Euro steadies as Greek euro exit fears calm

AP, LONDON, May 9: The euro steadied Monday as a string of official denials calmed investor fears of a Greek exit from the common currency.

It became increasingly apparent, however, that Greece will need to ask for more money or easier terms for paying back a euro110 billion ($160 billion) European Union and International Monetary Fund bailout package it was given last May.

"We think that Greece does need a further adjustment programme," Eurogroup Chairman Jean-Claude Juncker said after a Friday evening meeting with the Greek, French, German, Italian and French finance ministers, along with the EU's monetary affairs commissioner Olli Rehn and European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet.

Officials vehemently rejected a report from German magazine Der Spiegel that the country was seeking to exit the eurozone and bring back the drachma. Greek Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou said Greece was working on what to do over the coming two years given that the markets appear closed.

"In essence this will surprise no one; it had already become apparent that Greece probably cannot meet its debt obligations over the next couple of years without further assistance," said Jane Foley, senior currency strategist at Rabobank International.

"Rather than return to the market next year as the original bailout has assumed, is now seems fairly likely that Greece will instead ask for more funds from the EU," Foley added.

There were concerns in the markets that the EU's policymakers and institutions are once again struggling to keep up with broader market developments. The markets are clearly of the view that Greece will have to restructure its debts in some form or another, voluntarily or involuntarily — the yield on the 10-year bond was up another 0.11 percentage points at a staggering 15.62 percent.

At present, the eurozone rules don't allow for a restructuring until 2013 at the earliest.

"The chain of events is increasingly proving the limits of the EU's muddle-through strategy," said Christian Carrillo, an analyst at Societe Generale.

By early morning London time, the euro was up 0.3 percent on the day at $1.4416. In late European trading Friday, the single currency slid to a low of $1.4306 from around $1.45 before the euro exit speculation mushroomed.

Softbank reports robust earnings on smartphones

Ap, TOKYO, May 9: Softbank Corp., the only Japanese mobile carrier offering the hit iPhone, said annual profit nearly doubled despite suffering damage from the March 11 quake and tsunami that battered northeastern Japan.

Softbank, which did not break down quarterly numbers, reported Monday that profit for the fiscal year ended March 31 swelled to 189.71 billion yen ($2.37 billion) from 96.72 billion yen the previous year.

It said the increase was driven by a booming smart phone business that offset a special loss of 14 billion yen ($175 million) caused by the disasters.

Those losses were from fixing telecommunications networks and equipment destroyed by the magnitude-9.0 quake and ensuing tsunami, as well as offering free services to those in the disaster zone whose mobile phones were out of operation for any period, according to Softbank.

The Tokyo-based Internet and communications conglomerate said sales for the fiscal year climbed nearly 9 percent to a company record 3 trillion yen ($37.5 billion) from 2.76 trillion yen.

Separately, Softbank said it had invested $62.5 million in Gilt Groupe Inc., which operates an online shopping service, offering fashion clothing. Softbank has also agreed to acquire 50 percent of the Japan subsidiary of Gilt Groupe, to accelerate its expansion in Japan, it said.

Softbank, long the underdog in Japan's telecom industry, has seen its fortunes improve in recent years with the popularity of the iPhone and iPad from Apple Inc.

Its founder and president Masayoshi Son, often praised as the Bill Gates of Japan for having pushed Internet businesses, has been outspoken in criticizing the government's recent handling of the nuclear reactor crisis that was spawned by the tsunami.

Son, who owns 21 percent of Softbank Corp., has donated 10 billion yen ($125 million) toward the disaster effort, in addition to the 1 billion yen ($12.5 million) donated by Softbank Group.

"We want to be the kind of company that is liked by society," he told a news conference.

Son said sales results show Softbank is growing in the mobile business at a time when its two major rivals in Japan, NTT DoCoMo and KDDI Corp. were strugggling to grow. Softbank mobile users had grown from 15 million in 2005 to 25.4 million today, said Son.

"Our numbers were all good," he said of the earnings results.

Son said Softbank has gotten over the damage to its bottom line from massive broadband investments it made six or seven years ago.

But he promised to make key investments in response to complaints that Softbank cell phones had poor connections, instead of chasing immediate profit growth.

He said the company will invest 500 billion yen ($6.25 billion) this year in equipment, and another 500 billion yen ($6.25 billion) in 2012. Softbank invested 420 billion yen ($5.25) last year, he said.

Softbank did not disclose sales numbers for the iPhone or iPad in Japan. But long lines have formed outside stores whenever new models have arrived. Son said the new white iPhone 4, as well as the iPad 2, which both went on sale in Japan on April 28, were proving popular.

The company did not give a forecast for this year.

About 19 percent of Softbank's telecommunications equipment nationwide was damaged by the March 11 quake and tsunami, but nearly all of it has been fixed, including using substitute satellite connections, Son said.

In the long term, Son said he was banking on growth in Asia, and positioning Softbank group companies to become No. 1 in the region in the Internet business, with strategic investments, such as Renren Inc., which runs an online social network in China.

Softbank shares edged down 0.8 percent to 3,230 yen ($40) in Tokyo, shortly before the earnings were announced.

Asia shares boosted by US jobs growth, Europe down

AP, BANGKOK, May 9: Better-than-expected growth in U.S. jobs and a bounce back in commodity prices led to modest gains in Asian markets Monday, but Europe opened broadly lower amid concerns over Greece's debt crisis.

Oil rose above $100 a barrel, regaining some ground after last week's plunge. In currencies, the dollar weakened against the euro but was up against the yen.

The possibility that Greece — mired in recession because of austerity measures — may need more time to repay its debts, weighed on markets in Europe. Britain's FTSE 100 was 0.3 percent lower to 5,959.40. Germany's DAX slipped 0.9 percent to 7,431.45 and France's CAC-40 lost 0.9 percent to 4,022.36.

Wall Street appeared set for a higher opening, however, with Dow Jones industrial futures up 46 points to 12,615 and S&P 500 futures 5.4 points higher to 1,340.

The U.S. Labor Department reported Friday that private employers hired 268,000 people in April, the most since February 2006. Taking into account job cuts of government workers, the economy added a total of 244,000 jobs overall last month, well above the 185,000 jobs that analysts had predicted and easing worries that the economic recovery was faltering.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 0.8 percent to 23,336, with retail, raw materials and energy companies among the leaders. Anhui Conch Cement Co. Ltd. rose 2.9 percent and PetroChina Co. Ltd., the publicly traded unit of China's biggest oil and gas company, was 1.7 percent higher.

Australia's S&P/ASX 200 added 0.3 percent to 4,756.80, with BHP Billiton Ltd., the world's largest mining company, gaining 0.4 percent and rival Rio Tinto Ltd. up 0.6 percent.

A rebound in oil and commodities following last week's slide gave investors the confidence to wade back into shares, said Jackson Wong, vice president at Tanrich Securities in Hong Kong.

"There were oversold sectors — sold off on concerns that overall, the markets would crash. But everything is stabilizing, so investors are buying," Wong said.

But Japan's Nikkei 225 stock average ran into headwinds as the country struggles to rebuild following the March earthquake and tsunami. Down 0.7 percent at 9,794.38, the index has lost 4 percent since the March 11 disasters killed more than 25,000 people, destroyed towns, upended a nuclear power plant and washed away entire industries.

