>> abirached: this week on world business how hiv has held back a country, the devastating effect aids has had on south africa. if people are ill or do die from hiv infection of course there is a turnover of labour i think that is the biggest impact. >> abirached: disney aims for a whole new market with the launch of its first african american princess. >> abirached: when i finally got a black dolly i held on to that dolly for life really and i think they have tapped into a whole new market. >> abirached: and we meet jon landau producer of the most successful film of all time - avatar there are things that we are doing in this movie that were unfathomable only a few years ago. we wanted to wait to make avatar until the technology was there to tell the story

the way the movie deserved to be told. >> abirached: hello and welcome. im raya abirached and this is world business, your weekly insight into the globalbusiness trends shaping our lives. the eyes of the world will be on south africa this year as it prepares to host the fifa world cup. much money has been spent on the countrys infrastructure with the hope the competition will pay dividends for the future. but for millions of the countrys citizens, their future is much more uncertain, as south africa suffers the effects of the worlds worst hiv/aids crisis. football - the beautiful game - for all ages no doubt these

children will be dreaming of the futureas soccers world cup comes to south africa. it will be the biggest sporting event of the new century - but away from world cup fever.... the rainbow nation is struggling with a sad sideshow - nearly 4.5 million south africans are living with hiv/aids. >>reporter: greenpoint stadium where 70,000 football fans will watch the semi final of the world cup in july...an impressive figure by anyones standards but its worth bearing in mind that nearly 6 times as many people will die of aids in south africa in 2010. the cost to the economy could be as much as one percent of gdp, just under 3 billion dollars every year. (world bank) >>doyle: the big impact at the moment is on absenteeism... on training. if people are ill or do die from hivinfection of course there is a turnover of labour i think that is the biggest impact. there is alsoan impact because

of the cost of treatment programmes...on healthcare programmes medical aid schemes that will also cost organisations. >>reporter: the previous government under thabo mbeki, compounded the problem by casting doubt on the efficacy of anti retroviral treatments and advocated herbs and vegetables as a cure instead. its estimated nearly 300,000 people died as a result of the governments 10 years of denial and neglect .but in spite of that, there is now hope. >>bekker: congratulations to probably civil society and you know, the medical fraternity who definitely moved around the political obstacles and got it done any way and then, you know, with the new administration there has been real energy to say what are the next steps and how do we get going. >>reporter: in one of the biggest treatment programmes in the world, nearly a million people in south africa areon antiretroviral treatments which makes hiv a chronic

disease rather than a death sentence ...as long as diagnosis is early and medication is continuous. >>kibido: the arvs also prolong my life as well, it is working...and also to aid that healthy lifestyle it makes you very powerful...and truly i am not scared of hiv. >>reporter: but you cant start treatment unless you know your status...nyameko kibido is now a counsellor for aninnovative scheme which brings testing to the people, without the stigma. the tutu tester travels round the poorer regions of cape town offering people free checkups for chronic conditions like diabetes, heart disease and they are able to throw in a discreet hiv/aids test as well. last year it helped 12,000 people. >>nurse: one line in there means that you are negative...you dont have hiv...two lines means you are positive, you have got hiv.

>>reporter: the tutu tester also offers a test for tuberculosis which is now the leading cause of death in south africa, as one of the worlds biggest tb epidemics takes hold in hiv sufferers who have compromised immune systems. the ubuntu clinic in khayelitsha outside cape town has pioneered the treatment of hiv/aids and tuberculosis as a coinfection. >>mantangana: all tb patients are supposed to be asked about hiv status because hiv and tb are terrible twins...the infrastructure doesnt allow some of the clinics to integrate. the people that need to change their mentality are staff...because if you are working in a tb clinic you should be curious about hiv...if you are working in an hiv clinic...you should be curious about tb. >>reporter: the first third world designed aids vaccine to prevent it taking hold in the first place has been designed and is under trial at the university

of cape town... most of the funding for it now comes from the united states. aids vaccine research is notoriously difficult. in 2007 the merck drug company had a disastrous trial in south africa with an aids vaccines which actually seemed to increase infection. pharmaceutical companies are now reluctant to take part: >>williamson: its not easy...its very challenging...and drug companies have...they did start off putting quite a lot of resources into it...and one by one they pulled out of doing that, hiv vaccine research. if thevaccine is any risk at all companies dont, they rather put their time and money into things that are more profitable... >>reporter: while vaccine research continues...so does the crisis. the metropolitan foundation has been measuring the impact of antiretroviral treatment on different organisations and companies. it makes the case that it actually helps the companies

