05/05/2014 World Business Report

Those are the latest headlines from BBC World News. Now for the latest

financial news with Ben in the World Business Report.

With the crisis in Ukraine showing no sign of being resolved, ministers

from the G7 countries meet to discuss how Europe would cope

without oil and gas from Russia. And 25 years after the fall of the

Berlin Wall ` we're in Poland, and the shipyards of Gdansk, where it

all really started. I'm Ben Thompson. In a moment we'll get the

latest on China's ban on British Cheese ` we'll be live from

Singapore for that, but first... Is Europe too reliant on Russia for

its energy supplies? And could it find other sources if that supply

was switched off? That's what ministers from the G7 will be

discussing when they meet on Monday in Rome. Half of all Europe's gas

comes from Russia, and the main pipeline passes through Ukraine. But

with the worsening relations between Russia and Ukraine that supply could

be cut off and as Jeremy Howell reports, that's happened once

before. In the winter of 2009 people living

in Southeast Europe had to cut wood for fuel as Russia was in a quarrel

with Ukraine over unpaid bills and cut off all gas supplies to Europe

lowing pretty country. Continuing tensions mean a gas cutoff has again

become a threat. Countries in Eastern Europe like Bulgaria take

80% of their gas from Russia and have little in storage. The UK

imports no gas from Russia directly and has substantial stocks so the

immediate plan is to link up their existing ASP pipelines into a great

use and gas to where it is scarce in times of crisis. It takes time and

it is not something you can do overnight. At the end of the day it

comes down to how to share a reduced supply if one of the main supply

routes from Russia goes down. You have to ask where the supply is

going to come from. Europe needs to search beyond Russia. The USA has an

abundance of natural gas but it will be years before much of it can be

delivered to Europe. There are no gas exports on the Atlantic Coast of

the United States or the Gulf Coast. There is time for

construction and we are not looking at a significant volume of American

gas exports until 2020. In European country like `` country's like

Britain, and there is gas, but no one knows how much it will yield or

when. It will need many more years to wean itself off.

Cheese from Britain has been banned by China over questions of hygiene.

One British politician has said that Britain should now consider its own

action, unless China drops the ban. Let's cross live to our Asia

business hub in Singapore and Ali Moore. Exactly what happened? I

suppose I should put some context in it. China is not immune from its own

food scares and that is the reason that imported foods are so popular.

For example, milk powder for babies. This turns the issue on its

head. China says its British cheesemakers are the problem.

Chinese officials were touring a factory in the UK and after that

announced a temporary ban. I came up with a list of issues including air

sanitisation I'm a raw milk transport temperatures and the

storage. You mentioned that we only export roughly 11 tons of cheese to

China but this certainly puts some noses out of joint. Some doubt about

whether the reasons the Chinese have given for this ban are actually

legitimate and this is actually all about politics. It is hard to assess

that. This band has not been reported in the Chinese media or

officially announced `` ban. There are also reports that the factory at

the centre of this doesn't actually export to China. On the other side

of the coin, they now say that all factories will be demonstrated in

order to maintain high standards. UK authorities are taking it seriously

and are not try to negotiate but are actually holding inspections. Thank

you. Now ` it's 25 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall. It was an

historic moment ` one that's shaped Europe ever since. But the events

that led up to that moment began not in Germany, but in neighbouring

Poland. The trade union movement in the country, prompted the first

democratic elections and provided the catalyst for the fall of

communism. And the country has embraced the free market like no

other, seeing steady economic growth for the past 25 years, it was the

only EU country to avoid recession in the last financial crisis. In the

second part of our special series, Tanya Beckett has been to the

shipyards in Gdansk, where it all started. Eastern Europe's journey to

market capitalism has its place its birthplace in northern Poland. 25

years ago, ordinary shipyard workers rose up to shake free from the grip

of Soviet power. It started here in the shipyards of Gdansk, Poland's

transformation from Communism, in in the form of the Solidarity movement.

It began with a workers strike that led ultimately to democratically

held elections. The charismatic leader of the union, Lech Walesa,

won a Nobel Prize for peace and was elected the country's president in

1990. TRANSLATION: I led the fight and I was thinking about moving the

boundaries towards freedom. We could not be certain of success, even when

I was elected president. I still was not sure that we had won because I

knew that there were communists among us and that they could, at any

point, try to destabilise the situation. A quarter of a century

on, this is the nation Lech Walesa helped build. Last year, Fiat Poland

reached an important landmark, its one millionth Cinquecento rolled off

the production line. During communist times, the factory was

owned by the state and many of the current workers built Fiat cars

under the Soviet regime. TRANSLATION: The conditions were

very different then to what they are now. The floor was covered in

chemicals and the factory wasn't very clean. TRANSLATION: In those

days, we didn't have to look after anything because there was someone

else looking after the production. Nowadays, we have to take more

responsibility because this is our future. And Poland has taken care of

itself. Its economy avoided recession during the financial

crisis. It is one of the fastest`growing in the European

Union. The market economy has created haves and have`nots. Taking

care of those who lost out is one of the new divides it now needs to

cross. And you can follow the series and

read more on our website bbc.co.uk/europe25yearson. Next week

we're off to Hungary to find out how one of Europe's most entrepreneurial

nations has adjusted to life after communism.

Australia's Westpac has reported an 8% jump in cash profit for the six

months to March, which came in at 3.5 billion US dollars. That's a

record profit for Australia's second biggest bank, thanks to robust

growth in lending and a fall in bad debts. Banks in Australia are on

track for another year of record earnings, as the country's low

interest rates encourage more borrowers to take out loans. The

Prime Minister of Portugal will not need a standby level of credit.

Since their bailout that they have stuck to the tough measures and have

seen improvements. Plenty more including a round`up of the day's

papers. Enjoying a day off? Well a study by

Leeds University in the UK says economies would benefit as a whole

if we all worked a bit less, perhaps a four or even three day week.

Nations such as Denmark, the Netherlands and