Shares of Chubu Electric Power Co., which operates the Hamaoka nuclear plant along Japan's Pacific coast, plunged 10.3 percent after the government asked the company to shut three reactors while the utility builds a seawall and improves backup systems to protect the reactors from a major earthquake and tsunami.

Nuclear energy provides more than one-third of Japan's electricity, and shutting the three reactors would likely worsen power shortages expected this summer.

South Korea's Kospi finished lower, by 0.4 percent lower at 2,139.17.

Mainland Chinese shares edged higher as investors snapped up bargains after last week's big losses.

The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index gained 0.3 percent to 2,872.46 and the Shenzhen Composite Index gained 0.7 percent to 1,203.07. Shares in nuclear energy and railways led the gains.

"Nuclear shares led the advance because of reports that approvals for nuclear projects might resume by August," said Yang Yining, an analyst at Capital-edge Investment & Management, based in Shanghai. China halted approvals of new nuclear plants in March after the tsunami crippled Japan's Fukushima Dai-ichi plant.

On Wall Street on Friday, better-than-expected job growth helped send shares higher after a four-day slump.

The Dow Jones industrial average gained 54.57 points to close at 12,638.74. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 5.10 to 1,340.20. The Nasdaq composite rose 12.84 to 2,827.56.

Benchmark crude for June delivery was up $2.96 to $100.17 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell $2.62 to settle at $97.18 on Friday.

The euro rose to $1.4406 after tumbling to $1.4337 late Friday in New York. The dollar strengthened to 80.66 yen from 80.58 yen.

Central Japan nuclear plant to temporarily close

AP, TOKYO, May 9: The operator of a coastal nuclear power plant agreed Monday to the Japanese government's request to shutter three reactors there until it builds a seawall and other tsunami protections.

Chubu Electric Power Co. acted at a special board meeting after Prime Minister Naoto Kan requested the temporary shutdown at the Hamaoka plant amid concerns a earthquake magnitude 8.0 or higher could strike the region within 30 years.

The government acted after evaluating Japan's 54 reactors for quake and tsunami vulnerability after the March 11 disasters that crippled the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in northeast Japan.

"We understand that the prime minister's request is based on increased concerns over nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant accident," Chubu Electric President Akihisa Mizuno said at a news conference.

About 79,800 people live within a 6-mile (10-kilometer) radius of the Hamaoka plant about 125 miles (200 kilometers) west of Tokyo.

Nuclear energy provides more than one-third of Japan's electricity, and shutting the Hamaoka plant is likely to exacerbate power shortages expected this summer.

The three reactors account for more than 10 percent of Chubu's power supply. The Hamaoka plant is a key power provider to central Japan, including nearby Aichi, home of Toyota Motor Corp.

Since the March 11 disasters, Chubu Electric drew safety measures that include building a 40-foot-high (12-meter) seawall nearly a mile (1.5 kilometers) long over the next two to three years, company officials said. Chubu also promised to install more emergency backup generators and other equipment and improve the water tightness of the reactor buildings.

The Hamaoka plant lacks a concrete sea barrier now. Sand hills between the ocean and the plant are up to 50 feet (15 meters) high, deemed enough to defend against a tsunami around 26 feet (8 meters) high, officials said.

The government earlier estimated the improvements to the Hamaoka plant could take two years.

Oil rises to near $100 on weaker US dollar

AP, SINGAPORE, May 9: Oil prices rose to near $100 a barrel Monday in Asia, bouncing back from last week's plunge, as a weaker U.S. dollar made commodities less expensive for investors with other currencies.

Benchmark crude for June delivery was up $2.36 to $99.54 a barrel at late afternoon Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell $2.62 to settle at $97.18 on Friday.

In London, Brent crude for June delivery was up $2.52 to $111.65 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.

Oil prices fell 15 percent last week as the dollar strengthened and traders worried that slowing U.S. economic growth didn't justify a 35 percent increase from February to near $115 on May 2.

The euro rose to $1.4434 on Monday from $1.4312 on Friday while the dollar was little changed at 80.65 yen.

Some analysts are taking heart from a larger-than-expected increase in U.S. jobs last month. Non-farm payrolls rose by 244,000 jobs in April, while the unemployment rate rose to 9.0 percent from 8.8 percent in March.

"The fundamental backdrop in the market remains entirely unaltered, with global oil demand still showing continued strength," Barclays Capital said in a report. "The general (oil price) trend from here should be higher, rather than lower."

Other analysts expect oil to drop as higher U.S. gasoline prices — up 37 percent from a year ago — undermine crude demand. U.S. gross domestic product growth slowed to 1.8 percent in the first quarter.

"We expect oil to fall further as the global economy slows, the dollar continues to rebound, and the risk premium due to unrest in the Middle East eventually fades," Capital Economics said in a report.

In other Nymex trading in June contracts, heating oil rose 6.0 cents to $2.91 a gallon and gasoline added 7.0 cents to $3.16 a gallon. Natural gas futures were up 3.7 cents at $4.27 per 1,000 cubic feet.

UK banks won't appeal payment protection ruling

AP, LONDON, May 9: British banks on Monday gave up the fight against compensating customers who were missold payment protection insurance on mortgages and other loans, and now face a compensation bill estimated at 4.5 billion pounds ($7.4 billion).

The British Bankers' Association said it took the decision in the "interest of providing certainty" for bank customers.

"We continue to believe that there are matters of important principle which we will be taking forward in other ways with the authorities," the association said, without specifying the issues.

The Financial Services Authority has estimated that banks will pay a total of 4.5 billion pounds to settle claims

Natalie Ceeney, who heads the Financial Ombudsman Service, said the agency had been received up to 5,000 complaints each week from consumers since October.

"We will be working with the banks, over the coming weeks, to ensure that consumers' complaints are dealt with fairly and promptly," Ceeney said.

Lloyds Banking Group last week was the first to break ranks, taking a 3.2 billion-pound provision for repayments to customers. Barclays announced Monday that it had also decided against joining an appeal, and was making a provision of 1 billion pounds for compensation.

The Financial Services Authority has told banks that customers must be told if the insurance is optional, and they must be advised of their right to cancel. The agency also said the seller must be sure that the customer is eligible to claim under the policy, since some exclude nonresidents, the self-employed or people with certain health problems.

The banks had argued that the FSA's standard should not be applied retrospectively.

Schools may ban chocolate milk over added sugar

AP, LOS ANGELES, May 9: Chocolate milk has long been seen as the spoonful of sugar that makes the medicine go down, but the nation's childhood obesity epidemic has a growing number of people wondering whether that's wise.

With schools under increasing pressure to offer healthier food, the staple on children's cafeteria trays has come under attack over the very ingredient that made it so popular — sugar.

Some school districts have gone as far as prohibiting flavored milk, and Florida considered a statewide ban in schools. Other districts have sought a middle ground by replacing flavored milks containing high-fructose corn syrup with versions containing sugar, which some see as a more natural sweetener.

Los Angeles Unified, the nation's second-largest school district, is the latest district to tackle the issue. Superintendent John Deasy recently announced he would push this summer to remove chocolate and strawberry milk from school menus.

