The EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement offers some major free-trade benefits, but also represents an end to most aspects of the free market access that the UK previously enjoyed as an EU member state.
Malaysian cartel allegedly sold fake halal meat to Muslims for 40 years
A meat-fraud scandal is roiling Malaysia after a local news outlet uncovered a cartel that allegedly bribed customs officials in order to smuggle in all kinds of meat and label it halal, triggering outrage in the Muslim-majority country.For more than 40 years, the conspirators allegedly bribed senior officers from several government agencies to import meat from non-halal certified slaughterhouses including Brazil, Bolivia, Canada, China, Colombia, Mexico, Spain and Ukraine, according to the New…
Recycled condoms, heroic animals, and QAnon comes to Asia: the region’s most bizarre stories from 2020
It’s been an unusual year, mostly due to the once-in-a-lifetime disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic. It’s not a surprise in that case that 2020 brought its share of bizarre news. Here are the weirdest stories from a weird year.CATS DRESSED TO IMPRESSAfter quitting his job as a schoolteacher, Indonesian tailor Fredi Lugina Priadi tried his hand at a number of businesses – including running a motorbike repair shop – before stumbling upon feline fashions, an idea from one of his cat…
For Thailand’s Covid-hit economy, all that glitters is not gold as baht rallies
Gold sales in Thailand are surging as households reach for a financial lifeline amid the pandemic, a tactic that risks complicating government efforts to tame an export-stifling rally in the nation’s currency.Exports of the precious metal surged to a record this year as prices climbed and Thais unloaded jewellery, bars and medallions to raise cash for routine expenses. Bullion traders expect the trend to continue into 2021 as the coronavirus drags on tourism and manufacturing, the mainstays of…
Cambodia begins first crude oil production in joint venture with Singapore’s KrisEnergy
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen on Tuesday announced that the kingdom had extracted its first drop of crude oil from its waters, a long-awaited milestone for one of Southeast Asia’s poorest nations.The joint venture between Cambodia and Singapore’s KrisEnergy will see the extraction of the oil from fields in the Gulf of Thailand.The area boasts significant oil deposits, with Chevron first finding proven reserves off Cambodia in 2005. But production stalled as the government and the US giant…
Kim Jong-un calls meeting as North Korea faces worst economic crisis since 1990s famine
As North Korean leader Kim Jong-un grapples with the toughest challenges of his nine-year rule, he is set to open a massive ruling Workers’ Party congress next month to try to muster stronger public loyalty to him and lay out new economic and foreign policies.While few question Kim’s grip on power, there is still room for things to get worse, especially if the world fails to find a quick way out of the Covid-19 crisis.That would prolong North Korea’s self-imposed lockdown and could possibly set…
Drug crackdowns in Southeast Asia surge as illicit trade booms despite Covid-19
Drug traffickers in Southeast Asia are among a select group of workers unworried about job losses, with the illicit trade booming even as the coronavirus pandemic has disrupted supply chains worldwide.“Drug trafficking has continued at high volumes in Southeast Asia despite Covid-19, particularly in the lower Mekong, where methamphetamine production has surged and prices per kilo and on the street have dropped again,” said Jeremy Douglas, regional United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime…
Japan eyes China, US, Hong Kong markets in bid to beef up farm exports
Japan has drawn up an action plan to achieve its goal of boosting farm exports to 2 trillion yen (US$19 billion) by 2025, aiming to make products such as “Wagyu” beef and sake more competitive in the global market.The action plan designates 27 key agricultural, fishery and forestry items, also including apples and other fruit as well as seafood such as yellowtail and scallops, and sets export targets to be achieved by that year.It identifies specific markets where demand for the key items is…
Coronavirus: Thailand sees two new clusters, Philippines extends ban on UK flights
Thailand on Saturday said it had identified two new coronavirus clusters that appear to be linked to a major outbreak discovered a week earlier among migrant workers in a seafood centre near Bangkok.The new cases were found in 19 members of a motorcycling club who held a holiday gathering on Lanta island in the southern province of Krabi, and in nine people who were in a gambling den in the eastern province of Rayong, said the Disease Control Department.Thailand mulls lockdown as Covid-19 surge…
‘Failed Christmas gift’: New Zealanders flock online to get rid of disappointing presents
It may be the thought that counts, but still thousands of New Zealanders on Saturday hoped one person’s underwhelming Christmas gift would be another’s bargain find.By 8am on Boxing Day, more than 4,400 presents that had apparently missed the mark had been listed on the Trade Me website, including a Mazda car in the “wrong colour” and a pair of Apple Airpods Pro from a parent whose daughter preferred to have just the regular version.“Failed Christmas gift! Box opened, but not even put in ears,”…