turning science into specific products to be sold on the markets and lack entrepreneurship departments which instruct ways in which ideas can be turned into money. Dr Bernd Huber, president of the Ludwig-Maximilians-University, Munich, tells an audience of some 300 researchers attending a Brussels conference on the future of Europe’s science and technology.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE AMERICAN Honey Producers Association has told just-food of its fears that a European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling about honey pollen could flood the US market with honey imports. Richard Adee, the association’s Washington legislative committee chairman, said the ruling, (which said honey made from GM-pollen would require special authorisation for sale in the European Union (EU)), could disrupt global honey markets.…

BY MARK GODFREY

THE CEO of a Hyundai-Beijing Auto joint venture has told wardsauto that while three out of 10 cars sold globally will be sold in China by 2015, sales will be dominated by car-markers who get key emerging trends in the country’s provincial markets right.…

BY MJ DESCHAMPS

ALTHOUGH the production of confectionery products is on the lower end of the spectrum when it comes to susceptibility to food contamination scares, there are still certain, specific vulnerabilities that exist in the production of chocolates and sweet bakery items.…

BY DOM PHILLIPS

BRAZIL is a huge and complicated tobacco market. Cigarette consumption is in decline – 2% down, in 2010, according to market researcher Euromonitor, whose August 2011 report Cigarettes in Brazil says sales have fallen from 89.8 billion sticks in 2005 to a predicted 83.4 billion in 2011.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE RUSSIAN government received unusual praise from a Revenue Watch Institute and Transparency International assessment of public disclosures of oil, gas and other mineral management. It placed Russia third, out of 41 countries, behind Brazil and Norway. Mexico and Chile were fourth and fifth.…

BY ROBERT STOKES

A SURGE in e-book reading in Spain coincides with exhibition space being devoted to digital publishing for the first time ever at LIBER, the International Book Fair for the Spanish speaking world, from Wednesday to Friday this week in Madrid.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA

INDIA’S Jindal Steel and Power has refuted allegations made by the Bolivian government that the company has failed to meet it investment commitments made in 2007 while winning the development rights for the Latin American country’s 20 billion tonne El Mutún iron ore mine.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD, KARRYN MILLER, GARRY PIERRE-PIERRE, KEITH NUTHALL

FOR niche spirits, obscure can be good – and so products made in countries not renowned for their spirits production can gather export market cache. Latin America and the Caribbean are regions where effort by buyers can pay dividends.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

DEFINING a niche drink is an arbitrary matter and what may pass as niche today may well be considered mainstream tomorrow. Flavoured vodka, for instance, had a relatively specialised following in Europe until a few years ago – now it is classified as an official spirit drink under European Union (EU) regulations.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE FRENCH and Brazilian governments have forged an unusual European-emerging market alliance, calling for increased coordination among G20 states during food supply crises, and tighter regulation of the global food market. They have issued a joint communiqué calling for the creation of global and regional food stocks, close monitoring of global cereal stocks especially, greater regulation of food market derivatives, and the creation of financial mechanisms (including price guarantees) to protect food producers from excessive price fluctuations.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

RETAIL – WINNERS AND LOSERS

WINNERS

H&M

The Sweden-based brand expanded across the world this year, planning to open 220 new stores, mostly in western Europe and the US. Hennes & Mauritz’ (H&M) third quarter sales of SEK26.89bn (US$4bn) showed a sharp 14% increase on the previous quarter.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

CLIMATE control concerns will be integrated into all investment and advisory services offered by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), of the World Bank. It has created a new ‘Climate Business Group’ to undertake this work and grow IFC climate-related investments to more than US dollars USD3 billion within three years.…

BY DEIRDRE MASON

SALES of new cars are still holding up surprisingly well despite the global downturn, but within a few years of their purchase, how many of them will be running on retread tyres?

The signs are that the market for retread and recycled tyres will grow, as world demand for rubber grows, particularly in China.…

BY EMMA JACKSON

THE TEXTILE and clothing industry maybe almost unrecognisable from its organisation today in 10 years’ time: Chinese-owned offshore production; unstoppable e-commerce, demand for eco-textiles, shifting luxury markets to Asia’s new middle class, and higher prices for everyone, are just some predictions.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

SIGNIFICANT benefits to tobacco and tobacco product companies will present themselves if a deal on the long-running Doha Development Round is clinched next year at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). And some diplomats at the WTO’s base in Geneva are asking if agreement is not reached next year, whether the current negotiations will be scrapped.…

