In the decade that followed the Great Financial Crisis, inflation rates remained low and steady, and in some cases even threatened to turn negative, as economies around the world struggled to recover. This era came to an abrupt end in recent years following the double economic shocks of the COVID pandemic and Russias invasion of Ukraine. Many central banks and senior policymakers were caught on the back foot as inflation rates soared to levels not seen for nearly half a century in some countries...
Feb 04, 2025•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast China has approved the construction of what will become the worlds largest hydropower dam in Tibet. Located in the lower reaches of the Yarlung Tsangpo river, it could generate three times more energy than the Three Gorges Dam also built by China - and currently the worlds biggest. This Inquiry examines how important hydropower is for Chinas economy, whether it will meet its climate goals and whether this new dam is a safe project that prioritises ecological protection as China claims. We look a...
Jan 28, 2025•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast In December 2024, the decades-old Assad regime in Syria fell following 13 years of brutal civil war. The Islamist rebel group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, seized power in the capital Damascus, having co-ordinated a lightning offensive along with other opposition forces across the country. This week on The Inquiry, we examine how recent events led to the current situation, who the main players are vying for control, and the many challenges facing both the new government and the Syrian people. Presenter...
Jan 21, 2025•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Drinks with toxic ingredients have been linked to deaths and poisonings in Turkey, Laos and India in 2024. Fake alcohol is unrecorded and unregulated alcohol that hasnt been registered in official statistics for sales, production or trade. The range of unrecorded alcohol includes alcohol smuggled across borders, counterfeit alcohol and homemade brew. This week of The Inquiry we look at how toxic and widespread fake alcohol is. What are the health risks of drinking contaminated alcohol? Bootleg a...
Jan 14, 2025•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Cancer is a disease that will affect 1 in 5 people in our lifetime, and its estimated that around 20 million people worldwide will be diagnosed with some form of cancer in 2025. But how might a vaccine help in the treatment of cancer? Numerous trials began testing the viability of cancer vaccines in 2024, including one for melanoma and another for lung cancer. With all the promise that these new cancer vaccine trials bring for cancer patients, we explore the different ways in which vaccines coul...
Jan 07, 2025•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Robert F Kennedy Jr, nephew of America's 35th President, John F. Kennedy, has been nominated to be the next US health secretary by President-elect Donald Trump. The post oversees everything from medical research to food safety and public welfare programmes. Kennedy has been the face of Make America Healthy Again, a movement dedicated to public health, sustainable practices and a government that truly serves the people. This week of The Inquiry, we look at how MAHA wants to tackle chronic disease...
Jan 02, 2025•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast The Himalayan Kingdom of Bhutan, sandwiched between China and India, is perhaps best known around the globe for its unconventional measure of national development: Gross National Happiness. The concept was introduced back in 1972 by the fourth King of Bhutan, Jigme Singye Wangchuck. It assesses the countrys overall wellbeing on the basis of sustainable and equitable socio-economic development; environmental conservation; preservation and promotion of culture; and good governance. But the Bhutane...
Dec 24, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Accusations of sabotage have been made after a Chinese merchant ship cut through two important undersea cables in the Baltic Sea. Eight of the nine states in the Baltic are members of Nato but Russia has access to the sea from St Petersburg and for its Kaliningrad exclave. With previous incidents of damage to underwater pipelines and cables, there is concern that the security of critical underwater infrastructure is at risk from grey zone activities - damaging but deniable incidents below the le...
Dec 17, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast When Chancellor Olaf Scholz fired his finance minister, Christian Lindner last month, Germanys traffic light government collapsed, an uneasy coalition between parties with differing perspectives and strained relations, the Social Democrats, the Greens and the Free Democrats. At the heart of the political dispute lie deeply opposing views about spending plans, and how to fund much needed investment in infrastructure projects such as transport, education, green energy and digital technology, in or...
Dec 10, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast The car industry across the European Union employs over thirteen million people, both directly and indirectly, thats around six percent of the blocs workforce. But in recent years, Europes manufacturers have been struggling to cope with issues like economic downturns, clean energy requirements and the digital revolution. Some of the oldest, biggest carmakers are considering plant closures and job cuts in order to try and stay afloat. They are also facing fierce competition in the electric vehicl...
