We have successfully dealt with issues in South America many times before, and we believe we will work through this one as well.

It has been an honor to be a part of Illinois' history, and we look forward to sharing another century of growth with the state that we call home. As we take time to celebrate this event, we look with appreciation to those who have helped us reach this milestone, including our predecessors, employees, neighbors, customers, vendors, and shareholders.

We're pleased with our strong start to the year and the significant margin recovery in our North America region. Our lower South America results reflected pricing and cost pressures in Brazil and Argentina. Asia/Africa performed essentially in line with our expectations.

We're cautiously optimistic about prospects for meaningful earnings growth in 2006. We have achieved higher contract pricing in our US and Canadian businesses for 2006. We are focused on resolving the issues in our US operations, and expect a continuation of solid performances in our South American and Asia/Africa businesses.

Much has been accomplished to date, and we expect continuing improvements as we drive our actions and initiatives this year. All in all, we are optimistic about our Company's prospects in 2006 and our ability to continue to pursue profitable growth opportunities and achieve our stated long-term financial targets.

Stronger results in Canada and Mexico were unfortunately reduced by an operating loss in the US business, attributable to the continuing increase in energy and supply costs, and operating issues and boiler reliability at Argo, our largest plant.