BY EMMA JACKSON

THE TEXTILE and clothing industry maybe almost unrecognisable from its organisation today in 10 years’ time: Chinese-owned offshore production; unstoppable e-commerce, demand for eco-textiles, shifting luxury markets to Asia’s new middle class, and higher prices for everyone, are just some predictions.…

BY MINI PANT ZACHARIAH

BOB DYLAN was spot on: "One man’s loss always is another man’s gain." The stringent anti-smoking laws passed in India as a result of the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) framework convention on tobacco control’s have stubbed out cigarettes from public places.…

BY EMMA JACKSON

THE TEXTILE and clothing industry maybe almost unrecognisable from its organisation today in 10 years’ time: Chinese-owned offshore production; unstoppable e-commerce, demand for eco-textiles, shifting luxury markets to Asia’s new middle class, and higher prices for everyone, are just some predictions.…

BY MINI PANT ZACHARIAH

BOB DYLAN was spot on: "One man’s loss always is another man’s gain." The stringent anti-smoking laws passed in India as a result of the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) framework convention on tobacco control’s have stubbed out cigarettes from public places.…

BY ALAN OSBORN, KARRYN MILLER, GAVIN BLAIR, KEITH NUTHALL

MOST drinks manufacturers would bridle at the accusation that they used anything unnatural to make their products: after all poisoning consumers is bad for business. But in the world of marketing, everything is relative, and some ingredients are so fresh and untainted with processing chemicals that they can, simply, be sold as being more ‘natural’ than standard inputs.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

SUGAR has been at the centre of continuing concern about fraud draining European Union (EU) budgets of duty revenue. The latest operational report from EU anti-fraud unit OLAF (which reviewed 2009) recalled how fraudsters made millions of Euros from exporting 3,400 tonnes of sugar from the EU to neighbouring non-member state Croatia via the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL, EMMA JACKSON, MJ DESCHAMPS

IT is the classic chicken and egg scenario. To what extent do widespread networks of fuel filling stations need to be established offering compressed and liquefied natural gas (CNG/LNG) for a mass market of autos using these fuels to develop?…

BY DINAH GARDNER, PACIFICA GODDARD, KARRYN MILLER

AS the ranks of China’s middle class swell, their desire for leading healthier lifestyles – including what they drink – is also growing. Manufacturers have a wealth of ingredients from which to pick. Not only can they use globally-renowned healthy choices such as fruit juices and mineral-enriched drinks, they also have thousands of herbs, roots, flowers and fruits popular in Chinese medicine to choose from as ingredients and additives.…

BY WANG FANGQING, RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, BILL CORCORAN, PACIFICA GODDARD, KEITH NUTHALL

DRINKS packaging can be quite different in emerging and developing markets than in the rich world. One issue simply is scale. Poorer consumers are often, simply, more interested in smaller sized portions than richer.…

BY MUNZA MUSHTAQ

IF proof were needed that politics and business do not always mix well, look no further than Sri Lanka’s knitwear industry. The European Commission has announced as of August 15, Sri Lanka has been suspended from its Generalised System of Preferences (GSP+) preferential trading regime, providing access to European Union (EU) markets for countries that abide by certain principles of good governance and human rights.…

BY MARK ROWE

INNOVATIVE packaging is transforming the drinks industry. Heavy tins and bottles are being replaced by lighter composite and biodegradeable materials; hi-tech cartons are being manufactured that tell consumers if the milk’s gone off; and RFID (radio frequency identification) tags are being embedded with temperature sensors.…

BY MARK ROWE

IS the recession’s worst over for the jet fuel aviation industry? Passenger traffic during this late spring and summer has risen sharply compared with flights year-on-year, giving hope to an industry that Giovanni Bisignani, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), described last year as "structurally sick".…

BY KEITH NUTHALL and ALYSHAH HASHAM

CANADA – long a difficult jurisdiction for the tobacco sector – became tougher still on July 5, when a national ban on manufacturing and selling most flavoured cigarettes, cigarillos and blunt wraps came into force.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

LATIN American men like to think they are known for good looks, machismo and self-confidence. And these consumers are today turning to cosmetics to sustain and accentuate this image. The Latin American market for male grooming products and services is one of the most dynamic in the world.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

THE ORGANIC cosmetics market has been booming over the last few years, generating substantial consumer interest in the US and Europe. As cosmetics companies scramble to offer the latest, most effective natural ingredients, many are turning to the biodiverse region of Latin America for inspiration.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE INTERNATIONAL Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank is planning to help create a new US dollar USD23 million bottle-to-bottle plastic recycling facility in São Paulo, Brazil. Unnafibras Textil already recycles more than one billion bottles-a-year into raw materials, but the quality of the new resin would be good enough to sell a soft-drinks bottling plant on Paraiba province, north-east Brazil, said the IFC.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE INTERNATIONAL Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank is considering helping to create a new US dollar USD23 million bottle-to-bottle plastic recycling facility in São Paulo, Brazil. Unnafibras Textil already recycles more than one billion bottles-a-year into raw materials, but the quality of the new resin would be good enough to sell a soft-drinks bottling plant on Paraiba province, north-east Brazil, said the IFC.…