bottomline to be proactive: >>nicolay: hiv is costing the company around 2 percent of annual payroll on the current takeup on antiretroviral treatment whereas it would have cost them anywhere from 3 to 4 percent of payroll if they havent made antiretroviral treatment available to their employees...so there is definitely a huge saving. >>reporter: despite the alarming numbers , the truth is that the epidemics have a much greater impact on people in the rural communities, mainly women and children who are not part of the formal economy . there are now 1.2 million aids orphans in south africa. a huge burden, but one the economy appears able to handle. nicolay: there were periods in south africa where i had to talk to the national ratings agencies...standard and poors and so on...they wanted to see, you know, ask what is the impact of hiv on the economy and how our businesses are managing it

and their rating wasnt affected by it after all because we were managing it and we were treating people. >>reporter: in 2009, the world spent around 13 billion dollars on hiv alone with the money coming from global funding agencies...but with no visible reduction in hiv infections. activists say they want to see less aids for their money not more money for their aids...and in world cup year the message from the desmond tutu hiv aids foundation is give hiv the red card. >> abirached: disneys princess range of dressing up outfits and accessories is a multibillion dollar business. with an eye on expanding the market even further, last year disney released the princess and the frog which introduced the first africanamerican princess. tiana is the first new disney princess in more than a decade and shes proving that the movie might not matter - its the merchandise that makes the money.

its a fairy tale from the land of retail: set in new orleans, louisiana, the princess and the frog introduces the first new princess since disneys four billion dollar brand began ten years ago. the film features tiana - disneys only african american princess. while the box office returns might be lacklustre - product sales are robust. and disney doesnt seem to mind. >>tartaglia: were surprised that the level >>tartaglia: were surprised that the level of sales that were experiencing on this product line is equal to salesthat we have experienced on movies that have delivered a higher box office than princess and the frog is delivering. which is good, but there are

movies that have delivered a higher box office. >>reporter:

many of the young shoppers at the disney store on londons oxford street havent had the chance to seethe princess and the frog yet. but that doesnt mean that they dont want to buy the products. >>reporter: many fans who grew up watching princess films wonder what took the company so long to diversify the racial backgrounds of the royal court. especially given the rising wealth of the target demographic. >>musker: i do think it was a bit overdue. we saw the setting - the new orleans setting - as our motivation. we thought that this was a great vehicle to do an african american lead, it was something different for us and for disney, and that was good. >>reporter: keysha davis - entertainment editor for the womens magazine, pride thinks that a black princess will expand disneys reach to children who might have felt alienated in the past by the predominantly white brand. >>davis: i just think theyve tapped into a whole new audience. i think black mothers and fathers in their droves will go out to buy these princesses, because when i was a young girl, that was something i was crying out for. and even though i had white dollies, when i finally got a black dolly, that was something that i held onto for life really. i just

think theyve tapped into a whole new market. >>reporter: disney claims that the timing of the films release had nothing to do with the election of the first black president in the us the same year. but experts say - no coincidence. >>mitchell: one of the things that disney is trying to tap into with this story are the huge aspirations that are currently being fuelled in black women and black girls. think of michelle obama, and her rise into the spotlight. or the oprah phenomenon. black women around the world and their children their aspirations have never been so great. and thats what tiana is trying to tap into. >>reporter: but for the brand to be a success on the scale of other princesses, the film must stand the test oftime. other films from the franchise like aladdin, another collaboration from the filmmaker of theprincess and the frog, rank among

the top 100 us money makers of all time. in an attempt to achieve classic status, those filmmakers reverted to the old school technique of handdrawn animation. >>clements: this film was conceived as a return to the classical disney fairy tale. a new disney princess and a musical. those things made a hand drawn approach seem right. >>musker: literally millions of drawings, created on paper the way snow white was, or cinderella that old school way of drawing at time of 24 frames per second, very much labour intensive and a labour of love for all of the artists. >>reporter: which must make the poor box office showing more galling. but the films are not the only marketing tool disney has at its disposal. the company has dozens of outlets to promote

