Bloomberg Rice is fast becoming West Africa’s preferred food. After four decades of importing the staple, the region now aims to grow enough rice to meet domestic demand. Rice harvests in West Africa will probably reach an all-time high of 14.9 million metric tons this year, up from 14.6 million tons last year, when Senegal and Ghana produced record ...

  Tehran / Bloomberg Iran is preparing to unveil a historic agreement for Boeing Co. jetliners within days that could be valued at about $25 billion. The transaction would be the first struck by the planemaker since sanctions were lifted in January and would require US government approval. An order listed at $27 billion announced by Europe’s Airbus Group SE ...

  Seoul / Bloomberg Lotte Group, South Korea’s fifth-largest family-run conglomerate, has shelved plans to list its Malaysian petrochemicals business amid widening investigations at the parent, people familiar with the matter said. The group will postpone the planned share sale of Lotte Chemical Titan Holding Sdn. until after the probes are resolved, according to the people, who asked not to ...

  Port Louis / Bloomberg National carrier Air Mauritius will take delivery of a new plane this month and another next year, additions that will boost the reach of its fleet of 12 jets, Chairman Arjoon Suddhoo said. Founded in 1967, Air Mauritius currently operates a fleet of four Airbus Group SE A340-300C, two A340-300E, a pair of A330-200, two ...

  MADRID / AP Spanish clothes retailer Inditex, owner of the Zara store chain, posted Wednesday a 6.0-percent rise in its first-quarter net profit due to higher sales around the globe. The world’s largest fashion retailer by sales said profit for the quarter ending April 30 rose to 554 million euros ($621 million) from 521 million euros a year earlier. ...

  Shanghai / Bloomberg Walt Disney Co. has hosted over 600,000 visitors at its first theme park in mainland China since trial operations started early May, and its “enormous potential” has already prompted Disney to expand the resort, said Chief Executive Officer Robert Iger. “After we broke ground we paused to really recognize the growth of China’s tourism and Shanghai ...

  Bloomberg U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne warned that leaving the European Union could spark a fiscal crisis, as “Remain” supporters battle to turn around a referendum campaign that’s slipping away from them. Reduced trade and investment would leave a 30 billion pound ($42 billion) “black hole” that would have to be plugged by increased taxes and cuts ...

  Bloomberg If the U.K. votes to leave the European Union next week, it may not bode well for the 28-nation bloc’s oldest natural gas market. A so-called ‘ Brexit’ would probably cause the pound to plunge to its lowest in 30 years, according to economists surveyed by Bloomberg. That would make gas in the U.K. cheaper and temporarily boost ...

  Bloomberg Schneider Electric SE’s second attempt to buy a majority stake in U.K. software maker Aveva Group Plc proved short-lived after negotiations between the two companies ended just two days after they became public. “Following the termination of the preliminary discussions,” Cambridge-based Aveva said on Wednesday in a short statement that it had applied for its shares to begin ...

  Bloomberg The U.K. labor market showed signs of resilience in the face of the referendum on European Union membership as unemployment unexpectedly fell and wage growth accelerated. The jobless rate declined to 5 percent in the three months through April, the lowest since 2005, the Office for National Statistics in London said on Wednesday. Economists in a Bloomberg survey ...