Bamboo Innovator

In Japan, traditionally a land of subtle smells, Scented Fabric Softeners Wrinkle Some Noses

In Japan, Scented Fabric Softeners Wrinkle Some Noses

Boom in Strong Fragrances Has Raised a Stink

MAYUMI NEGISHI and PHRED DVORAK

Updated Dec. 13, 2013 5:15 a.m. ET

TOKYO—Japan’s environment ministry came up with a novel suggestion earlier this year for women sweating out the summer in hot, energy-scrimping offices. “Combat body odor,” the ministry suggested in a tip-filled Web page touting its turn-up-the-thermostat campaign, “by using scented fabric softener.” In the fragrance-happy U.S., that would have been just so much background scent, but in Japan—traditionally a land of subtle smells—it raised quite a stink. Call it the war of the noses. Read more of this post

Abe Breaks Micro-Farms to End Japan Agriculture Slide: Economy

Abe Breaks Micro-Farms to End Japan Agriculture Slide: Economy

Takashi Nakajima earns $100,000 a year growing lettuces, employs Chinese laborers to harvest them, and has four months off in winter to indulge his passion for speed skating. He’s the result of a protected farming system that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is about to dismantle. Read more of this post

Reimagining India: Google’s executive chairman expresses optimism about India’s technology sector but urges companies to prioritize domestic excellence over global dominance

Reimagining India: A conversation with Eric Schmidt

Google’s executive chairman expresses optimism about India’s technology sector but urges companies to prioritize domestic excellence over global dominance.

December 2013

Google openedInterview transcript its first office in India almost a decade ago, and executive chairman Eric Schmidt has since watched the country’s technology sector expand rapidly. In this video interview, Schmidt is optimistic about the role technology can continue to play in India’s development but warns that the regulatory environment must keep improving. This interview was conducted by James Manyika, a director in McKinsey’s San Francisco office, and what follows is an edited transcript of Eric Schmidt’s remarks. Read more of this post

Reimagining India: The global CEO of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide discusses the difficulties in simultaneously promoting India as exotic and amazing to tourists, while assuring foreign investors of the country’s stability and potential

Reimagining India: A conversation with Christopher Graves

The global CEO of Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide discusses the difficulties in simultaneously promoting India as exotic and amazing to tourists, while assuring foreign investors of the country’s stability and potential.

December 2013

Launched in 2002, Ogilvy & Mather’s “Incredible !ndia” marketing campaign—with its now-iconic exclamation mark—increased the size of the country’s tourism industry more than fivefold in barely a decade. Yet as Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide global CEO Christopher Graves explains in this video interview, foreign and portfolio investors aren’t looking for “incredible”; they want a stable and reliable investment climate. What follows is an edited transcript of Graves’s remarks. Read more of this post

Reimagining India: MIT Sloan School of Management professor Yasheng Huang warns of the dangers of India’s reliance on the IT sector for economic growth, calling for regulatory reforms and greater investment in basic services

Reimagining India: A conversation with Yasheng Huang

MIT Sloan School of Management professor Yasheng Huang warns of the dangers of India’s reliance on the IT sector for economic growth, calling for regulatory reforms and greater investment in basic services.

November 2013

Needed reforms

Leapfrogging wisely

India is known globally for the rise of its information-technology and software industry. Yet in this video interview, Yasheng Huang, a professor of global economics and management at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and essayist from Reimagining India: Unlocking the Potential of Asia’s Next Superpower(Simon & Schuster, November 2013), warns the country against becoming too dependent on those sectors. He argues India’s potential will only be realized if the country develops its manufacturing and services sectors, which requires labor-market reforms and significant investments in both education and social services. Without those, India will not only face growing social inequality but could also jeopardize its pipeline of college-ready students critical to the high-tech industry. What follows is an edited transcript of his remarks. Read more of this post

Rajan Faces India Rate Quandary as CPI Tops 11% Amid Growth Woes

Rajan Faces India Rate Quandary as CPI Tops 11% Amid Growth Woes

India’s consumer-price inflation exceeded 11 percent last month, adding pressure on central bank Governor Raghuram Rajan to raise interest rates again next week even as industrial output slid more than expected. Consumer prices rose a more-than-estimated 11.24 percent in November from a year earlier, official data yesterday showed. Most economists in a Bloomberg News survey predict Rajan will hold the benchmark interest rate at 7.75 percent in a policy decision due Dec. 18, after raising it 50 basis points since he took over the Reserve Bank of India in September. Read more of this post