its princess wares - from the small screen, to the store - and even, the ice rink. the disney on ice versions of the princess story perform in more than 60 countries. feld entertainment, the company doesnt release financial statements, but says theyre profitable. and as long as theres money to be made - expect to see more of the princesses, from the big screen...to your little ones feet. >>tartaglia: its pretty popular everywhere. if you look at the penetration of the brand, its mostly penetrated inthe us. but its penetration is increasing in every single territory where we have launched the brand. its increasing in europe, western europe, and were expanding into eastern europe. we are talking about china and india as the next countries where the property seem to resonate. >> abirached:

>> abirached: despite the success of the princess range, disney is worried it might be overly feminizing its filmsand is restyling its next movie rapunzel to make it more boy friendly. it will now be called tangled and features a swashbuckling male lead. still to come on world business... we stay with hollywood and meet jon landau producer of the incredibly successful scifi epic avatar and riding out recession, why show jumping is getting a clear round in the uk clearing every hurdle in its path ...and the rest in just a moment on world business... >> abirached: james camerons scifi epic avatar may have been snubbed at the oscars, but the team behind the movie can take

at least some consolation from the fact that it is now the highest grossing film of all time... >>reporter: avatar is a huge film by anyones standards. epic in scale and nearly 3 hours long, the 3d effects cost a staggering 237 million dollars and the total budget including marketing was around 750 million dollars. no wonder studio bosses at 20th century fox were anxious on opening weekend that avatar would tank. they neednt have worried. avatar became the fastest film to pass the 2 billion dollar mark at the box office and has gone on to take 2.6 billion dollars. cynics might argue that high priced 3d tickets contributed to the inflated figures, but it is undoubtedly the most profitable film of all time. i sat down with the producer of avatar, jon landau and began by asking why it had taken so long for the film to make it to the silver screen. >>landau: it was really about technology advancement. i mean there are

things that we are doing in this moviethat were unfathomable only a few years ago. and we wanted to wait to make avatar until the technology was there to tell the story the way the movie deserved to be told. jim wrote this in 1995 and everybody loved the script. 20th century fox loved the script. but said wait a second, how are we going to do this. we didnt know. so we waited until we could figure it out and then we embarked on the journey. >> abirached: in some words, what has changed? its 3d but its something new in 3d. its digital but its something new in digital. run us through... >>landau: well there are a couple different things that changed. the first thing that changed was our ability to create cgi characters that really convey and express human emotions driven by human performances and the key to that was going to an image based process where we photographed the actors faces and instead

of putting reflectors, markers on it, we used this image to drive the performance on a frame by frame, pore by pore level. in addition when were capturing those performances, we dont do it in ablack box. we give jim cameron a camera and put it in his hands. jim is a very tactile director andthis enables him to move this camera around a virtual space where when he looks at the character, he doesnt see the character, he sees the world, he sees everything that is there. on top of that for the live action portion, weve developed a 3d camera system that allows us to shoot a 3d movie with the same flexibility when you shoot a 2d movie, where the cameras two lenses move dynamically the wayour eyes do so that the strain of watching a 3d movie is taken by the camera and not by the viewer in the theatre. >> abirached: how do you feel jim has an imagination that even technology might not catch up with? >>landau: you know, i think jim is always a little ahead of what technology can do. and i think thats what makes him so exciting. but he does it to service a story. he writes a story first and he writes

that tobe an emotionally engaging story and then when the technology is ready, hell tackle it. 26 >> abirached: how would you like this film to be remembered? >> landau: well i think as filmmakers we have an obligation to present the socially relevant issues and i thinkscience fiction is really a metaphor for the world in which we live and if people can leave avatar thinking about some of the ideas that were introduced in the movie, thinking about what are we doingto our world today, thinking about how we living our lives and interacting with other cultures, people of different colors. i think those are important things

for people to leave the theatre with. >> abirached: you might think that show jumping is a specialist sport, only open to the very rich. but in the uk riding is more popular than it has been in nearly a century and the sport, despite the recession, is riding high. >>reporter: i found myself in an almost magical winter wonderland the other day...it was a beautiful place... and the home, in fact of britains top ranked showjumper.... >>de jong: nice spread youve got out here. cant be doing too bad out of the showjumping biz. >>maher: no...not bad. weve spent few years building it up. it had some good owners, business people putting money and we managed to do quite well. >>reporter: he makes it sound easy. its not. the arenas ben competes in may look glamorous....but getting

