WcP Blog

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PARIS: Ten years after it was introduced, France has ended the compulsory 35 hour work week. Legislators in France have voted to allow companies to sidestep the 35-hour workweek by negotiating individual overtime agreements with their employees. The new legislation, which was passed by Parliament late Wednesday night and which will take effect in September, is the boldest step yet in stripping what many view as an emblematic labor law, without quite getting rid of it. While the workweek limit is as good as buried, every hour beyond 35 that is worked will be considered overtime and will therefore be more expensive.

Labour Minister Xavier Bertrand denied that people would have more working hours imposing on them and said now "everything will be negotiated company by company." Under the new legislation no one in France can work more than 48 hours in a given week, including overtime. Right now, despite the current law, many French employees work longer than 35 hours a week but accumulate time off or overtime. They actually average 41 hours, compared with 41.7 in Germany, 43.1 in Britain, 41.3 in Italy and the EU average is 41.9. In terms of paid annual leave, the French are in the mid-range in Europe with 25 days holiday as guaranteed non-working days.

The new legislation opens the way for company-specific negotiated agreements between employers and labor unions about the number of hours a week and days a year an employee works. The new limits are more generous than before: For manual workers who are paid by the hour, the weekly maximum limit rises to 48 hours, in line with European Union legislation. For white-collar staff members, paid by the day, the annual maximum of days they can be asked to work will rise to 235 days from 218. Also up for negotiation is the amount of time an employee gets in compensation for the extra hours worked, as opposed to being paid for the overtime.

The new changes are likely to affect small and medium-sized businesses most. Many large companies benefited from the additional flexibility that the 35-hour week provided by allowing them to annualize work time, making staff members work more in high season and less in low season without having to pay costly overtime. Blue-collar workers have periodically complained that this practice ended up reducing their income.

But most employees, and particularly those with comfortable incomes and a preference for additional time off, have grown attached to the shorter workweek. Professionals, whose salaries are calculated on a daily basis rather than hourly, fear that they will lose a dozen extra holidays a year that they had enjoyed in compensation for working more than the legal 35 hours a week. Their dismay at the changes was on display Wednesday afternoon when hundreds protested outside the Senate building, sporting banners with slogans like "There is life after work." And the union that represents white-collar employees and management staff, CFE-CGC, published an open letter in French newspapers complaining about the changes.

The new legislation also includes rules to make labor unions more representative. Any union participating in negotiations on work time needs to have obtained at least 10 percent of the vote in company elections. But any union representing 30 percent or more of the internal vote is allowed to sign a binding agreement with management.

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Photos courtesy of The Economist, Reuters/Charles Platiau, and AFP

Original Source: euronews and International Herald Tribune

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July 24 (Bloomberg) -- Crude oil traded near a seven-week low after reports showed demand in the U.S. and Japan, two of the three largest oil consuming countries, fell as high prices crimp fuel consumption. U.S. fuel demand averaged 19.9 million barrels a day last week, the lowest since January 2007, the Energy Department said yesterday. Japan imported 0.7 percent less oil in June than a year ago, the first decline in nine months, the Ministry of Finance said today.

"Our overall view is that oil prices are at a point that will bring about demand-side adjustments that will ultimately cause prices to be at a lower level," said David Moore, a commodity strategist with Commonwealth Bank of Australia Ltd. in Sydney. "There seems to be an intangible factor here where sentiment has swung quite sharply in the past couple weeks."

Crude oil for September delivery was at $124.23 a barrel, down 21 cents, at 11:36 a.m. Singapore time on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Yesterday, oil dropped $3.98, or 3.1 percent, to settle at $124.44 a barrel, the lowest close since June 4. Futures have lost 5 percent this week. Oil prices also fell as the Energy Department report showed that gasoline supplies rose 2.85 million barrels last week. Stockpiles of distillate fuel, a category that includes heating oil and diesel, climbed 2.42 million barrels. Brent crude oil for September settlement was at $125.10 a barrel, down 19 cents, on London's ICE Futures Europe exchange at 11:34 a.m. Singapore time. It dropped $4.26, or 3.3 percent, to close at $125.29 a barrel yesterday, the lowest settlement since June 4.