Narendra Modi could be India’s Shinzo Abe

Narendra Modi could be India’s Shinzo Abe

Tue, Dec 10 2013

(The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own)

By Andy Mukherjee

SINGAPORE, Dec 10 (Reuters Breakingviews) – Narendra Modi could be India’s Shinzo Abe. If the recent state polls are any indicator of the electorate’s mood, the opposition politician will be prime minister of the world’s largest democracy by May next year. Just like his Japanese counterpart, Modi would oversee higher asset prices and revive growth, but struggle with structural reforms. Read more of this post

India toughens insider trading rules

India toughens insider trading rules

Wed, Dec 11 2013

By Himank Sharma

MUMBAI (Reuters) – India’s financial market regulator unveiled new proposals on Wednesday, broadening the scope of who can be held liable for insider trading violations, as it steps up its fight against securities fraud. The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) plans to include company employees, directors and their immediate relatives and other stakeholders such as founders, handling market sensitive information under its purview. Read more of this post

India Readies Big Move Into Solar Energy

India Readies Big Move Into Solar Energy

Proposed 4,000-Megawatt Plant in Rajasthan Would Power Homes in the Northwest

BIMAN MUKHERJI

Dec. 13, 2013 9:03 p.m. ET

SAMBHAR, India—Here on the shores of a salt-water lake in the desert state of Rajasthan, India hopes to build a solar-power station that eventually will dwarf the world’s largest such plants under construction today. Read more of this post

‘An Uncertain Glory’ by Jean Drèze and Amartya Sen | ‘Transforming India’ by Sumantra Bose

‘An Uncertain Glory’ by Jean Drèze and Amartya Sen | ‘Transforming India’ by Sumantra Bose

Indian reformers did not sell their liberal reforms to the people, who concluded the free market helps the rich alone.

GURCHARAN DAS

Dec. 13, 2013 5:44 p.m. ET

Two and a half years ago India was the envy of the world. It had survived the global financial crisis, and its economy was growing at a rate of 9% a year, creating masses of jobs and lifting millions out of poverty. This happy situation was the reward of free-market reforms that began in 1991. As government reduced the regulatory shackles on business, dozens of innovative firms emerged that competed brutally at home and began to succeed on the global stage. India’s governments after 1991 kept reforming, if slowly. Even slow reforms added up to make India the world’s second fastest-growing economy. Read more of this post

Americans Say Dream Fading as Income Gap Hurts Chances

Americans Say Dream Fading as Income Gap Hurts Chances

The widening gap between rich and poor is eroding faith in the American dream.

By almost two to one — 64 percent to 33 percent — Americans say the U.S. no longer offers everyone an equal chance to get ahead, according to a Bloomberg National Poll. And some say the government isn’t doing much to help. Read more of this post

Hong Kong’s cooling measures force real estate agents out of jobs

Hong Kong’s cooling measures force real estate agents out of jobs

HONG KONG — Ms Chu Kin Lan has already closed six out of 11 offices of her Hong Kong real estate agency, whose Chinese name translates as Precious Prosperity, and let go of half of her 70 employees amid the city’s toughest curbs on home buying in its history. But the worst pain may be still to come.

22 HOURS 51 MIN AGO

HONG KONG — Ms Chu Kin Lan has already closed six out of 11 offices of her Hong Kong real estate agency, whose Chinese name translates as Precious Prosperity, and let go of half of her 70 employees amid the city’s toughest curbs on home buying in its history. But the worst pain may be still to come. Read more of this post

Electrolux applies emerging market lessons to wider business

December 13, 2013 1:00 pm

Electrolux applies emerging market lessons to wider business

By Richard Milne in Stockholm

Christmas shoppers in Stockholm’s upmarket NK department store have a chance this year to show just how much of a dedicated foodie they are: Electrolux is selling a stand mixer for SKr15,900 ($2,400) there. Handmade in France, the mixer is a reflection of the Swedish appliance company’s presence in professional kitchens: Electrolux equipment is found in half of Europe’s Michelin-starred restaurants, according to chief executive Keith McLoughlin. Read more of this post

