Major International Business Headlines Brief::: 23 December 2022

Fri Dec 23 09:46:25 CAT 2022

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Major International Business Headlines Brief::: 23 December 2022 

 <https://wwww.nedbank.co.zw/> 

ü  Airport strikes: Border Force staff begin Christmas walkout

ü  Amazon could be blamed for fake Louboutin shoe ads - EU

ü  Cost of living: Japan's inflation hits a 41-year high

ü  UK economy shrank more than previously thought

ü  FTX founder released to parents on $250m bail

ü  Donki discount store mascot survives axe after Japanese uproar

ü  Trump business losses sharply reduced his tax bill

ü  Reindeer herders fear Arctic industry boom

ü  Rail fares in England to rise by up to 5.9% from March

ü  UK economy shrank more than previously thought

ü  Nigerian Govt to Sell Five Electricity Companies to Fund 2023 Budget

ü  Tanzania: Tcra - Verify Your SIM-Card, or We Switch It Off By Jan 31st
2023

ü  Nigeria: 'Problems' in Buhari's 2023 Budget Stalls Passage

ü  Africa: Rwanda Tops Africa in Internet Speed

 <mailto:marketing at willdale.co.zw> 

Airport strikes: Border Force staff begin Christmas walkout

Hundreds of thousands of travellers arriving in the UK have been told to
expect disruption as passport control workers begin strikes.

Border Force staff are the latest UK workers to take action as rises in the
cost of living outpace pay.

The military and civil servants have been drafted in at six major airports
and at Newhaven port.

Postal workers will also walk out on Friday and national rail strikes start
again from Christmas Eve.

About 1,000 Border Force workers, many of whom check people's passports as
they arrive in the UK, will strike from 23 to 26 December, and 28 to 31
December.

They will walk out at Heathrow, Gatwick, Manchester, Birmingham, Cardiff and
Glasgow airports, and the Port of Newhaven.

Members of the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) are in a
long-running dispute with the government over pay, jobs, pensions and
conditions.

December strikes: Who is striking and what are their pay claims?

When are the train strikes and why are they taking place?

The Home Office said that it had been working to minimise delays for
passengers.

Heathrow, the UK's busiest airport, said passengers on departing flights
would be unlikely to be delayed - passports are normally checked on the way
in to a country.

Passengers who are arriving will be able to use passport e-gates as usual,
it said. But these cannot be used by all passengers, including children
under 12.

There are 579 flights due to land at Heathrow on Friday, with an estimated
10,000 passengers arriving before 07:00 alone.

This will be the busiest Christmas for airports since 2019, and the first
without any coronavirus restrictions in place.

Jasmine O'Donoghue, 25, has been in Costa Rica since 16 November. She is due
to travel to Heathrow and on to Jersey, where she's from, on 27 December,
which is not a strike date.

Nevertheless, she has been advised she should change her flight due to the
impact of the strikes on domestic transfers.

She said she was feeling anxious around the uncertainty of getting home.

"Right now I don't know if I'm getting on the flight, or will change my
flight," she said. "It would be nice for my family and my boyfriend if I was
at home for New Year after being away for so long."

Flight volumes

Aviation data firm Cirium said 1,290 flights are scheduled to land at
affected airports on Friday, capable of carrying more than a quarter of a
million passengers.

Over the period of the strikes, a total of 8,910 flights will arrive, with a
capacity of nearly 1.8 million people.

Steve Dann, Border Force chief operating officer, said travellers should be
prepared for disruption.

He said the military personnel and civil servants, "many of whom are
sacrificing their Christmases", will "not be able to operate with the same
efficiency as our permanent workforce".

Paul Charles, chief executive of travel consultancy The PC Agency, said many
passengers "are likely to face longer queues and delays during this festive
period, and some could find themselves stuck on arriving aircraft before
being allowed into the terminals".

PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said although talks have been held with
ministers, pay is never discussed.

"The government could stop these strikes tomorrow if it puts more money on
the table," he said.

"Like so many workers, Border Force employees are struggling with the cost
of living crisis. They are desperate."

Rail and postal strikes

Arriving airline passengers may also be affected by rail strikes, which are
due to run from 23 to 29 December.

Thousands of members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport (RMT) union at
Network Rail will strike on Christmas Eve, which will cause train services
to stop running at around 1500 GMT on that day.

While drivers have been warned to expect long queues as millions set off on
journeys to spend Christmas with family.