But nutritionists — and parents — are split over whether bans make sense, especially when about 70 percent of milk consumed in schools is flavored, mostly chocolate, according to the industry-backed Milk Processors Education Program.

Many, including the School Nutrition Association, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Dietetic Association, American Heart Association, and National Medical Association, argue that the nutritional value of flavored low-fat or skim milk outweighs the harm of added sugar. Milk contains nine essential nutrients including calcium, vitamin D and protein.

A joint statement from those groups points to studies that show kids who drink fat-free, flavored milk meet more of their nutrient needs and are not heavier than non-milk drinkers.

"Chocolate milk has been unfairly pegged as one of the causes of obesity," said Julie Buric, vice president of marketing for the Milk Processors Education Program.

Others note the nation's child obesity epidemic and say flavored milk simply needs to go.

Eight ounces of white milk served in Los Angeles public schools contains 14 grams of natural sugar or lactose; fat-free chocolate milk has an extra six grams of sugar for a total of 20 grams, while fat-free strawberry milk has a total of 27 grams — the same as eight ounces of Coca-Cola.

"Chocolate milk is soda in drag," said Ann Cooper, director of nutrition services for the Boulder Valley School District in Louisville, Colo., which has banned flavored milk. "It works as a treat in homes, but it doesn't belong in schools."

Flavored milk is also a target of British TV chef Jamie Oliver, who has made revamping school food a signature cause.

For a segment to be aired on his "Food Revolution" TV show, he recently filled a school bus with white sand to represent the amount of sugar Los Angeles Unified school children consume weekly in flavored milk.

"If you have flavored milk, that's candy," he told The Associated Press.

Oliver cheered Deasy's proposal to remove flavored milk from schools during a recent joint appearance on the "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" show.

If the school board adopts the ban, Los Angeles Unified would join districts including Washington and Berkeley, Calif.

But efforts by some other districts turned sour after children drank less milk. Milk consumption drops by 35 percent when flavored milks are removed, according to the Milk Processors Education Program.

Cabell County, W.Va., schools brought chocolate milk back at the recommendation of state officials, and Fairfax County, Va., did the same after its dairy provider came up with a version sweetened with beet sugar rather than high-fructose corn syrup.

The Florida Board of Education also backed away from its proposed ban on chocolate milk after the state agricultural commissioner urged the board to look at all sugary food and beverages served in schools.

The Los Angeles district has worked with its dairy supplier on flavored versions using the sweetener Truvia and chicory, district spokesman Robert Alaniz said.

Cooper and others argued children will drink plain milk if that's what's offered.

"We've taught them to drink chocolate milk, so we can unteach them that," Cooper said. "Our kids line up for milk."

Boulder Valley hasn't been barraged with complaints since removing chocolate milk two years ago, but it hasn't tracked whether milk consumption has dropped, she said.

Parents line up on both sides of the issue.

Deborah Bellholt, a South Los Angeles mother, said none of her six children ranging from pre-school to high school age will drink plain milk. "By allowing kids flavored milk, they still get the calcium they need," she said. "If not, they'd bypass it."

But Mimi Bonetti, a suburban Los Angeles mother with two elementary school-age children who drink plain milk, said she gets angry that chocolate milk is portrayed as nutritious. Children can get calcium and other nutrients from other foods, she said.

"If you offer them the choice of chocolate or plain, of course they're going to choose chocolate," Bonetti said. "When you're telling kids that drinking chocolate milk is a healthy choice, it's sending the wrong message."

Ask kids, and most vote for chocolate. Suburban Los Angeles seventh-grader Nacole Johnson said plain milk tastes yucky. If there were no chocolate milk, "I wouldn't drink it," she said.

Turkey hosts UN forum on world's poorest nations

AP, ISTANBUL, May 9: Speakers at a U.N. conference in Turkey that aims to help the world's poorest countries say rising food and fuel prices have put additional pressure on people living in poverty.

In a keynote speech on Monday, Nepalese Prime Minister Jhalnath Khanal also said the impact of climate change, including droughts and floods, is hurting countries that are struggling to develop.

U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon is among thousands of delegates at the meeting in Istanbul.

The conference of "least-developed countries" lists 48 members. Thirty-three are in Africa, 14 are in Asia and one — Haiti — is in the Americas.

US, China to talk trade, currency, human rights

AP, WASHINGTON, May 9: America's massive trade deficit with China, currency rates and human rights concerns will all be on the agenda when top officials from the United States and China sit down for high-level talks this week.

The annual meetings will bring together top officials from both countries representing dozens of government agencies in the areas of trade and finance, and foreign policy.

While no major breakthroughs are expected, both sides hope to build on the progress made during a state visit by Chinese President Hu Jintao to Washington in January.

That visit helped smooth relations that had been strained in 2010 over such issues as U.S. military sales to Taiwan.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke will lead the U.S. team.

Both countries will, for the first time, bring top military leaders to the discussions in an effort to defuse military tensions that were heightened last year by the U.S. arms sales.

The Chinese team will be led by Vice Premier Wang Qishan, China's top economic policymaker, and State Counselor Dai Bingguo, a veteran diplomat.

The talks will begin with an opening session and then break into separate discussions on the economy and foreign policy. The U.S. and Chinese leaders are also scheduled to meet Monday with President Barack Obama. The talks wrap up on Tuesday.

China is facing threats of U.S. economic sanctions on goods shipped here to its largest foreign market unless it does more to end what U.S. manufacturers say are unfair trade practices, including currency manipulation, that have cost American jobs.

At the same time, China, America's biggest foreign creditor, wants assurances that its $1.2 trillion in U.S. Treasury holdings are safe despite the impending congressional debate over raising the government's $14.3 trillion borrowing limit.

"The Chinese are astounded that the U.S. government would let the debate get to the stage where there is even a remote possibility of a default," said Eswar Prasad, a China expert at Cornell University.

The higher debt limit is needed to make sure America can keep paying the interest bill on the debt to China and other investors.

While Geithner said last week that the U.S. would press China to accelerate efforts to revalue its currency, the yuan, he also sounded a conciliatory tone. He noted that the yuan has risen in value by 5 percent since last June, and even faster once inflation was taken into account.

A softer approach on China's currency will not please American manufacturers. They contend that China's currency is undervalued by as much as 40 percent and they want Congress to approve economic penalties if Beijing doesn't move faster.

The U.S. trade deficit with China last year was a record $273 billion, one-fifth more than in 2009. The administration is considering filing new trade cases against Chinese practices that U.S. companies contend are unfair.

U.S. officials say they want to see more progress on economic commitments made in January.

Those include closer monitoring of Chinese government purchases of software, a move intended to boost Beijing's buying of legal U.S. software and reduce its use of pirated software. American companies say such theft is costing them billions in lost sales.

The Chinese also pledged to revamp a policy that limits the ability of U.S. companies to compete for Chinese government projects unless the products are designed in China. American businesses regard this as an effort to force them to turn over their technology to China or be locked out of its government market.

On foreign policy, officials said Clinton will renew efforts to gain China's support in confronting nuclear threats from North Korea and Iran, and she will raise the issue of human rights.

China recently undertook the biggest security crackdown in years, apparently prompted by the communist leadership's fear of Middle East-inspired unrest migrating to China.

