kyoshi miyochi is the director of the osaka city bureau. he spent two years traveling back and forth to the vietnamese city conducting surveys. the result convinced him that osaka could use its know-how to help ho chi minh city. >> translator: the two municipalities are very similar in some ways, so the way i see it, our technology could really benefit ho chi minh city. >> reporter: ho chi minh's flat top ography's helps compensate for the water pressure but ho chi minh has linked many distribution reservoirs to compensate, they use pumps to increase the water pressure. this system impressed ho chi minh city agreed to provide it with comprehensive support to upgrade its water system. >> translator: osaka has extensive experience, so we are hoping it can improve our system and reduce the amount of leaking water. >> reporter: the next step is for local companies to receive orders from ho chi minh city. in the meantime, osaka held a seminar for the vietnamese to promote the high technology of japanese companies. >> translator: as a private sec

rice futures trading began in osaka in the early 18th century.t was abolished in 1939 when the government tightened its control over commodities. rice futures trading is expected to make the buying and selling of rice more transparent, but a national group of agricultural cooperatives is not taking part. it says futures trading may cause volatility in the price of japan's staple food. >>> private research firms expect japan's gross domestic product from april to june to shrink for the third conservative quarter due to the march 11th quake and tsunami. ten financial institutions and research estimates the gdp will decline from .3% to 1.2% in real terms. the figure represents contractions of minus 1.4% to minus 4.7% on an annualized basis. the institute's tribute the contractions to widespread self-restraint by japanese consumers in the fields of shopping and traveling following the march 11th disaster. they say production and exports also dropped because of shortages of semiconductors and auto parts after the disaster. some of the firms expect jap

its investors are considering providing services to and from kansai airport in osaka. a move by all nippon airways apparently prompted jal to break into the low-cost carrier business. ana has already announced plans to launch two budget airlines next year. one will be based at narita and the other at kansai airport. >>> and now let's bring you weather forecasts around the world. >>> that is all for now on "newsline." thanks for watching. have a good day. ♪ >> this university town in the philippines is home to more than a hundred schools and research institutes. one coffee shop there is a local favorite. crowds ever students gather here as the sun goes down. the man making coffee behind the counter is jabez, 23 years old. he is a proprietor of this shop. he opened this coffee shop in the neighborhood that nurtured him. he served heavenly cups of coffee to please his customers. >> every drink that's from the heart is a work of art. so i just invented that too because heart rhymes with art. jabez's coffee is filled with his heart and soul. it embodies his passions and asp

coming in at 34 degrees in osaka. elsewhere looking at 26 in seoul. 40 degrees in chongqing. 36 in shanghai. now let's get a look at south asia. we're dealing with monsoon rain effecting much of indochina. pockets of heavy showers in around myanmar. we're looking at heavy downpours to occur again. the ground already saturated. risks of flooding, landslides going to be high. as well as northeastern india and bangladesh. now for the americas. starting to see the tropical storm move away from bermuda. also the low pressure up in the northeastern u.s. additional rain will come throughout the night. thunderstorms as well. that could certainly bring some additional flooding problems out here. the central areas looking at severe areas to break out. also for montana in the u.s. looking windy. watch out for the stormy conditions. in the eastern u.s., temperatures pretty comfortable. 29 in washington, d.c. fairly cool but does stay hot in the south. houston coming in at 35 degrees. finally taking a look at europe, we're looking

coming in at 34 degrees in osaka. elsewhere looking at 26 in seoul. 40 degrees in chongqing. 36 in shanghai. now let's get a look at south asia. we're dealing with monsoon rain effecting much of indochina. pockets of heavy showers in around myanmar. we're looking at heavy downpours to occur again. the ground already saturated. risks of flooding, landslides going to be high. as well as northeastern india and bangladesh. now for the americas. starting to see the tropical storm move away from bermuda. also the low pressure up in the northeastern u.s. additional rain will come throughout the night. thunderstorms as well. that could certainly bring some additional flooding problems out here. the central areas looking at severe areas to break out. also for montana in the u.s. looking windy. watch out for the stormy conditions. in the eastern u.s., temperatures pretty comfortable. 29 in washington, d.c. fairly cool but does stay hot in the south. houston coming in at 35 degrees. finally taking a look at europe, we're looking