Dec 03, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast When protests against decades of rule by the Assad family were crushed by Syrian government forces in the spring of 2011, opposition groups took up arms and the country descended into civil war. The conflict drew in Syrias Kurds, jihadi groups including Islamic State and al-Qaeda, and the international community. 13 years on President Assad controls around two thirds of the country, but northern Syria remains out of the regime's grip and is highly volatile. Internal divisions, international infl...
Nov 27, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Aerospace giant Boeing has had big problems to overcome since the crashes of two of its 737 Max aircraft. Its situation was compounded this year with another safety scare and a strike losing it billions of dollars. It has a new CEO who has pledged to return the company to its engineering roots and away from cost cutting and in October, Boeing managed to raise 21bn US dollars by issuing new shares in the company. However, catching up on lost production will take time and money and financially the...
Nov 21, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Earlier this year the global video sharing platform You Tube dominated TV viewership in the United States, knocking Disney off the top spot and leaving major media names like Netflix, Paramount, Amazon and Fox in its wake. In a first for the streaming platform, the time people spent watching YouTube on television accounted for 10.4 percent of total TV in the month of July. In terms of its world reach, the platform is now available in more than one hundred countries and pulls in nearly three bill...
Nov 14, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast The International Space Station will be decommissioned in 2030 and crash down into the Pacific Ocean, ending more than three decades of international cooperation. Launched in the wake of the Cold War, the ISS is seen as a triumph of global diplomacy between the US, Russia and other nations. Its demise will mark the end of an era. Nasa has awarded contracts to commercial companies to develop potential successors to the ISS, and maintain a U.S. presence in low earth orbit. Meanwhile Russia and Ind...
Nov 04, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast This year wildfires in Canada have caused devastation to the countrys treasured town of Jasper. The wildfires have ravaged the landscape, destroyed communities and displaced hundreds of thousands of people. The causes are many, and fires are a natural occurrence. But humans, and the climate, are making them worse. As the number and intensity of fires increase, the methods used to both prevent and fight them may need to change. How can Canada fight its wildfires? Presenter: Tanya Beckett Producer...
Oct 28, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Ukraines President Zelensky recently presented his Victory Plan to end the war in Ukraine to both Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, the two candidates competing to be the next President of the United States of America. President Zelenskys view is that if his plan is supported by Ukraines allies, then the war could be ended by next year. But both US Presidential candidates, whilst in agreement that the war has to stop, have expressed a very different approach to how they would work towards that. An...
Oct 22, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast A court room in the US State of Nevada provided the setting for the recent hearing between media mogul Rupert Murdoch and his children, over who will inherit his empire on the 93 year olds death. The succession battle, worthy of the TV drama Succession, which was partly inspired by the Murdoch dynasty, was played out behind closed doors and its unlikely that the decision, when it comes, will be made available to the public. Murdochs News Corp owns hundreds of newspapers and media outlets around ...
Oct 15, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast With Lebanon, Gaza, and Israel all under fire and a death count running into tens of thousands, the Middle East has never been in a more dangerous position. The United States has been a big diplomatic influence on attempts at peace negotiations in the Middle East. The last major attempt at peace negotiations was in the spring of 2024 when the US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken visited the region to try and broker a ceasefire. But despite the efforts of not just the US, but Egypt, Qatar and Eu...
Oct 09, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast In September Greek Tourism Minister Olga Kefalogianni announced the introduction of special fees for passengers disembarking from cruise ships at Mykonos, Santorini and some other ports. The fees are part of a broader strategy to manage the resurgence of mass tourism post-covid, reducing some of the negative impacts such as pressure on water supplies, waste management and overcrowding, while spreading the economic benefits more fairly across society. Greece is not alone in considering how to all...
Sep 30, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Just over three years ago the Taliban seized Kabul and stormed to power in Afghanistan. They soon declared a new government which is still not recognised by any other country. The Taliban claim they have made improvements to the country. War is over and, they say, there is more peace and security than before they came to power. But millions of people are struggling to survive in the country, there is a restrictive rule of law that is imposed by a very hierarchical government structure and half t...