The high-level talks began in 2006 in the Bush administration and focused on economic issues. The Obama administration expanded the focus in 2009 to include foreign policy as well as economic concerns.

Arizona seeks online donations to build border fence

AP, PHOENIX, May 9: Arizona lawmakers want more fence along the border with Mexico — whether the federal government thinks it's necessary or not.

They've got a plan that could get a project started using online donations and prison labor. If they get enough money, all they would have to do is get cooperation from landowners and construction could begin as soon as this year.

Gov. Jan Brewer recently signed a bill that sets the state on a course that begins with launching a website to raise money for the work, said state Sen. Steve Smith, the bill's sponsor.

"We're going to build this site as fast as we can, and promote it, and market the heck out of it," said Smith, a first-term Republican senator from Maricopa.

Arizona — strapped for cash and mired in a budget crisis — is already using public donations to pay for its legal defense of the SB1070 illegal immigration law.

Part of the marketing pitch for donations could include providing certificates declaring that individual contributors "helped build the Arizona wall," Smith said. "I think it's going to be a really, really neat thing."

Construction would start "after we've raised a significant amount of money first" but possibly as soon as later this year, Smith said.

"If the website is up and there is an overwhelming response to what we've done and millions of dollars in this fund, I would see no reason why engineering or initial construction or finalized plans can't be accomplished," he said.

The nearly 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border already has about 650 miles of fence of one type or another, nearly half of it in Arizona. The state's 376-mile border is the busiest gateway for both illegal immigrants and marijuana smuggling.

Department of Homeland Security spokesman Matthew Chandler said federal officials declined to comment on the Arizona legislation.

State Corrections Director Charles Ryan said getting inmate labor to help construct border fencing wouldn't be a problem.

Minimum-security prisoners already have been used to clear brush in immigrants' hiding spots near the border and clean up trash and other material dumped by border-crossers, he said.

Work crews of Arizona inmates also have been used to refurbish public buildings, build sidewalks and construct park facilities.

At 50 cents an hour, "we are a relatively inexpensive labor force," Ryan said. "If we have the funding to do it, we're capable of doing it."

Arizona's existing border security fund is being used to pay for legal costs of defending SB1070 in court, though Brewer's 2010 executive order creating the fund allows its money to be used for any "border security purpose." A federal judge has blocked implementation of key parts of SB1070, but Brewer has said she'll take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary.

The fund through Wednesday has received nearly 44,000 donations totaling more than $3.7 million, collected online and through mailed donations since May 2010. Roughly half of the money has been spent, and Brewer spokesman Matthew Benson said the balance is also needed for SB1070-related legal expenses.

Smith and other supporters of the border-fence legislation haven't produced any cost estimates for the state project, saying only that the state should be able to do it far more inexpensively than the federal government.

That still could be put the state's costs in the tens of millions of dollars — or more.

A 2009 report by Congress' Government Accountability Office said costs of federal fencing work to keep out people on foot ranged from $400,000 to $15.1 million per mile, while costs for vehicle barriers ranged from $200,000 to $1.8 million. Costs varied by such things as types of fencing geography, land costs and labor expenses, the report said.

Brewer signed the Arizona fence bill on April 28, and it will take effect with most other new state laws on July 20.

It took the bill about 2 1/2 months to land on her desk, easily winning approval on party-line votes during a legislative session dominated by budget-balancing work

During committee hearings and floor debates, Republicans said the state has a legal and moral obligation to take action because the federal government hasn't done enough to secure the border.

"My constituents want this thing fixed and fixed once and for all, and we're going to do it," Republican Sen. Al Melvin of Tucson said during a February committee hearing. "People should not be dying in the desert."

Democrats questioned the project's feasibility and called it a feel-good distraction from pressing for more comprehensive action on border and immigration issues.

"If we are here to pass symbolic legislation and not really address border security, SB1406 does the job. But people don't benefit from symbolic legislation," Democratic Rep. Catherine Miranda of Phoenix said April 18 House vote.

Under the bill, the border fencing work could be done either in conjunction with other border states or by Arizona alone.

Smith said the committee will consider where to build the fence and what kind of fence is needed.

But the eventual choice could be like double- and triple-fence barriers already installed along the border in Yuma County in southwestern Arizona because they appear to block crossings, he said.

Any type of fence would require approval of landowners, but Smith said he expects that to be forthcoming from the state and private land owners, including ranchers who have complained of break-ins and other trouble associated with smugglers and illegal crossings.

Individual ranchers likely will cooperate with the state fencing project, just as they have done with federal officials on placing helipads, watering stations and communications equipment to help officers patrolling the border, an Arizona Cattle Growers Association official said.

However, the 1,100-member association didn't take a position on the fence bill, said Executive Director Patrick Bray.

"We certainly appreciate the efforts put into this legislation, however the funding is a huge question. It's an empty solution because we don't know where the money is going to come from."

Bray added: "We want to stay focused on the overall border security issue. At this point we are looking for a more comprehensive security approach rather than this pieces that might come to fruition."

US ranks 17 as clean tech producer, China is No. 2

AP, AMSTERDAM, May 9: Denmark earns the biggest share of its national revenue from producing windmills and other clean technologies, the United States is rapidly expanding its clean-tech sector, but no country can match China's pace of growth, according to a new report obtained by The Associated Press.

China's production of green technologies has grown by a remarkable 77 per cent a year, according to the report, which was commissioned by the World Wildlife Fund for Nature and which will be unveiled on Monday at an industry conference in Amsterdam.

"The Chinese have made, on the political level, a conscious decision to capture this market and to develop this market aggressively," said Donald Pols, an economist with the WWF.

Denmark, a longtime leader in wind energy, derives 3.1 percent of its gross domestic product from renewable energy technology and energy efficiency, or about euro6.5 billion ($9.4 billion), the report said.

China is the largest producer in money terms, earning more than euro44 billion ($64 billion), or 1.4 percent of its gross domestic product.

The U.S. ranks 17 in the production of clean technologies with 0.3 percent of GDP, or euro31.5 billion ($45 billion), but those industries have been expanding at a rate of 28 percent per year since 2008.

"The U.S. is growing substantially, so it seems the policy of (President Barack) Obama is working," Pols said. But the U.S. cannot compare with China, he said.

"When you speak to the Chinese, climate change is not an ideological issue. It's just a fact of life. While we debate climate change and the transition to a low carbon economy, the debate is passed in China," Pols said. "For them it's implementation. It's a growth sector, and they want to capture this sector."

The report was prepared by Roland Berger Strategy Consultants, a global firm based in Germany. It gathered data on 38 countries from energy associations, bank and brokerage reports, investor presentations, the International Energy Agency and a score of other sources. It measured the earnings from producing renewables like biofuels, wind turbines and thermal equipment, and energy efficiency technology such as low-energy lighting and insulation.

"Clean technologies are really growing fast, but China is responsible for the majority of that growth," said Ward van den Berg, who compiled and analyzed the data for the consultancy firm.

Until recently, Chinese massive production of solar cells was aimed at the export market, but they are now making solar systems for the home market, as they have been doing for several years in wind energy, Van den Berg said.

Following Denmark and China, other countries in the top five clean-tech producers, in terms of percentage of GDP, are Germany, Brazil and Lithuania, the report said.