BY EMMA JACKSON,RAGHAVENDRA VERMA,WANG FANGQING and PACIFICA GODDARD,

AS people migrate across the globe, the drinks industry has witnessed a slow influx of regionalised flavours into untraditional markets. White and green tea from Asia is now sold across the globe in soft drinks, and ‘exotic’ fruits such as pomegranate, mango and lychee are becoming popular juice flavours in Europe and the US.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A EUROPEAN Food Safety Authority (EFSA) panel has refused to set an advisory limit for the intake of sugar by European Union (EU) consumers. EFSA’s panel on dietetic products, nutrition and allergies has concluded in a comprehensive assessment of dietary requirements for EU consumers “there was insufficient evidence to set an upper limit for sugars”.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE TOWN of Asbestos in French-speaking Québec, Canada – named after the mineral that underpins its economy – is waiting to see whether its provincial government will approve a Canadian dollar CAD58 million (US dollar USD56 million) loan enabling an underground mine to tap an immense deposit.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

Flavio Franceschetti, Sindicom’s convenience store consultant, said: "The "Big C-stores" sell around US$100,000/month. This result is less than supermarkets, but in line with the average sales of the large network franchise stores of food service, big bakeries and delis.…

BY MARK ROWE

THE OIL palm is a prolific shrub that can be converted into palm oil, one of the most versatile fats known to man – rich in solid saturated fatty acids and able to withstand refining at high temperatures.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A WORLD Trade Organisation (WTO) study has found Brazilian municipalities near oil wells are little better off than those with no hydrocarbon resources. "Oil windfalls translate into little improvement in the provision of public goods or the population’s living standards," it concludes, warning flows of local oil royalties can increase corruption and crime.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A EUROPEAN Commission expert group has warned of serious potential shortages in supplies of rare non-ferrous metals in the next 20 years, especially of those required by emerging technologies.

An ad hoc group of the European Union (EU) Raw Materials Supply Group has concluded that 16 non-ferrous metals should be placed on a "critical list" of concern.…

BY WANG FANGQING,RAGHAVENDRA VERMA and PACIFICA GODDARD

Convenience stores are no longer the preserve of cash rich but tine poor consumers in developed markets. They are increasingly popular in emerging markets too. Foreign convenience store operators in China, for instance, are now moving beyond major metropolitan centres – where they have long been established – to smaller lower-tier cities.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

While most of the alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages produced in Brazil are consumed domestically, the exception is the juice sector. Brazil is one of the world’s top three producers of tropical fruit, according to Brazilian Fruits Institute (IBRAF), and an important global provider of fruit juice.…

BY DANIEL PRUZIN

REPRESENTATIVES from around 160 countries are moving toward clinching a deal on new World Health Organisation (WHO) Protocol on Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products, which could be wrapped up within the next 12 months. Unlike its predecessor, the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (under whose authority this latest agreement is being negotiated), the protocol is something of a mixed blessing for the tobacco industry.…

BY ALYSHAH HASHAM and KEITH NUTHALL

A NEW report from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has underlined the enormous disparities in stocks of metals used in rich and poor countries.

The report ‘Metals in Society’ examines the amount of individual metals present in society, and the potential for using the in-use stock to offset demand from virgin metal stocks.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN meat importers will be looking to boost supplies from the Mercosur countries of South America, if they strike a planned trade deal with the European Union (EU). A resumption of negotiations on slashing tariffs for goods traded between the EU’s 27 member countries and the four-country Mercosur block, (Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay), has been announced by the European Commission, the EU’s executive.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD, ALAN OSBORN and KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN automakers will be looking to boost exports to the Mercosur countries of South America, if they strike a trade deal with the European Union (EU). A resumption of negotiations on slashing tariffs for goods traded between the EU’s 27 member countries and the four-country Mercosur block, (Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay), has been announced by the European Commission, the EU’s executive.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD, RAGHAVENDRA VERMA, WANG FANGQING, JOHN PAGNI and KEITH NUTHALL

THE RISE of the world’s large emerging markets – Brazil, Russia, India, China and Mexico (or BRICM to give them a popular acronym) has been especially significant for the drinks industry.…

BY WACHIRA KIGOTHO

EAST Africa is developing as an important source of biofuels and biofuel feedstock, with governments keen to attract foreign direct investment for this potentially strategic rural development option.

