emissions and stay productive in the face of extreme weather. hello and welcome to asia business report. i'm arunoday mukharji. the chief executives of eight global banks have testified under oath at an annual senate hearing. they made comments about the state of the us economy, with some bosses warning of recession and tough times ahead. they also all agreed that crypto currency should be regulated in the same way as banks are. but it was another issue that caused the biggest reaction, as erin delmore explains. regulators say the new rules are needed to make sure banks have sufficient resources to pay their debts in order to protect the system in a crisis. but on capitol hill wednesday, eight us bank ceos said that's unnecessary and issued a warning that new regulations

will hurt the economy and credit markets. the rule would have predictable and harmful outcomes to the economy, markets, business of all sizes and american households in ways that the federal reserve has not studied, contemplated or shared. the hearing is part of the senate banking committee's annual oversight of big banks and what a year it's been. regional bank failures, including silicon valley bank and signature bank, dominated the early part of the year. the ceo said wednesday that the industry is on steady footing and that large banks like theirs helped stabilize the industry after early 2023's failures. the hearing is an opportunity to win favour on capitol hill, especially from moderate democratic senators. but the real audience is the regulators responsible for the final language and implementation of the rule. google has hailed another era in artificial intelligence. gemini has advanced to reasoning capabilities and in its own words, think more carefully. it is an upgrade two

the existing ai chat bot according to google. facebook and instagram have become a breeding ground for child predators. according to a lawsuit filed by mexico. raul torres said his office heads set up fake accounts that were set phallic pictures. meta says it's working hard to root out predators. italy has withdrawn from an initiative. italy has withdrawn from an initiative. italy was heavily criticised half the time by the united states and other allies, amid fears that it could give china control of sensitive technologies and infrastructure. leaders are set to meet in beijing in the next few hours. they are expected to discuss a range of issues.

the president of the european union of chamber of commerce in china told me what is likely to be on the agenda. we are very happy this is taking place. we've had three or four years with we think that is very, very positive. not expecting too much in terms of outcomes but we think it is very important that europe begins to articulate what some of the points here are on that very lopsided trading relationship. and of course, also, on ukraine. explain to us what it has been like for eu

businesses in china and has that environment changed, would you say, the last few months? we did a poll of 1800 members back injune, that it was the worst business confidence level that we had seen over the past decade or so. two thirds of our members indicated it had become harder to do business in china, and an equal number indicated they had been losing business opportunities because of red tape in china. but it's also fair to say we have seen there seems to be some changes of heart at the top level in august the release of the so—called 2a missions by the state council, that i could go towards the concern of the business. and of course just a week ago we saw the six nations, the five you countries for reentry up to 15 days to china. these are positive steps. i think sitting on the fence a little bit and are trying to figure out this is technically short—term or is it

really an expression of a deeper change of sentiment. staying with china, we're set to know more about the state of trade between the manufacturing powerhouse and the rest of the world. import and export data is due out shortly. for more, let's speak to dan wang. she is the chief economist at hang seng bank china. the local government debt and regional banks are both in relatively big trouble. so we've seen various measures from the central government trying to limit the scope of this trouble but over time we do anticipate more decline in china's housing market

especially residential housing market and that actually justifies the worries in the report so what will happen to china actually depends on the response from the central government in the year to come. when it comes to the investor sentiment there as being quite pessimistic in the past few months and i believe china need to do something new and something more drastic in order to boost it. a sign that players are searching for alternatives to pricey graphics processors which can cost in the margin of 40,000 for one chip. they currently dominate the ai market. chat gbg, for instance, was trained using 10,000 of the units clustered together in a supercomputer belonging to microsoft. at the un climate talks in dubai this week, delegates are addressing the responsibility that farming has on climate change. agriculture creates around a third of the world s greenhouse gas emissions. so what are the solutions? joshua thorpe has

been finding out. on a farm in kent, southern england, an army of robots are picking the last of the seasons strawberries, making sure only the ripest and best shaped berries get plucked. 0nce picked, the fruit is packaged and sent to supermarkets across the country. the robot has two robot arms and each arm has two cameras that see in colour. on each end, and those cameras find right berries. they allowed the robot very dexterous lead to pick those berries. when we picked each berry we transfer it to this inspection system which allows us to check quality and therefore place it into a planet or if it's defective in some way to discard it. the fruit picking industry in the uk relies heavily on margaret workers who are becoming harder and harder to recruit. we can reduce food waste by eliminating recruitment risk. eliminating footprints of large numbers of migrant and seasonal

