Asia Pacific

U.S. companies operating in China are reporting an increasingly "challenging" business environment stemming from rising costs, government restrictions and threats to intellectual property.

The percentage of women in the Indian workforce has declined in recent years after rising steadily during the 1980s and 90s, according to India's Ministry of Labour.

A fatal garment factory fire in Bangladesh in April, in which about 1,100 people died, and several other deaths in a factory collapse have not reduced enthusiasm for the country as a manufacturing centre among international clothing retailers, local manufacturers reported at the recent Bangladesh Apparel and Textile Exposition in Dhaka.

South Korea’s President Park Geun-hye has called for agreement on a free trade treaty with Indonesia as trade between the two countries continues to climb.

B.C. Premier Christy Clark has announced her third trade mission to Asia to promote the province’s natural gas reserves and clean energy products and to develop relationships with B.C.’s priority trading partners.

Forestry Minister Steve Thomson began a week-long forestry trade mission to increase awareness of British Columbia’s forestry and wood products in Asia by speaking to the Japanese Lumber Council and touring a panel plant on October 18.

Japan's justice ministry has decided to ease criteria in a points-based preferential immigration system introduced last year to attract highly skilled foreign workers. It has been found that the criteria are far too strict. Only 17 people used the system in its first 11 months of operation.

Indian companies are fighting back against a nuclear liability law making suppliers responsible for defects in any components they supply.

Japan has announced that it plans to complain to the World Trade Organization (WTO) later this month about a ban by South Korea on the importation of Japanese fisheries products.

Bangladesh's High Court has cleared the way for construction of a controversial coal-fired power plant in Bagerhat, which critics say will endanger the Sundarbans, the world's largest mangrove forest.