The Rise of the Resource Curse

The Rise of the Resource Curse

In many ways Mongolia is an outlier — an exotic tourist destination filled with windswept deserts, nomads and yurts. It might also be a vision of the world’s future. With a tiny $10 billion economy and less than 3 million people, Mongolia is fantastically resource-rich. And with borders touching China, Russia and Central Asia, the landlocked nation seems to have won a geographic lottery ticket. It doesn’t need to go far to find enthusiastic customers for its immense endowment of copper, gold and other minerals. Read more of this post

Commodity Tycoons Try, Try Again: Australia’s leading commodity tycoons are moving ahead with huge investments—in spite of their falling fortunes

Commodity Tycoons Try, Try Again

Australia’s leading commodity tycoons are moving ahead with huge investments—in spite of their falling fortunes

REBECCA THURLOW

Dec. 13, 2013 11:25 a.m. ET

THE BIGGEST COMMODITY bull-market run in a generation now appears to be over. But don’t try telling that to some of the world’s richest mining tycoons—at least not the ones in Australia.  Read more of this post

‘Chocfinger’ sells Amajero trading arm for price of a Mars bar; Ward’s Armajaro unit turns sour amid high costs

December 13, 2013 9:04 pm

‘Chocfinger’ sells trading arm for price of a Mars bar

By Emiko Terazono in London

Anthony Ward, the cocoa trader known as “Chocfinger” for a string of audacious deals in commodities markets, has been forced to sell his London-based cocoa, coffee and sugar trading business for just $1 – about the price of a Mars Bar. Mr Ward, who in 2010 shot to prominence for buying a large amount of cocoa stocks in a strategy that sent prices to a 33-year high, will receive less than 50 cents for his stake in Armajaro Trading, the company he helped create. Read more of this post

State Media Effort to Spin the ’5 Benefits’ of China’s Smog Falls Flat

Dec 10, 2013

State Media Effort to Spin the ’5 Benefits’ of China’s Smog Falls Flat

Increased instances of lung cancer. Respiratory problems. Asthma. Even ugly sperm. The list of noxious side effects China’s notorious pollution causes is well known – a point one Beijing newspaper felt compelled to make in a commentary following recent state-media efforts to spin the country’s smog. “It’s beyond one’s imagination to find ‘positive energy’ to unite the people in smog,” the Beijing Times said Tuesday (in Chinese). “But for some people, one way to show their existence is to treat a funeral as happy event and find pleasure in disasters.” Read more of this post

Tyson is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to build its own farms in China instead of buying chickens from independent farmers, aiming to capitalize on widespread concerns over food safety

Inside China’s Supersanitary Chicken Farms

Looking to Capitalize on Food-Safety Concerns, Tyson Shifts From Using Independent Breeders

DAVID KESMODEL and LAURIE BURKITT

Dec. 9, 2013 3:29 p.m. ET

HAIMEN, China—Nestled among tiny farms in this rural outpost outside Shanghai is a huge, supersanitary chicken farm—a bold bet by Tyson Foods Inc. TSN +0.62% that it can thrive in China by overhauling a decades-old business model. Read more of this post

Take Chinese creativity seriously – or lose out; To say China is a nation of copiers is only half-true

December 12, 2013 7:02 pm

Take Chinese creativity seriously – or lose out

By John Howkins

To say China is a nation of copiers is only half-true, writes John Howkins

Beijing and Shanghai are like New York and Chicago in the 1890s: excitable, rumbustious and slightly crazy. Fortunes are made and lost quickly. Local government officials are deeply involved in property and business. The families and companies that succeed become the new aristocracy. Read more of this post

Smog Darkens Shanghai’s Prospects for Becoming a Global Financial Center; The Recent Stretch of Filthy-Air Days Shocks Residents, Inspires Thoughts of Flight

Smog Darkens Shanghai’s Prospects for Becoming a Global Financial Center

The Recent Stretch of Filthy-Air Days Shocks Residents, Inspires Thoughts of Flight

WEI GU

Dec. 12, 2013 1:35 p.m. ET

In the debate over which matters more in China, money or quality of life, the quality-of-life side may have found the ultimate argument: If you can’t breathe, nothing else really matters. China’s pollution problem is spreading and growing worse, a fact on stark display last week in Shanghai, the country’s financial center. A stretch of filthy-air days in that coastal city so thoroughly shocked residents—who had largely escaped the smog that has long plagued the likes of Beijing and Harbin—that it inspired fresh talk about getting away from China. Read more of this post

