If you're a regular purchaser of alcohol you’ll know that Ireland has the 3rd highest excise duties in Europe and among the highest supermarket prices per unit in the world. That’s despite thousands of tourists coming to this country just to enjoy our famed stouts, whiskeys and liqueurs. But is there even more regulation to come on alcohol and how does the industry respond?   

Speaking to Joe this morning was Patrick Rigney is the founder of Drumshanbo Gunpowder gin and now chairs Dublin’s newest brewery owned by some of the city’s biggest publicans. 

With the Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales still underway, research from Domain dot IE found that consumers tend to rank price way above the safety or otherwise of the site that they want to buy from.  It comes as the banking industry warns that one in five people in Ireland lost money as a result of scams last year. 

Speaking to Joe about the findings David Curtin the Chief Executive of the domain dot.ie. 

International business news headlines along with Kathleen Brooks from XTB.

Sony Kapoor is the Professor of Climate, Geoeconomics, and Finance at the European University Institute and adviser to the IMF and the UN.  Joe spoke to him at the AIB sustainability conference and in the wake of COP29 in Baku, about companies and governments rowing back on climate change commitments and the arrival of a new climate-sceptic US administration.

Finland and Ireland are remarkably similar.  They’re both relatively remote with roughly the same populations. They have had an often violent past with big neighbours and they're both very open, technology driven, trading nations which tend to be buffeted by global events. But the Finns have been voted the most content in the world and yet that’s not something we say often about our own land. 

Joe was joined by Leena Gardemeister - Finland’s ambassador to Ireland.

Joe was joined by the team behind Shorla Oncology who have just won EY Entrepreneurs of the Year.

A look at Friday's business news headlines with Kate English, Head of Real Estate Research at Deloitte.

It’s the season to get vouchers from friends, colleagues and sometimes your employer.  But not all of them are transferable?   

Mostly if you get a voucher for one place it’s only usable in that place.  But increasingly there are options to buy a voucher which is usable in dozens of places.  That’s especially the case for spa or resort days out. 

 Speaking to Emmet this morning was Adrienne Stewart the Founder of Hotel and Spa resorts.com . 

We spend a lot of time worrying about how artificial intelligence will overpower humanity. But what if the real problem is the reverse? Emmet ask  Jonathan Birch, a professor at LSE and author of Edge of Sentience. 

There is a phrase that ‘Demography is destiny’ and India’s destiny looks increasingly good.  It passed China recently as the most populous nation on Earth with 1.3bn people while birth rates are falling everywhere else. 

But its economy is also booming and is set to pass out Japan and Germany to become the 3rd largest in the world.   And its middle class will soon start moving the dial in terms of global trade.  But its poverty levels are still huge and it could take a century to modernise its infrastructure.  

Joe discusses all with James Pomeroy is Global economist with HSBC.