Ethiopia, Kenya, Mozambique, Sudan, and Tanzania are countries where foreign companies are competing to acquire land for biofuel projects.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has requested authorisation from European Union (EU) ministers to launch negotiations to forge an EU-Brazil air transport agreement. Despite 4.4 million passengers flying between the EU and Brazil annually, there is no EU-Brazil agreement, just bilateral deals with 15 of the 27 EU member states.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

According to the US department of agriculture (USDA), about 70% of the 2.5 billion litres of fruit and vegetable juices sold in Mexico in 2009 were produced domestically. Mexico exported USdollar USD266.99 million worth of juices in 2009, compared to USD308.23 million in 2008 and USD247.29 million in 2007, according the UN Comtrade database.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

INTRODUCTION

LATIN America has never been a strong player in the global drinks marketplace, but maybe, as much of the region struggles towards unprecedented prosperity, this could change. Mexico has shown the way with the international profile of its beers, notably Corona, and its world-beating Tequila and Mezcal industries.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

The most important markets for bottled water have traditionally been developed economies like Western Europe and the United States. However, growth in these markets has recently flattened out, exacerbated by the global economic crisis and growing environmental concerns over the product.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

AUTO manufacturers have long worried about the growth of counterfeiting in their industry, especially of vehicle part copies that might not perform. They have also complained about their designs being copied by rival car makers, especially in emerging markets.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has signalled it is unlikely to intervene to prevent the proposed takeover of Ukraine’s gas pipeline network by Russia’s Gazprom. Displaying his relatively relaxed attitude to closer energy links with Moscow, new German EU energy Commissioner Günter Oettinger told a press conference: "The decision has to come between Kiev and Moscow and not in Brussels."…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

MAJOR emerging markets Brazil and India have told the World Trade Organisation (WTO) they are fulfilling commitments to open their markets duty-free to the 49 poorest countries worldwide (called ‘least developed countries’ of LDC) mostly sub-Saharan African, Asian and Pacific islands.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

INTRODUCTION

LATIN America has never been a strong player in the global drinks marketplace, but maybe, as much of the region struggles towards unprecedented prosperity, this could change. Mexico has shown the way with the international profile of its beers, notably Corona, and its world-beating Tequila and Mezcal industries.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

The carbonated soft drink segment has suffered recently in the United States and Europe, as consumers have become more health conscious and switched to less sugary alternatives, but in Latin America carbonated beverages have continued to perform well.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

A decade ago, Latin America was considered to be one of the beer industry’s toughest markets, due to frequent bouts of economic uncertainty and political turmoil. But a lot has changed in the region since the year 2000, and recently instead of recoiling from this region, the biggest beer companies in the world have been fighting tooth and nail for shares of it.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

Despite the difficult economic climate, spirits are still selling well in Latin America, and in 2008, 3 billion litres of spirits were sold, according to Canadean. However, spirits for the most part are not a very dynamic segment, and consumption per capita has remained steady between 4.5 and 4.6 litres for the last five years, and growth was flat at 0.4% in 2009.…

BY MONIKA HANLEY

THE BALTIC States and their eastern neighbours have long been viewed as a cheap supply of labour and goods to the rich countries within the European Union (EU), but now local companies and governments are looking to expand biofuel production to satisfy both growing domestic and export demand.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

Wine is not a particularly popular alcoholic beverage in most of Latin America, and only 1.94 billion litres were consumed in the region in 2009, according to Euromonitor International. Wine is also the only major beverage segment that has dropped in consumption per capita in Latin America in the last five years, from 3.8 litres in 2005 to 3.6 litres in 2009 (compared to almost 50 litres consumed per capita per year in France for example) said beverage information specialist Canadean.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

Although in most parts of the world consumers cut back on juice and nectar consumption, and growth in this segment has been the slowest in 10 years, juices and fruit-flavoured drinks were one of Latin America’s fastest growing segments in 2009, according to Euromonitor International.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE GAS utility for Brazil’s largest city São Paulo is upgrading and extending its gas distribution network. The European Investment Bank (EIB) is lending Euro 100 million to the Companhia de Gás de São Paulo (Comgás) to build 2,500 km of new pipelines; replace 158 km of old cast iron pipes, replace meters and upgrade regulator stations.…

BY MARK ROWE

MANY cosmetics sectors would consider themselves successful to have managed fractional increases in sales over the past 18 months. But one sector has apparently bucked the trend – men’s grooming.