to perform there requires plenty of hard work. so from 7am till late, monday to wednesday...the 27 year old trains virtually non stop....and the rest of the time...hes pretty much on the road, competing.... >>maher: last year was my busiest year and i was away 42, 45 weekends in the year... >>reporter: which isnt surprising given that over the past 10 years the number of show jumping events sanctionedby the sports international federation has tripled to almost 1000 a year. that includes prestige events like londons olympia horse show, which even in the midst of a recession is proving more popularthan ever... >>brooksward: nine out of 11 performances you couldnt buy a single ticket for and the others were sort of 90% full. its been a huge success this year. >>reporter: olympia is a beautifully presented show....although it perhaps does little to dispel the notion thatequestrian sports are somewhat

elitist..... >>connell: theres 4m people compete in this sport in this country. that by definition is not elitism. >>billington: people think its an elitist sport, but all myself, whittaker, skelton...none of us were born with a silver spoon in our mouth...but weve made it from nothing. >>brooksward: love their horses...love their way of life. very normal, down to earth people. thats the commonality. doesnt matter what youve got in your bank. >>reporter: whatever their owners background, the british equine industry has a turnover of over 6.5 billion dollars. more horses are actually being ridden than before ww1, and the elite among them are unquestionably highly skilled... >>de jong: what you dont realize when you watch show jumping on tv is just how high these horses are going. im about 195cm tall, and at the very top level theyre jumping around shoulder height for me...which about 160 to 165cm. and later in this item im going to be crouching down just below that height and benwill be jumping right over the top. should be interesting.

>>reporter: or indeed, catastrophic....now top horses ...the type that tend not to demolish things...are largelydutch and german breeds...and their price tag can run into the millions of dollars...but thats onlyif you can get their owners to part with them... >>kraut: at this level most riders have brought them along and dont want to sell them. so to even buy one, ifyou had an open checkbook and unlimited funds its not that easy to find one. >>reporter: find a good one though...and you can start dipping into an ever increasing prize pool... >>maher: ...regularly now, theres easily 50 thousand euros to the winner and possibly 100000 euros so theres good prize money to be won. >>reporter: but factor in costs such as staff fees, buying, keeping and transporting horses...paying the electricity bill to run your monster sun lamp, and youll be lucky if youve

got enough left over to feed thedogs... 13 >>de jong: reporter how do you support yourself? >>billington : very poorly. people think you are in at a lot of money winning big prizes but it all goes into a bigblack hole trying to support ourselves. >>reporter: those costs explain why even top riders like ben dont support themselves purely by competing and ownfew of their own horses. his business plan involves a mixture of training clients horses, and otherriders as well as competing. he only charges around $300 a week to stable clients horses, which barely covers costs...but in return, takes a relatively high percentage of any prize money collected... >>maher: because i charge not such a great rate on the week to week basis, then majority of time, i might take a 50% split of the prize money. >>reporter: but even the prize money may be rising...the days when show jumping pulled huge terrestrial tv audiences are long gone....and for many

riders, thats meant more meagre sponsorship earnings... >>billington: in the olden days we had big sponsors you know giving 150 thousand pounds a year to run your horses then, what you earn its profit then. but we dont have that anymore. >>reporter: although those sponsors may be missing a trick...particularly if theyre looking to target female consumers... >>brooksward: its one of the few sports that appeals to the female market directly. 70 probably 80% of that audience out there are females >>leijon: well, its the only sport where men and women compete on the same. height and everything is the same.i dont know if theres any other sport that does that. >>reporter: but whoevers on board...ultimately, is jumping success down to the quality of the horse, or the rider....? >>maher: in general, the best horse wins. >>connell: its probably easier to find great riders than it is to find great horses. >>kraut: its the horse. >>billington: when you get to the real sharp end of the stick its definitely the horse.

>>reporter: which is why i was hoping that ben was riding a very good horse.... and fortunately for all concerned, but most importantly me...he was... >> abirached: thats it for this weeks world business. thanks for watching. well see you again at the same time next week.