20/03/2012 World Business Report

Those are the main news headlines. Let's now you-to-date you in all

the stories in business. It's over Hello. Thanks for joining us here

on World Business Report. I am Sara Coburn. The Italian Prime Minister

attempts to reconcile employers and trade unions as he fights to

maintain momentum on his labour reforms.

I'm Rico Hizon in Singapore. China hikes the price of fuel for the

second time in a month as it struggles with the rising cost of

crude in the international market. And advertising in a connected

world - how one sector tells us a lot about the state of the global

Now, the Italian Prime Minister will make a last-ditch attempt to

reconcile employers and trade unions on Tuesday, as he fights to

maintain momentum on his labour market reforms. Mario Monti will

meet with union representatives in the hope of persuading them to back

his project by the end of the week. Since he came to power in November,

the Prime Minister has insisted the reforms are a crucial priority for

the government. But the main employers' lobby that is threatened

not to sign a deal if he gives too much ground to the unions. Let's

get more on this. Vaginaing us now from Rome is John Wyse from the

School of Economics in Italy. Thanks for joining us. First of all,

how big a challenge do you think it is going to be for Mario Monti to

get these two sides to agree? it is definitely gonna be a big

challenge for him. The question is not so much if it's a big challenge,

but if he's gonna be able to pull it off. And, uh, although the, uh,

the discussions were quite negative, the positions of the unions were

negative in terms of going ahead with the agreements, it seems that

there should be some last-minute efforts and should be some efforts

on the part of the President of Italy, to try to convince the

unions to go ahead and eventually sign off on this deal. So I think

that I wouldn't be - I am confident that the things are gonna be worked

out in the end. And, uh, that we're gonna find a way out of this crisis.

Mario Monti has made it very clear that he is determined to press

ahead with these reforms with or without the backing of the unions.

But if he were to do that, without the unions agreeing, how

sustainable would that be? Well, it is not gonna be that sustainable,

because although he is getting the support from the majority, meaning

the three major parties that are backing him you, he is gonna find a

lot of hurdles along the way. And, uh, probably there's gonna be a

Apology for the loss of subtitles for 72 seconds

Rico, we were gonna talk about petrol prices in China today. It

looks like we're gonna see a big rise there. There's a worry about

what that might mean for inflation? That's right. Sara, it is the

biggest increase in close to three years in China. And the second hike

in a month. The price of petrol has been raised by about 6%. And diesel

7%. There is pressure on authorities to make the move

because global oil prices have been high because of tensions with its

key supplier, Iran. This also basically ensures the fuel supplies

and to help local refining companies cut their heavy losses.

Economy - this is also a sign that the mainland government is less

concerned now about rising prices for inflation, because this was a

concern you until early this year, Sara, as rising prices had been a

problem on the mainland since the global financial crisis led

authorities to introduce stimulus packages four years ago. Consumer

prices, July of last year, 6.5%. It has now eased to about 3.4% in

February, compared with eurozone levels, which are still below the

government's targets of 4%. And under the country's fuel-pricing

system, the method of prices can be adjusted when international crude

changes by more than 4% over a period of 22 days. According to

analysts, we could still see more price rises on the mainland going

forward. Farah. Thank you very much, Eureka, from Singapore. Let me

update you on other headlines. The Australian Senate has pushed

through into law a 30% tax obiron ore and coalmine -- on iron ore and

coalmining companies. It will affect BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto and

Xstrata. It's to use the benefits from the recent boom in natural

resources. It comes into effect on the 1st of July. John Carter is now

officially a flop of galactic proportions. Disney expects to book

a loss of $200 million on the movie in the quarter through to March.

That's one of Hollywood's biggest ever money users. The production

costs are estimated to be around $250 million. $100 million more was

spent on marketing. The film is based on a series of books written

by the Tarzan creator, Edgar Rice Now, the global advertising giant,

M&C Saatchi, will reveal its full- year results later today.

Traditional advertising channels are feeling the impact of the

increase in digital ad campaigns. In fact, global digital advertising

spend is set to outstrip newspapers anticipate print revenues for the

first time next year. So it's no surprise then that M&C Saatchi is

targeting growth through social media and also through the Asian

market. This is just one particular execution. There's two others

here... The advertising world may be coming out of the doldrums, but

it's facing a very different environment than it's been used to.

M&C Saatchi and many others like it believe devices such as tablets and

mobile phones are set to drive advertising further into the

digital world. As our lives become more hectic, more of us are turning

to social networks to not only manage our professional lives but

our personal ones too. And the big brands are set to spend a lot of

money on digital platforms across the next two years. In fact,

industry spend is expected to double.

Digital marketing is set to grow due to the personalised message

companies can get across to the consumer. Industry experts say

advertising expenditure for online marketing may increase as much as

25% of the total piefplt and with nearly half the -- pie. And with

nearly half the Asian population enjoying increasing access to

platforms and search engines, it's no wonder eyes are on China.

think consumer behaviour is different in China. They spend

twice as much time online as in the US. That's driven - spend that's

driven consumer markets and also confidence as well is higher there

than I think perhaps in Europe. Companies are seeing that they are

investing, the ad market in China is going to grow by $70 million

over the next three years. It's going to overtake Japan as the

second-biggest market when it comes to advertising over the next three

years. I think it's driven. You know, it's a relatively new market

for advertising, so it's a very big area for expansion. Time-wise,

advertising was relatively simple. Buy print space and air time,

create a spot and target a captive audience. Today it's very different

and ad firms have to cater for those passive viewers who still

exist, alongside the ever-changing consumer, who can ignore ads at the

touch of a button, or can engage with them so much that they pass