Elizabeth Hawley, world's Everest expert

Reuters, KATHMANDU, May 9: Over fifty years living in the shadow of Mount Everest has made U.S.-born Elizabeth Hawley the unrivalled authority on the world's highest peak. Not bad for a former journalist who has never set foot on the snow of base camp.

When the 87-year-old Hawley came to Nepal in 1960 as a journalist for Time magazine, she had no idea that she was on the road to becoming the most highly-respected chronicler of mountain climbing in the Himalayan nation, home to eight of the world's 14 highest peaks.

Today, from her house in Kathmandu, Hawley runs the Himalayan Database, a record of major climbs of the Nepali mountains, and a necessary endorsement for climbers to gain global fame by validating their achievements.

"I never took a conscious decision but it has been an engaging work over all these years," the short, thin Hawley told Reuters, peering over the rim of her glasses at decades of notes from interviews with climbers stacked on shelves in her study.

Though the database itself is unofficial, it is widely respected by climbers.

Born in Chicago in 1923, Hawley began reporting for Reuters in 1962, nine years after the pioneering climb of Everest by Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay opened the gates to global tourism in the mountainous nation.

"I very quickly realized that mountaineering will be a very important part of news reporting for an international news agency," she said, dressed as always in a neatly pressed skirt.

But Hawley, now the unofficial arbiter of climbing-related disputes, has herself never been to Everest base camp from where climbers begin their ascent and which turns into a tent city in climbing times.

"Why go there?" she asks. "I have seen it in pictures. It is crammed and uncomfortable. It is all rocky and it is a mess."

During the peak March-May climbing season, Hawley is busy driving the maze of Kathmandu's narrow streets in her iconic light blue 1963 Volkswagen Beetle, as she has done for over 45 years, to meet climbers bound for or returning from mountains.

Still a U.S. citizen, she also doesn't speak Nepali.

But over five decades she developed close friendships with climbers such as Hillary, Italian Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler of Austria. The last two were the first to climb Everest without bottled oxygen in 1978.

Hawley considers the 1963 American ascent of the 8,850-meter (29,035 feet) Everest summit, via the untested West Ridge route, and the first female ascent, by Japan's Junko Tabei in 1975, the biggest Everest milestones after 1953.

"Junko Tabei became the first woman to climb Everest long after the first man. This is definitely important," Hawley said.

Mount Everest is Nepal's most popular peak and attracts hundreds of climbers every year. A total of 3,145 people have scaled it, and at least 227 people have died there.

"Many people climb Everest because they want to get away from problems back home, take the challenge of how far they can go, and be in a small group of people with a single purpose," Hawley said.

"This band of climbers will continue to try new routes to Everest, apply new techniques and climb new peaks in the future."

Tuscaloosa mayor says faith helped after tornado

AP, TUSCALOOSA, Ala., May 9: Hours after a tornado devastated Tuscaloosa, Mayor Walt Maddox couldn't believe what he was looking at — whole stretches of his city just "wiped off the map."

He asked the police sergeant who was driving the SUV — a police chaplain — to pull over.

"Sergeant," he asked Chad Palmer, "will you pray for us and pray for our city?"

Palmer's prayer asked for strength, patience, protection and wisdom. Maddox said it's helped carry him in the aftermath of the April 27 tornado outbreak that pummeled this central Alabama college town, killing at least 41 people, injuring hundreds and leaving still others missing.

"From that point on, I've had this incredible amount of energy and strength," Maddox said late last week.

The Democrat has been mayor since 2005 and had been a former school system personnel director. For him, these have been long days dominated by briefings and visits to ravaged areas. Some nights, he's been able to rest only with the help of a sleep aid. When he wakes, he momentarily forgets the hurting in his city.

"For about five seconds, it just feels like another day of work," he said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Suddenly the 38-year-old Maddox had to go from being a mayor focused on economic growth to one seeking to help storm victims, restore normalcy and rebuild.

"I want to grieve," he said, "but there's just not time." He said he had not cried yet, but he'd "come close several dozen times."

For Maddox, it all began with a 4:30 a.m. call from the director of the Tuscaloosa Emergency Management Agency. There was a potential for heavy straight-line winds. That morning at the gym, he ran five miles — the last time he would get a run in for a while.

By noon, Maddox learned that the National Weather Service had handicapped the city's odds of tornado activity at 45 percent.

Only 12 days earlier, an EF-3 tornado had touched down in Tuscaloosa, damaging 20 neighborhoods and 100 buildings. At worst, Maddox feared a repeat. He was concerned city resources would be stretched too thin.

The reality was much worse.

Maddox watched the twister sow its path of destruction in real time. In his office with Palmer, Maddox tuned his television to the city's network of traffic cameras. Using a joystick, he maneuvered a camera near Interstate 359. Then, he saw the funnel.

"My heart dropped," he said. "I thought it was about to take out the Tuscaloosa Police Department," which has its headquarters near I-359.

The storm continued on its deadly path, missing the police department but destroying the emergency management agency's offices. Maddox followed it for a time, fiddling with the joystick to keep the camera pointed toward the tornado. Finally, Palmer urged the mayor to head to the basement where other city staffers were gathered. He did.

After the storm passed, Maddox scheduled a briefing for 7 p.m. But that was 90 minutes away and the mayor couldn't sit still. Finally, he told Palmer and an aide that they were going for a drive.

Traffic was snarled, and Maddox initially didn't see any damage aside from some snapped tree branches. Then he began to see the enormity of what had happened.

"In the entire expanse, it was flat," he said. He said University of Alabama students were just walking toward the college, "almost as if they were in a trance."

They kept driving.

"I was going to need help from God," he recalled thinking, before asking Palmer to pull over.

When he returned to city hall, he delivered a pep talk to his staff.

"How we conduct ourselves in the days and weeks ahead will determine how our citizens will feel about our future," he recalled saying. "We have to be calm and we have to be caring."

The city's disaster response, honed during a Federal Emergency Management Agency session two years ago, has won plaudits.

"We're going to make mistakes," he said. "But the mistakes we're going to make are from an intensity of effort."

Maddox understands city government. Before becoming mayor, he served a term on the city council.

Since the storm, Maddox's attire has been plain, often a polo shirt, cargo pants and work boots. The married father of two spends at least two hours in the affected areas every day, offering hugs and handshakes and hauling cases of water.

University President Robert Witt said Maddox has helped restore some sense of normalcy to the reeling city.

"I think his behavior in the initial hours and days after the storm did more to cause a devastated city to believe things would get better because they had a leader who would function extremely well in a crisis situation." Witt said.

Residents have praised Maddox, a Tuscaloosa native who graduated from the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where he played football for four years and won a public speaking scholarship.

Anne Stickney, who has lived in Tuscaloosa for 35 years, said she liked that Maddox was out in the community, not just working in city hall.

"He's sunburned!" she exclaimed. "You don't get sunburned sitting in your office. He's out there doing something."

Study in South Korea finds higher rate of autism

AP, CHICAGO, May 9: A study in South Korea suggests about 1 in 38 children have traits of autism, higher than a previous U.S. estimate of 1 in 100.

