this is business live from bbc news with maryam moshiri and victoria fritz. a crucial day in the trade war between the united states and china. will president trump follow through on his threat of another $200 billion worth of tariffs on beijing? live from london, that's our top story on thursday 6th september. decision time looms as american businesses have until the end of the day to express their views. we'll have more on this in a moment. also in the programme... the world's largest working offshore wind farm open‘s off the coast of north—west england today. it's the size of 20,000 football pitches and we'll have a special report from near the site. and the latest from the european

markets, which have just and the latest from the european markets, which havejust opened. from toy robots to real learning. we'll find out why a leading tech company is switching its focus to education. and burberry has announced it's to stop using fur and burning its excess products. ididn't i didn't even know it did start. —— did that. are you attracted to firms with a more ethical approach? or is this just a pr exercise? let us know — just use the #bbcbizlive. hello and welcome to business live. we start with the trade war between the world's two biggest economies. it's having far reaching effects around the globe, and it could be about to get a lot worse. president trump is considering a massive escalation in his dispute with china, over what he sees as their unfair trade practices. us businesses and individuals have until the end of today to submit their views.

the president has threatened to slap import tariffs on another $200 billion worth of chinese goods — hitting everything from selfie sticks to semiconductors. on top of the $50 billion of goods the us taxed earlier this year, that would mean punitive taxes on half of everything china exports to the us. beijing has responded in kind — it's imposed tariffs on $50 billion worth of american imports, and is threatening to hit us goods worth another $60 billion. greg swenson, partner at merchant banking firm brigg macadam, joins us now. thank you forjoining us. trump is talking about these unfair trade practices. what exactly has he taken issue with and do you think he is

right? with regards to china, he is definitely right. they are systematic cheaters. beijing has never really believed in free and fair trade. i think the focus on china is brilliant. the concern american have of the most part is two things, what it does diverse supply chains and and what it means getting into trade spat with china, mexico and the eu, when it's mainly about china. china is the systematic cheaters. you say are systematic cheaters. you say are systematic cheater but what are they doing wrong, nothing illegal? there is a system and it is a top—down economy. the state—supported businesses violate all kinds of dumping rules. for sure, babe violate pattern and trade rules and are doing technological espionage. the one thing everyone can agree on, whether you are on one side or the other in the us is china cheats. even chuck schumer is fully on board with the

president on this. that's one thing thatis president on this. that's one thing that is not in doubt, that china cheats. i7 that is not in doubt, that china cheats. 17 of the last 17, the wto cases by the us against china have been victorious for the us. so there is clearly no doubt, even the wto agrees. is this the right way to go about addressing the balance? that is the issue. past presidents have tried. eight years of the 0bama administration, there was basically administration, there was basically a failure of doing anything about china. is it the right method? i don't think so. tariffs are never good. what is the right method? businesses are not keen on this. who knows what the us consumer thinks. what do you do about the problem? with president trump you have to expect the unexpected. he is being a bit courageous here, trying to shake the tree and get to the table. i think it might work. there might be some

pain along the way. there hasn't been a material effect on the economy yet. the president is playing with the house's money. economy yet. the president is playing with the house's moneym not just the playing with the house's moneym notjust the house's money but the entire global trade system. this is significant and will have ramifications for trade all around the world. it is. this is uncharted territory. american business people are concerned. the three numbers i like to look at 82, 85 and 60 seven. 85% of americans right now on both sides of the aisle believe trade is good for the coming. 85% believe it's good for the consumer and 67 believe it's good forjob creation. this is a pretty divisive issue in the us, because a lot of republicans especially are very much against trade wars and tariffs. but we have to admit that china is a systematic trade cheater and that has to be dealt with. greg swenson, if anyone will shake the tree it might be you

but donald trump as well. let's take a look at some of the other stories making the news. it's been brewing for a long time, but starbucks is finally bringing its coffee to italy. the seattle—based chain opens its first location in milan on friday, and in a ploy to woo notoriously snobby italian coffee—lovers, it's going to focus on espresso, pizza and made—to—order ice cream. not sure that's going to work! uk fruit and vegetable growers will be able to recruit non—eu migrants as seasonal workers after brexit, under a new pilot scheme. visas for up to 2,500 workers a year will last for six months between spring 2019 and december 2020. china has unveiled tax breaks for banks and other financial institutions to encourage lending to small firms. so—called "micro—loans" are to be exempt from value—added tax. it's the latest step to support the country's domestic economy. facebook is making a big investment on its first data centre in asia where it has amongst its most users.

