San Francisco is the home of construction makeovers, and one contractor in particular, GCI General Contractors, has taken it to a fine art, as Alan Swaby learns.

Anyone familiar with the geography of San Francisco will know that with water on three sides, there is precious little opportunity for new buildings to be erected. As such, the construction industry in the city itself is focused on renovation and refurbishment.

The Boeing Company is restructuring its Boeing Military Aircraft (BMA) business from 1 October, involving a consolidation from six divisions to four. Boeing’s military division makes the well-known Chinook transport helicopters, as well as the C-17 transport and F/A-18 fighter-bomber.

UK mobile phone giant Vodafone, the world's biggest mobile operator by revenue, has announced the sale of its 3.2 per cent stake in China Mobile for around £4.3 billion.

The sale is the first of what is expected to be several sales of minority holdings as part of Newbury-based Vodafone’s strategy to focus on core markets as it tries to improve its share price.

The buyers of the stake, of which it is thought there may be several, have not been identified.

The global market for industrial & institutional cleaning products is forecast to exceed $36.7 billion by the year 2015, according to a new report by Global Industry Analysts, Inc.

After being hit by the recession in 2008 and 2009, the report suggest that the I&I cleaning products market is poised to gain momentum and register healthy growth over the coming years.

Royal Dutch Shell is in exclusive talks with the Finnish fuel distributor St1 to sell the oil major's Swedish refinery, it has been announced.

The Gothenburg refinery has simple-to-medium complexity, allowing it to process low-sulphur light crude from the North Sea; but not high-sulphur crude.

With a processing capacity of about 78,000 barrels of crude oil per day, the refinery supplies the domestic market with specialist fuels, such as diesel that does not freeze in the cold Scandinavian climate.

10. The first Labor Day

America's first Labor Day parade took place in New York City on 5 September 1882, organized by the Central Labor Union.

After marching from City Hall, past reviewing stands in Union Square, and then uptown to 42nd Street, the workers and their families gathered in Wendel's Elm Park for a picnic, concert, and speeches.

As Americans celebrate Labor Day, the laborers being celebrated are ever fewer in number, with the US economy having lost over 8 million jobs since the recession took hold and national unemployment standing at almost 15 million people.

Last week’s figures from the US Labor Department revealed that the economy lost another 54,000 jobs in August, with the unemployment rate now standing at 9.6 percent.

UK oil giant BP has revived the sale of its Alaskan assets after failing to sell them to US oil and gas company Apache in July, according to a report in the Financial Times.

Houston-based Apache is said to be still in the running to purchase the assets, while US-based Occidental Petroleum is also seen as a potential bidder.

The FT said it is not yet known whether BP is planning to sell its entire 26 per cent stake in the giant Prudhoe Bay oilfield, which includes the operating rights.

Canadian mining giant Goldcorp has agreed to buy Andean Resources Limited for C$3.6 billion, thereby adding the Cerro Negro gold deposit in Argentina to its assets.

The Cerro Negro gold project is an advanced-stage, high-grade vein system in the Santa Cruz province of Argentina, with indicated resources of 2.54 million ounces of gold and 23.56 million ounces of silver. Inferred resources total 523,000 ounces of gold and 3.12 million ounces of silver.

The government of Liberia has embarked upon a $1.6 billion palm oil project with Golden Agri-Resources (GAR), the subsidiary of Singapore palm oil producer Golden VerOleum.

The 25-year concession granted by the government, which is believed to be one of the biggest investments in Liberian agriculture, will create some 35,000 jobs in the south-eastern regions of the country.