Friday will be the busiest day on the roads this week with an estimated 16.9
million journeys being made across the UK, according to the AA.

In addition, Royal Mail workers will strike on 23 and 24 December.

A Royal Mail spokesperson said that over the 48 hours of the strike "we will
be doing all we can to deliver Christmas for our customers".

Thousands of employees have stepped in to help sort and deliver mail, and
"more than 12,000 posties returned to work on the last strike day", the
spokesperson said.

The Royal Mail accused the Communication and Workers Union (CWU) of "a
cynical attempt to hold Christmas to ransom".

The CWU in turn said the Royal Mail had turned down a last-minute offer of
negotiations and that the Royal Mail's sole intention is to destroy
jobs.-BBC

Amazon could be blamed for fake Louboutin shoe ads - EU

Amazon could be held responsible for advertising 'fake' red-soled shoes
which potentially breach designer Christian Louboutin's EU trademark.

Similar red-soled high heels are advertised on Amazon by third party vendors
without Louboutin's consent.

Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) said Amazon may be accountable
for any trademark infringement.

Louboutin said the platform's selling model was "misleading the public".
Amazon says it will study the decision.

The preliminary ruling by the Luxembourg-based court clears the way for
Amazon to potentially be held liable for adverts for any counterfeit
products sold on its site.

There has been a long-running dispute between Amazon and shoemaker
Louboutin, whose high heels typically sell for at least £600.

Louboutin brought two cases against the company, in courts in Belgium and
Luxembourg, in 2019 - alleging Amazon regularly displayed adverts for
red-soled shoes on its marketplace without Louboutin's consent.

The two courts sought the guidance of the Court of Justice of the European
Union (CJEU).

In its ruling on Thursday, the CJEU said Amazon could potentially be
considered responsible for alleged intellectual property breaches found in
the advertisements of counterfeit shoes featuring the famous red sole.

Users of the platform may be under the impression that it is Amazon - and
not the third-party seller - who markets the product "in its name and on its
behalf", the CJEU press office told the BBC.

The Court of Justice of the European Union said it was now up to two
national courts, in Belgium and Luxembourg, to decide whether this was the
case.

The platform also offers "additional services to these third-party sellers",
in particular "the storage and shipping of their products" the CJEU noted.

'Clear differentiations'

Louboutin maintains that Amazon has illegally used the trademarked red sole
"for products identical" to its own, and "insists, in particular, on the
fact that the disputed ads are an integral part of Amazon's commercial
communication".

Thierry Van Innis, Louboutin's lawyer, said the CJEU had followed the
designer's arguments "in every detail".

"Amazon can be held accountable for the breaches as if the platform was
itself the seller," Mr Van Innis told news agency Reuters, after the court
ruling.

"Amazon will be forced to change their model and stop misleading the public
by mixing up their own and third-party offers."

Mr Van Innis said Louboutin was not currently seeking financial
compensation: "We're not talking money at this stage. We want the breaches
to stop," he said.

The case feeds into part of the wider debate on trademark infringement on
online marketplaces and the difficulty for users in identifying the true
seller.

Intellectual property lawyer Fabian Klein, from law firm Pinsent Masons,
told the BBC that platform providers should review the layout of their site
to ensure that it was clearly identifiable to the public where the offers
originated from.

Mr Klein said, "If a platform is just a market place, without its own
offerings - like eBay - nothing will change."

"But for platforms that mix own offerings and third-party offerings, they
should consider - from a trade mark perspective - whether they want to
create a different look and feel, or other clear differentiations."-BBC

Cost of living: Japan's inflation hits a 41-year high

Japan's core consumer price inflation edged up to 3.7% in November, the
highest it has been since 1981.

That was when a Middle East crisis disrupted oil production and caused
energy prices to soar.

But after decades of the country trying to boost inflation, Japanese
consumers are now experiencing the pain of higher prices despite stagnant
wages.

Until now, the Bank of Japan (BOJ) had kept its ultra-loose monetary policy
to boost its economy.

But earlier this week, it surprised the market by raising the cap on the
interest rate on its 10-year government bonds from 0.25% to 0.5%.

As a result, the Japanese currency has spiked against the US dollar, hitting
151 yen to the greenback for the first time since 1990.

Cost of living: The shock of rising prices in Japan

The weak currency has fed into the country's inflation as it accelerated
high import costs which went up due to the war in Ukraine.