Demand has declined for three straight weeks, the Energy Department report showed. U.S. fuel consumption averaged 20.3 million barrels a day in the past four weeks, down 2.1 percent from a year earlier, the department said. Refineries operated at 87.1 percent of capacity last week, down 2.4 percentage points from the week before, according to the department. It was the lowest utilization rate since the week ended May 9. Refineries were forecast to operate at 89.5 percent of capacity last week, unchanged from the week before, according to the median of analyst estimates in the Bloomberg survey. Crude-oil inventories dropped 1.56 million barrels to 295.3 million. Stockpiles were forecast to decline 675,000 barrels, according to the survey results.

Oil has tumbled 16 percent from a record $147.27 a barrel on July 11, as a stronger U.S. dollar limited the appeal of commodities as a hedge against inflation and high prices cut fuel consumption. Prices also fell the past two days as Hurricane Dolly moved away from oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico.

Energy companies evacuated some oil rigs as a precaution. That cut production in the Gulf by 4.7 percent, the U.S. Interior Department said yesterday. Companies that carried out evacuations include BP Plc, Noble Corp., Chevron Corp., Devon Energy Corp., Citgo Petroleum Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell Plc.

Oil and other commodities may drop further and the dollar increase if the Federal Reserve boosts interest rates to curb inflation. Philadelphia Fed President Charles Plosser yesterday said higher mortgage costs and continued declines in house prices pose no bar to raising interest rates. Policy makers must increase borrowing costs before inflation expectations become "unhinged," Plosser said in an interview with Bloomberg Television yesterday.

The dollar traded at 107.74 yen at 11:11 a.m. in Singapore, after rising 0.5 percent yesterday, when it reached 107.97, the highest since June 26. The U.S. currency was at $1.5684 per euro, after rising 0.5 percent yesterday and touching $1.5670, the strongest since July 9.

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Photos courtesy of AP/Energy Department, Bloomberg News and LA Times

Original Source: Bloomberg

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SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google Inc. opened its website Knol to the public on Wednesday, allowing people to write about their areas of expertise under their bylines in a twist on encyclopedia Wikipedia, which allows anonymity. "We are deeply convinced that authorship -- knowing who wrote what -- helps readers trust the content," said Cedric DuPont, product manager for Knol. The name of the service is a play on an individual unit of knowledge, DuPont said, and entries on the public website, knol.google.com, are called "knols." Google conducted a limited test of the site beginning in December.

Knol has publishing tools similar to single blog pages. But unlike blogs, Knol encourages writers to reduce what they know about a topic to a single page that is not chronologically updated. "What we want to get away from is 'this last voice wins' model which is very difficult if you are a busy professional," DuPont said.

Google wants to rank entries by popularity to encourage competition. For example, the first knol on "Type 1 Diabetes" is by Anne Peters, director of the University of Southern California's Clinical Diabetes Programs. As other writers publish on diabetes, Google plans to rank related pages according to user ratings, reviews and how often people refer to specific pages, DuPont said. Knol focuses on individual authors or groups of authors in contrast to Wikipedia's subject entries, which are updated by users and edited behind the scenes.

Knol does not edit or endorse the information and visitors will not be able to edit or contribute to a knol unless they have the author's permission. Readers will be able to notify Google if they find any content objectionable. Knol is a hybrid of the individual, often opinionated entries found in blogs and the collective editing relied on by Wikipedia and other wiki sites. The service uses what it calls "moderated collaboration" in which any reader of a specific topic page can make suggested edits to the author or authors, who retain control over whether to accept, reject or modify changes before they are published.

In its early stages, Knol remains a far cry from Wikipedia, www.wikipedia.org, which boasts 7 million collectively edited articles in 200 languages. Google signed a deal with Conde Nast's New Yorker, giving Knol authors the rights to use one of the magazine's famous cartoons in each Knol posting. Google will allow Knol writers to run ads on their entries and will share income with them.

DuPont said that rather than competing with Wikipedia, Knol may end up serving as a primary source of authoritative information for use with Wikipedia articles. "Knols will fill gaps on what we have on the Web today. That is what we hope," DuPont said. Mr. Dupont dismissed speculation that Knol was designed as a Wikipedia killer: "Google is very happy with Wikipedia being so successful. Anyone who tries to kill them would hurt us."

