30/04/2012 World Business Report

just hours after the head of the UN observer team for Syria arrived in

Damascus. Sally is next with World Business Report. The headlines:

Bending the rules - EU members submit plans for cutting their

budget deficits next year. Many argue the 3% target is out of reach.

Spain's woes deepen as it double dips into recession. Another grim

statistic reveals the uphill battle it faces to get a grip on its

The Netherlands' struggle to reach a deficit deal did not meet their

deadline. With three eurozone countries already bailed out,

anxiety about the financial state of several member states remains

high. Brussels calls it convergence. States will show today how they

plan to come together and stabilise feature spending. It was a close

call for the Dutch. Previously in the financially strict count, the

Netherlands only just managed to agree on a national budget at the

11th hour. There Brown pledged to get better as it's down to 3% of

GDP. -- everyone pledged to get down their debt as it down. Spain

was given more budget wriggle room this year but its sovereign debt

crisis is worsening. European analysts say this Budget round will

be a difficult balance between austerity and growth spending. If

you look back to the last European semester there were far less

European countries under immediate pressure but now you have countries

like Spain, Italy, Belgium and others who are under much more

pressure than we have seen in the past and these pressures are felt

in the process of the European semester and they are being felts

also because other members are exerting stronger pressure on this

country's first in certain -- facing certain problems. It is

still jemmy leading the charge for budget reforms while Central and

southern Europe wants room to create investment Ford -- room for

The eurozone country that has made it clear it will not hit the 3% EU

debt target next series Spain. In a bid to tackle its mounting debts,

the eurozone's fourth largest economy has been forced to

implement sweeping austerity plans. -- next year is Spain. On Friday

official jobless figures showed a jump in unemployment to just over

24% with half of all under-25s out of work. Across Spain over the

weekend, tens of thousands took to the streets. They protested against

government reforms. This time there were not the numbers seen during

last month's general strike but public sector cuts and tax

increases are causing anger, in particular, the government's

additional 10 billion euros worth of savings and for public health

and education. TRANSLATION: We are here defending public health and

the education system because they want to destroy it for good but it

is funded with our tax money. It is ours and we have the right to fight

for it. TRANSLATION: The government will here ass. I do not even know

if they pay any attention to us at the moment but they will have to

pay attention to us and the only reaction is for us to show their is

some alternative. Our policy cannot be devalued like this. The effects

of austerity have not been fully felt. Spain's crisis and sky-high

unemployment mean more and more people rely on free food handouts.

This man, head of the Spanish Federation of food banks, say they

are helping nearly double the number of people they were five

years ago. With Spain now officially in recession, some

analysts fear that, with the government's program of austerity,

the economy will struggle to start growing again. TRANSLATION: This is

a difficult situation. We are at the edge of the precipice. Spain is

all t of all take Italy and then the fire

will be all over Europe. -- a huge economy. Authorities here are

preparing for more unrest. The government says it will be a hard

year but the reforms will continue. It argues that posterity is. --

that posterity is the only choice for Spain to regain its credibility

on the markets and to encourage future growth. As we have been

seeing in Spain, fiscal austerity is leading to unemployment rising

higher and higher. Young people across Europe are being hit

especially hard. The International Labor Organisation is warning the

situation is only going to get worse. Let's speak to Raymond

Torres, the author of the ILO's report. Tell us how difficult

things will become in terms of unemployment? -- of employment. It

will rise by 5 million people this year and another 5 million next

year if something is not done. We are already talking about a

situation where 40% of people without work have been looking for

employment for more than one year - an extraordinary figure that is

worrying for the future. Is Europe the place where it is most acute?

Europe a -- Europe certainly is a place where the situation is

deteriorating very rapidly. The economy and the job market is

slowing down in places like China as well and in North America to

some extent. What is the ILO saying about how to change is very

worrying trend? The first point to remember is that austerity is

counter-productive. It is counter- productive in terms of jobs. It is

affecting the economy and, in particular, the job market. It is

ironic because austerity is ineffective even in terms of

cutting a country's deficit. Countries who have been severe in

their austerity are not showing much growth. There are no positive

results at the moment from austerity and we need an

alternative. We will have to leave it there but thank you very much

for telling us your views on how things are in the international

labour market. Let's turn our attention to Japan where Prime

Minister Yoshihiko Noda meets US President Barack Obama in

Washington today. He is expected to discuss closer trade ties between

the two nations. Rico Hizon is in Singapore. Tell us more about this.

Apart from a closer bilateral relationship, Yoshiko no-no will

also address Japan's keen interest in joining the trans-Pacific

partnership of operation which aims to create a free-trade zone across

the Pacific. -- Yoshihiko Noda. He is facing strong opposition from

Japanese farmers over this pact. It will have a severe impact on the

country's agriculture sector. Many Japanese farmers would be swept

away by the global competition as the level -- the levee on imported

rice runs at nearly 800%. The removal of high tariffs would

benefit the overall economy but not The markets in Asia - most are

trading higher but, of course, Japan is closed today so do not be

fooled by that figure. The Japanese market is closed for a public