Japan has one of the lowest inflation rates in the world, and has bucked the
trend of other G7 countries that have gradually raised interest rates to
curb soaring prices.

The annual inflation rate in the US is 7.1% while it is 11.1% in the EU and
10.1% in the UK.

-BBC

UK economy shrank more than previously thought

The UK economy shrank by more than first thought in the three months to
September, revised figures show.

The economy contracted by 0.3%, compared with a previous estimate of 0.2%,
as business investment performed worse than first thought, the Office for
National Statistics (ONS) said.

Growth figures for the first half of 2022 have also been revised down.

The UK is forecast to fall into recession in the final three months of the
year as soaring prices hit growth.

A country is considered to be in recession when its economy shrinks for two
three-month periods - or quarters - in a row. Typically companies make less
money, pay falls and unemployment rises, leaving the government with less
money in tax to use on public services.

Darren Morgan, director of economic statistics at the ONS, said: "Our
revised figures show the economy performed slightly less well over the last
year than we previously estimated", with manufacturing "notably weaker".

He added that household incomes, when accounting for rising prices,
continued to fall, and household spending "fell for the first time since the
final Covid-19 lockdown in the spring of 2021".

The ONS said that gross domestic product (GDP) - the measure of the size of
the economy - was now estimated to be 0.8% below where it was before the
pandemic struck, downwardly revised from the previous estimate of 0.4%
below.

GDP graphic

The economy has been hit as surging energy and food prices push inflation -
the rate at which prices rise - to its highest level in 40 years.

It means that consumers are spending less and businesses are cutting
investment.

Along with its revision for the July-to-September period, the ONS said the
economy also grew less than first estimated in the first half of the year -
expanding by 0.6% in the first quarter and 0.1% in the second quarter.

The ONS has previously said growth stood at 0.7% and 0.2% in those quarters
respectively.

It is not unusual for the ONS to revise its growth estimates. It produces a
first estimate of GDP about 40 days after the quarter in question, at which
point only about 60% of the data is available, so the figure is revised
later as more information comes in.

Presentational grey line

Analysis box by Andy Verity, economics correspondent

We already knew the UK economy shrank in the third quarter of the year while
other economies grew. But now the disparity between the UK and the rest of
the world looks starker than previously thought.

An economy that remains 0.8% smaller than its pre-pandemic level is in
marked contrast to the eurozone - up 2.2% at the last count - or Canada - up
by 3%.

The Paris-based think tank the OECD recently forecast in 2023, the UK
economy would continue shrinking by more than the rest of the G7, while
other economies returned to growth.

There's now a growing body of evidence that some of that underperformance is
due to Brexit.

Presentational grey line

Last week, figures from the ONS indicated that the economy shrank by 0.3%
over the August-to-October period.

The government's independent forecaster, the Office for Budget
Responsibility (OBR), has warned that the UK will fall into a recession
"lasting just over a year".

The OBR has predicted that the economy will shrink by 1.4% in 2023 before
growth gradually picks up again.

Chart showing economic growth in G7 nations

As a result it expects the unemployment rate to rise and house prices to
fall sharply as the Bank of England puts up interest rates to control
soaring prices.

Last week, the Bank raised its key rate to 3.5%, the highest level for 14
years, which is pushing up repayment costs for people with mortgages and
loans.

The UK is not the only country seeing its economy slow down, with the US and
eurozone also expected to fall into recession next year.

However, Gabriella Dickens from Pantheon Macroeconomics said she expected
the UK to "suffer the deepest recession among major advanced economies in
2023".

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt blamed Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine for the
economic difficulties.

"High inflation driven by Putin's invasion of Ukraine is slowing economic
growth across the world. No country is immune, least of all Britain," he
said.

But responding to the latest ONS figures, Labour's shadow chancellor Rachel
Reeves accused the government of losing control over the economy.

"GDP data has been revised down, leaving the UK with the worst growth in the
G7 in the last quarter," she tweeted.

"The Tories have lost control of the economy and are leaving millions of
working people paying the price."-BBC

FTX founder released to parents on $250m bail

Former FTX boss Sam Bankman-Fried will face home detention while awaiting
trial in the US on charges that he defrauded customers and investors of the
collapsed cryptocurrency exchange.

A US judge said the 30-year-old former billionaire could be released to his
parents on a $250m bond.

At the hearing, Mr Bankman-Fried did not admit or deny guilt.

