How do you do business with the rest of the world when nobody officially accepts that your nation state even exists? Rob Young looks at the struggles facing unrecognised breakaway states such as Abkhazia, Transnistria and Nagorno Karabakh.

Thomas de Waal of think tank Carnegie Europe explains how many of them have turned to smuggling and even Bitcoin mining as a way of making ends meet. Meanwhile the BBC's Ivana Davidovic reports from Nicosia in Cyprus where the city's main thoroughfare is still physically divided between the prosperous Greek south and the unrecognised Turkish north.

Plus how can these nations compete international football? Sascha Duerkop has the answer. He is general secretary of Conifa, the international football league for teams that Fifa refuses to recognise.

(Picture: Children wave the North Cypriot flag; Credit: STR/AFP/Getty Images)

Why Facebook's Libra project will attract the attention of regulators. Rob Young hears from the BBC's technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones about why Facebook is launching its own currency. Charles Cascarilla, founder of the digital currency company Paxos explains why the Libra project is so ambitious. Rebecca Harding, chief executive of the data and analytics group Coriolis Trade Technologies and former chief economist at the British Bankers’ Association, explains why regulators will be paying attention.

(Photo: Illustration of Facebook and digital currency, Credit: Getty Images)

We need to transform the way we grow food if we are to head off disaster - so say leading agronomists. But can it be done?

The modern agricultural industry, borne out of the Green Revolution that has multiplied crop yields since the 1960s, has contributed to multiple new crises - obesity, soil degradation, collapsing biodiversity and climate change. To address this "paradox of productivity" a whole new revolution is needed, according to Professor Tim Benton of the University of Leeds and think tank Chatham House.

The BBC's Justin Rowlatt travels to the world's longest running scientific experiment, a collection of wheat fields dating back to the 1840s at the Rothamsted agricultural research centre just outside London, to ask resident scientist John Crawford whether our past success in staving off global hunger can be sustained in the coming decades.

Plus what role should the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation play, especially as that body prepares to appoint new leadership? Justin speaks to the former UN Rapporteur for the Right to Food, Olivier de Schutter.

Producer: Laurence Knight

(Picture: The Broadbalk research wheat fields at Rothamsted; Credit: BBC)

The Turkish commercial capital must vote again for a new mayor after March's election result was overturned by the government.

Ed Butler visits the city and meets Ekrem Imamoglu, who narrowly won in March but spent just 17 days in office before the decision was made to re-run the election. Mr Imamoglu says he saw overspending and waste, and that around 10% of the city's budget could be saved.

The country is also experiencing an economic slowdown, and Ed speaks to Deniz Gider of the Turkish construction workers' union, about how it's affecting his members. Plus economist and political scientist Atilla Yesilada explains how Turkey finds itself in this current economic crisis.

(Picture: Supporters of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu protest against the re-run of the mayoral election in Istanbul; Credit: Yasin Akgul/AFP/Getty Images)

The attitude towards immigration in Europe and America is hardening under a wave of populist politics, and businesses are finding that despite labour shortages in many sectors, bringing workers in from abroad is becoming harder.

The BBC's Frey Lindsay reports from Stockholm on a phenomenon dubbed "talent expulsions" - highly skilled workers being ordered to leave the country because their paperwork is not perfectly in order.

A similarly bureaucratic approach has been taken in the UK, where it is dubbed the "hostile environment" for immigrants. Since the 2016 Brexit referendum some three million EU citizens suddenly find themselves subject to it. Dutch campaigner Monique Hawkins tells how she was told to leave the UK despite having lived there more than three decades. Meanwhile Danny Brooks of international recruitment firm Virtual Human Resources says UK businesses are already finding it much tougher to attract the talented employees they need.

We also get the view from Singapore. About half the city-state's residents are immigrants, after several decades of a successful pro-business immigration policy. We ask former diplomat Kishore Mahbubani what is the secret of his country's success.

Producer: Laurence Knight

(Picture: "Denied" rubber stamp; Credit: bankrx/Getty Images)

It's more than a decade since the global financial crisis. Central banks have pumped trillions of dollars into the financial system to support markets and the broader economy. But there are warning signs that major risks may be re-emerging in the financial markets.

This month, fund manager Neil Woodford suspended trading in his largest fund after rising numbers of investors asked for their money back. Could this highlight a vulnerability in the financial system that runs right through the investment management business?

