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WITH an estimated USD1.5 trillion lost to the global economy because of bribes, the World Bank is pushing for a diverse array of technology to be deployed – it is a call being answered with anti-graft systems being installed worldwide.

Reducing corruption “is a priority” for the World Bank, it said in a briefing note in September 2017.…

GUATEMALA’S turbulent political climate is eroding domestic business confidence, although the impact on textile exports – which depend heavily on the United States market – remains to be seen.

Guatemala’s institutional crisis erupted in the summer. On August 31, Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales ended the mandate of the Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), a body established by the United Nations to help dismantle graft and crime networks.…

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…

AMERICAN confectioners may suffer from the latest tit-for-tat tariff exchange between the USA and China, with retaliatory duties from China targeting US confectionery exports. Many of these duties are high – at 25% – imposed from September 24 on US-made sugar; cocoa powder; milk powder; honey; jams; and more; plus 20% duties on US-made confectionery without cocoa; chewing gum; some chocolates; and more.…

*EU member states have been given temporary permission to use so-called reverse charge mechanisms to collect VAT, involving shifting liability to pay from suppliers to customers, to fight fraud. The EU Council of Ministers has approved a directive allowing governments to reverse charge VAT on domestic supplies of goods and services above EUR17,500 per transaction until June 2022, when a country is losing 25% or more of VAT to carousel fraud.…

AS the USA continues to expand its shale gas production, environmentalists are keeping a close eye on how this increasingly large industry is managing its pollution. For the American sector is huge. The USA produced 16.86 trillion cubic feet of shale gas in 2017, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), accounting for around 62% of all US natural gas production during the year.…

Indonesia is seeking to open new markets for its textile and garment products – not only are free trade agreements with Australia and fellow Asian countries are on the cards, the industry’s association and the government has announced, but the industry is also targeting African export sales.…

Japan’s traditional tobacco market continues to contract, with fewer people smoking and more smokers expressing a desire to stop, but sales in the heated tobacco sector remain positive and are growing.

Less than 30% of Japanese adults now smoke, according to statistics released by the health, labour and welfare ministry in early September, the first time the figure has fallen beneath that threshold since statistics were first collated in 1986.…

Cryptocurrencies have made a big splash across Asia, and governments have taken very different regulatory approaches to curb associated financial scams and money laundering.

While there is one group of countries that has banned the operation and use of cryptocurrencies entirely, including China, India and Vietnam, a second category spans countries that see cryptocurrencies as potentially boosting their own financial sectors.…

THE UNITED States Trade Representative (USTR) today branded the Global Forum on Steel Excess Capacity a failure, claiming its efforts have not delivered the production cuts that markets need to stabilise prices.

In a strongly worded statement released after a forum ministerial meeting was staged today (Sept 20) at the Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD), in Paris, the USTR argued that the group’s results to date “leaves us questioning whether the Forum is capable of delivering on these objectives”. …