By casting a wider net and looking closely at mainstream children, the researchers expected to find a higher rate of autism characteristics. But they were surprised at how high the rate was. They don't think South Korea has more children with autism than the United States, but instead that autism often goes undiagnosed in many nations. U.S. estimates are based on education and medical records, not the more time-consuming survey conducted in South Korea.

Two-thirds of the children with autism traits in the study were in the mainstream school population, hadn't been diagnosed before and weren't getting any special services. Many of those undiagnosed children likely have mild social impairments, rather than more severe autism.

"It doesn't mean all of a sudden there are more new children with (autism spectrum disorders)," said co-author Dr. Young-Shin Kim of the Yale Child Study Center. "They have been there all along, but were not counted in previous prevalence studies."

It's not clear whether the children need special services or not, other experts said.

"I'm sure some of these children probably could benefit from intervention, but I don't think we could make a statement that all would benefit from intervention," said Dr. Marshalyn Yeargin-Allsopp, chief of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's developmental disabilities branch.

The CDC wasn't involved in the new study, although another federal agency, the National Institute of Mental Health, provided some funding. The group, Autism Speaks, which advocates for more aggressive autism screening, also helped pay for the study. Autism Speaks had no role in the study's design.

The research, published Monday in the American Journal of Psychiatry, attempted to screen all 55,000 schoolchildren, ages 7 to 12, in a district of Goyang City, near Seoul.

However, only about two-thirds of mainstream children participated. About 63 percent of their parents filled out a survey. The researchers acknowledged that parents of affected children might be more likely to fill out the survey.

The questionnaire used is a recognized screening tool for high-functioning autism such as Asperger's syndrome. It asks such questions as whether the child "stands out as different" in a number of ways, including lacking empathy, lacking best friends and being bullied by other children.

From there, some of the children who screened positive were tested further. Very few of the children actually completed the entire diagnosis process. But the researchers say they still were able to use the findings to estimate that about 2.6 percent of the population had some autism traits — compared to the U.S. estimate of 1 percent.

The ambitious study took five years to complete. The U.S. government's approach is quicker and allows more ongoing results, Yeargin-Allsopp said.

"Community providers, researchers and others are interested in prevalence of autism on a frequent basis," Yeargin-Allsopp said. "This is not possible if you're doing a screening of an entire population" as was attempted by the South Korean researchers.

Other funders of the study were Children's Brain Research Foundation and the George Washington University Institute for Ethnographic Research.

Schools may ban chocolate milk over added sugar

AP, LOS ANGELES, May 9: Chocolate milk has long been seen as the spoonful of sugar that makes the medicine go down, but the nation's childhood obesity epidemic has a growing number of people wondering whether that's wise.

With schools under increasing pressure to offer healthier food, the staple on children's cafeteria trays has come under attack over the very ingredient that made it so popular — sugar.

Some school districts have gone as far as prohibiting flavored milk, and Florida considered a statewide ban in schools. Other districts have sought a middle ground by replacing flavored milks containing high-fructose corn syrup with versions containing sugar, which some see as a more natural sweetener.

Los Angeles Unified, the nation's second-largest school district, is the latest district to tackle the issue. Superintendent John Deasy recently announced he would push this summer to remove chocolate and strawberry milk from school menus.

But nutritionists — and parents — are split over whether bans make sense, especially when about 70 percent of milk consumed in schools is flavored, mostly chocolate, according to the industry-backed Milk Processors Education Program.

Many, including the School Nutrition Association, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Dietetic Association, American Heart Association, and National Medical Association, argue that the nutritional value of flavored low-fat or skim milk outweighs the harm of added sugar. Milk contains nine essential nutrients including calcium, vitamin D and protein.

A joint statement from those groups points to studies that show kids who drink fat-free, flavored milk meet more of their nutrient needs and are not heavier than non-milk drinkers.

"Chocolate milk has been unfairly pegged as one of the causes of obesity," said Julie Buric, vice president of marketing for the Milk Processors Education Program.

Others note the nation's child obesity epidemic and say flavored milk simply needs to go.

Eight ounces of white milk served in Los Angeles public schools contains 14 grams of natural sugar or lactose; fat-free chocolate milk has an extra six grams of sugar for a total of 20 grams, while fat-free strawberry milk has a total of 27 grams — the same as eight ounces of Coca-Cola.

"Chocolate milk is soda in drag," said Ann Cooper, director of nutrition services for the Boulder Valley School District in Louisville, Colo., which has banned flavored milk. "It works as a treat in homes, but it doesn't belong in schools."

Flavored milk is also a target of British TV chef Jamie Oliver, who has made revamping school food a signature cause.

For a segment to be aired on his "Food Revolution" TV show, he recently filled a school bus with white sand to represent the amount of sugar Los Angeles Unified school children consume weekly in flavored milk.

"If you have flavored milk, that's candy," he told The Associated Press.

Oliver cheered Deasy's proposal to remove flavored milk from schools during a recent joint appearance on the "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" show.

If the school board adopts the ban, Los Angeles Unified would join districts including Washington and Berkeley, Calif.

But efforts by some other districts turned sour after children drank less milk. Milk consumption drops by 35 percent when flavored milks are removed, according to the Milk Processors Education Program.

Cabell County, W.Va., schools brought chocolate milk back at the recommendation of state officials, and Fairfax County, Va., did the same after its dairy provider came up with a version sweetened with beet sugar rather than high-fructose corn syrup.

The Florida Board of Education also backed away from its proposed ban on chocolate milk after the state agricultural commissioner urged the board to look at all sugary food and beverages served in schools.

The Los Angeles district has worked with its dairy supplier on flavored versions using the sweetener Truvia and chicory, district spokesman Robert Alaniz said.

Cooper and others argued children will drink plain milk if that's what's offered.

"We've taught them to drink chocolate milk, so we can unteach them that," Cooper said. "Our kids line up for milk."

Boulder Valley hasn't been barraged with complaints since removing chocolate milk two years ago, but it hasn't tracked whether milk consumption has dropped, she said.

Parents line up on both sides of the issue.

Deborah Bellholt, a South Los Angeles mother, said none of her six children ranging from pre-school to high school age will drink plain milk. "By allowing kids flavored milk, they still get the calcium they need," she said. "If not, they'd bypass it."

But Mimi Bonetti, a suburban Los Angeles mother with two elementary school-age children who drink plain milk, said she gets angry that chocolate milk is portrayed as nutritious. Children can get calcium and other nutrients from other foods, she said.

"If you offer them the choice of chocolate or plain, of course they're going to choose chocolate," Bonetti said. "When you're telling kids that drinking chocolate milk is a healthy choice, it's sending the wrong message."

Ask kids, and most vote for chocolate. Suburban Los Angeles seventh-grader Nacole Johnson said plain milk tastes yucky. If there were no chocolate milk, "I wouldn't drink it," she said.

Avastin helps fight macular degeneration: study

AFP, WASHINGTON, May 9: The anti-cancer drug Avastin is as effective in fighting macular degeneration as Lucentis, which, however is 40 times more expensive than the cancer fighting medicine, according to results of clinical trials published in the United States.

The study compares Avastin (bevacizumab) to Lucentis (ranibizumab), which both have been developed by US firm Genentech, owned by Swiss laboratory Roche.

