Mr Bloomberg has already given US$125 million to the global cause and will provide US$250 million more.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation said it will spend US$125 million over five years.

The US$500 million would be spent on a multi-pronged campaign - nicknamed Mpower - that Mr Bloomberg and Dr Margaret Chan, director- general of the World Health Organisation (WHO), outlined in February.

It will urge governments to sharply raise tobacco taxes; prohibit smoking in public places; outlaw advertising to children and cigarette giveaways; start anti-smoking advertising campaigns and offer people nicotine patches or other help to quit.

Health officials, consumer advocates, journalists, tax officers and others from Third World countries will be sent to the United States for workshops on lobbying, public service advertising, catching cigarette smugglers and running hotlines for smokers wanting to quit.

A list of grants is at tobacco controlgrants.org

'I believe a world in which everyone is aware of the destructiveness of tobacco and empowered to avoid it is within reach,' Mr Bloomberg said at an announcement in New York on Wednesday.

'Smoking is an epidemic that can be stopped, and we want more people to get involved,' Mr Gates said at his first public event as chairman of his philanthropic foundation since he left his full-time executive role at Microsoft last month.

He said China and India should get special attention. Statistics show that by 2030, more than 80 per cent of worldwide tobacco-related deaths will occur in low- and middle-income countries, compared to half today.

China has an estimated 350 million smokers, a third of the world's total, and one million people die from tobacco use in the country each year, according to the WHO.

Beijing plans to ban smoking in sports venues, parks and public transport during next month's Olympic Games, but restaurants and hotels are exempted.

Mr Gates said he was happy to defer to Mr Bloomberg's leadership in the anti-tobacco campaign.

Mr Bloomberg, 66, who made a fortune from the financial information company he founded, was a former smoker who quit about 30 years ago.

In his first term as New York's mayor, he banned smoking in bars and restaurants.

He said on Wednesday that during his administration, the city's smoking rate has fallen by 22 per cent, and teen smoking by more than 50 per cent.

Mr Gates, 52, said he hopes that anti-smoking efforts will prevent Africa - where about 20 per cent of men smoke - from suffering the high rates that European and American countries once did.

REUTERS, WASHINGTON POST, NEW YORK TIMES