While the global personal care market has slowed due to the recession, men’s grooming is one of the few bright spots, with 6% value growth from 2007 to 2008.…

BY CLEMENCE MANYUKWE

AFTER being allocated a piece of land in the year 2000 as part of the country’s controversial and often violent land reform, it has taken nearly a decade for small scale tobacco farmer Tendai Dambanjera to commercially justify the claim of what he says is his ancestral land.…

BY KARRYN MILLER

THE FINALISED National Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS2) programme of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) may show the Obama administration’s continuing support for boosting biofuel production – but will it give concrete results? The updated rules have considered the mixed reviews expressed when a proposed programme was announced last year, however some interested parties still feel the latest outcome will fail to propel the biofuel industry forward.…

BY MIRIAM ELDER

WHILE the government of the Russian Federation has made real efforts to fight money laundering – as documented recently in the Money Laundering Bulletin – the problem remains rampant in this resource-rich country, according to Russian and international experts.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

INTRODUCTION

There are signs around the world that the textile market is beginning to recover from the global economic crisis, and developing markets will be leading that recovery. Asia is, of course, at the forefront, but many countries in Latin America have also weathered the crisis and have come out in a surprisingly decent position, with their dynamic textile and apparel industries well positioned for future expansion.…

BY MARK ROWE

BOTH the oils and fats industry and environmentalists have long been aware of concerns over the oil palm, the prolific shrub that can be converted into palm oil, one of the most versatile fats known to man.

For almost as long, there have been campaigns to improve its cultivation in south-east Asia, which accounts for around 75% of global supply; but concern is now focussing on South America, where cultivation is growing rapidly, placing pressure on the Amazon rainforest and other wildlife-rich habitats in a belt stretching across central Brazil and Ecuador to Colombia’s Caribbean coast.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

LAST year in Latin America, British American Tobacco (BAT) and Philip Morris International (PMI), the region’s two dominant companies, battled to maintain profits through declining volumes. Overall, Latin America was profitable for both companies. For BAT, profits were mainly attributable to a strong performance in Brazil, and improved premium brand sales, however volumes sales declined throughout the region.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

MAJOR emerging markets Brazil and India have told the World Trade Organisation they are fulfilling commitments to open their markets duty-free to the 49 poorest countries worldwide (‘least developed countries’) mostly sub-Saharan African and Asian. New Delhi and Brasilia said ready-to-wear clothing were key exports that would benefit.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

RICH country textile and clothing chemical and dyes companies maybe able to avoid undertaking chemical safety tests in key emerging markets because of an Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) mutual acceptance of data system. Using the unlikely acronym MAD, this procedure enables signatory countries to accept chemical safety tests carried out in fellow member states.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

RICH country cosmetics companies maybe able to avoid undertaking chemical safety tests in key emerging markets because of an Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) mutual acceptance of data system. Using the unlikely acronym MAD, this procedure enables signatory countries to accept chemical safety tests carried out in fellow member states.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE UNITED Nations and Brazil are helping a small west African country fight against its exposure to organised drugs crime by funding and helping manage the construction of a new police academy. Since a civil war in the late 1990s, Guinea-Bissau – a former Portuguese colony – has seen weak governments under attack from international narcotics rings.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

RICH country textile and clothing chemical and dyes companies maybe able to avoid undertaking chemical safety tests in key emerging markets because of an Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD) mutual acceptance of data system. Using the unlikely acronym MAD, this procedure enables signatory countries to accept chemical safety tests carried out in fellow member states.…

By Alan Osborn and Mitch Vandenborn, International News Services

BY DEIRDRE MASON, PACIFICA GODDARD, GAVIN BLAIR and KEITH NUTHALL

NEW technologies devour new resources and the move towards hybrid and electric vehicles could make some currently impoverished countries rich. As the world moves away from fossil fuels, the soft metal lithium will become increasingly in demand as a critical component of auto batteries for green cars.…

BY KARRYN MILLER

WHEN Mexico’s economy faced a sharp decline last year, few industries were spared – tobacco included. A downturn in the world economy teamed with a slew of factors made a dent in the country’s tobacco sales. But in spite of this tobacco companies have remained positive.…

BY MARK ROWE and KEITH NUTHALL

THIS April, the UK will launch a feed-in tariff for electricity, which the government said will accelerate take-up of green energy among the general public. According to the European Commission’s energy directorate-general, the European Union (EU) already uses at least 20% more energy than is justified, which has led to twin concerns – the need to reduce consumption of fossil fuels and to encourage consumers to switch to green energy tariffs and sources.…

