03/04/2014 World Business Report

tackle the virus are being undermined. `` can purchase letters

with false paperwork. Now for the latest business news.

A two tier Internet market. Businesses fear that that could be

the future as those who provide the pipelines look to charge certain

customers more. It has been called a mini stimulus package but Chinese

plans to boost the economy are by no means small.

A very warm welcome. Also in the programme: We gauge reactions to the

comments from the IMF boss who warns that the global economy is still too

weak. First, every year, there is another surging demand for films and

music streamed over the Internet. The telecom companies which the

pipelines for delivering the content would like to increase their charges

for high`speed streaming. They say that it is only fair that the

company is using them the most should pay extra. The European

Parliament will today vote on whether to allow this to happen. The

idea is very unpopular with many Internet users and content

providers. BloomFM Provides a busy streaming

service. It is a minnow compared to competitors such as Google. Telecom

companies which provide Internet network would like to be able to

charge premium rates to the providers of films and television

and music if they want them streamed to the users at high speed. Giant

corporations like Google may be able to afford the rates. BloomFM says

that they could not. If the user is getting a disadvantage when using

our service and it is skipping or not very good, we are giving them

fewer choices and less opportunity. There has been a surge in demand for

streamed films and music on the Internet. Over the course of the

last year, data traffic on the Internet rose by 57% in Western

Europe and 77% in North America. Service providers such as Vodafone

say that print content uses up so much capacity on their networks that

they are constantly having to build more. They need to charge premium

rates to be able to pay for that investment. But there is a principle

at stake. The notion that the Internet should be open equally to

all. This analyst foresees that the rise of a new two tier Internet.

There will be a low tier. The Socialist principle of unimpeded

content is likely to be congested. Above that will be the express lane.

This will be controlled by corporations, largely out of the US,

given that it is a more entertainment driven environment.

And measure before the EU parliament would allow service providers to

charge premium rates for streamed content but would cap the price is.

The measure is likely to face strong opposition in the Parliament from

political groups on the left. Will stay with what's going on in

Brussels. A flurry of activity. The European Parliament will also vote

on the tradition on a cap on charges for bank transactions harbouring ``

following heated debate. The EU will decide on whether to set a limit to

the charges that the shop must pay to the bank when you purchase

something within the EU using your credit card. I'm joined by the

director of Euro Commerce for more detail. Can you clarify the charges

this vote is about? The charges are what we call interchange fees. These

are that these that the retailer has to pay the bank of the consumers. ``

retailer's bank. It is a charge which retailers do not have a way to

negotiate. It is imposed by card schemes and agreed between banks.

Retailers pay 14 billion euros, 70% of the costs are interchange fees.

We are looking forward to a positive vote in the Parliament today for

these fees to be considerably reduced to the benefit of

retailers, small and large but also consumers. Is it just applicable to

retailers, not to other businesses from whom we buy services such as

airlines? Exactly that. You are correct to point out that this does

not only apply to retailers. It applies to airlines, petrol and gas

stations, and increasingly also for any e`commerce companies. We are

moving towards electronic payments and it is therefore quite important

that the affordability of payments is considerably improve. In terms of

the card is used, is it credit and debit cards? Quite often, when we

pay something with a credit card, we have to pay extra for the privilege.

The proposed regulation would apply to both credit and debit cards. We

do hope that that the costs would go down, meaning that the amount of

card transactions, especially debit transactions, will increase

significantly. This would also improve consumers `` for consumers.

Thank you. We appreciate your time. We will keep an eye on both those

stories in Brussels when the boats occur. We will update you. Let's

talk about the global economy. We could be heading for years of subpar

growth according to the head of the International monetary fund. She

said that the world is emerging from the greatest financial crisis in

almost 100 years and is at a critical juncture. She urged more

action to tackle low inflation in the eurozone. Growth remains slow

and weak. And that the cost of continued sluggish growth are high.

Modest income gains on my meagre reductions of unemployment and

inequality. Very labourious reduction of deficit.

Re`establishment of a good debt trajectory, all of that. The risk is

that without sufficient policy ambition, the world could very well

fail into a middle term `` medium term, low growth trap. Despite her

warnings, markets continue to surge around the world with investors

pushing global 's docks to post crisis highs. News from China today

that they are taking steps to fuel the economy and that has helped the

increase. It was music to the ears of investors when China said that

they would pump more money into the economy? That's right. As you say,

shares are rising pretty much across the board. They are actually all up

for the seventh day. That marks the longest rally so far this year. They

are not up by much but the fact that they are still in positive set ``

territory, as you say, that was after the Chinese government acted

to boost economic growth in the first time this year. The government

says it will cut taxes on small firms and plans to speed up the

construction of railway lines. The measures had previously been

included in the economic workplan for 2014 but they had not actually

been put together before in a package quite like this, aimed at

boosting growth. We know that this comes after a string of

disappointing data from China which had been leading to fears of a

slowdown. It was now really after the weekly meeting on Wednesday that

the government announced these measures. They include an 18%

increase in the total number of railway lines being built compared

to last year. Many of those tracks are in rural parts of China, the

central and western regions of the country. They wish to finance the

investment by selling $24 billion of government bonds. Chinese

authorities say that they will extend tax provisions granted to

small businesses into 2016. Last month, we heard from the National

Peoples that Mac Congress that the tax rate is being kept at the 7.5%

rate. There is a slowdown in the manufacturing activity which is

leading analysts to question the growth target of 7.5%. `` National

People's Congress. Thank you very much. We will look at the market in

a moment. President Putin has signed an executive order scrapping a 2010

agreement with Ukraine which ensured a discounted gas price in exchange

for the right to station about `` Black Sea Fleet in Premier. Ukraine

could see a further increase in the cost of Russian gas. That is an

important story. We will keep you up`to`date on that as the changes.

These are the markets. The seven`day rally has a lot to do with China but

also the fact that we are seeing a global rally on markets. Look at the

close in the US. We will discuss this further when we look at

newspapers. It is all over the Financial Times. See you soon. With

us.