like the ones we've had with kristi yamaguchi and always dreaming foundation and being part of the osakaty association, founder member of course, and asian-american journalist association, again, others following her. for david and for jan, if you look at television today, no matter what channel you turn to, there are asian americans on the journalism positions. and i believe and i know it's because of both david and jan's work behind the scenes, in front, bringing just that whole professional care to what they do every day. and i remember a very unique story. as i was a first-year law student at berkeley, jan was covering this whole issue about affirm active action and whether or not asian americans were still going to be part of affirmative action in the law school admissions. after i had been successful in passing my first semester of my required law school, i was out with the asian law caucus and other asian lawyers and asian law students protesting the admissions criteria, the elimination of agents from the admissions criteria. and there was janana here r invitingly and other attorn

this professor developed the endoscope with a team at osaka medical college. >> translator: it will enable us to examine from the stomach to the intestines. the device is a groundbreaking improvement in medical checkups. >> reporter: a patient swallows this new endoscope just as they would any other capsule endoscope. he was the first to try the device. this image shows the capsule endoscope moving inside his stomach. the patient said he felt no discomfort after swallowing it. the machine fires a flash twice a second, while traveling around inside the stomach to screen its walls. this is the image produced by the endoscope. the doctor and his team say the device offers a real breakthrough in digestive screening, as it can enter the small intestine, an organ that's currently very difficult to examine. the small intestine is the longest portion of the digestive tract. about 67 meters long. it's a flexible tube that twists and turns inside the body. conconventional endoscopes can't reach very far into the coiled organ. but the self-propelling endoscope will allow doctors to examine every part

it was started by a socks manufacturer in osaka. here's how it works. the project team provides cotton seeds to farmers who grow it in their damaged paddies. after harvesting, a spinning company and a team buys the crop at three times the regular price. apparel makers turn it into clothing and socks. the finished items are sold as reconstruction support products at marked up prices. every week, a cotton expert from the project team visits sato's farm to offer advice. this year is a trial run. if all goes well, cotton will be planted on 1,000 hectares in northeastern japan next year. >> translator: unless you put seeds in the ground, there won't be a harvest. i have to take it one step at a time at a slow pace. it's the only way to get anywhere. >> the cotton project is providing much needed income to struggling farmers. but there is another benefit. experts say after three years of cultivation, salt levels of the soil should return to where they were before the tsunami. >>> prime minister nato kan and visiting vice president joe biden said they should b

this professor developed the endoscope with a team at osaka medical college. >> translator: it will enable us to examine from the stomach to the intestines. the device is a groundbreaking improvement in medical checkups. >> reporter: a patient swallows this new endoscope just as they would any other capsule endoscope. he was the first to try the device. this image shows the capsule endoscope moving inside his stomach. the patient said he felt no discomfort after swallowing it. the machine fires a flash twice a second, while traveling around inside the stomach to screen its walls. this is the image produced by the endoscope. the doctor and his team say the device offers a real breakthrough in digestive screening, as it can enter the small intestine, an organ that's currently very difficult to examine. the small intestine is the longest portion of the digestive tract. about 67 meters long. it's a flexible tube that twists and turns inside the body. conconventional endoscopes can't reach very far into the coiled organ. but the self-propelling endoscope will allow doctors to examine every part

more than are joined by james corbett a member of the center for research on globalization a lie from osaka japan a thank you for joining us today so nato says it's absolutely critical to secure khadafi is vast chemical weapons arsenals are given the chaos in tripoli but are non-existent police forces a lack of structure among rebel fighters just how safe are the stockpiles. well it's an interesting question but perhaps it presupposes the idea that sort of the stockpiles are unsafe in the hands of the rebel forces and would be safer in the hands of the nato forces whereas the people who have so far been involved in siege in tripoli and killing tripoli civilians in tripoli have been you deny you know side so i think the question is really who are the people to be concerned about having access to those weapons but certainly there are and by the most conservative estimates friends of five hundred civilians have been killed in the fighting so far if not more and it's difficult to get accurate numbers obviously at this point but hundreds of civilians certainly have died at this point so i think

in asia, japan's osaka comes in at number 12 ranking. in the middle east is abu dhabi at 78.e lance berg is africa's most livable city, but that's way down the list at 92. finally, the report found that buenos aries is south america's best place to live overall. it ranked 62nd. so now you know where you need to live. let's turn our attention to what's been going on in the weather picture. a tropical storm swept into southern china on wednesday bringing heavy rains and causing damage. let's get to jen delgado at the cnn weather center. certainly this storm does seem to have a long life span. >> absolutely. we've been talking about it for well over a week. we do know it caused flooding problems through taiwan as well as the philippines. it was a deadly storm. we saw flooding in china when it made landfall around 2:30 local time. it also created very strong waves right along the coastal areas of china. let's go to the video. look at what's happening there. you can see the waves. this actually -- talking about the tropical storm, made landfall and was approaching right around hig