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Now on BBC News all the latest business news live from Singapore. | :00:00. | :00:14. | |
behind the devastating fires this year. | :00:15. | :00:27. | |
Betting big. Asia's casino giants are spending billions on new | :00:28. | :00:30. | |
resorts, but is there enough business to go around? | :00:31. | :00:35. | |
The thick haze blanketing parts of South East Asia for months was | :00:36. | :00:49. | |
caused by forest fires, like this one in Indonesia, started | :00:50. | :00:55. | |
deliberately to clear land. Palm oil pulp and paper companies were widely | :00:56. | :00:59. | |
blamed, but until now none had been held to account. Now the Indonesian | :01:00. | :01:04. | |
government says 56 companies are being punished. | :01:05. | :01:10. | |
Yesterday they released the initials and general locations of these | :01:11. | :01:16. | |
companies. The forestry ministry, when she was pushed by journalists, | :01:17. | :01:20. | |
said she didn't feel comfortable widely releasing the name, but | :01:21. | :01:24. | |
insisted the Indonesian government had nothing to hide and that over | :01:25. | :01:28. | |
the period of their investigation and as these companies are punished | :01:29. | :01:32. | |
in various criminal and administrative ways their names | :01:33. | :01:37. | |
would be released to the public. Who are these companies? Amongst | :01:38. | :01:41. | |
them there aren't too many recognisable faces and only really | :01:42. | :01:47. | |
one that was foreign-owned. That's right. Yesterday they said of | :01:48. | :01:50. | |
the company is one was foreign-owned, a Chinese owned | :01:51. | :01:55. | |
company. The other companies, the three we already know, are having | :01:56. | :01:58. | |
their licences revoked for their role in the fires. One of them is a | :01:59. | :02:07. | |
supplier for the Asian paper company. These companies are | :02:08. | :02:13. | |
suppliers for larger companies, but, as you say, an recognisable names. A | :02:14. | :02:19. | |
lot of the companies are also Palm oil plantations. One of the | :02:20. | :02:24. | |
companies is also a member of the palm oil associations here in | :02:25. | :02:27. | |
Indonesia, which is a powerful lobby body. That associations has said it | :02:28. | :02:32. | |
will now expel that member. Is there a sense that what the | :02:33. | :02:37. | |
government is doing now will make any difference at all when | :02:38. | :02:43. | |
fires inevitably start again next year? The president himself has told | :02:44. | :02:45. | |
the BBC that it will take three years to fix this problem. | :02:46. | :02:50. | |
Forestry experts and environmentalists say they are | :02:51. | :02:54. | |
encouraged by these announcements, especially the fact that they are | :02:55. | :03:00. | |
revoking a licence. -- licenses. This hasn't happened in previous | :03:01. | :03:03. | |
years and there is a sense that this sort of punishment could have some | :03:04. | :03:09. | |
effect. But there is also widespread hopelessness in the government and | :03:10. | :03:13. | |
yesterday a senior security minister, when I asked him about it, | :03:14. | :03:17. | |
said the Indonesian government could not promise that the fires and haze | :03:18. | :03:22. | |
would not happen again next year, because he said the fires were an | :03:23. | :03:29. | |
entrenched part of Indonesia by. -- life. Of course the haze in | :03:30. | :03:35. | |
Indonesia is one of the many issues south-east Asian nations have failed | :03:36. | :03:36. | |
to tackle, but at the end of this month it will form a new economic | :03:37. | :03:45. | |
community. It will be the world's third largest trading bloc, but will | :03:46. | :03:50. | |
it be effective? I spoke to the head of international trade and | :03:51. | :03:55. | |
development and asked if the new economic community would help or | :03:56. | :04:00. | |
hinder trade. We need corporations to deal with the spillover of | :04:01. | :04:06. | |
actions of governments. That's exactly why frameworks matter. So | :04:07. | :04:11. | |
that Asian economic communities should move to something that's more | :04:12. | :04:18. | |
forceful, that should become agreements that have the force of | :04:19. | :04:22. | |
law. In the case of Hades, the environmental consequence of it, | :04:23. | :04:32. | |
these have social issues. -- haze. All of these could be addressed | :04:33. | :04:37. | |
through the frameworks. Research suggests that even though small and | :04:38. | :04:41. | |
medium enterprises make up a huge chunk of South East Asia's economy, | :04:42. | :04:46. | |
the AEC won't actually benefit it that much. 90% of all enterprises | :04:47. | :04:52. | |
are small, medium enterprises and they actually provide most of the | :04:53. | :04:57. | |
private sector employment in any economy in the world. In the case of | :04:58. | :05:03. | |
AEC, one of the problems is that the very basic issues of connectivity | :05:04. | :05:08. | |
for instance are not really at the level of realisation that they | :05:09. | :05:13. | |
should be. Well, the AEC is being formed just as the region's largest | :05:14. | :05:19. | |
economy starts to slow down. China is restructuring and that's going to | :05:20. | :05:22. | |
affect how its economy grows going forward. How might that in practice | :05:23. | :05:27. | |
