concerns about. this is g.w. business africa welcome the central bank of ghana has lowered its prime lending rates to sixteen percent on monday bringing it to the lowest rate since twenty thirteen markets are expected no change in monetary policy decision is being seen as a sign that the country has made some progress in its attempts to battle soaring inflation let's say a closer look between twenty fourteen and twenty sixteen the lending rate rose steadily with the figure hitting a high of a whopping twenty six percent it has dropped since then to the most recent rate of around about seventeen percent but compared with other parts of the world like the eurozone for example where interest rates have remained close to zero for years it's still very high the same buyers to guard inflation rage rate which is currently hovering at around nine percent slower than in previous years but still very high compared to other countries let's bring in our correspondent articulates

you from a capital. i say again a has had the highest interest rates across africa for years how is that influenced the going to an economy. well it's us influence the economy a great extent because. interest rates really can set me. up praying for example this autonomy and economy that many businesses cannot find what they do and so they need to grow to debunk small loans and the incest streets determined by the. also influences which treats the banks loans to these means necessary while still grates on high the need to sew up prices to talk your silly impacts everyone who we see in the economy in boston. and why. i put up with the need to bite but i finally saw the interest rate this key in so many how the economy is like. it is the time really rides to go four percentage points

lower. it's a minute complained about the interest rates well what upsets our banks said to be there for the reason why do you say this is because in twenty eight team the last parts of twenty eighteen. some growth experience across accordance with up on thought it is important to reduce it to reduce their stay on gandhian so yes this is the time to read you'll say dominic while it's been. going. on i mean some talent and it's just a really fun and cool i don't read upbeat people come benefits from hollis's like reducing interest. was the bank then on the other hand maybe to castle could have gone leaving even lower than sixteen percent. now sometimes for the reason that he said but then to read through their rates this year on this

month was because if seen some improvement in the economy but the banks also think that reducing its. just the will part of this new means that you also be out of these names we can all make a lot a lot of gains on the loans that you've given out to people to do business so they could have gone further by the banks of course in response aims and sort of set up on how to look at the concepts of consumers and also of the banking sector i mean this street that i've not noticed. so measure to drop in central bank articulacy from thank you very much. but one of ghana's most important exports is of course cocoa beans the industry is worth some two point two billion dollars a year and provides work to seven hundred thousand people but transparency remains an issue and payment methods are still old fashioned

a group of entrepreneurs now wants to change that first they will have to convince authorities to embrace digitisation. it's painstaking manual work cocoa farmer orlando's manu and his family remove the beans from the pods by hand they then laid out to dry for a week. ghana's cocoa industry is state controlled the government decides the national cocoa price every year right now it's around a dollar forty per kilo. in larger villages licensed buying companies manage the farmers out push. the harvest from around the region our pool together and packed it to sixty four kilos sacks. so this. close to where good news come from. so. the biggest. and the business not the country is. because of this number.

but that system doesn't reveal the exact farm the projects comes from us in the capital our software company is working on ways to address the problem it uses g.p.s. to keep track of farmers and their production processes the data is saved on just smart cards and allows farmers to be paid digitally. for both. parties and. this is cut to the click so shy of the cut again the far details comes this one fifty. three. and they want that information is traffic. clinically be wired the money directly onto the car or the farmer but that vision is still quite far from reality ghana's cocoa supply chain can only be digitalized if the state run cocoa bond

enterprise gives the project its backing until then everything from counting the beans to quality control checks will still be done by hand. if we are trying to feed or form. new. teams to. bite. it's gradual up. but as long as the exact origin of the beans in the sack remains unclear the potential for fraud remains after all no one can check whether the higher priced beans labeled as fair trade really do come from farms with better conditions. now plastic waste is becoming an ever bigger problem more and more countries across the continent people are realizing that was cycling is a must mentalists from kenya took to the sea in a boat that looks like

a traditional dar but is made entirely from recycled plastic waste. the good ship flip flop you set sail on a mission it's the first sailing vessel built completely out of plastic waste incorporating around thirty thousand flip flops and other garbage the team took two years and ten tons of plastic to build this ten meter vessel on lamu island off the canyon coast we had this. plastic us. so much of the plastic. we feel pretty eight million tons of plastic waste end up in the world's oceans every year and some of it makes landfall here in kenya this group of environmental activists want to change that they collected garbage and raised money to build the boat they even have the support of the united nations program to combat climate change it seems so simple to me it's so obvious the motivation is just something positive we wanted.

for message and that's what the. really clear positive message about plastic being valuable. and aside from floating a message to save the environment so far flip floppy has managed swimmingly on a five hundred kilometer voyage from mood to zanzibar. name to learn to the. hundreds of thousands of workers should be back on the job this week after the end of a thirty five day government shutdown that kept them out of work and. fortunately those workers will receive back pay economists say there's no make up for the last spending of the past months and the price tag is quite steep. it might have been traffic chaos at the airports that brought an end to the u.s. government shutdown after more than a month with air traffic controllers calling in sick flights were delayed or

canceled at new york's la guardia and other national hubs then washington came through with a deal. an agreement between president trump and democrats in congress with no money paid for a border wall and sure things will go back to normal federal offices will reopen as well national parks workers will get paid and their relief to. the shutdown was really traumatic for a lot of people and i think it put a lot of american workers in a really challenging financial situation and i think that in the future i hope that shut down. the family will be able to pay our bills will be able to hear anything you know the off the street and out begging for through but the economic damage is done the shut down came over the white house's demand for five point seven billion dollars for a border wall now analysts to standard and poor's say the shutdown cost six billion dollars mostly due to lost productivity and weakened economic activity the council

of economic advisors within the white house takes the costs even higher estimating a weekly loss of point one three percentage points of quarterly gross domestic product according to their numbers the month long dispute could cost the economy about twenty six billion dollars. and it could all get even more expensive the current agreement will last for three weeks it is unclear what happens then. u.s. president donald trump promised his controversial tax plan would be like quote rocket fuel for the u.s. economy but it seems trump's tuck's rocket was a dud according to a new survey the one point five trillion tax cuts trump signed into law has no measurable impact for most u.s. companies investment or hiring plans that's according to a survey released by the national association of business economics a four eighty four percent of respondents said the massive tax cut had little

effect on their new hires or investment. in spain taxi drivers have blocked. a major thoroughfares over the weekend to vent. the drivers are demanding further was frictions on the service which they say unfairly on the cuts the business he's banished government already agreed to clamp down including capping licenses for new drivers about the taxi drivers say the new regulations do not go far enough. and that's it from me and the business to. check out our website for more background stories. slash business update for you in just a moment. belonging

to one official estimates more than one point two million venezuelans live in colombia legally and illegally. already eckel all returned to. visit friends i don't think i'd ever go back there to live you know when i lived there again i don't know so i'm not sure. witness global news that matters. made for mines. we present europe at its most fascinating at its most exciting. most creative. glamorous trendy tasteful innovative brilliant charming.

fabulous filesystem. check out the good stuff february second on t.w. . once upon a time there was a young girl. with a burning ambition. to become a conductor. i was a very curious child and very excited and in love with music and i would go to concerts with my parents. for being on stage with the musicians and being part of that magic it was a difficult trip to the first girl so she was told to become doctors but this girl had other ideas and one day she really did become a world famous conductor on monday.

to. start the january eighteenth d.w. . and pope francis was a bloodbath in venice while self declared entering president. calls for a fresh street protests against president. pressure on the jury is increasing as israel and australia joined other countries in recognizing its rival also on the program another democratic software company the twenty twenty us presidential

election california santa stuff council houses consider the heavyweights of what promises to be a coup.