For now, Knol has only a few hundred articles, compared to the nearly 2.5 million in Wikipedia’s English language version. And for now, the best place to follow the debate on whether or not Knol is a Wikipedia killer is on the Knol entry on, where else, Wikipedia.

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Photos courtesy of lifehacker.com.au, Wikipedia and BetaNews

Original Source: Reuters and NY Times

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(CNN)— Former Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul is moving forward with plans for his own rally during the Republican National Convention —and is moving his location to a larger arena to accommodate the unprecedented response.

The three day event called ‘Rally for the Republic’ will officially launch Paul’s new political action group: the ‘Campaign for Liberty.’ When planning for the event began earlier this year, it was originally scheduled to take place at the University of Minnesota, but due to a “strong initial response,” it was moved to The Target in Minneapolis, which can house up to 18,000 people. The GOP holds its convention across the river in St. Paul.

"The Rally for the Republic will send a powerful, positive message to the Republican Party that there is an army of grassroots activists across the country ready to work with them if steer back to their traditions of limited government and personal liberty," said Campaign for Liberty spokesman Jesse Benton.

Paul, who has often voiced his differing policy views from presumptive Republican nominee John McCain, has made it clear in past interviews with CNN his supporters won’t be in Minneapolis to interfere or cause problems for the Republican Party. “We’re not going to disrupt them,” Paul told CNN last month. “We’re not going to demonstrate as much as present a positive case for values that we believe should be the Republican values.”

From August 31 through September 1, the former presidential dark horse will hold a series of grassroots leadership and training events culminating with a “celebration of traditional Republican values,” where Grover Norquist, Tucker Carlson, Gov. Gary Johnson, Barry Goldwater Jr. and Bruce Fein are expected to speak.

The Texas congressman, who opposes the Iraq war and is a libertarian on economic issues, drew an avid following during the Republican primaries. He won 1.2 million votes and raised nearly $35 million. His campaign said the Campaign for Liberty, formed June 16 when he ended his presidential bid, has attracted over 71,000 members.

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Photos courtesy of Getty Images

Original Source: Boston Globe and CNN

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(Fortune Magazine) -- The billionaire co-founder of Microsoft has always been something of a utopian. In his mind, even the world's knottiest problems can be solved if you apply enough IQ. Accordingly, Gates, who has been spotted on Seattle freeways reading a book while driving himself to the office, covets knowledge. It's as if he's still trying to make up for dropping out of Harvard, as he spends just about any spare waking minute reading, studying science texts, or watching university courses on DVD. Some say his wealth and famous opportunism are reminiscent of the robber barons of yore. Yet here is a man who has set a goal to eradicate malaria. Rich as he is - his net worth is an estimated $50 billion - you can't call the man greedy when he has pledged to give back to humanity all but a tiny fraction of 1% of that fortune.

These traits only begin to explain why Gates, at 52, has chosen to redirect his efforts toward more altruistic pursuits. On July 1 he stepped away from an operating role at Microsoft (MSFT, Fortune 500) to devote more time to philanthropy and other interests. The shift has been on his mind for nearly a decade, and it reflects some important experiences over his lifetime. Like that seminal time back in 1968 when his mother, Mary, spearheaded an effort to install a used Teletype terminal in his school so that her already autodidactic junior high schooler could teach himself how to program a mainframe. There was his epiphany when he first met fellow billionaire Warren Buffett in 1991 - and realized that it quite literally pays to follow your curiosity beyond your own area of expertise. And there's the poignant letter his mother wrote in 1993 to his fiancée, Melinda French, cluing her in to the Gates family credo: "From those to whom much has been given, much is expected." (Mary Gates would die the next year.) That letter, in turn, led to the self-conscious irony in the slogan he and his wife hit upon for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation: All lives have equal value.

Bill Gates 2.0 will have three offices: one at Microsoft in Redmond, a second about 15 miles away at the Gates Foundation in downtown Seattle, and a third almost exactly equidistant between the other two (and much closer to home). In typical hyper-systematic fashion, Gates has allocated blocks of time to each location: a day in Redmond, two at the foundation, and two at the personal office, which he suspects will be his real "center of gravity." There will be a lot of overlap among his three roles. That's because the guy's greatest pleasure seems to be in finding connections among things he's interested in.