BY ALAN OSBORN,ANCA GURZU and KEITH NUTHALL

THE GLOBAL trade in illicit tobacco is huge and growing and a significant source of dirty money worldwide. Tobacco multinational British American Tobacco (BAT) estimates that 6.3% of cigarettes worldwide are illicit products (either counterfeit, smuggled or sold domestically on the black market), which makes 332 billion sticks, and that is a lot of cigarettes.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

While many had hoped December’s Copenhagen Conference would be the necessary first step in the global fight against climate change, in the wake of the signed partial accord, we are left with many more questions than answers. Now, 2010 is the new deadline for whether the world can agree a practical response to the dangers of global warming.…

BY DEIRDRE MASON, PACIFICA GODDARD, GAVIN BLAIR and KEITH NUTHALL

NEW technologies devour new resources and the move towards hybrid and electric vehicles could make some currently impoverished countries rich. As the world moves away from fossil fuels, the soft metal lithium will become increasingly in demand as a critical component of auto batteries for green cars.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

RUSSIA and Ukraine appear to have headed off an oil transit dispute that could have created a repeat of last year’s major disruption of European natural gas supplies. Moscow and Kiev have signed an agreement increasing by 30% the fees Ukraine charges on transporting Russian oil to the European Union (EU) – this alters a 2004 contract and the change had sparked a diplomatic tussle.…

By Keith Nuthall, International News Services

For many journalists covering globalisation affairs, the end of the European Union’s (EU) banana trade dispute with the USA and Latin American countries is like the loss of an old friend. This dispute – which ended today – has been subject to formal World Trade Organisation (WTO) proceedings since 1996. Its resolution is a rare ray of sunlight in Geneva, where multilateral trade talks have long been mired in self-interest and complacency.

The Doha Development Round of global trade negotiations – which itself has been lumbering on since 2001 – appears far from completion. The political and commercial impetus that pushed its predecessor, the 1990s Uruguay round, towards great success, is nowhere to be found with Doha.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD, ANCA GURZU, GAVIN BLAIR and KEITH NUTHALL

NEW technologies devour new resources and the move towards hybrid and electric vehicles could make some currently impoverished countries rich. As the world moves away from fossil fuels, the soft metal lithium will become increasingly in demand as a critical component of auto batteries for green cars.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

EUROPEAN Union (EU) regulatory approval has been granted for two Brazilian financial groups taking over major Brazil meat companies JBS SA and Bertin SA. The European Commission gave competition law clearance for the purchase by J&F Participações S.A.…

BY ANCA GURZU

INFRASTRUCTURE and technology costs are the two important factors when talking about promoting intermediate alternative fuels such as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and compressed natural gas (CNG), the Center for Automotive Research, a US-based non-profit organisation, has told wardsauto.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL, EMMA JACKSON and ERIC LYMAN

THE COPENHAGEN climate change conference ended on December 18 with an accord where key world economies promised to make binding agreements to cut carbon emissions. But detail on exactly how much will be settled at a later date, meaning its long term effects on the oil and gas industry are unclear.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

CHINA has come under increased pressure to scrap export restrictions on certain key non-ferrous metals, with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) establishing a disputes panel to adjudicate complaints about these rules. With the European Union (EU) being joined by the United States and Mexico as formal parties to this dispute, the outlook could be serious for China if it loses.…

BY GREGORY MELUS

THE BRAZILIAN textile industry is confident it can overcome any ill effects from its government placing World Trade Organisation (WTO)-authorised retaliatory tariffs on more than 222 US products. These will be applied to US textile imports, including threads, yarns, cotton, polyester fabrics, and finished products ranging from handkerchiefs to crocheted blouses, in response to US cotton subsidies which have been deemed too high by the WTO.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

THE CIGARETTE market in Argentina remained strong in 2008: the retail volume increased 3.12% from 2007 to 42.47 billion sticks, valued at Euro 1.72 billion, a 17.6% increase from 2007, according to the Argentine ministry of the economy.…

BY MARK ROW

THERE are 44 million smokers in Russia, and 31% of Russians smoke. Male smoking rates (61%) are among the highest in the world, while female smoking rates have more than doubled from 1991 to 2008 from 7% to 15%, according to Tabakprom, the Russian cigarette manufacturer’s association (NOTE – SPELLING IS CORRECT).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

CORRUPTION in Greece is now considered as bad as in Romania and Bulgaria – European Union (EU) member states investigated by the European Commission over graft. Greece’s slide from 57th in last year’s Transparency International (TI) corruption perception index to 71st in this year’s report will concern its new left-wing PASOK government.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

