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South-east Asia is a region that has sharp contrasts in economic development, from between the wealth of Singapore to countries such as Myanmar, where poverty is endemic and consumer markets are relatively undeveloped.

Such contrasts pose challenges for personal care product companies seeking regional strategies to tap the markets of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ (ASEAN) 10 countries, whose cosmetics suppliers have to comply with the standards of the ASEAN Cosmetics Directive, which was modelled on European Union legislation.…

Business governance experts in Canada have told Board Agenda how they think companies can maximise the ability and performance of their non-executive board members.

Their comments come as concern about the effectiveness of non-execs in Canada has been piqued by media reports that Pierre Beaudoin, a director of Montréal-based comms and finance conglomerate Power Corp, had 20.28% of shareholder votes withheld at a director election in May – usually such elections proffer 100% support.…

SINGAPORE has promised that it will implement the base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) project developed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD). The Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) has said it accepts profits should be taxed where real economic activities generating them are performed and where value is created.…

With earth movers set to move in on August 1, the Airport Authority Hong Kong (AAHK) plans to build an HK141.5 billion (USD18.2 billion) third airport runway at the city’s Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA) on Chek Lap Kok island. It is set to be the most expensive infrastructure project in the city since the 1997 handover from the UK.…

The brutal anti-crime crackdown promised by the Philippines’ President-elect Rodrigo Duterte may result in the European Union (EU) withdrawing its Generalised System of Preferences Plus (GSP+) tariff-reduction scheme from the country, weakening Philippines textile and garment exports. Duterte had in early June been subject of scathing criticism from UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon for endorsing killings of journalists as well as for offering large bounties to security forces and the general public to eliminate drug traffickers in extrajudicial killings.…

THE SINGAPORE Stock Exchange (SGX) has started negotiations with London’s Baltic Exchange, which could see Singapore Exchange Ltd obtain full ownership of The Baltic Exchange Ltd, which operates this UK-based international freight derivatives market.

The Baltic Exchange and SGX will now meet with Baltic shareholders and business partners to explain and discuss the offer.…

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.”…

Yesterday’s (May 17) easing of US sanctions against Myanmar to improve bilateral trade and allow more financial transactions to take place could result in more US fast-food companies establishing a presence in the former pariah state.

The US treasury, for instance removed seven state-owned enterprises and three state-owned banks (the Myanma Economic Bank, Myanmar Foreign Trade Bank, and Myanma Investment and Commercial Bank), from a blacklist.…

Seizures of contraband cosmetics have become an increasingly common sight on local TV in China. A recent case in point (this March – 2016) saw 1,488 boxes of South Korean cosmetics seized from a forty-foot container in the east coast port city of Qinhuangdao, about 300km east of Beijing.…

CONCERN is growing that foreign direct investment (FDI) within Vietnam, including in the textile sector, needs to be tempered with efforts to deter unlimited environmental pollution. Public opinion in Vietnam – important even within this one party officially communist state – has been riled by mass fish deaths off Vietnam’s central coast, with environmentalists blaming a toxic leak from a steel mill in April receiving investment from Taiwan, a key investor in Vietnam’s textile sector.…