Gates' official title at his foundation, which he shares with his wife and father, is co-chair, but his real role will be as the organization's chief strategic thinker. And Gates is teeming with ideas, especially about things scientific. Unlike most benefactors, he doesn't merely want to eradicate malaria and AIDS; he wants to understand the nuances of immunology. He wants to learn about what happens on a molecular scale when a plant's genes are altered to improve hardiness. He insists on knowing the precise legal reasons women in developing countries are robbed of their estates when they become widowed. "Here's how Bill thinks," explains Nathan Myhrvold, the former head of Microsoft's R&D labs. "He is always interested in looking at big systems in the world and understanding them at every level that he can. As an example, I got this e-mail from him today as part of this whole discussion on corn prices and crop yields and shortages resulting from ethanol production, and at the end Bill says, 'I really need to understand phosphates more.'"

Another big part of his new job will be to make more public appearances and do more arm-twisting of governments and corporations to do more for the world's poor. "I'm uniquely able to reach out to the big companies, to ask them not just to write checks but to offer more of their innovative power," Gates says. "There's a big category of my time for talking to drug companies, cellphone companies, banks, and technology companies, as well as talking with other people who are lucky enough to have superbig fortunes about how they want to give those back to society." That does not translate to fundraising - on the contrary, the foundation plans to exhaust its $100 billion endowment by the end of the century. Gates is talking about setting an example for the plutocracy. Jeff Raikes, the former Microsoft executive who was just appointed CEO of the foundation, thinks that effort could have as much impact on the world as the works of the foundation itself: "He has an incredible opportunity to help shape the thinking of other multibillionaires by getting them to think about the process, the structure, the best practices."

In his younger years, Gates' gimlet-eyed idealism manifested itself in stubbornness and self-righteousness, an unusual boldness, and a tendency not to suffer fools. Most people who have worked closely with him can recall more than one instance in which he reacted to a comment or idea by standing up and hissing, "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life." He hasn't lost that inclination toward intellectual arrogance. But in his philanthropic work, the shoe is sometimes on the other foot. He's not, after all, a microbiologist or a geneticist. Moreover, with age and maturity, Gates has become much better able to acknowledge what he doesn't know or when he's wrong.

For many years, as he built Microsoft, his field of vision was of necessity rather narrow. One of the most important experiences that jostled him out of his single-mindedness was his first meeting with Buffett, on July 5, 1991. As Gates tells the story: My mom called me at the office to come out to Hood Canal for a Fourth of July barbecue because she wanted me to meet Warren Buffett. And I said, "Mom, I'm working." But she insisted. So I took a helicopter so I could spend my couple of hours there and then get back quickly and work on software. Then I met Warren, and I thought, "Oh, wow, this guy isn't just about buying and selling stocks and businesses. He is thinking about how the world works." And he asked me questions that I always wanted somebody to ask me, about why hadn't IBM (IBM, Fortune 500) been able to do what we had done, and how software gets priced, and why does one company have a defensible position. He wanted to understand the dynamics of the industry. To me it was way far away from, "What is your company worth?"

Then he explained to me about how Wal-Mart (WMT, Fortune 500) had not only changed things in its business, but how it had an effect on newspapers because they thought of their advertising differently than individual local stores had. And he talked about how banking really worked in terms of credit risk. The whole time all I could think was, "Hey, I'll be smarter about running Microsoft after I talk to this guy." And so I stayed the whole day. Ever since then, Gates has tried to make more time to broaden his knowledge, and his capacity to absorb ideas has served Microsoft and the foundation well. But now reading, learning, and blue-sky brainstorming will be considered an integral part of his job description, and no doubt they will yield something.

Buffett, who knows him as well as anyone, says the notoriously competitive Gates will have to find new ways to judge his accomplishments rather than by market share or in dollars. "He'll be competing with his own standards," Buffett says. "In the end, he is going to want people to look at the Gates Foundation 100 years from now and say, 'This guy did it the way it should have been done.'" With all he did at Microsoft, Gates has a tough act to follow. "Bringing personal computing to billions has totally changed the world, and it's changed it, net-net, way for the better," says Myhrvold. "So even before you look at what his foundation has done for Africa or for the poor, he's already done more for the good of the world than essentially anyone else in our lifetimes."