the region? I think there are many opportunities that come with this. | :05:28. | :05:34. | |
-- So there are structural reasons behind it, not least that some of | :05:35. | :05:39. | |
the competent evenness of the Chinese economy is being lost | :05:40. | :05:43. | |
because of a natural development. They have now higher wages, which | :05:44. | :05:49. | |
means that supply chains... Before they used ASEAN for the components | :05:50. | :05:56. | |
of some groups and now they will relocate to Asian countries. There | :05:57. | :05:59. | |
are opportunities that come with it, but also there is a great deal of | :06:00. | :06:04. | |
investment that is looking for would opportunities. Many of them come | :06:05. | :06:12. | |
from China itself. The slowdown in growth in China does not mean that | :06:13. | :06:18. | |
we have an end, if you like, both to the demand of goods from ASEAN as | :06:19. | :06:28. | |
well as the great dynamics of the foreign direct investment from | :06:29. | :06:31. | |
China. In other business news, oil prices | :06:32. | :06:36. | |
have fallen to levels not seen in more than a decade, surpassing even | :06:37. | :06:40. | |
the losers seen during the recession of 2008. Brent crude sank before | :06:41. | :06:48. | |
recovering slightly. The global oil supply has driven down prices of | :06:49. | :06:50. | |
oil. Shares of Toshiba are falling again | :06:51. | :07:00. | |
by nearly 6% this morning, after its dramatic restructuring | :07:01. | :07:04. | |
announcement. On Monday the firm said it would cut nearly 7000 jobs | :07:05. | :07:09. | |
in its consumer electronics business, still a TV manufacturing | :07:10. | :07:13. | |
plant in Indonesia and that it expects record losses of $4.5 | :07:14. | :07:18. | |
billion in the financial year. Shares fell more than 10% ahead of | :07:19. | :07:23. | |
that announcement yesterday. The Australian billionaire James | :07:24. | :07:28. | |
Packer has quit the board of casino group Crown Resorts, just four | :07:29. | :07:31. | |
months after stepping down as chairman. He owns more than 50% of | :07:32. | :07:39. | |
Crown and said he plans to focus on developing new projects in Sydney, | :07:40. | :07:43. | |
Melbourne and Las Vegas. The company has faced 18 straight months of | :07:44. | :07:47. | |
falling revenues into Chinese territory of Macau, which is the | :07:48. | :07:53. | |
world's biggest gambling hub. It used to rake in more than seven | :07:54. | :07:58. | |
times the Las Vegas strip each year, but it has been struggling recently | :07:59. | :08:01. | |
and facing a growing number of rivals in the | :08:02. | :08:05. | |
to cash in on the Asian appetite for gambling. This report from Manila in | :08:06. | :08:11. | |
the Philippines. For decades money has been rolling | :08:12. | :08:17. | |
into Macau. It has had a near monopoly on the Asian gaming market, | :08:18. | :08:20. | |
but the wheel of Fortune appears to have turned. China's slowing economy | :08:21. | :08:27. | |
and the crackdown on corruption has scared off mainland gamblers, | :08:28. | :08:32. | |
causing casino revenues to plunge. Other countries, like the | :08:33. | :08:35. | |
Philippines, are having to reassess their bets on the gaming industry. | :08:36. | :08:40. | |
This is a second -- the second of four resorts being built in Manila. | :08:41. | :08:45. | |
They comprise of hotels, luxury shop, entertainment and big casinos | :08:46. | :08:50. | |
like this. -- luxury shops. The Philippine government hopes to build | :08:51. | :08:54. | |
an entertainment hub, similar to the Las Vegas strip. They hope to bring | :08:55. | :08:58. | |
in more tourists as well as billions of | :08:59. | :09:05. | |
Singapore, Macau and the Philippines hopes to get a slice of that market. | :09:06. | :09:13. | |
What competition is stiff. Australia, Cambodia and even Saipan | :09:14. | :09:17. | |
have casinos. Japan, South Korea and Vietnam may also legalise casino | :09:18. | :09:22. | |
gambling for local citizens. But analysts say attracting rich | :09:23. | :09:24. | |
gamblers to the tables will be tough. Basically the Chinese | :09:25. | :09:32. | |
highroller players are affected by the antigambling corruption | :09:33. | :09:40. | |
crackdown. Despite these headwinds short term, long-term casinos are | :09:41. | :09:46. | |
facing rising organisation, the rise in Commonwealth. That's why Asia's | :09:47. | :09:53. | |
biggest casino companies are spending nearly $30 billion on new | :09:54. | :09:59. | |
building projects across the region. But, given the current climate, it | :10:00. | :10:02. | |
makes sense for them to hedge their bets. Any are now chasing tourists | :10:03. | :10:07. | |
to offset the loss of wealthy Chinese gamblers. | :10:08. | :10:13. | |
much flat this morning and that's before we go. | :10:14. | :10:19. | |
much flat this morning and that's really due to low volumes ahead the | :10:20. | :10:23. | |
Christmas season coming up this week. And of course we've also got | :10:24. | :10:27. | |
the price of Brent crude falling to 11 year lows, which affects | :10:28. | :10:31. | |
sentiment somewhat. That's it for this edition of Asia Business | :10:32. | :10:32. | |
Report. Thanks for watching. The top stories this hour: The | :10:33. | :10:45. | |
prominent Chinese human rights | :10:46. | :10:51. |