Latest news with #economicChallenges
Daily Mail
09-07-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
Café where Jacinda Ardern took Stephen Colbert in New Zealand collapses - as calls grow for ex-prime minister to return for Covid inquiry
The café where Dame Jacinda Ardern took The Late Show host Stephen Colbert, when he visited her while she was serving as prime minister, has closed its doors. The Auckland business, KIND, cited economic headwinds that had failed to improve in the years following Covid lockdowns. Its closure coincides with pressure on 44-year-old Ardern, who has moved to the United States, to return to her home country and provide evidence at an inquiry into her government's Covid response. The café owners issued a statement about it's closure to social media on Monday. 'We are closing the doors for good tonight... Economic conditions, spiraling costs, excessive rent are all factors in our decision to close. We have been going backwards for too long, hoping things will change but they haven't, they aren't,' it read. 'KIND was founded as a social enterprise to make the neighbourhood of Morningside a greener and healthier place to live. We have been part of this awesome neighborhood for seven years and still love it. Thank you to all our neighbours and customers who have supported us through the good times, the covid times and the hard times. We wish we could have kept going, but it was not to be. In a world where you can be many things, be kind.' Ardern took Colbert to the café when he visited in October 2019 after she had invited the Lord of the Rings fan to visit when she appeared as a guest on The Late Show a year earlier. A Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Covid-19 response in New Zealand has held public hearings this week. A first stage of the inquiry was held in 2023 and this second stage will look at vaccines and lockdown decisions made by the government in 2021 and 2022. Ardern has lived in Boston since late 2023 and there have been calls for her to return to give evidence at the inquiry, which she has indicated through a spokesperson she is prepared to consider. The mother-of-one, who is the joint-youngest women to give birth while a sitting world leader, was a popular prime minister for most of her time in office but her approval rating plummeted before she resigned in January 2023. Since leaving office, she has made few incursions back into public life, but has expanded on her time in office in her memoir, A Different Kind of Power, released in June by Penguin Random House subsidiary Crown. She re-entered the political fray in May with a rallying call for internationalism, rebuking the inward outlook of the US under President Donald Trump. She spoke at Yale College's Class Day, the undergraduate arm of the prestigious Ivy League university ands opted against 'the usual pep talk that perhaps you might expect' in an address witnessed by thousands. 'The world,' she said, 'Over the course of a few short months, moved from tumultuous to an all-out dumpster fire.' 'There's the war in the Middle East and Europe, with both leaving questions over our sense of humanity. 'The daily reminder of climate change that bangs on our door but falls on deaf ears at the highest echelons of power. 'Challenges to rules around trade, increases in migration flows, and a decreasing regard for civil rights and human rights, including the right to be who you are.' Ardern said the world stood at an 'inflection point in global politics', fuelled by post-pandemic economic challenges, when politicians needed to care for the most vulnerable. 'Some of the greatest leaders here in the United States have recognised that amongst all of the challenges politicians face, they must meet the most basic needs of their citizens, first and foremost,' she said. 'FDR (former president Franklin D Roosevelt) said in 1944 while still governing a country at war, ''true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made''.' Ardern supported unsuccessful Democratic candidate for president Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election, appearing at party events. In a thinly veiled attack on Trump's America First economic doctrine, she said isolationism was an 'illusion'. 'You cannot remain untouched by the impacts of infectious disease. A trade stand-off can never just hurt your competitors,' she said. 'A warming planet does not produce extreme weather that respects borders, and far-flung wars may not take the lives of your citizens but it will take away their sense of security and humanity. 'We are connected. We always have been,' she said.
South China Morning Post
09-07-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
China's domestic economic challenges
China's domestic economic challenges In this series, the Post explores the various domestic economic issues that China faces as it navigates an unprecedented trade war with the United States.
Bloomberg
03-07-2025
- Automotive
- Bloomberg
Audi Resists US Price Hikes as 19% Sales Drop Adds to Tariff Woe
Volkswagen AG's Audi won't increase prices in the US in July after its sales there nosedived in the second quarter. The German brand's deliveries in the lucrative market fell 19% in the three months through June, the sixth consecutive quarterly decline there. Audi cited a challenging economic environment as well as model changeovers for the drop.
Bloomberg
03-07-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Taiwan to Step Up Lending to Companies for Domestic Investing
Taiwan is raising its quota for lending to companies so they can invest in the archipelago's economy as they navigate economic challenges including uncertainty due to potential tariffs from the Trump administration. Some NT$720 billion ($24.9 billion) of loans will be allocated from 2025 to 2027, the cabinet said in a statement on Thursday — up from the NT$360 billion announced earlier. The government will also subsidize fees for the loan application, the cabinet added, and allow companies to hire more migrant workers if certain conditions are met.
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South China Morning Post
01-07-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
Hong Kong's restaurant industry in dire straits as more residents opt for Shenzhen eateries
Read more here: Hong Kong's restaurants have been facing challenges on several fronts, as many long-time and recently established businesses have been forced to close. Industry experts say the Covid-19 pandemic's economic fallout has pushed many Hong Kong residents to be more conservative about their expenses. A growing number of them are travelling north to mainland China, where dining and entertainment options are much more affordable than they are in Hong Kong.