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Photos courtesy of Microsoft Archives, Fortune, and Robert Maxwell

Original Source (with slideshow and video): Fortune

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GENEVA (Reuters) - Major world powers will sound out Iran's readiness to negotiate an end to the long dispute over its nuclear program on Saturday. The unprecedented participation of a senior U.S. official in the one-day meeting in Geneva, together with Iranian comments playing down the likelihood of an attack by the United States and Israel, have raised hopes of progress.

Arriving for talks with officials from the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany -- the so-called sextet -- chief Iranian nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili said he had "positive intentions". Jalili has a mandate from Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to take any decision needed, a senior Iranian official told Reuters, adding that the meeting "will clarify the fate of the negotiations".

Iran, the world's fourth-largest oil producer, rejects suspicions that it wants the atom bomb, saying the aim of the program is to generate electricity so that it can export more crude oil and gas. Western diplomats say they want the talks to clarify Iran's response to an enhanced sextet offer, delivered last month, of technical and commercial incentives to suspend uranium enrichment. "We are interested in creating conditions in a creative manner to start negotiations," said a spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, who presented the offer to Tehran.

The EU foreign policy chief's spokeswoman says the EU wants 'solid relations' with Iran in different areas, including the nuclear technology. Cristina Gallach, who discussed the Saturday meeting in Geneva with Press TV, said that "the EU position is that we want very much a solid relationship with Iran, one that encompasses all areas, including the nuclear issue, political and economic relations." EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana will meet Iran's top nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili in Geneva on Saturday. The meeting will also bring together envoys from the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany.

Gallach stressed that the world powers that have offered "a generous package of incentives" to Iran last month want to see what the response of Iran is to the package to start a new round of negotiations with Tehran. She expressed hope that an 'appropriate framework' for the negotiations with Iran would be worked out in the Geneva talks. Pointing to Washington's decision to send a top diplomat to Geneva to attend the talks on Iran's nuclear program, Gallach said that the US and other countries that have sent envoys to the meeting want Iran's nuclear issue to be solved through negotiation.

Tension has intensified since Tehran tested missiles last week, alarming Israel and unsettling energy markets on fears that conflict could disrupt supply. Yet oil prices slipped on Friday, ending 13 percent down from last week's record of over $147 a barrel of crude. Traders cited as factors the attendance of Burns -- a career diplomat who helped restore U.S. ties with Libya in 2006 -- and a comment by Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki that the chances of an Israeli or U.S. strike were "almost zero".

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Photos courtesy of BBC News, EPA, and Press TV

Original Source: Reuters and Press TV

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Pope Benedict XVI recalled the natural beauty he observed during his 20-hour flight to Sydney, saying he felt "a profound sense of awe," and denounced "insatiable consumption" as a threat to the world's environment.

The pope made his first major appearance on his Australia tour Thursday before an estimated crowd of 150,000 people at World Youth Day. The event is believed to be the world's largest Christian gathering and dubbed "the Catholic Woodstock."

He delivered his homily in several languages to people representing 70 countries, lamenting "erosion, deforestation, the squandering of the world's mineral and ocean resources in order to fuel an insatiable consumption." In his address, Benedict warned that mankind's "insatiable consumption" has scarred the Earth and squandered its resources, telling followers that taking care of the planet is vital to humanity — striking a theme that has earned him a reputation as the "green pope."

He was greeted at World Youth Day by a traditional aboriginal welcoming ceremony. In his address, the pope thanked aboriginal elders and noted the decades of hardship native people faced throughout Australia's history. "I am deeply moved to stand on your land, knowing the suffering and injustices it has borne but aware too of the healing and hope that are now at work, rightly bringing pride to all Australian citizens," the pope said. "To the young indigenous -- aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders -- and the Tokelauans, I express my thanks for your stirring welcome." At a meeting with top government officials, including Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, the pope praised his official apology in February on behalf of the nation to its aboriginal people.

Pope Benedict XVI urged religious leaders of all kinds to unite against those who use faith to divide communities — an apparent reference to terrorism in the name of religion. He met with representatives of Muslim, Jewish, Hindu and Buddhist faiths for about 40 minutes during the Roman Catholic Church's youth festival, which has drawn hundreds of thousands of pilgrims to Sydney. "In a world threatened by sinister and indiscriminate forms of violence, the unified voice of religious people urges nations and communities to resolve conflicts through peaceful means and with full regard for human dignity," Benedict told a gathering of clerics from different faiths in Sydney.

