Search Results for: Research

IN the USA alone, USD1.4 billion in counterfeit consumer products were seized in 2016 by the United States Customs and Border Protection, including 2,000 shipments of counterfeit cosmetics products. This, according to a note from USA-based Clarkston Consulting, cost the beauty industry at least USD75 million, which said: “Counterfeiting of consumer products remains on the rise” – see https://clarkstonconsulting.com/insights/counterfeit-cosmetics/counterfeit.…

THE LEBANESE government has moved to ban the sale of certain Turkish products, including textile imports worth USD123.3 million a year, to protect local production.

However, Lebanon’s textile manufacturing sector is small, raising questions as to why Turkish textile imports should be banned.…

THE EUROPEAN car industry has welcomed a commitment by the European Union’s (EU) executive body, the European Commission’ – in a policy paper (called a ‘communication’ on automated mobility) – to have all new vehicles connected to the internet by 2022.…

GROWTH of distributed renewable power generation with storage is set to pick up significantly in key global regions of demand for electricity. Quantifying its impact on the rate at which renewables will capture share in the energy mix is made difficult by its often-hidden nature, but some utilities and energy policy makers are starting to get to grips with the challenge – the eventual results will be of interest to oil and gas marketers.…

DEMAND from two key generations is driving resurging sales in the global wallpaper market: Millennials and their quest for a sustainable lifestyle coupled with embracing all things technological, together with the baby-boomer generation’s affection for heritage preservation.

Sales for the past five years have been growing steadily amidst a wealth of promotional material boasting wallpaper’s environment-friendly credentials, a connection to traditional cultural influences or how technological advances can transform a simple wall covering into a dynamic home or workspace.…

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 ECONOMIES of the Asia Pacific region are impressively dynamic, but HR experts agree much more could be gained if the region were to succeed in improving women’s skills and providing them with equal opportunities at work.

Illustrating just how much potential there is, the latest report from the McKinsey Global Institute published in April, ‘The power of parity: Advancing women’s equality in Asia Pacific’, has found that advancing women’s equality in the region could add USD4.5 trillion to their collective GDP annually in 2025 – a 12% increase over the “business-as-usual trajectory”.…

FINTECH firms are pushing new artificial intelligence (AI) solutions for customer due diligence (CDD) but AML reporters and regulators are wary about integrating them with legacy systems.

Such reluctance is a pity, said Dan Adamson, DDIQ president and global head of cognitive computing at New York-based Exiger, given the increasingly vast amount of data generated by existing non-AI IT. …

A LANDMARK deal on the European Union’s (EU) renewable energy directive (RED), reached in the early hours of June 14 in Brussels between the European Commission, European Parliament and EU Council of Ministers (of member states), means the European power sector will have to become greener.…

Cotton industry analysts have said the clothing industry should not overreact to a major hike in Chinese cotton futures contracts, following years of stockpiling the fibre by China buyers, even though they accept market uncertainty has been driving up prices.

Contracts have been purchased covering more than 361,000 bales of US cotton for 2019-20, according to US Department of Agriculture data which “would be enough to make 400 million t-shirts,” the Wall Street Journal suggested in an article on June 10, adding: “China has never booked that much cotton that far in advance at this time of year, in data going back to 1998” and has now become a “major consumer” of US cotton.…