sharanjit leyl is in singapore, the recipient of this new investment and spoke to facebook‘s thomas furlong, the vice president of infrastructure data centres. sharanjit why did facebook decide to launch the data in singapore? like you said, it has the most number of users right here in asia. what is extraordinary is they made this announcement the same day that facebook‘s chief operating officer was facing scrutiny on capitol hill. halfway across the world, facebook making a big billion—dollar investment in asia, something that is unlikely to please the trump administration which is trying to keep all those big investments at home. facebook spendingjust keep all those big investments at home. facebook spending just over $1 billion on a state—of—the—art data centre in the centre of singapore. the first of its kind in asia. as

you said, i spoke to the vice president of infrastructure data centre, thomas furlong and asked why he thought asia was an important market. no big surprise, said because facebook has its largest number of users right here. india is their biggest market, followed by indonesia, the philippines and others in the top ten in terms of sheer number of users. he told me that the 170,000 m2 data centre will only really be operational in 2022. that depends on the speed of construction. it will be state—of—the—art, environmentally friendly, using less land and water. the centre for authorities are pleased because it bringsjobs. sharanjit leyl, thank you. let's look at the markets. asian markets pretty much affected today by emerging market turmoil, problems with the argentinian economy means a discern that stocks have slipped.

european stocks have opened in the last half an hour or so and they are also following the lead from asia. kim gittleson has the details on what is ahead on wall street later. on thursday, investors will be paying close attention to the latest trade developments out of washington, as well as a slew of economic data. in particular, they'll be focused on one bit of data that will give them a sense ofjust what's happening when it comes to the us economy and jobs. it's a survey that is expected to show that the us added something like 190,000 private—sectorjobs during the month of august, which is slightly lower than the 216,000 jobs added during the month ofjuly. unemployment remains at a record low here in the united states, but the key question, not just for investors but for many americans, is when that low unemployment rate will translate into a wage boost for the majority of workers. so far, we haven't seen wages increase at the rate that many economists were expecting, given the rate of economic growth that's happening here in the united states. kim gittleson there.

joining us now is george godber, fund manager at polar capital. thank you forjoining us. we were talking about emerging markets and this kind of broader and more generalised sell—off we are seeing. do you think it is justified? we had problems before in argentina and turkey, we're used that that this feels different. correctly identified you have some self—inflicted pain, argentina, mismanagement of the economy and the same in turkey and those economies are down significantly. now its breadth, indonesia and south africa are very down and on and on. so what is causing this? partly emerging markets don't like a strong dollar. president trump's policies led to a strong dollar because your rates going up because they borrow money in dollars. things like oil, the dollar —based commodity, if their cost basis is going up it puts a pinch on global markets. and, of

course, china, one of the biggest emerging markets and has been understandably weak because of what you were talking about earlier because of trade and tariffs sanctions. the worry is contagion from emerging markets will spread to european markets and european banks? european markets and european banks? european banks especially. 0ne european markets and european banks? european banks especially. one of the markets that then we can assist you in dollar terms is germany. a huge global export. also in the ci’oss huge global export. also in the cross ha i rs of huge global export. also in the cross hairs of president trump on his trade war. the global trade system and impacts on it are very difficult to understand. it's not like we can go back and say let's look at what happened, the big trade war in the 1990s, because yesterday that the 1930s before this activity was happening. there were odd spats in certain areas but not something like this that could affect all global trade and the inflationary impact it will have. george, thank you. you will be back later to look through some paper. thank you. still to come... play and learn — we're talking to a leading toy robot manufacturer which has decided to switch focus and concentrate on