Without mentioning terrorism directly, the pontiff said creating harmony between religion and public life was "all the more important at a time when some people have come to consider religion as a cause of division rather than a force for unity." The remarks come as the Vatican tries to repair ties with the Islamic world that were strained by a speech he gave in 2006 that appeared to associate Islam with violence, outraging many Muslims.

Thursday's events were the pope's first public appearances since arriving in Australia on Sunday and spending several days resting. The pontiff, appearing rested and in good form, gave his first major speech before an estimated crowd of 200,000 pilgrims gathered for World Youth Day. Tens of thousands more lined Sydney harbor's foreshore as he toured the city, first by boat and then in the popemobile.

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Photos courtesy of AP, Reuters/Will Burgess, Robert Pearce, Greg Wood/Pool, and WYD 2008

Original Source: CNN and AP

Image Gallery: Reuters: Pope says young inheriting scarred, squandered earth

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FARNBOROUGH, England: Plane makers and airlines at the world's largest air show struck a tone between conciliatory and defensive on global warming Wednesday — pledging to make flying more fuel-efficient but bridling at a European Union emissions trading scheme. Executives from British Airways and Airbus used a "sustainable aviation" summit at the Farnborough International Airshow to attack the EU over its revised emissions trading scheme, which it said will cripple the European industry coming on top of soaring oil prices. BA Chief Executive Willie Walsh said he supported a trading scheme in general but had "serious reservations" about the EU proposal, which he said would encourage carriers to bypass European hubs. "The EU should look again at applying a scheme that is workable in the first place and able to be applied worldwide," Walsh said.

European airlines say the EU greenhouse gas cap and trading system would impose extra costs of 4 billion euros ($5.41 billion) a year. Buying enough carbon permits to operate between 2011, when the program would begin, to 2022, will cost more than 45 billion euros ($61 billion). Airbus CEO Tom Enders, who also broadly supports a trading scheme, criticized European politicians for pushing ahead with the "unbalanced" scheme "irrespective of the burden put on airlines by the oil price."

Crude oil prices hit a record of US$147.27 last week, underpinning a rise in oil costs for the aviation industry from US$44 billion in 2003 to an expected US$190 billion this year. The aviation industry has come under growing public and political pressure to curb carbon dioxide emissions, with calls for plane makers to invest more in new technology and for airlines to replace outdated fleets. New designs find ways to cut weight and air resistance and use more fuel efficient engines.

The industry has argued that it is moving toward a cleaner future and that it is not the worst offender when it comes to the environment. Executives repeated cited the statistic that the aviation industry accounts for just 2 percent of global man-made Co2 emissions — in contrast to other factors like deforestation which accounts for some 20 percent. The 2 percent figure is forecast to rise to just 3 percent by 2050 if no action is taken.

Environmentalists, however, argue that the growth in air travel — currently about 5 to 6 percent a year — threatens to undo improvements made in other industries, ultimately undermining international targets to halve emissions by 2050 compared with 1990. "We are under fire from many fronts, certainly from environmentalists, certainly from the uneducated general public that finds us an attractive target at which to shoot," said Scott Carson, CEO of Boeing Commercial Airlines. "But the flying public still wants to fly."

Boeing Co. has touted its 787 jet for its greater fuel efficiency, although the plane has been hampered by delays that have cost the company credibility and billions of dollars in expected additional costs and penalties. Chicago-based Boeing on Tuesday said it remains on track to test fly its 787 jetliner in the fourth quarter of this year and make its first delivery in the third quarter of 2009 — but acknowledged that its timetable remains tight.

Its European rival Airbus claims its A380 superjumbo is more fuel efficient per passenger kilometer (mile) than a car, with less emissions, less noise and a seat capacity stretching from the median 555 to a staggering 800. However, the A380 building program has also not been smooth. Toulouse-based Airbus in May announced new delays on deliveries, already almost two years late, saying the company is behind schedule in switching to automated production. It said it will deliver 12 planes in 2008 instead of 13, and 21 planes in 2009 instead of 25. Etihad also gave the A380 program a vote of confidence, committing to buy 10 of the aircraft.

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Photos courtesy of BBC News

Original Source: International Herald Tribune

Image Gallery: BBC News | In pictures: Farnborough 2008, Anniversary