He has previously distanced himself from the charges, which have shaken the
entire crypto industry.

"I didn't knowingly commit fraud. I don't think I committed fraud. I didn't
want any of this to happen. I was certainly not nearly as competent as I
thought I was," he told the BBC, shortly before his 12 December arrest in
the Bahamas, where he lived, and FTX was based.

Two of Mr Bankman-Fried's closest colleagues pleaded guilty to fraud on
Wednesday and are helping with the investigation.

Federal prosecutors in New York have accused Mr Bankman-Fried of unlawfully
using customer deposits made at FTX to fund his other crypto firm, Alameda
Research, buy property and make millions of dollars in political donations.

In a press conference last week, they described it as "one of the biggest
financial frauds in US history" announcing eight criminal charges, including
wire fraud, money laundering and campaign finance violations. Financial
regulators have also brought civil charges.

Mr Bankman-Fried spent nine days in prison in the Bahamas weighing his
choices before telling the Nassau magistrates' court on Wednesday that he
would not fight extradition, which could have sparked a long legal fight.

At Thursday's court hearing in New York, assistant US Attorney Nick Roos
said prosecutors would not oppose releasing Mr Bankman-Fried on bail,
despite a "fraud of epic proportions", pointing to his decision to return to
the US voluntarily and his much diminished financial state.

Mr Bankman-Fried's release requires him to surrender his passport and submit
to location monitoring and detention at his parents' home in California. He
also agreed to regular mental health treatment. His parents will co-sign the
$250m bond, Mr Bankman-Fried's attorney, Mark Cohen said.

Singapore's crypto ambitions shaken by FTX collapse

FTX crypto boss Sam Bankman-Fried denied bail in Bahamas

The son of two Stanford University professors, Mr Bankman-Fried founded FTX
in 2019.

Known to his legions of fans as SBF, the curly-haired MIT graduate was a
hero in the crypto world, nicknamed the 'King of Crypto' and known for
bailing out struggling firms and making massive donations to charity.

The collapse of his firm, which was once valued at more than $30bn (£25bn),
has unsettled the wider industry, sparking bankruptcy filings at other firms
and further declines in crypto values.

The firm declared bankruptcy in November, after customers and investors
rushed to pull their funds from the firm amid reports that its finances were
shaky.

Mr Bankman-Fried, who stepped down as chief executive the same day, has
previously denied deliberate wrongdoing, and said he is focused on restoring
funds to customers.

At Thursday's arraignment, Mr Bankman-Fried spoke only once, when asked if
he understood the conditions of his release, and that he could be charged
with an additional crime if he fails to show up to court.

"Yes I do," he replied.-BBC

Donki discount store mascot survives axe after Japanese uproar

Japan's largest discount chain has reversed a decision to replace its mascot
after outrage from fans online.

Don Quijote, called Donki in Japan, has over 600 stores in the country and
is known for selling a huge range of products at cheap prices.

Its mascot Donpen, a blue penguin which wears a Santa hat, has become
synonymous with the store.

So an announcement that Donpen would be replaced sparked widespread shock on
Japanese social media last week.

The company announced on Twitter it had decided to replace the penguin with
"Dojo-chan" - an anthropomorphic representation of the Japanese katakana
character "do".

It did not give a reason for the change.

That prompted an outpouring of dismayed reactions online. Some fans posted
photos of themselves in Donpen onesies, while others threatened to boycott
Donki stores.

Another user launched a poll asking which mascot Donki fans preferred. That
attracted more than 33,000 clicks with Donpen winning 93% of the vote.

The change also appeared to have blindsided Don Quijote president Naoki
Yoshida. He said on Twitter he didn't "understand the situation either" and
had asked "relevant departments" for clarification.

Pokemon to go on without Ash and Pikachu

Cost of living: The shock of rising prices in Japan

A few hours later, Mr Yoshida announced that Donpen would remain as the
company's mascot.

"We have taken the opinions of many of you very seriously and have discussed
them with our board members. As a result, it was decided that 'Donpen' would
continue as the official character," he said.

The company behind Don Quijote, Pan Pacific International Holdings, also
apologised for the incident and said they appreciated fans' support for
Donpen.

Donpen was born in Antarctica and raised in Tokyo, according to the official
Donki website. He enjoys taking "walks at night" and "it's rumoured his
appearance changes", the store says.