During the trials, scientists randomly assigned 1,208 patients with neovascular macular degeneration -- a condition that leads to the gradual loss of central vision -- to receive injections in the eye of ranibizumab or bevacizumab on either a monthly schedule or as needed with monthly evaluation.

"At one year, bevacizumab and ranibizumab had equivalent effects on visual acuity when administered according to the same schedule," reported the authors of the study, including Doctor Juan Grunwald from the University of Pennsylvania.

"Ranibizumab given as needed with monthly evaluation had effects on vision that were equivalent to those of ranibizumab administered monthly."

However, the costs of the treatments were vastly different.

The average cost in the ranibizumab group per patient was $23,400 compared to $385 per patient in the bevacizumab group, the researchers said.

The study appears in the latest issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.

A little waiting may be good for head-injured kids

Reuters, NEW YORK, May 9: Observing some kids after a head injury may help doctors decide which ones need a head x-ray, according to a new study published in Pediatrics.

That's important because researchers still aren't sure whether too many of those x-rays, called computed tomography, or CT scans, might trigger cancer years later.

CT scans can help doctors recognize more serious head injuries that need treatment. But observation is probably a good strategy for kids who have some risk of a serious brain injury, but aren't showing serious symptoms, said Dr. Lise Nigrovic of Children's Hospital Boston, who worked on the study.

If a kids shows up at the ER very soon after a head injury, "you may just not have had enough time for symptoms to develop," she told Reuters Health. Or, a kid "may have some symptoms that make you a little concerned, but you just want some time" before making a decision about doing an x-ray.

"We all want to make sure that we use CT scanning in the cases where it's likely to be positive and that we save children from the radiation for those that we know are very unlikely to be positive," Dr. Martin Osmond, of the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, told Reuters Health.

"This study adds important new information about who to observe" before making that decision, added Osmond, who has no ties to the new study.

Nigrovic and her colleagues reviewed data on over 40,000 kids with a head injury who were taken to one of 25 different emergency rooms.

The original data had been collected by the Pediatric Emergency Care Applied Research Network. Doctors treating the kids made a note in their records about whether each kid was kept in the hospital and observed by doctors and nurses before they decided whether or not to perform a CT scan.

About 5,400 kids - or 1 in 7 -were observed. Those kids were slightly less likely to get a CT scan: 31 percent of them had the head x-ray, versus 35 percent of kids when doctors made that decision right away.

In both groups, fewer than 1 of every hundred kids had a serious brain injury.

Twenty-six kids who were observed and sent home without a CT scan came back later for an x-ray - and 1 of them ended up having a brain injury diagnosed by the x-ray.

The research team concluded from that finding that observing some kids before making the decision about a CT scan might be a safe and effective way to cut back on the number of those scans.

Nigrovic gave the example of a 4-year-old who fell off a swing. "They're complaining of a headache (and) they vomited once at home," she said. But, they are awake and talking 2 hours after the injury, making doctors less fearful. "That's a great patient for observation," she said.

Osmond thinks the study is an accurate picture of how doctors are now treating these patients: In severe cases doctors will get a scan right away, in cases where they believe the symptoms are sufficiently mild, they're likely to send the patients home, but in cases of doubt they'll observe the child to see if there are any changes, he explained.

Still, Osmond added, a few questions remain. For example, it's unclear just how long it makes sense for doctors to observe kids before deciding whether or not to do a CT scan or send them home.

That, as well as how safe it is to put off CT scans while observing an injured kid, will be the focus of future research, Nigrovic said.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/c7DozH Pediatrics, online May 9, 2011.

Four injured in iPad fight at Beijing Apple store

AFP, BEIJING, May 9: Four people were taken to hospital and a glass door smashed as a near-riot broke out at Beijing's top Apple store among crowds rushing to snap up the popular iPad 2 tablet computer, according to state press.

Angry consumers began rushing the store on Saturday afternoon after a "foreign" Apple employee allegedly stepped into the crowd to push and beat people suspected of queue jumping, the Beijing News said.

After the employee retreated back into the store, a crowd of consumers smashed the glass front door and shoved security guards as they surged forward in anger over the alleged beatings, the report said.

Consumers have lined up for hours at Apple stores in Beijing and Shanghai since the iPad 2, the updated version of the tablet computer, went on sale in the world's biggest Internet market on Friday.

The store in Beijing's chic Sanlitun commercial district closed early Saturday because of the altercation, but according to a voice recording on the store's phone was open for business Sunday.

Apple officials were not immediately available for comment when telephoned by AFP.

Police were investigating the incident and have interviewed four people hospitalised with injuries, the Beijing News said.

Lines for the popular iPad 2 have grown so long that people have begun selling their places in the queue, while a secondary market has also developed with consumers reselling their tablet computers for profit after leaving the store, the report said.

Late Saturday, the store posted a notice saying that queue jumping and the unauthorised sales of Apple products would not be tolerated, the paper said.

Apple usurps Google as world's most valuable brand

Reuters, LONDON, May 9: Apple has overtaken Google as the world's most valuable brand, ending a four-year reign by the Internet search leader, according to a new study by global brands agency Millward Brown.

The iPhone and iPad maker's brand is now worth $153 billion, almost half Apple's market capitalization, says the annual BrandZ study of the world's top 100 brands.

Apple's portfolio of coveted consumer goods propelled it past Microsoft to become the world's most valuable technology company last year.

Peter Walshe, global brands director of Millward Brown, says Apple's meticulous attention to detail, along with an increasing presence of its gadgets in corporate environments, have allowed it to behave differently from other consumer-electronics makers.

"Apple is breaking the rules in terms of its pricing model," he told Reuters by telephone. "It's doing what luxury brands do, where the higher price the brand is, the more it seems to underpin and reinforce the desire."

"Obviously, it has to be allied to great products and a great experience, and Apple has nurtured that."

Of the top 10 brands in Monday's report, six were technology and telecoms companies: Google at number two, IBM at number three, Microsoft at number five, AT&T at number seven and China Mobile at number nine.

McDonald's rose two places to number four, as fast food became the fastest-growing category, Coca-Cola slipped one place to number six, Marlboro was also down one to number eight, and General Electric was number 10.

Walshe said demand from China was a major factor in the rise of fast-food brands. "The Chinese have been discovering fast food and it's such a vast market -- Starbucks, McDonald's... and pizza has hit China," he said.

"The way McDonald's has reinvented itself, adapted its menus, added healthy options, expanding the times of day it can be visited, for example oatmeal for breakfast... that allied with growth in developing markets has really helped that brand."

Nineteen of the top 100 brands came from emerging markets, up from 13 last year.

Facebook entered the top 100 at number 35 with a brand valued at $19.1 billion, while Chinese search engine Baidu rose to number 29 from 46.

Toyota reclaimed its position as the world's most valuable car brand, as it recovered from a bungled 2010 product recall. The survey was carried out before the March earthquake that caused massive disruption to Japanese supply chains.

The total value of the top 100 brands rose by 17 percent to $2.4 trillion, as the global economy shifted to growth.

Millward Brown takes as a starting point the value that companies put on their own main brands as intangibles in their earnings reports.

It combines that with the perceptions of more than 2 million consumers in relevant markets around the world whom it surveys over the course of the year, and then applies a multiple derived from the company's short-term future growth prospects.