In China, Western Companies Cut Jobs as Growth Ebbs; Recruiting and Consulting Firms Feel Squeeze From Pullbacks

In China, Western Companies Cut Jobs as Growth Ebbs

Recruiting and Consulting Firms Feel Squeeze From Pullbacks

CATHY CHU

Dec. 12, 2013 12:36 p.m. ET

HONG KONG—After years of rapid expansion in China, some Western companies are shedding jobs as the world’s second-largest economy grows at its lowest rate in more than 20 years. Read more of this post

In China, Foreign Firms Battle Locals for Top Workers

In China, Foreign Firms Battle Locals for Top Workers

As More Chinese Job Seekers Look to Domestic Firms, Foreign Players Ramp Up Perks

KATHY CHU

Dec. 12, 2013 1:04 p.m. ET

Chinese companies are looking increase their appeal to China’s job seekers by improving pay and benefits—and it’s working. Alan Pang of Aon Hewitt tells Kathy Chu why China’s job seekers increasingly prefer domestic employers to Western ones. Read more of this post

If You Can’t Beat the Shanghai Smog, Change the System

On Thursday, as the smog that has choked Shanghai for much of the last week reached hazardous levels, the city’s environmental authority took decisive action to address the frequent air-quality alerts: It adjusted standards downward to ensure that there won’t be so many.

It was a cynical move, surely made to protect the bureau’s image in the face of unrelenting pollution that only seems to grow worse, despite government promises to address it. At this advanced stage in China’s development, nobody in the country (or elsewhere) — not even the loyal state news media — seems to believe that the problem is solvable, at least not any time soon. Even worse, nobody — not the state and certainly not the growing number of middle-class consumers (and car buyers) — seems ready to take responsibility for the mess. Read more of this post

China Turns Over Corporate Audit Documents to U.S. Regulators

China Turns Over Corporate Audit Documents to U.S. Regulators

Move by Chinese Authorities Is Related to a Sweeping Probe of U.S.-traded Chinese Firms

MICHAEL RAPOPORT

Updated Dec. 13, 2013 1:06 p.m. ET

Chinese authorities have turned over more audit documents to U.S. regulators regarding U.S.-traded Chinese companies, audit firms disclosed in legal filings, part of a sweeping U.S. probe of suspected instances of accounting fraud. Audit documents regarding at least six Chinese companies trading on U.S. exchanges now have been either turned over to U.S. regulators or are “in the pipeline” to be furnished to the U.S., the audit firms said in filings in an administrative proceeding pending before the Securities and Exchange Commission. Read more of this post

China to judge local governments by their debt: Xinhua

China to judge local governments by their debt: Xinhua

Mon, Dec 9 2013

BEIJING (Reuters) – China will soon rate the performance of local governments partly by how much debt they incur, as Beijing tries to wean the country off heavy government investment, state media said. The central organization department, which oversees the appointment of senior party, government, military and state firm officials, said debt will be key when evaluating performances, according to the state news agency Xinhua. Read more of this post

China Drugmakers Face U.S. Scrutiny on Investigator Bump

China Drugmakers Face U.S. Scrutiny on Investigator Bump

U.S. regulators are more than tripling to 27 the number of workers they’ll have in China to inspect pharmaceutical plants and products, a move that may spur a wave of enforcement similar to what’s happening in India. An increased number of Food and Drug Administration investigators in India this year led to import bans against some generic drugs from Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd. (RBXY) and Wockhardt Ltd. (WPL) for failure to meet U.S. standards. The China expansion is the culmination of almost two years of negotiations with government officials, Christopher Hickey, director of the FDA’s China office, said in a telephone interview from Beijing. Read more of this post

China Decides to Expand OTC Stock Market Nationwide

China Decides to Expand OTC Stock Market Nationwide

Dec. 14, 2013 5:17 a.m. ET

SHANGHAI—China is opening up its over-the-counter stock market to numerous small businesses, offering a fresh funding channel to the companies, which are seen as vital to employment and economic growth. The State Council, or cabinet, said in a statement Saturday that the primary over-the-counter market is being opened to “qualified” companies around the country. Read more of this post