CIGARETTE MARKET

With a population of 192 million, Brazil is among the top 10 cigarette markets in the world. In 2008, 91.09 billion sticks were sold, valued at US$8.58 billion according to Abifumo, the Brazilian tobacco manufacturers association.…

BY ANCA GURZU

The USA tobacco manufacturing (and leaf) industry has been facing tough times, with its habitual trade surplus dwindling to almost nothing. The USA’s Tobacco Merchants Association (TMA) reported a US$603.7 million trading surplus at the end of 2008, which was 32.5% less than the 2007 surplus of US$894.3 million.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A EUROPEAN Commission report has highlighted concerns about some steps taken by European Union (EU) trading partners to protect their personal care product sectors from the recession that could restrict EU exports. A key worry was Indonesia’s draft regulation on cosmetics labelling and packaging that insists product information such as usage advice, product numbers and expiry dates be labelled in Indonesian.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

AN INITIATIVE boosting the ability of Latin American and Caribbean countries to prevent precursor chemicals from being diverted from legitimate uses to illegal narcotic production has been launched. The UN Office in Drugs and Crime and European Commission’s three-year PRELAC project will cover: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Jamaica, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Trinidad & Tobago and Venezuela.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

The Venezuelan cigarette market experienced an overall decline in 2008 and the first half of 2009. In 2008, 11.95 billion sticks were sold, an 8.6% drop from the 13.07 billion sticks sold in 2007, according to the United Nations Statistics Division.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

IT is a mind-bending question. How on earth, given the complexity and variety of available biofuels, their feedstocks and manufacturing processes, can their relative ‘green-ness’ be measured efficiently? But, to the delight of mathematicians and technical consultants the world over, this toughest of queries has to be answered.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

A NEW crisis over the presence of genetically modified (GM) ingredients in food and livestock feed has once more focused attention on the European Union’s (EU’s) controversial GM policies. It has especially raised the spectre of job losses, farm bankruptcies and higher consumer prices if a relaxation of the current de facto zero tolerance restriction applying to unauthorised GM products is not agreed soon.…

BY PAUL COCHRANE

FOLLOWING the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Israel was quick to come out and identify itself with the ensuing US-led ‘war on terror’. This was not surprising, given the Arab-Israeli conflict and the attacks Israel has sustained from militant Palestinian groups.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Commission has proposed giving Brazil additional annual import quotas for its sales of sugar in the European Union (EU) to take account of the expansion of the EU through the accession of Romania and Bulgaria. The Commission wants 550,000 tonnes of extra Brazilian raw cane sugar imported annually for refining.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Union (EU) may relax its maximum level for total aflatoxins from 4µg/kg to 10µg/kg within tree nuts such as a Brazil nuts and cashews (but excluding almonds, hazelnuts and pistachios). This follows a European Food Safety Authority assessment that "public health would not be adversely affected" by such a move.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

TRANSPORT infrastructure investments to help grow Argentina’s major (but currently troubled) soy export sector have continued, with the hope that the recent growth in the industry will become permanent.

In the mid-1990’s Argentina was producing a modest 11 to 12 million metric tonnes (mt) of soy per year.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

MOST people use a post office, so they are an ideal outlet for spreading important public health messages such as about avoiding HIV. As a result, the Universal Postal Union (UPU), UNAIDS, the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the UNI Global Union trade union federation are launching a global awareness campaign using post office.…

BY RUSSELL BERMAN

THE AMERICAN bio-based oils and fats sector is watching closely the development of key proposals and recommendations that could significantly alter the way goods are shipped across the country.

One of its most pressing transport concerns is an advancing proposal to end a decades-long antitrust exemption for freight rail.…

BY JAMES FULLER

SMALL island states are always vulnerable in energy sustainability terms, but the growth in renewable energy technologies is giving them a better shot at security of supply. The Caribbean is a case in point, where green energy technologies are being explored across the region.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THERE is a sense, in the rivers of documents pouring from international talks to replace the Kyoto Protocol with a new global warming treaty in Copenhagen this December that the chickens are really coming home to roost.

For the first time – at July’s G8 summit in Italy – there was a common near-universal declaration that humankind has been messing up the climate and has to stop filling the atmosphere with carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA

INDIAN environmentalists and farmers’ groups are warning major drinks companies that by transforming the country’s horticulture patterns and changing its existing fruit supply chain they are playing with fire.