Don Quijote was one of the few stores in Japan to turn a profit during the
Covid-19 pandemic, and has outlets in many parts of Asia.-BBC

Trump business losses sharply reduced his tax bill

Former president Donald Trump reported steep business losses in his final
year in the White House, allowing the billionaire to avoid paying income
tax.

He also did not face tax audits during his first two years in office,
despite rules requiring the review of tax filings by sitting presidents.

The revelations came after Democrats voted to release the records on Tuesday
after a four-year legal battle.

A spokesman for Mr Trump said the release was politically motivated.

"If this injustice can happen to President Trump, it can happen to all
Americans without cause," Trump Organization spokesman Steven Cheung said.

Mr Trump last month launched his third bid for the White House, and has
long-cultivated an image as a successful businessman.

But Democrats said the documents raised questions about Mr Trump's
practices.

US presidents are not required by law to release their tax returns, but for
decades they have done so voluntarily.

In contrast, Mr Trump sought to shield his personal finances, sparking a
legal battle that was decided by the Supreme Court last month.

The documents released by the House Ways and Means Committee as a result of
the fight span the years 2015 to 2020.

Mr Trump and his wife, Melania, paid some form of tax during all six years,
the documents showed, but were able to cut down their income taxes in
several years as income from Mr Trump's businesses was more than offset by
deductions and losses.

The committee questioned the legitimacy of some of those deductions,
including one for $916m (£758m), and members said on Tuesday the tax returns
were short on details.

The panel is expected to release redacted versions of his full returns in
the coming days.

Tax deductions

The documents that have been released paint a decidedly mixed portrait of
the businessman, who made his name developing property and starring as a
celebrity boss on a reality television show.

The records show Mr Trump and his wife Melania made tens of millions of
dollars in investment income each year.

But they also claimed millions of dollars worth in deductions and losses in
their businesses, including property, sharply reducing what they owed in tax
on their income.

Democrats raised questions about the legitimacy of some of those moves, and
said the Internal Revenue Service, the US tax authority, had failed to
properly investigate.

The IRS declined to comment.

The couple reported adjusted gross income of $24.3m in 2018 and paid a net
tax of $1m, while in 2019 they reported $4.4m of income in 2019 and paid
$134,000 in taxes.

Those were the only two years they claimed positive gross income.

In 2017 they reported gross income of negative $12.9m, yielding an income
tax bill of $750.

In 2020, they reported negative gross income of $4.8m and paid no net income
tax.

The couple was also responsible for self-employment and household employment
taxes, which totalled $3m during their four years in the White House.-BBC

Reindeer herders fear Arctic industry boom

Reindeer herder Elle Merete Omma says climate change is causing problems for
her animals, but so are the carbon-cutting industries designed to fight it.

"We are having a double burden actually at the moment," says Ms Omma, "I'm
worried about the future."

She belongs to a community of indigenous Sami reindeer herders near the city
of Umeå in northern Sweden, who say they've been affected by the climate
crisis.

Thick fluffy snow usually falls from November onwards, but the start of this
winter was mild, with rain and sleet instead. This freezes quickly and makes
it harder for reindeer to graze on lichen, their major food source.

A nearby hilltop wind farm, designed to cut emissions by producing renewable
energy, isn't helping, argues Ms Omma. This is because the turbines have cut
off grazing lands where snow typically "lays more often and stays for a
longer period".

"The reindeers will not go into this [wind farm] area at all
 because of the
sound, because of how it looks, the visual impact," says Ms Omma, who also
works for the Sami Council, an independent non-profit organisation
representing Sami rights.

Omma says that if a reindeer herder loses part of his or her animals'
grazing land to a wind farm, it can be very difficult for them to find
replacement space nearby. This is because adjacent land is often being used
by herders from neighbouring Sami communities.

There isn't enough such land to go around, she says, which has already led
to conflicts between herders, as well as legal battles with local
industries.

Research into the impact of wind farms on reindeer has produced mixed
findings. Recent reports by the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
and the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency concluded that reindeer can
choose to avoid wind farms.

Yet other academic studies in Sweden and Norway found little impact.

But with applications for hundreds more turbines in her area, Ms Omma is
worried it will become increasingly challenging for herders to maintain the
lifestyle and livelihoods they've had for centuries.

About one in 10 Sami living in Sweden makes money from trading in reindeer
meat, fur and antlers. Many others work in tourism and handicraft jobs
linked to Sami culture.