The full report is at www.millwardbrown.com/brandz.

Angry Birds developer eyes IPO in 3-4 years: report

Reuters, HELSINKI, May 9: Rovio, the developer of the "Angry Birds" mobile game eyes an initial public offering in three to four years, its chief marketing officer was quoting as saying in a Finnish business daily on Monday.

"It is very possible that we will be listed in bourse in three to four years, but we are not in a hurry," Chief Marketing Officer Peter Vesterbacka told Kauppalehti, but did not say where the IPO could take place.

"We can carry out all of our current plans without bourse listing, but bourse is still a more meaningful direction than, for instance, selling the company."

He said Rovio aimed within three years to become the world's leading entertainment brand. Currently the firm is opening a new office in China and mulls new offices in Japan and the United States.

Vesterbacka estimated Rovio's 2011 sales would be around 50-100 million euros ($69.85-$139.7 million) versus 6.5 million in 2010.

More parents lenient about young web use: poll

Reuters, NEW YORK, May 9: Despite age restrictions on some social media sites, the number of U.S. parents who would allow children 10-12 years old to have a Facebook or MySpace account has doubled in a year, a new survey showed.

Seventeen percent of U.S. parents questioned in the poll said they had no problem with a pre-teen child using a social media site, compared to just eight percent a year ago.

And 11 percent of parents admitted to using social media sites on behalf of a young child or infant, according to the online survey of about 1,000 adults by Liberty Mutual's Responsibility Project.

"More and more parents are allowing their children to have a Facebook account or to have more online activity at younger and younger ages." said Janet Taylor.

The clinical instructor of psychiatry at Columbia University at Hospital in New York described the findings as a sign of the times.

"It's not alarming. I think it means we need to be aware of what is going on and how to best utilize social media," she added in an interview.

Most parents think that children under 18 should not be able to keep their account to themselves and a third monitor their usage. Forty four percent also limit the time spent on the Internet or texting.

Facebook, which has 500 million active users, was the most popular social network among adults in the poll. Nearly 90 percent used it frequently, followed at a very distant second by the professional website LinkedIn with 6 percent, Twitter and MySpace.

Although only three percent of people questioned said they used the microblogging site Twitter frequently, they had definite ideas about what was acceptable and what was not.

Nearly two-thirds thought it was unacceptable for the staff of celebrities and CEOs to ghost-tweet for them and 46 percent didn't think celebrities should use Twitter to argue with each other.

Twenty seven percent also did not agree with CEOs tweeting about their company.

Most Twitter users follow their friends and celebrities and tweet about their daily activities or current events. Only four percent tweeted about politicians or a religious leader, while 11 percent tweeted about their own achievements and 8 percent used it to criticize other people.

When questioned about cyberbullying, most parents said they thought it was their responsibility to resolve the situation if their child was a victim and 63 percent thought teachers and schools should be doing more to stop it.

Apple, Google to face lawmakers in privacy tussle

Reuters, WASHINGTON, May 9: Tech companies such as Apple and Google are hoping the tracks of millions of mobile device users will lead to billions of dollars in revenue.

But where they see dollar signs, lawmakers see red flags.

The revelation last month that Apple's iPhones collected location data and stored it for up to a year -- even when location software was supposedly turned off -- has prompted renewed scrutiny of the nexus between location and privacy.

On Tuesday, senior Apple and Google executives will submit to questions from a congressional panel on how location-tracking may violate users' rights.

Smartphone and advertising companies argue that they use data on what users like (which they know because users use the phone to check prices); where they are (which they know because of contact with cell phone towers); and who their friends are (which they know from social media like Facebook) to give their customers ads for products they are most likely to buy.

"There are terrific things about mobility. There's a lot of good stuff that can come out of this," said Joseph Turow, who follows marketing for the University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg School for Communication.

Companies capable of delivering advertisements to the right consumers in a mobile format could make big money.

"What's the implications of the data in terms of revenues? The issue is in one word -- huge. We think that by the 2014 time frame or so it will be well north of $3 billion," said Carter Lusher, an analyst with research firm Ovum.

"There are simply more and more devices shipped every day that can be targeted."

A study done for Google -- which sells mobile ads -- found that 82 percent of smartphone owners notice mobile ads and 74 percent make a purchase as a result of using a smartphone while shopping, according to the trade publication Mobile Marketer.

But the discomfort comes with the failure of companies -- ranging from smartphone makers, to app makers, to advertisers -- to disclose to customers what information they are collecting and what they will do with it, said a staffer for Democratic Senator Al Franken, chairman of the online privacy subcommittee that will hold Tuesday's hearing.

Witnesses will include Google and Apple executives, as well as Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department officials.

"There are rights-based harms," the staffer said. "We have a fundamental right to know what information is gathered from us, and what they do with it."

Google said in a statement that it was looking "forward to engaging with policymakers." An Apple spokesman said the company was not immediately prepared to discuss the hearing.

PRIVACY ADVOCATES WANT A TOUGH BILL

Tuesday's inquiry remains just that: lawmakers seeking more information on the technology and its potential uses.

But the risk is, if public concern snowballs into consumer outrage, that lawmakers may eventually pass laws restricting such activity.

Franken's staff has been concerned by reports that insurance companies have explored using location tracking to calculate insurance rates by noting where people go -- for example if they go to a gym or a donut store.

Already three online privacy bills have been introduced -- by Representatives Bobby Rush and Jackie Speier and by Senators John McCain and John Kerry. It's far too early to tell which, if any, of them might become law.

The bills include proposals that companies tell consumers what data is being collected, who it is shared with and how it is safeguarded.

"The fact is that they're creating these sort of mobile digital dossiers based on what you do on your mobile phone and where you are," said Jeff Chester, head of the Center for Digital Democracy.

Franken has not yet decided what he would like to see in a bill, his staffers say.

"Congress has a role to play here. Congress has not done a good job of updating privacy laws," said Marc Rotenberg, head of the privacy think tank Electronic Privacy Information Center.

The University of Pennsylvania's Turow agreed, advocating a ban on collection of data on financial or health issues, perhaps even as minor as over-the-counter medicine purchases.

"Executives in advertising don't understand what's going on," he said. "I really do believe that we need ground level protections. And certain things should be prohibited."

Pakistan cricket bosses seek Afridi answers

AFP, Karachi, May 9: The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Monday demanded Shahid Afridi explain why he criticised coach Waqar Younis, saying the one-day captain had violated the code of conduct.

 

Afridi criticised Younis for interfering in team selection during the 3-2 one-day series win over the West Indies.

 

"Waqar interferes with the team selection and everyone should do his job," Afridi said on his return from the West Indies on Sunday.

 

"PCB has taken notice of the statements made by Afridi in the media about the differences within the tour management in West Indies. It is a violation of code of conduct on part of Afridi," the PCB said.

 

"An explanation has been sought from him for the reasons to make such statements publicly. PCB will take appropriate action after submission of the tour-report at the conclusion of the tour."

 

Pakistani media last week reported that serious differences had emerged between Afridi and Waqar during this year's World Cup.

 

Pakistan reached the semi-finals in the tournament, jointly hosted by India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, before being beaten by India who went on to win the championship.