The BBC's Manuela Saragosa and Laurence Knight speak to two veterans of the investment community: Mohamed El-Erian, chief economic adviser at Allianz and former head of Pimco in California; and Lord Paul Myners, the former head of Gartmore in the UK. Both worry that investors are unaware of the risk they are running that they won't be able to access their money when they most need it, and warn that regulators could be blindsided by the next big crisis.

Producer: Laurence Knight

(Picture: A trading screen flashes red; Credit: Getty Images)

Asian countries have told the West to stop dumping its plastic waste on them - and it could spell the end of the recycling industry. China imposed a ban on imports last year, and now Malaysia and others are returning the stuff back its senders.

Manuela Saragosa speaks to Jim Puckett, founder of the Basel Action Network, who has successfully lobbied for the international trade in recyclable waste to be curtailed, because he believes it is actually bad for the environment. Arnaud Brunet, director of the Bureau of International Recycling, explains why he thinks that's an unfair depiction of his industry.

(Picture: A man scavenges for plastic for recycling at a garbage dump site in Bachok, Malaysia; Credit: Mohd Samsul Mohd Said/Getty Images)

The Niger Delta is Africa's biggest oil producing region. It has also become a security and environmental nightmare thanks to dozens of spills and theft by armed rebels.

Oil and gas giant Shell has long been criticised for its operations in the region. Igo Weli, one of the company's directors in Nigeria, tells Manuela Saragosa how the threat of violence makes it hard for them to clean up their act.

But while Shell claims it is trying its best in challenging circumstances, Mark Dummett of Amnesty International says the company could be doing a lot more and is still under-reporting the extent of the problem. Manuela also speaks to Jumoke Ajayi of Nigerian oil conglomerate Sahara Group, and Erabanabari Kobah, who acts as a spokesperson for one of the Niger Delta communities.

Producer: Laurence Knight

(Picture: A member of the Nigerian navy forces patrols on an abandoned site of an illegal oil refinery in the Niger Delta region; Credit: Stefan Heunis/AFP/Getty Images)

With ever more jobs at risk of automation, should the automatons be taxed the same as humans?

Ed Butler speaks to Dr Carl Frey of the Oxford Martin School, who co-authored a report five years ago claiming that almost half of US jobs could made redundant by emerging technology in the next 30 years. His new book, The Technology Trap, looks to the history of the Industrial Revolution as a guide to current developments. He worries that millions of workers could soon find their careers devastated, while the ultimate benefits of technology may only felt decades in the future.

It is perhaps then not surprising that many politicians, academics and businessmen - including Microsoft founder Bill Gates - now advocate a tax on automation to level the playing field with humans. We pit an advocate of such a tax - Ryan Abbott of the University of Surrey - against critic Janet Bastiman, chief scientist at StoryStream, which provides AI services to the automotive sector.

(Picture: Robot call centre; Credit: PhonlamaiPhoto/Getty Images)

The challenge of getting ex-offenders back into work. Vivienne Nunis hears from Lester Young Jr, an ex-offender in the US where low-paid work for prisoners is commonplace, while Daniel Gallas reports from Brazil where female prisoners are allowed to operate businesses from their cells. Keith Rosser from the recruitment company Reed describes the challenge of persuading employers to take on convicts in the UK. Elizabeth Hotson meets Max Dubiel, founder of Redemption Roasters, a coffee company that makes a virtue of hiring former prisoners.

Is the search engine's share of our attention and our data too dominant, and should regulators step in and break their business up? Ed Butler gets to pitch these and other questions to Google's former chairman Eric Schmidt.

Google, along with other Silicon Valley leviathans such as Facebook, Amazon and Apple, faces increasing criticism from commentators, regulators and politicians for its monopolistic power. Among them is the tech journalist Franklin Foer of The Atlantic magazine, who tells Ed that the political tide is now turning against big tech in the US.

(Picture: The Google logo is reflected in the eye of a girl; Credit: Chris Jackson/Getty Images)

The cruel multi-million-dollar business of scamming lonely hearts out of their money by posing online as the perfect lover.

Vishala Sri-Pathma speaks to victim David in the UK, who gave almost $20,000 to a woman he met online and hoped to marry and start a family with, before discovering "she" was actually a fraudster. Meanwhile Australian Eliza tells of her amazement at the amount of homework the con artist she encountered must have done researching her background before attempting to swindle her.

Such cases are becoming ever more common thanks to the internet, which enables scammers to mine would-be victims' social media sites for valuable information, while concealing their own identity on dating apps. David Clarke, chair of the UK fraud advisory panel, says it has made romantic fraud a valuable international criminal enterprise.

(Picture: Woman looks at smartphone while biting lip; Credit: DeanDrobot/Getty Images)