"If we are constantly in a position where the number [of people] that can
live in a traditional way is declining, I think that the culture will
disappear, and the language will disappear, and the landscape will also
change," argues Ms Omma.

Kristina Falk, head of permits for renewable energy firm Svevind, which
operates many of Sweden's wind turbines, insists that assessing any
potential impact on reindeer is always "an important part" of the planning
process.

She's "very keen to have an active dialogue" with Sami communities to try to
enable shared land use, but argues there isn't always an openness to
compromise. "In some areas, we have reached agreements between the company
and the Sami village, in other cases it is the court that has decided which
conditions shall apply to the operation."

But Ms Omma argues that Sami communities don't always have the resources to
engage in discussions with businesses or politicians.

"At the moment, my Sami village - we get requests from different sorts of
industries every week," adds Ms Omma. "The work burden is just too high, so
people get sad, and it has an impact on their mental wellbeing."

These debates feed into much bigger, complex discussions about the
cumulative impact of a boom in carbon-cutting industries in northern Sweden.

The region is already home to one of Europe's biggest electric battery
factories, powered by renewable energy sources. And a fossil fuel-free steel
plant is being built that will use new hydrogen technology instead of
traditional blast furnaces.

There are also plans for new mines, designed to extract the raw materials
used in these types of industries.

Meanwhile, Sweden is one of Europe's largest electricity exporters, partly
driven by big investments in hydropower in northerly regions over the last
few decades.

According to Maria Petterson, a professor in environmental law at Luleå
University of Technology, investing in fossil-free industries is broadly
necessary for Sweden to meet its climate goals.

But she is concerned that the competing interests between reindeer herders
and plans for more wind farms and mines have already increased tensions in
some local communities.

"We're very few people per square kilometre, which means that in theory we
have room for a lot of these big industries that are needed for the green
transition," she says. "On the other hand, there are people here, and there
are other land-use connected interests, that often come into conflict with
these big establishments.

"The Sami community are more affected by climate change than average people.
So they are much in need of this green transition, but they are also
impacted by the way in which we achieve the green transition," she argues.

"So this is a very problematic situation where this sort of 'green versus
green' problem comes really to the forefront."

Five hours north of Umeå, the small town of Jokkmokk, just inside the Arctic
Circle, is another place where Sami reindeer herders say they're feeling
crowded out by the new industrial revolution.

A planned iron ore mine, run by British company Beowulf Mining, was given
conditional approval by Sweden's former Social Democrat government in March,
with the right-wing parties which are now in power, also voting in favour.

Beowulf Mining has turned down multiple requests to speak to the BBC about
its plans. But the Swedish Association of Mines, Mineral and Metal Producers
(Svemin) argues that the project will provide an important new local source
of iron ore (used to make steel), which would help countries across the EU
to further develop carbon cutting industries, like wind parks or electric
car and battery production.

"Of course, recycling [metals] is extremely important and we need to put
more effort into finding methods of recycling as much as we can," says
Svemin's chief executive Maria Sunér. "But it won't be enough, so we will
need mining for many years to come."

However, Sami reindeer herders say the mine will slice up their herding
district, and that more animals will be killed in road accidents if local
infrastructure is expanded for bigger trucks and machines.

"We've really already paid enough," argues herder Rikard Länta, 54, pointing
to the site's proximity to existing hydropower and forestry industries.

"There isn't one 'bad guy', there are many bad ones. There are so many
[industries] that want to come here
 and take, take, take, take, take these
so-called 'natural resources'."

Greta Thunberg has campaigned in Jokkmokk several times, describing the
plans as an example of "colonialism", for failing to recognise the concerns
of local indigenous people.

Last month her charity donated £158,582 to Sami reindeer herders to help
with legal costs.

Climate campaigners also argue that the mine would create more environmental
problems than it solved, suggesting that waste could pollute nearby lakes
and rivers.

Beowulf Mining is yet to secure an environmental permit, and parliamentary
approval for its plans came with a long list of caveats. These include
making an effort to minimise the impact on reindeer herding, and offering
compensation to Sami if they need to adapt the way they work, for instance
by putting the reindeer on trucks to move them round the mining area.

But many Sami are strongly opposed to making these types of concessions.

"This is absolutely against the traditional way of reindeer herding," says
Henrik Blind, a local Green Party politician from a reindeer herding family.
"This is a fight for our rights."

