Synopsis
Insights into the business world with Peter Day - featuring content from BBC Radio 4's In Business programme, and also Global Business from the BBC World Service.
Episodes
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In Business: The NHS - The Recruitment Dilemma
19/01/2017 Duration: 27minSince its inception, the National Health Service has always relied on doctors and nurses who have been trained overseas. How does it plan for the workforce it requires? In the second of two programmes exploring today's health service, doctor-turned-journalist Smitha Mundasad, asks why the NHS is currently facing a recruitment crisis on so many fronts. She'll ask what impact Brexit could have. Can pharmacists, physician associates and other health workers do some of the work doctors do, and so reduce staff shortages? And will the NHS start training more of its own workforce? Presenter: Smitha Mundasad Producer: Rosamund Jones.(Image: NHS surgical team who come from around the European Union. Credit: Junaid Masood)
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In Business: The NHS and Productivity
12/01/2017 Duration: 28minThe NHS is facing a sustained squeeze. An ageing population, the rising cost of new treatments and increasing patient demand on the one hand, and the impact of continued austerity on the other. What can it do? One answer might lie in improving productivity. In the first of two programmes on the NHS, Louise Cooper explores its productivity puzzle. What does increased productivity look like in the health service? She meets clinicians, across the country, who are trying to do more for less. Can their efforts be replicated across the NHS? And, if so, will it ever be enough? Presenter: Louise Cooper Producer: Rosamund Jones.
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In Business: Mexico and Mr Trump
05/01/2017 Duration: 28minHow is Mexico preparing for the presidency of Donald Trump? During the election campaign Mr Trump promised to tear up trade agreements with Mexico, build a border wall and send back millions of illegal Mexican immigrants. Caroline Bayley travels to Mexico to find out how the country feels about the US's new president and what impact his policies might have on Mexico. Producer: Anna Meisel. (Image: A woman hits a piñata of Donald Trump during a protest in Mexico City, on October 12, 2016. Credit: RONALDO SCHEMIDT/AFP/Getty Images)
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In Business: Transforming Trains?
29/12/2016 Duration: 28minWork on HS2 is finally due to start next year. And those whose housing will be affected have dominated the headlines. But what will it mean for business? For some it seems a huge opportunity if high speed rail kick starts much broader regeneration. Other businesses face major challenges during construction, or fear they'll lose out when the new railway changes the way people work. And what does it all tell us about how the UK copes with major infrastructure? Maryam Moshiri visits Sheffield and north London to test business opinion. Producer: Chris Bowlby.
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In Business: Corporations and the Arts
22/12/2016 Duration: 28minWho pays for the arts, who should pay for the arts? In the UK, there is controversy about corporate sponsorship of arts organisations - particularly oil companies. In the US, there is a very different approach and state funding is much lower. Andrew Dickson examines the funding models and speaks to BP as well as a number of leading arts organisations. Producer, Penny Murphy (Image: Burlington House, the Piccadilly site for the Royal Academy of Arts. Credit: Fraser Mar).
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In Business: Brexit and the Future of Farming
15/12/2016 Duration: 27minWhat will Brexit mean for the future of British farms? The EU has been subsidising agriculture - via the Common Agricultural Policy - for decades, and there is a tariff-free market for produce. Jonty Bloom looks at the challenges that lie ahead.Producer, Ruth Alexander.
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In Business: Whatever Happened to Advertising?
12/12/2016 Duration: 28minLast year, the UK became the first place where spending on digital ads exceeded that spent on all other forms of advertising combined. In this new world, what are ad agencies doing to square up to the challenges they face? Management Today's Matthew Gwyther presents. The producer is Nina Robinson.(Image: A visitor looks at old posters advertising various chocolate products at the Belgian Chocolate Village museum. Credit: EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images)
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In Business: The Italian Banking Crisis
25/11/2016 Duration: 27minWhy are Italy's banks in crisis and what's the impact on business? The country's banks have huge numbers of non-performing loans, the result of nearly a decade of recession. The economy has shrunk by nearly 10% in that time. Some small banks have already failed, others may follow. What has it been like to do business through these very lean times? Are banks continuing to lend? And what solutions might there be for one of Europe's biggest players? Ruth Sunderland visits small businesses, the backbone of the Italian economy, and asks what is required to strengthen the banking system. Producer : Rosamund Jones.
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Global Business: Estonia’s e-Residents
03/10/2016 Duration: 26minEstonia is one of the smallest countries in Europe, with only 1.3 million citizens. But it is hoping to become much bigger – by attracting what it calls e-residents. A scheme was started two years ago to give citizens of any nation the opportunity to set up Estonian bank accounts and businesses – and to develop a digital identity which can be managed from anywhere. Ruth Alexander examines how it works, and who benefits.
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Global Business: A Tree of Life
29/09/2016 Duration: 26minWhen it comes to business, much of the focus in Sweden is on its successful tech start-ups. But its traditional industries are still a cornerstone of the economy. Global Business' Keith Moore takes a look at Sweden's forestry industry by following the journey of a tree, from the forest, to the sawmills and through to the shops many of us visit across the world. (Photo: Felled trees in a forest)
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In Business: Brexit: The Response of the French Abroad
22/09/2016 Duration: 27minHow has London's French community fared since Brexit? Caroline Bayley explores why so many entrepreneurs have chosen to start businesses on this side of the channel. And what is the capital's attraction for so many of France's young people? After the vote to leave the EU, the response of many French ex-pats was deep shock. Three months on, are French people and companies re-assessing their future in the UK? And will London be as open for business as it has been in the past? Producer: Rosamund Jones.
