Tony Blair set off on a farewell tour of Africa today, his last major trip before he steps down as prime minister next month.

During the next five days, the premier will visit Libya, Sierra Leone and South Africa. Mr Blair was the first British leader in 60 years to visit Libya in 2004, after Colonel Gadafy agreed to give up developing nuclear weapons and handed over agents blamed for the Lockerbie aeroplane bombing.

This week’s trip to the continent is designed to highlight the issues of aid, climate change and fair trade.

A spokeswoman for Mr Blair said he hopes it will “build momentum for progress” ahead of the crucial G8 international summit in Germany next month.

Downing Street said that “all three countries he will visit illustrate, in different ways, the benefits of this government’s active, values-driven foreign policy engagement with Africa”.

Mr Blair is due to hold talks with the South African president, Thabo Mbeki, and will give a speech on African policy while he is visiting the country on Thursday and Friday.

His trip to Sierra Leone is expected to be warmly received. In 2000, deployment of British troops helped end a lengthy civil war characterised by atrocities against civilians.

Mr Blair has devoted more of his time in office to Africa than many other British prime ministers, putting Africa at the heart of the UK’s agenda for its presidency of the European Union.

He hopes the trip will demonstrate his commitment to Africa and reiterate the message that the G8 countries need to deliver on the promises they made at the Gleneagles summit in 2005. The world leaders agreed to double aid to African nations and write off debts totalling more than 20bn.

Mr Blair will also seek new pledges on education and Aids at this year’s summit.

The humanitarian crisis in Darfur, Sudan, will also be high on the agenda as Mr Blair talks with African leaders.

He will also call for more support for the African Union’s efforts to train and deploy African peacekeepers in areas like Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

NEW YORK—A sharply increasing portion of America’s working mothers say their ideal situation would include a part-time job, rather than working full time or staying at home, a new national survey finds.

The survey, being released Thursday, found that only 21 percent of working mothers with children under 18 viewed full-time work as the best arrangement, down from 32 percent in 1997.

Sixty percent of the working mothers said a part-time job would be best, up from 48 percent 10 years ago. And 19 percent said not working at all would be ideal Д roughly the same as in 1997.

Cary Funk, a Pew researcher on the survey, said the trend reflected women’s latest thoughts on the ideal arrangement for their children.

“I don’t think it means people are going to give up their jobs,” she said. “It’s more of an expression of the difficulties of combining responsibilities at work and home.”

The survey also found a shift in preferences among stay-at-home mothers.

Only 16 percent of them said their ideal situation would be to work full-time outside the home, down from 24 percent in 1997. Conversely, 48 percent of them now say that not working at all outside the home is the best arrangement, up from 39 percent who felt that way in 1997.

Fathers with children under 18 had a different outlook Д 72 percent said the ideal situation for them is a full-time job, 12 percent said they would prefer part-time work and 16 percent said not working at all outside the home would be best.

The survey was conducted by telephone in February and March among a national sample of 2,020 adults. The margin of error is 3 percentage points for the full sample, higher for various subgroups.

According to the latest federal figures, 70.5 percent of American women with children under 18 work outside the home Д including 60 percent of mothers with children under 3. And the newly emerging preference for part-time work doesn’t mesh with current reality: three-quarters of the working mothers have full-time jobs.

However, MaryAnne Hyland, an management professor who has studied flexible work policies, said U.S. companies are increasingly offering attractive part-time arrangements.

“In the past, part-time jobs were often dead-end jobs, and working mothers felt they had to work full time to maintain benefits,” she said. “Now more companies are offering these benefits for part-time jobs.”

The Pew survey found a division of opinion between working and stay-at-home mothers as to whether it’s good or bad for society that so many mothers work outside the home.

Among stay-at-home moms, 44 percent viewed this trend as bad, 22 percent as good, and the rest said it made no difference. Among working moms, 34 percent saw the trend as positive, another 34 percent as negative.

The survey also found differences in how working and stay-at-home moms assess the job they do as parents Д mothers working full-time give themselves lower ratings, on average, than at-home mothers or mothers working part-time. This self-rating question wasn’t asked in the 1997 Pew survey, so there was no way to track changes over time.

The survey questions did not seek details about how many hours a week the respondents worked. Joan Williams, an expert on workplace issues at California’s Hastings College of the Law, said the finding that more women wanted shorter hours may reflect the fact that many of them Д especially in white-collar professions Д are working more than 40 hours a week.

KANSAS CITY, Mo.—Pancake house operator which is acquiring casual dining chain , said Wednesday its second-quarter profit rose 37 percent, helped by new franchise restaurant openings, same-store sales growth and cost controls.

Net income for the quarter ended June 30 rose to $14.1 million, or 82 cents per share, from $10.3 million, or 56 cents per share, a year ago.

Analysts surveyed by were looking for profit of just 59 cents per share.

Revenue climbed to $89.5 million from $85.1 million last year, above the $87.3 million analysts projected.

The company also said it was paying a dividend of 25 cents per share.

IHOP shares, which have traded in a 52-week range of $44.06 to $66.40, were up 56 cents to $65.58 in midday trading Wednesday.

, the company’s chairwoman and chief executive, said the company continued to drive topline sales through opening 15 new franchise restaurants, increasing same-store sales and moderating expenses. In a conference call with analysts, she said the pending Applebee’s acquisition would not be a serious distraction.

“We intend to keep our eye on the ball and will not allow management focus on IHOP to waver,” she said.

For the three months ended June 30, sales at stores open for at least a year increased 2.5 percent as higher average customer checks offset lower dining room traffic. The company said it is continuing to battle a sluggish restaurant market, brought about by higher fuel prices and changing consumer behavior, and increased competition for breakfast customers.

IHOP reiterated its existing guidance for 2007 as it relates to its IHOP business, saying it expects same-store sale growth of 2 percent to 4 percent and the addition of 61 to 66 new restaurants. But it said it is suspending its fiscal 2007 profit outlook as current guidance doesn’t account for the impact of the Applebee’s acquisition on results.

The company said last week it plans to buy Overland Park, Kan.-based Applebee’s, the nation’s largest casual dining restaurant chain, for $2.1 billion in cash and assumption of debt in a deal expected to be completed in the fourth quarter.

IHOP said it plans to fund part of the acquisition through selling Applebee’s real estate holdings and turning over company-operated stores to franchisees, a plan that Tom Conforti, IHOP’s chief financial officer, said could begin early next year.

Stewart, president of Applebee’s domestic division from 1998 to 2001, said transition plans are under way and that she’s received largely positive comments from IHOP franchisees, including some asking about buying or developing some of Applebee’s company-operated stores.

Asked whether she would change recent efforts by Applebee’s to reposition its brand to go after a more upscale audience or return to its bar-and-grill roots, Stewart said she would have a better idea later this year.

“I would really strongly suggest that you think of that brand positioning as a filter for everything we do on a go-forward basis, whether that’s the remodel, whether that’s the new prototype, whether that’s the service platform, whether that’s the menu,” she said. “Everything needs to go through that brand filter and I’m not in a position to say today that there is complete alignment of what that is.”

She also said the companies were developing plans for retaining key Applebee’s employees and would move forward with Applebee’s plans to move to a new corporate headquarters in Lenexa, Kan.