Yet in Jokkmokk's bakery, where the counters are packed with cinnamon
biscuits, local supporters of the mine talk about a different kind of
sustainable development for the town's shrinking community.

"I think it's good for the municipality to bring in more jobs," says
26-year-old Elin Stenman, who is a nurse. She hopes the mine will encourage
more people to move to the area, which could allow the local health centre
to have longer opening hours. "We'd also get more shops and more
opportunities for community development."

Back at Luleå University of Technology, Professor Petterson says these types
of "goal-based" conflicts are increasingly polarising communities in
northern Sweden, despite the nation's reputation for consensus-based
decision making. As investments in new industries continue to pick up pace,
she's not optimistic things will improve.

"This is not an easy situation," she says. "We don't know where to go from
here."-BBC

Rail fares in England to rise by up to 5.9% from March

Regulated rail fares in England will rise by up to 5.9% from March, the
Department for Transport has announced.

The rise is being capped at a level well below inflation, "to help reduce
the impact on passengers", the transport secretary said.

Labour called the hike - which is still the second highest on record - "a
sick joke", while a watchdog said passengers were not getting value for
money.

Fares will officially rise on 5 March 2023.

Before the Covid pandemic, fares were raised in January each year, based on
the retail prices index (RPI) measure of inflation from the previous July.

Inflation is the rate at which prices rise, and the normal formula for fares
is RPI plus 1%.

However, the government said that "for this year only" rail fare increases
for 2023 would be capped at 5.9%, well below July's RPI figure of 12.3%.

Like last year, the government is also freezing fares for January and
February, so that passengers have more time to buy tickets at the existing
prices.

Transport Secretary Mark Harper said the rise represented a "fair balance"
between passenger and taxpayer needs, and described the move as "the biggest
ever government intervention in rail fares".

"It has been a difficult year and the impact of inflation is being felt
across the UK economy. We do not want to add to the problem," he said.

However, the increase to fares will be the largest since a 6.2% jump in
2012, according to analysis of Office of Rail and Road data by the PA news
agency.

Graphic showing possible rail fare increases

Labour said average fares had risen by 58% since 2010, twice as fast as
wages.

"This savage fare hike will be a sick joke for millions reliant on crumbling
services," said shadow transport secretary Louise Haigh.

"People up and down this country are paying the price for 12 years of Tory
failure."

Prices are going up rapidly - and wages are not keeping up. People are
getting poorer.

Meanwhile, anyone who has tried to use a train in the past couple of weeks
will be well aware that the industry is not in good shape.

Some networks are better than others, but industrial action has caused
disruption across the country.

So just imagine if you had to tell people right now they would have to pay
13% more for their tickets next year.

Because under the normal, RPI-linked formula, that's the magnitude of the
increase we would be seeing. Obviously, it would cause uproar.

Capping the rise to 5.9% - a figure that is linked to earnings - might avoid
that kind of political carnage.

But it is still the biggest increase in more than a decade, and some
commuters will see their travel costs rise by hundreds of pounds.

And let's not forget - these are the regulated tickets. Unregulated fares
may go up by a lot more.

Presentational grey line

Transport Focus warned that more needed to be done to improve the experience
of passengers on the railways.

"After months of unreliable services and strike disruption, it's clear that
too many passengers are not getting a value for money service," said its
director, David Sidebottom.

"Capping fares below inflation and the delay until March is welcome and will
go some way to easing the pain, but the need for reform of fares and
ticketing in the longer-term must not be forgotten."

Regulated fares cover about 45% of fares, including season tickets on most
commuter journeys, some off-peak return tickets on long distance journeys
and anytime tickets around major cities.

The rise affects England, and mainline services from England into Wales.

It does not apply to Transport for Wales trains, but their changes tend to
match those made across the border.

Fares for rail services in Northern Ireland are set by state-owned operator
Translink, which does not use RPI. The Scottish government has not announced
its plan for next year yet, though it has said that peak fares on the
publicly-owned operator ScotRail will be suspended for six months.

The pandemic saw a steep drop in the number of train passengers, as more
people worked from home, and numbers have remained well below pre-Covid
levels.

Rail passengers have also faced disruption due to a wave of strikes, with
further industrial action planned over Christmas and in early January.

Workers are demanding pay rises that reflect the soaring cost of living,
while also trying to stop job cuts and changes to working conditions-BBC

UK economy shrank more than previously thought