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In Business: Start-up Scotland
15/09/2016 Duration: 28minBrexit, a global slump in oil prices, and political uncertainty around a second independence referendum; these have combined to place the Scottish business community in uncharted waters. Additionally, Scotland has longer term historical structural issues, particularly when it comes to successfully starting and growing new ventures. It is widely recognised that the Scottish economy needs to grow faster and be less dependent on both fossil fuels and inward investment. For this edition of 'In Business', the BBC's Scotland Business Editor Douglas Fraser explores what is being done to support and encourage entrepreneurship.Producer: Dave Howard.
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In Business: Making Babies - the business of fertility
08/09/2016 Duration: 27minThe business of making babies is booming, both in the UK and globally, as recent research suggests the world’s fertility industry is set to be worth an estimated 15 billion pounds by the year 2020. One in six couples in the world are thought to experience fertility problems. There's a huge range of treatments available – from egg donation and specialist ‘add ons’ to improve the odds, to egg freezing and surrogacy, not to mention an increasing market for gay and lesbian couples. In Britain, the NHS restricts and rations access to IVF, and sperm donation is heavily regulated. However in Denmark, a multi-million dollar sperm bank is supplying some 80 countries under a very different framework. Pharmacies at the supermarket chain ASDA have been selling IVF drugs at cost price, and tech giants Google and Facebook will pay the costs of freezing the eggs of female employees to be used at a later date.Will ethical and moral issues surrounding the baby making business, hinder the growth of the fertility industry? Or w
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In Business: Has 3D printing lived up to the hype?
01/09/2016 Duration: 27minPeter Day takes a close look at the progress of 3D printing in manufacturing 5 years on from the first programme he made about this new way of making things. Back then there was much hype and excitement about its potential to revolutionise traditional manufacturing. From aircraft parts to cartilage in knees, Peter discovers 3D printing's current range and uses and asks whether it's really lived up to its early promise.Producer: Caroline Bayley
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In Business: Supportive partner = success at work
25/08/2016 Duration: 27minAccording to Sheryl Sandberg – Chief Operating Office of Facebook and one of the most powerful people in the world - the most important career choice you’ll make as a woman is who you choose to be your life partner. Whilst men tend to assume they can have it all – a great career AND a great family - women don’t. And she puts that down to the uneven division of labour in the home. She claims in households where both parents work full time, women do twice the amount of house work and three times the amount of childcare. She says that she and her late husband were '50/50' and that has played a huge part in her success. How many of us can claim the same?The numbers of working mothers in the UK are at record levels with 70% of women with dependent children now part of the workforce. But those who work still earn less overall and enjoy lower status than their male counterparts, especially after having children. Evidence also shows that those who do forge the most successful careers are largely child-free.So how eas
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In Business: A Virtual World
23/08/2016 Duration: 27minA new technology is emerging which could change the world as significantly as mobile phones or the Internet. That technology is Virtual Reality. Up to now it’s mainly been used for fun - but things are changing. Adam Shaw investigates how VR could change our lives and revolutionise the world of business. Enabling us to be in two places at once and, for example, replacing the need for many painkillers and helping cure psychological problems. Producer: Smita Patel
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In Business: How Safe Are Your Secrets?
11/08/2016 Duration: 27minCompanies don't often like to admit it, but we know the spies are out there, attempting to infiltrate almost every sector of industry, eager to winkle out the most valuable corporate secrets. And they sometimes succeed, passing on the information to rivals whether at home or abroad. So what can be done to pursue the perpetrators and protect business from this growing threat? In this episode of In Business Peter Day learns the lessons from businesses that have fallen victim to corporate espionage and he hears that most companies' Achilles' heels lie in the least expected places. Producer Lucy Hooker
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Global Business: Pitch Night
04/08/2016 Duration: 26minTrinitas Mhango is one of a new generation of young, would-be entrepreneurs in Malawi. She has a dream of making it big in business and she has a great idea - to mass produce and sell sanitary pads in one of the poorest countries in Africa, where millions of girls and women cannot afford proper sanitary management. The market research she has done shows it is a potentially huge market and Malawi desperately needs people like her to succeed and help grow its near bottom of the GDP league economy. There is just one big problem - she has not got the money to set up on her own. Malawi’s banks won’t lend her the cash she needs and even if they would, with interest rates at a staggering 40% she would never make it. But now Trinitas has a great opportunity to get the backing she needs to kick-start her business. She is going into competition at Pitch Night, where the best and brightest young entrepreneurs in the country pitch their ideas hoping to win the hearts, minds and financial support of some of the Malawi’s B
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In Business: Return to Teesside
28/07/2016 Duration: 28minJob losses have plagued Teesside for decades and the area still has a stubbornly high unemployment rate. Ruth Sunderland grew up in Middlesbrough where her father worked as an engineer. In 1987 the company, where he'd been employed since he was a teenager, collapsed and he never worked again. Believing there was no future for her in her home town, she left to forge a career in London. Following more recent job losses in the steel industry, Ruth returns to her roots. Will entrepreneurial start-ups provide young Teessiders with prospects that, 30 years ago, she could not see? And what does the post-steel, post-Brexit future look like from Teesside? Producer: Rosamund Jones
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Global Business: Chattanooga - the High Speed City
02/06/2016 Duration: 26minChattanooga has been re-inventing itself for decades. In the late 1960s Walter Cronkite referred to the city as "the dirtiest in America." Since then heavy industry has declined and, to take its place, civic leaders have been on a mission to bring high-tech innovation and enterprise to Chattanooga. In 2010 the city became the first in America to enjoy gig speed internet following an investment of a couple of hundred million dollars from its publically-owned electricity company, EPB. What economic and psychological benefits have super-fast internet brought to this mid-sized city in Tennessee? Has the investment in speed paid off? Presenter: Peter Day Producer: Rosamund Jones.