educational products. we'll be asking them why? you're with business live from bbc news. energy regulator 0fgem has revealed the government's price cap on energy bills this morning. the aim of the cap is to protect more than 10 million homes which are on standard variable tariffs. dermot nolan is the chief executive of 0fgem. festival, explain to us what you hope to achieve by putting in this ta riffs hope to achieve by putting in this tariffs in place. what we hope to achieve is to offer protection to 11 million customers who are on poor value deals and saving the typical customer around £75 a year and assuring them they will now always be paying a fair price for their energy. mr nolan, maybe this is a

little too little too late because we have heard from energy firms they have been putting up their ahead of this cap coming in. the cost of producing energy has risen significantly over the last year, more than 50%. this price cap can protect people from the price changes of wholesale energy but what can do is assure all customers that they will be paying a fair price and that any changes in the overall price of energy, of producing it, will be passed on fairly and transparently. so what you want is for people and the standard variable ta riffs for people and the standard variable tariffs to pay up to a certain amount. what happened to be people to actually change their provider, to actually change their provider, to shop around? isn't that where you should be focusing more on? that is where we are focusing. i would encourage any customer to engage with the market and switch. there are over 70 companies in the energy, residential energy market. there is

active switching. there will still be good, efficient deals on the market. i would encourage people to switch. it will be easier to switch, there will be changes in the way people produce and use energy in the next two or three years which i think will be quite exciting but meanwhile, for those who have found it more difficult to engage and a switch, we have a price cap in place, we will put a price cap in place, we will put a price cap in place that will protect them and assure them they are paying a fair price. dermot nolan, thank you. let's look at a tablet and the poet danny mac story about problem debt. aa.3 danny mac story about problem debt. a a .3 million people have got problem debt and about a tenth of them are likely to have suffered mental health problems as a result. if you want to know more about that, head to the bbc website and find out on the business live page. you're watching business live. our top story: a crucial day in the trade war

between the united states and china. will president trump follow through on his threat of another $200 billion worth of export tariffs on beijing? a quick look at how the markets are faring... european markets opened about 45 minutes ago, and as explained earlier, we have had a difficult day. asian stocks, worries about the turmoil in countries like argentina and turkey and also that trade war between china and the us, escalation is playing and investors‘ minds. now, let's get the inside track on the multibillion—dollar global market for robotics which has long been dominated by industrial and logistics uses. but now we have begun to see a shift toward new. there will be a $1.5 billion market for consumer and business robots by 2019. and while the consumer side of the industry is dominated by cleaning robots and automated lawn mowers, robots can also be an important educational tool.

sphero is a company that started in that sector, then branched out into toy robots based on popularfilms, but has now turned back to its origins. they have sold over three million robots since they started and are currently in 20.000 schools worldwide. paul berberian is the boss of sphero, and joins us now. thank you forjoining us. before we start, we have one of your little robots here. would you like to show us what he can do? this is our most popular educational robot, spark plus. i will just popular educational robot, spark plus. i willjust give him a little drive here. can he score a goal between the two monks? if you want to bring him back to you... there he is.

how is it educational, how is it educating kids to have this robot in schools? first of all, we want to make kids excited to come to school. so first and foremost, they are really fun. but also, they are completely programmable and accessible for very young children, all the way through university. if the teacher is going to be talking about a subject... let's say maths, teaching the pythagorean theory, it's pretty a bstra ct pythagorean theory, it's pretty abstract for a child to be staring ata abstract for a child to be staring at a whiteboard or computer screen. but when you say, get up from your desk and let's programme these robots to draw triangles on the floor, it becomes real life, they apply to the real world and it becomes memorable. when teachers bring out sphero, it's the best day in school. this had origins elsewhere, in play. why did you decide to go more into the educational sphere, if

