Search Results for: Switzerland

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 newly implemented African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is expected to have minimal positive impact in the short term for the continent’s garment and textile manufacturers. The FTA, which came into force at the start of the year and brings together 1.3 billion people in a USD3.4 trillion economic bloc of 54 African countries, a January 1 formal implementation date that was delayed by six months due to the Covid-19 pandemic.…

WHILE the UK’s exit from the European Union (EU) will bring significant change to civil aviation across Europe, extensive air industry provisions within the 1,256-page EU/UK trade and cooperation agreement agreed on Christmas Eve, means that significant disruption has been avoided.…

LUXEMBOURG may be a small country, but it is big in dairy, especially milk – with its other main products cheese, butter, butteroil and cream. Growth in the dairy sector of this Grand Duchy, similar in size to the UK country of Dorset and slightly smaller than the US state of Rhode Island, is continuing – even during the market disruption of the Covid-19 pandemic and Brexit.…

A Shanghai-based startup confectioner LANDBASE (NOTE TO EDITOR – UPPER CASE SPELLING FOR COMPANY NAME IS CORRECT) has tapped China’s competitive chocolate market though selling sugar-free chocolate, sweetened with alternative flavouring inulin, targeted at health-focused consumers.

The two-year-old company’s brand CHOCDAY and product lines ‘Dark Milk’ and ‘Dark Premium’, have been developed in China, but manufactured in Switzerland for the Chinese market, a first in China.…

The international gold trade is worth over USD6 trillion a year, according to the World Gold Council (WGC), but oversight of the supply chain is considered weak by many critics, relying on self-regulation, making it vulnerable to money laundering.

Gold remains scarce and hence valuable: from antiquity until 2019, just 197,576 tonnes has been mined – equivalent to a 21.7 metre cube, according to the World Gold Council.…

SOUTH Africa’s paints and coatings industry has been struggling though the particularly tough Covid-19 lockdown imposed by the country’s government, which saw its manufacturing plants and most paint retailers closed from March 26 until May 1.

What made this order worse was that from March 26 until May 1, homeowners were told to remain at home except for essential purchases, making it hard for them to help each other with renovations, swapping decoration equipment and more – preventing many from undertaking renovations during this enforced time off.…

The Peruvian alpaca-based fabric industry is targeting a robust post-Covid 19 recovery by strengthening its international relationships through strategic alliances. Also, by focusing on innovation, this speciality wool segment is also trying to reverse declines in production and exports worsened by claims of cruelty by alpaca farmers made by USA-based campaign group PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals).…

In the car of the not-too-distant future, Japanese vehicle technology developer Kyocera Corp believes the dashboard, the engine bay, the front wheels and the front pillars of the vehicle will effectively have disappeared. 

At least from the perspective of the driver and/or passengers when inside the cab.…

SWITZERLAND’S federal government has passed a new law that will finally prevent Swiss companies and individuals from tax deducting bribes as investment or business development costs, even though such graft has been illegal since July 2017.

That was the date that a revised criminal code outlawing bribery in Switzerland and overseas of public and private partners came into force, but Swiss tax law has not kept pace.…