agricultural workers travelling increasingly long distances or farms. these were about fruit pickers help this farms like this one in southern england reduce wastage and cut emissions that arrive the word arise from food production. these robots are getting more and more sophisticated, they are able to detectjust the right level of redness in the front end and even small defects. and this is just one example of how artificial intelligence is helping farming and agriculture become more efficient and more sustainable. over in california's central valley, a favourable climate is plenty of tomatoes, but in recent years unpredictable weather patterns like heat waves have caused massive changes. the morningstar company, the largest main processor in the world, the us data analytics. the platform uses satellite imagery and artificial intelligence to help solve problems like wastage and

over irrigation. we provide everything to the burners for the promise, that tells you all right, this is where you have a problem, this is what the problem is all about and this is what you need to do about it in order to either save the crop or increase your yield down the line. the challenge that remains with the use of artificial intelligence and our culture is one of scaling up. they is still relatively scarce and robots are costly to produce. but with the growing need to reduce the environmentalfootprint of farming, ai innovation is rapidly gathering pace. and it's surelyjust a matter of time until it starts to bear fruit onto a much wider scale. joshua thorpe, bbc news taylor swift has a stellar year by being named times person of the year.

last month she was declared a billionaire as well. in the three other musicians along with her have achieved billionaire status. they are rhianna, beyonce as well as jay—z. this is all we have on this edition of asia business report, you can find all her top stories on our website as well, thanks very much for watching but do stay on with bbc news. this was the scene last month as the storm swept across wales. but what can be done to protect properties like this from flooding? these defences are part of a project in a town

classed as a flood high risk area. the hope is that these walls will contain the water within the weather nearby and help save hundreds of householders from the heartache of flooding. currently there is about 223 properties at risk of flooding during a flood event and that is predicted to increase to over 380 with climate change over the next 100 years. the effects can be devastating. this animal sanctuary is close to the river and regularly blighted by flooding. injanuary, they had to take one of their dogs for chemotherapy by boat. had to put my elderly mother in a boat to get her home a few weeks ago. push her through the water. i've had to put dogs on a boat to get them up to the car to go to the vet. it is just an absolute living hell. moving isn't an option for this woman. she says she is trapped. for more stories from across the uk, head to the bbc news

website. hi. i'm ellis with the catchup tonight. ref body cams, another win for taylor swift and a teacher's pet. but first, boris johnson. the former pm has spent his day answering questions about decisions during covid, the inquiry looking into how the pandemic was handled. he said he should have twigged how serious the virus was sooner and shouldn't have shaken covid patients' hands in march 2020. even with seizures and severe pain,, 21—year—old zara corbett says she's begging for help as she copes with endometriosis, which affects one in ten women. she has been put into early menopause, one potential treatment

for her condition. there are specialist support centres for endometriosis in the uk, but none are in northern ireland where she is from. for a point of contact with hand. we can't go on like this. life shouldn't be like this. and this might be in some other stories now. a trial of refs wearing body cams and adult grassroots footy will be doubled after they were used in around 500 matches and no instances of abuse were recorded. and one for the swifties. taylor swift has been named time magazine's person of the year to cap off a stellar 2023. the star said she is the proudest and happiest she's ever felt. time now to leave you with 10 seconds of telly. the teacher's pet, this assistant labradoodle, helps a teacher in london who had a stroke. you're all caught up, bye for now.

hello and welcome to sportsday, i'm marc edwards. here's what's coming up on the show. losing his pep, aston villa leapfrog guardiola's struggling city side with a superb win

over the champions. england back on form to level the 0di series against west indies. underfire, buttler and curran come up trumps. and, new balls please. but it's golf which will intoduce new rules to limit the distance a ball can be hit. we start with football, and just a day after predicting his team would win an unprecedented fourth premier league title, pep guardiola's manchester city have failed to win for a fourth league match in a row. losing 1—0 at aston villa. it's the first time in more than seven years the champions have hit a run like this.