decide to go more into the educationalsphere, if you decide to go more into the educational sphere, if you like? because you seem educational sphere, if you like? because you seem to have cut the number ofjobs because you seem to have cut the number of jobs in your company because you seem to have cut the number ofjobs in your company quite recently. why the shift, what's going on? when we started the business, we were all it's kind focused on the ability for our products to be programmed. then we got introduced to a company, the wa lt got introduced to a company, the walt disney company, that was making the star wars movies. it turns out that one of their lead characters, and upcoming star in the movie, was similarto and upcoming star in the movie, was similar to the products we were making. bb eight. yes. it was a dream made in heaven, we made and it was a wonderful moment in time and we sold millions of units but it was very much tied to the movie. it was a huge spike in revenue for us but not necessarily long—term growth. at the same time, the world got to know us because of bb8. the core educational side of our business was continuing to grow and that is

something that is here forever. we need to teach our kids and get exposed to technology. they need to learn to code. these are the jobs of the future. if we can make products that become tools in the classroom to help them learn, that is a business that will last forever. how accessible with these products be for kids around the world, who perhaps live in areas where schools can't afford or don't have to robots? that is a real issue. these products are not inexpensive but we try to make a range of products. this product here is only 50 us dollars and has all the programming capabilities of are more expensive units. it's like smartphones, when they first came out they were only accessible to the very wealthy. now they are all around the globe. we are seeing corporations make large donations to buy our products are meant to give to schools that may not be able to afford it. so it is starting to become a trend, where we need to have these advanced technology tools

to help our kids learn to become creators of technology, rather than just consumers. very briefly, this is in yourfirst just consumers. very briefly, this is in your first business, you just consumers. very briefly, this is in yourfirst business, you have had two big failures, what have you learned? had two big failures, what have you learned ? can had two big failures, what have you learned? can i have a go? you certainly can. don't drop it! $130. you won't break it. so yes, i've had some successes but i have also had some successes but i have also had some failures. i think what you learned through the failures is... you can have a great idea, you can be really passionate about something that sometimes timing isn't right. soi that sometimes timing isn't right. so i hada that sometimes timing isn't right. so i had a solar panel company and it was a brilliant piece of technology. but the marketjust wasn't right to raise money for it. we kind of mr clean tech window for fundraising. you of need money to build a business. passion is important, but timing is important as well. i have proved myself as a

non—robotic person, i can't make it do anything! paul berberian, thank you forjoining us. from failed solar panel technology and timing not being right to timing being everything and a new type of technology. the world's largest working offshore wind farm opens later in north west england. the walney facility already had 102 turbines before the completion of a further 87 earlier this year. she has been told to concentrate! she has been told to concentrate! she is fiddling with the robot. the project is owned by danish company 0rsted — and our very own ben thompson is on the site. welcome to barrow in furness in cumbria on what is a really big day. they are opening the world's largest offshore wind farm. nearly 20 kilometres off the coast here. just give you a sense of how big those turbines actually are, take a look

at this. this is one of the blades that has been used elsewhere. it is about half the size of the ones currently being used in the new extension. with those funds, you can have a double—decker bus inside the blade. it the size of 20,000 football pitches and will power 600,000 homes when it is fully operational. so today, a big day for the firm who is installing it. why here off the coast cumbria, why is it important to put wind turbines that? it is great because we have the two things we need for a great offshore wind farm, high wind speeds and shallow water depths. the iris ian north sea are some of the best places in the entire world for offshore wind farms. it cost a lot offshore wind farms. it cost a lot of money to do it offshore, is it worth it, do you get back what you invest? absolutely, and the cost has come down dramatically in recent years. we learned the lessons of installing these, we have the economy of scale and the in experience you get. the cost has

come down to become competitive with other forms of generation. good luck and enjoy the rest of the day. you have a sense of some of that scale. we have been doing the numbers this morning. each of the turbines out there is about the size of blackpool tower. if my maths stands new bride, it is about 98 times the height of me. it makes a change that there is something a bit taller! is his maths right? adomah, we will have do find out later. we have been talking through the paper stories on this one and the bbc news website. burberry stops burning unsold goods and stops using real fur. burberry stops burning unsold goods and stops using realfur. george, is this a pr exercise or burberry moving in the right direction?” this a pr exercise or burberry moving in the right direction? i was really surprised surprise studied surely not, george! surprised they are doing this. clearly they have a big inventory management problem. but it is a sort of thing that backfires, if you are a consumer, it