Sep 24, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast At the beginning of September, the far-right party Alternative for Germany or AfD, won an election in the eastern state of Thuringia. The result marked the far rights first win, in a state parliament election, since World War Two. In the more populous neighbouring state of Saxony the party came in a close second. Whilst in both states the party has been officially classed as right-wing extremist, the results nonetheless, signify a sharp rebuke from the voting public towards Germanys established ...
Sep 16, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast In August this year, a US court in Washington DC ruled that Google acted illegally to crush its competition and maintain a monopoly on online search and related advertising. This is just one of a number of lawsuits that have been filed against the big tech companies, as US antitrust authorities attempt to strengthen competition in the industry. Now Google is facing another legal case in Virginia, USA, over its advertising technology. Whilst in Europe it has been fined billions in monopoly cases....
Sep 10, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Hezbollah has both political and military wings both of which are designated by several countries as terror organisations. It emerged several decades ago in Lebanon. Since Israel launched its war in Gaza in the wake of the Hamas attacks of October 7th, it has intensified its military activities along the border between Israel and Lebanon. The persistent question has been what is it trying to achieve? Are the attacks intended as a show of support for the Palestinians in Gaza or an attempt to take...
Aug 27, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast In 2018 an historic document known as the Provisional Agreement was signed between the Catholic Church and the Peoples Republic of China. So far this agreement has been renewed every two years and the expectation is that it will be renewed again this year. The only detail that has been made public is that the Agreement allows the Pope final approval on Bishops appointed by the Chinese authorities, other than that it is cloaked in secrecy. But there have been occasions since its signing where the...
Aug 20, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Project 2025 is a blueprint for the next conservative president of the US. The think tank behind it, The Heritage Foundation, has published a book, Mandate for Leadership. Its an anthology of ideas that suggest sweeping changes to federal government, presidential power and US involvement in global affairs. Mandate for Leadership is a collection of policy ideas, written for any president to use once in office. Previous Republican administrations have implemented many of its action points. Project...
Aug 09, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Last year the Canadian province of British Columbia, launched a landmark three-year pilot programme on drug decriminalisation. For a number of years now communities across Canada have been facing their own opioid crisis, as drugs like fentanyl become more easily available. Vancouver in British Columbia, has always been at the forefront of drug policy change, yet it has seen an explosion in overdose deaths due to toxic drugs in recent years. So the city readily adopted the decriminalisation progr...
Aug 07, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Hundreds of monumental human shaped statues are motionless, and exposed to the elements, on Rapa Nui - also known as Easter Island. A name that dates back to 1722, when a Dutch explorer first saw it on Easter Sunday. The statues, or Moai, were there centuries before that and are sacred to the Rapa Nui people. They have also become a world famous tourist attraction and can be found in multiple outdoor locations across the small island. They are heavy and huge - sizes range from 1 to 20 metres tal...
Jul 29, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast The South China Sea is a major world shipping route bordered by a number of countries including China, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, all of whom have staked claims to various zones in this vast expanse of water. But tensions have grown in recent years between China who claim the majority of the South China Sea for themselves and the Philippines. Lately these tensions have escalated into a series of dangerous encounters as the two countries seek to enforce their right to disputed reefs and o...
Jul 22, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast The H5N1 bird flu virus has spread from birds to dairy cattle in the United States where a number of agricultural workers have also been infected by it. This is thought to be the first time humans have caught the virus from another mammal and the first time the virus has been detected in cattle. This unusual development is being tracked by virologists who have followed Bird Flu since it first emerged in Hong Kong in the 1990s. Since then, across the world millions of wild birds and poultry have ...
Jul 16, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Since the CNN Presidential Debate in June 2024 headlines in the US calling for Joe Biden to pull out of the race have been relentless. There have been questions about his age, performance, and ability to run for a second term in the White House. Bidens ratings have slipped, and donors and party members have publicly said that Biden should step aside. Joe Biden maintains he will not go and that he is the best person to beat would-be president Donald Trump. He does still have staunch supporters an...
Jul 10, 2024•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
