Note 22 - Employee defined contribution plan

6 Months Ended

Jun. 30, 2013

Compensation and Retirement Disclosure [Abstract]

Pension and Other Postretirement Benefits Disclosure [Text Block]

22.   Employee defined contribution plan

Full time employees of the Company in the PRC participate in a government mandated defined contribution plan, pursuant to which certain pension benefits, medical care, employee housing fund and other welfare benefits are provided to employees. Chinese labor regulations require that the PRC subsidiaries of the Company make contributions to the government for these benefits based on certain percentages of the employees’ salaries. The employee benefits were expensed as incurred. The Company has no legal obligation for the benefits beyond the contributions made. The total amounts for such employee benefits were approximately US$231,000 and US$195,000 for the six months ended June 30, 2013 and 2012, respectively. The total amounts for such employee benefits were approximately US$111,000 and US$91,000 for the three months ended June 30, 2013 and 2012, respectively.