MAPUTO, Aug 12 (AFP) - AIDS will for the first time top the agenda at a southern African conference that in the past has focused mainly on economic issues, organizers said Saturday.

The Southern African International Dialogue (SAID) is an economic forum that gathers leaders from this region and a few other countries for talks that in the past have centered on trade and economic growth.

But this year, Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), and particularly its effects on children, will top the agenda at the August 20-23 meeting in Maputo, said Eneas Comiche, the event's co-chairman.

Leaders at the SAID are also expected to discuss the effects of other deadly diseases, such as malaria, Comiche said.

AIDS is taking a devastating toll on southern Africa, where the rate of Humano Immune-deficiency Virus (HIV) infection is higher than anywhere else in the world.

The pandemic is crippling businesses and civil services, with workers dying as they approach senior positions.

It is also creating poverty in the countryside, and wrecking education -- Africa's long-term hope -- as those who take AIDS orphans under their wings cannot afford to pay for their education as well as that of their own children.

A key expression at the SAID meetings is "smart partnerships," which Comiche described as having government, labor, industry and neighbouring countries working together for progress in a win-win philosophy.

Members of the 14-nation Southern African Development Community (SADC) have already called for drug manufacturers to provide a package of services along with cheaper drugs to fight the HIV and AIDS pandemics.

An expensive antiretroviral cocktail is used in developed countries to reduce infection to the state of a chronic but manageable illness, but its cost is beyond the means of African governments and individuals.

Pharmaceutical companies are now negotiating with the UN agency UNAIDS on reducing their prices for developing countries, and are even offering some drugs free.

But South Africa, among other countries, does not want to accept free drugs without necessary infrastructure and support systems being put in place.

Across sub-Saharan Africa, 24.5 million people are infected -- more than 70 percent of the world total of 34.3 million -- and AIDS has orphaned more than 12 million African children, 95 percent of the world's total, according to UNAIDS.

Mozambique's health authorities estimate that 700 people there are infected with HIV every day. About 250,000 Mozambican children have been orphaned after their parents died of AIDS, and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) expects that number to grow to one million within five to six years.

More than 400 delegates, including heads of state and government, are expected for the fourth annual SAID meeting.

Among those who have said they will attend are the presidents of Nambia, Mozambique, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zimbabwe, the prime ministers of Granada and Malaysia, the deputy prime minister of Malawi and the king of Swaziland.

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