Bloomberg Nestle SA is increasing checks on the coffee it buys, after recent tests showed beans from some countries had levels of the weedkiller glyphosate that are close to a regulatory limit. The world’s largest coffee roaster has informed suppliers of Indonesian and certain Brazilian beans of the new procedures, which go into effect starting from October 1, according to ...
Read More »Apple hires AstraZeneca CIO David Smoley
Bloomberg Apple Inc has hired David Smoley, chief information officer (CIO) of pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca Plc, for a vice president role. Smoley joined the Cupertino, California-based technology giant this month after six years at the UK-based drugmaker. At Apple, he will work in a similar information technology role and won’t be focused on Apple’s growing healthcare efforts. He is reporting ...
Read More »JLR to close plants for a week as Brexit safeguard
Bloomberg Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) plans to close its UK factories for a week in November to guard against disruption to supply chains from a possible no-deal Brexit, Chief Executive Officer Ralf Speth said. The shutdown will go ahead whether or not Britain seeks an extension to the October 31 deadline for leaving the European Union, he said at a ...
Read More »Globalisation cut inequality between rich, poor nations
Up through the 1980s, the blessings of the Industrial Revolution seemed largely confined to a handful of countries in Western Europe, East Asia, the US, Australia and Canada. But in the past three decades, there has been a sea change, and developing countries have made great strides in catching up. Although inequality has risen within some nations, at the global ...
Read More »Thomas Cook: Holiday from hell
As the operation to fly home stranded Thomas Cook Group Plc passengers begins — and the blame game gets going over why the 178-year-old travel agent collapsed — another parallel process is underway: Seeing what can be salvaged from the ruins. Even before the company entered liquidation, there was never going to be much left for shareholders. They would probably ...
Read More »Small diet changes have big climate effects
Global meat consumption has more than doubled since the 1960s, and meat production is set to double again by 2050. In one way, that’s a good thing — proof that rising incomes are supporting higher living standards in developing countries. But Americans, famous for enjoying too much of a good thing, still eat three times as much meat as the ...
Read More »UK PM Boris Johnson’s Brexit gamble is failing
As UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson sat at the United Nations in New York, his political strategy was collapsing at home. Last week, Britain’s Supreme Court shot down Johnson’s decision last month to suspend Parliament. It was an unequivocal rebuke: All 11 justices concurred that Johnson’s plan was “unlawful, void and of no effect†and rejected each of the government’s ...
Read More »Putin is finally worried about climate change
After years of procrastination, Russia, the world’s fourth-biggest greenhouse gas emitter, has officially joined the Paris climate agreement, which it signed in 2016. It shows that President Vladimir Putin’s views of climate change are evolving and he wants his government to do more. Putin was never a fully-fledged climate change denier. Rather, he once didn’t take it seriously enough. Addressing ...
Read More »Aston Martin’s pricey insurance policy
The maker of Aston Martin sports cars is buying what it calls an insurance policy against the risk it runs out of cash before the most critical product launch in its 106-year history. The terms of a new $250 million debt package show just how limited the UK company’s options for securing funds are as it seeks to challenge Bentley ...
Read More »This dirty word is driving economic change in Japan
Workers born outside Japan are playing an increasingly important role in the world’s third-largest economy. Just don’t call it immigration. The country is often said to pride itself on homogeneity and an aversion to outsiders. But as Japan’s population declines and ages, employers are becoming aware of their constraints. The number of employees from overseas has more than doubled since ...
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