New Delhi-based environmental activist Vandana Shiva is far from unusual in arguing swift social and economic change caused by large scale earmarking of primary production could cause unrest.…

BY ANDREW CAVE

Food commodity prices are seldom out of the news nowadays, due to a mushrooming global population, the food-for-fuel controversy, an increasing focus on sustainability and the continued growth of the organic sector. However, beyond the generality of crop prices spiralling to new highs in 2007 and 2008 and then plummeting – in some cases – back to where they were before the boom, the picture is far from uniform.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

A GROUP of emerging market countries led by Brazil and India has complained at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) about allegations that the European Union (EU) has been unfairly detaining transit shipments of generic medicine exports. Speaking to the WTO’s trade related aspects of intellectual property rights (TRIPs) committee, Brazil and India (backed by China and others) said delays were common.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

GLOBAL initiatives designed to promote sustainable practices in the bio-based oils and fats industry are making strong progress. The key Roundtable on Responsible Soy (RTRS) has now released "principles and criteria" designed to ensure soy production does not cause long term damage to the environment and society.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

IT has long been outmoded and inaccurate to split the world into two camps: industrialised developed economies, and largely agricultural developing countries. The growth of the 1990s and the current decade means there is a wide range of social and economic sophistication and wealth amongst the poorer of these two old-fashioned categories.…

BY RUSSELL BERMAN

THE SWEEPING energy reforms being undertaken by the new administration of US President Barack Obama include billions of dollars in funding for biofuels and other clean energy sources.

America’s biofuels industry is applauding Mr Obama’s early moves, although advocates are still awaiting regulatory directives on renewable fuel standards.…

BY JAMES FULLER

WHILE the global recession is hitting profits in the oil and gas sector worldwide, the Caribbean’s key producer Trinidad & Tobago remains bullish about the industry bringing it long term financial and economic stability. Indeed, the twin-island country’s minister of energy and energy industries Conrad Enill said this month that both a fifth liquefied natural gas (LNG) train and a new oil refinery are projects which are still firmly on the table for the Caribbean energy powerhouse.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL, LEAH GERMAIN and MONICA DOBIE

MAYBE the best sign that renewable energies have hit the mainstream is that they now have their very own international organisation: the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). Launched in Bonn, Germany, this January, with the support of 76 countries, including its host nation, Spain, Italy, France and Sweden, the roster of signatory nations has since been swollen by India and Belarus.…

BY ALAN OSBORN

IN this year’s Money Laundering Bulletin series of articles on the development of an international profession of anti-money laundering (AML) specialists, we have often examined specialists working at the sharp end. But that is not the whole story of course.…

BY RAGHAVENDRA VERMA

INDIA’S US$12.4 billion annual turnover tobacco industry is passing through a difficult period, with little hope for a better future, despite its continued large size – this estimate coming from the Tobacco Institute of India for sales of all tobacco products, chewing tobacco and beedis.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

WHILE the European Union (EU) has not exactly fallen out of love with biofuels, it has to be said that the relationship has become more complicated since the EU started worrying about the environmental problems associated with the sector.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL, EMMA JACKSON and ALAN OSBORN

IN the early 1990s the nuclear power industry faced a bleak outlook. High profile accidents such as in Chernobyl and Three Mile Island in, Pennsylvania, the USA, had raised public concern about the safety of the industry to all time high.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL, EMMA JACKSON and ALAN OSBORN

FEW things say more about the growing enthusiasm for nuclear power than the rush of young students eager to make a career in the industry. It is happening mainly in America but other countries are now beginning to see the same development.…

BY ALAN OSBORN, LUCY JONES and KEITH NUTHALL

INTRODUCTION

CLOTHING and textile production and trade subsidies are under pressure today, as they have not been for many years. There has been a steady trend towards liberalisation in the sector worldwide, stemming from the abolition of the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) Agreement on Textiles and Clothing (ATC) in January 2005 and with it, then end of restrictive quotas for imports for the WTO’s 152 member countries.…

BY PACIFICA GODDARD

WHILE net revenues for tobacco product sales in some key countries in South America have experienced growth in the last few years, in general the regional tobacco product market is stagnant. Producers blame increased excise rates, public health awareness, and new and more rigidly enforced regulations for the gloom.…

By Eric Lyman, in Poznan, Poland, for ISN Security Watch

 As countries battle to come up with a plan to limit greenhouse gas emissions in 2009, attention will almost surely begin to focus on two main players that hold the fate of the international process in their hands: the US and China.

December’s United Nations negotiations on climate change in Poznan, Poland, concluded with relatively little progress. Delegates voted to activate a fund to help poor countries adapt to the changing climate, for example, but they did not approve a mechanism to put cash in the fund.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE EUROPEAN Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has proposed relaxing a tight limit on residues of the pesticide thiram on bananas, which would enable Belgium’s Taminco NV to import the fruit from Ecuador, Costa Rica,

Columbia, Panama, Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala, Venezuela, and Brazil.…