sits on your conscience. why are they burning? to protect prices and exclusivity. clothes, accessories, fragrances. it was extraordinary and raises an important dilemma in my mind, a move to fake fur. that carries its own environmental consequences. a lot of that is very heavily plastics —based. so it will be interesting to see how this works. as a pr exercise, whether as the success they are after. the news they even did that in the first place is beyond shocking, says pamela. i'm quite surprised that so many of these big companies still use real fur. many of these big companies still use realfur. yes... many of these big companies still use real fur. yes... there was, there are interesting articles to say it sustainably, you can get ethical realfur and say it sustainably, you can get ethical real fur and there are ways to do it and it can be betterfor the environment, longer term. to do it and it can be betterfor the environment, longerterm. but, asa the environment, longerterm. but, as a finish on many items of

clothing, you it up and down the high street, people like the look of it, fake fur, and large cases of people selling fake fur which is real fur. people selling fake fur which is realfur. a problem for consumers. 0ur realfur. a problem for consumers. our second story is about what's going on with the music industry. i was really fascinated to find out that the us remains the single biggest market for british market but a british artist has been the world's bestselling album for the last nine of the last 13 years. so this is a real issue around brexit and freedom of movement for artists to move but also about intellectual property rights. i think that intellectual property rights has deeper context. this case at the european court of justice, deeper context. this case at the european court ofjustice, you tube showing videos they are not painful, brexit touches all our lives. lovely to have you want, thank you for joining us. that's it from us today. bye— bye joining us. that's it from us today. bye — bye for joining us. that's it from us today. bye—bye for now. good morning. a decidedly tunnel

filled to weather today. pretty cool out there, with some rain at times but not all the time. a little bit of sunshine as well. the satellite picture has quite an unsettled look to it. various clumps of cloud spiralling around the uk. this particular area of cloud here will bring some rain across central and southern areas, parts of wales, the midlands and then toured east anglia and the south—east through the afternoon. staying dry across the extreme south—east, right through until the late afternoon. at some brightness into the south—west of england, 19 celsius. patchy rain in parts of the midlands and wales. from northern england, a mixture of sunny spells and showers. a similar story in northern ireland. showers across scotla nd northern ireland. showers across

scotland will be really heavy, with rumbles of thunder and flashes of lightning. across the northern half of the country particularly, very cool of the country particularly, very cool, 13—14 at best. this evening and overnight, a band of cloud and rain continuing to sync across south wales and southern parts of england. then we see some clear spells and some showery rain pushing towards the north—east by the end of the night. it will turn quite chilly, evenin night. it will turn quite chilly, even in towns and cities in the north, down to 5—6. tomorrow, a cool start, some bright weather around. the further south and west, not a bad day, with styles of sunshine. the north—eastern areas, we will see rain coming and going all day long. some of that rain will be quite heavy and it will be breezy, especially in the north—eastern areas. even if you have some sunshine, it will feel quite cool, temperatures 15 in aberdeen, 17 in belfast and cardiff 20 in london. low pressure bringing rain to the north—east will try to slide away to

get into saturday. another frontal system is pushing on from the west this time. during saturday, likely to see heavy rain pushing on to wales on the midlands. the far south may stay dry through the day, uncertainty about that. it looks like we will have brighter skies in northern ireland and scotland. temperatures 17—20dc. sunday, a breezy day where ever you are. there will be some spells of sunshine but there will also be some showers. hello. it's thursday. it's 9 o'clock. i'm victoria derbyshire. welcome to the programme. good news — your energy bills are to be capped if you're on a standard tariff. the regulator says 11 million of you will save around £75 a year. 0fgem's boss tells us energy firms wont be able to get round it. we will be enforcing this in the strictest fashion possible. right. you will tell them to? we have the power to require them not to. by

telling them something stronger?m legally requiring them. they will not be legally allowed to charge above the price cap. so how will energy companies be forced to comply? we will speak to energy uk who represents them.