15/09/2016 Asia Business Report

Indonesia becomes the first country to guarantee their timber products

come only from legal sources. And how one woman turned her passion for

shopping and travel into dollars and cents.

Good morning, Asia and hello, world. It's a Thursday and guide you could

join us for this edition of Asia Business Report, I'm Rico Hizon and

we start in Indonesia is set to in the world to export illegally

verified timber products to the European Union -- glad you. It will

mean European consumers will be able to buy Indonesian furniture and

paper knowing it doesn't come from illegal logging. We have a report

from Jakarta. Indonesia has some of the world's

oldest forests, home to unique and endangered animals. It also has one

of the world's fastest rates of deforestation. Now Indonesia and the

European Union have finalised a deal aimed at ending the illegal trade.

The agreement means EU companies will only be able to import timber

certified as coming from legal and sustainable sources. TRANSLATION: We

wanted a system that will stop the timber getting into the hands of the

buyers. The products are proved illegal and the other countries are

not. We have a competitive advantage.

Indonesia has set up a verification system where it claims to trace the

timber source back through the whole supply chain. The fact the EU has

now endorsed that system as credible is welcome news for timber exported

as a. We, as the traders, the exporters,

and the exporters and buyers, we don't have to convince them that we

sell legal woods because it is already accepted by your government

-- timber exporters. But environmentalists are one in the

verification system remains open to corruption. TRANSLATION: I don't

think we can say that it will stop the illegal deforestation because

even if it is technically legal it doesn't mean the license was given

objectivity and correctly, a verification system that makes

consumers feel safe and good about buying will increase demand for

Indonesian timber and that will be a catalyst for new deforestation.

We know that the system is not 100% perfect. That is the best we can

have at the moment. And any loopholes or problems that will be

found, concrete cases... If the corrections have to be made in the

system, this will be done regularly. 14 other countries are in

negotiations with the EU to reach a similar deal.

Creditors have started to offload some of the stock of troubled Korean

shipping Linehan Jim. Three bulk carriers used for carrying

commodities like iron ore, coal and framework sold for a total of $39

million -- coal and other materials. -- and Jim. You can find the latest

on this story on the website. The story won't go away despite

Malaysia's efforts to make it disappear. For months the

investigation into one MVV has made headlines, many of them on the Wall

Street Journal. -- 1MDB. This week the two-minute occasions minister

hit back calling the newspaper's coverage accessible and arrogant. --

communications minister. The single most important role for

any news organisation is to hold the powerful accountable and to answer

questions people have too find out when people have been potentially

misusing funds or misusing their position. We have been doing this,

there are law enforcement investigations as a result of our

reporting and the other information that has come out about 1MDB -- have

two. We have done our public duty of telling people what has been going

on. What are you say to the Malaysian government who calls your

coverage desperate and aggressive and you have taken sides as a

political campaigner, they are throwing the kitchen sink at you. We

haven't taken any sides, our mission is to find the facts and tell the

truth, there is a lot of money involved and allegations of

wrongdoing and we have been able to uncover where this money went

through hard reporting in difficult circumstances. It's important. It's

about the way in which an important government in this region has used

money and we have exposed a lot of the facts and a lot of people didn't

want to come to light and that is what good journalism does. Indeed.

But a lot of critics are saying the Wall Street journey is publishing

more stories than any other publication in a show or around the

world. -- Wall Street Journal. What is really your impetus in this story

and why are you keeping up the pressure? -- in Asia. It's important

to find out how public officials use their position and it's important

that we, as we would in any other country, and we have done stories

about this in the United States where we are based, and Europe and

elsewhere in the world, 1MDB is a very important story for the people

of Malaysia, Asia more generally and people everywhere to know when that

kind of money is being appropriated in ways that clearly law enforcement

around the world doesn't think is necessarily right and it is

important for us to investigate and explore and reveal what we know.

Gerard Baker of the Wall Street Journal. Watch sales keep on digging

through weaker global command and China's crackdown on corruption and

those factors being blamed for plunging earnings this week. Luxury

brands are taking a hit and sales have fallen for Richmond, the parent

company of Cartier Mont blanc. Earlier I spoke with a watch vision

are dope, editor of a blog. Definitely sales are slowing down in

Asia. North Asia is driven by China, Southeast Asia is struggling because

the economy isn't as good, commodity prices are down, Indonesia isn't

doing as well as it was so this all contributes to the lack of demand

for luxury watches. What about demand from China, is the crackdown

on corruption a major issue? Or is this the economic slowdown? It is

both, the demand for luxury watches is tied to the crackdown on

corruption. A study in Beijing four years ago showed there was a

correlation between the transfer of power in China and imports of luxury

watches. There's a correlation between the two. Are they

diversifying away from the watch market to make up for the shortfall

in watch sales? No. The specialist watchmakers are still only focusing

on watches. Those luxury brands that are big in watches but also do other

things, they are focusing on the other product lines like Cartier,

focusing on jewellery because they are doing better than watches. You

don't expect a rebound any time soon? Certainly not, at least two,

maybe three years before things turn around.

Most people who enjoy travel and shopping know how expensive these

habits can be, but once Singapore entrepreneur has taken her to macro

love Stanton them into an online business. Her website helps guide

people to the best local shopping horns at home or on holiday. She

told us about her start-up success. -- her two loves.

It is dedicated to local designers and retailers online so we bring

together the community of shoppers and local retailers and giving them

a space online to come together. People want better experiences when

they are travelling, they want more local experiences when they are

travelling, so a platform like this helps them have those experiences.

We tell them where to go and what to buy when they are there. Launching a

start-up in Southeast Asia has been quite an easy journey. It's a really

forgiving market. In the first steps of setting up the website it was a

personal approach and me personally walking the streets and selecting

the stores. Then all of a sudden they started to come to us. Hannah

then we started to add new destinations. We Ben reached nine

destinations in Asia and we expanded them into the US and San Francisco

and all of California -- then. Some of the key challenges that are faced

in setting up a start-up is firstly pulling together the right team. The

second challenge has really been to scale the business and accelerate

the traction and our biggest setback has probably been technology and

getting the technology right. When you're a founder that is not a

technical founder, you're really relying on the technical team to get

it right. Our growth has been around 30% year-on-year but in the last

year we have more than doubled. The next 12 months will be a great year.

We've got 15 cities to work off as a foundation and we will be expanding

into many others in the next year, and also pushing out a lot of

technology to help us reach more shoppers and also more businesses.

A shopaholic's website. Before we go a quick look at the markets and as

you can see, all in negative territory at this hour. The Nikkei

225 down by a century and the All Ordinaries giving back 19 points due

to a mixed trading day on Wall Street. Thank you so much for

investing your time with us. I'm Rico Hizon. Sport Today is coming up

next. Typhoon Meranti makes landfall in

China after battering Taiwan were more than half a million people have

been left without