Agricultural Input Subsidies in Pakistan: Nature and Impact

Pakistan has a history of subsidising agricultural inputs. Although none of the agricultural inputs were subsidised during the early 1950s, the process was initiated in the second half of the decade by subsidising chemical fertilisers in order to popularise their use [Niaz (1984)]. The list of subsidised inputs and the rate structure of the subsidies were expanded considerably throughout the Sixties. Towards the end of the Sixties, it was noted that almost all the agricultural inputs including fertilisers, insecticides, seeds, irrigation water, tubewell installations, and the operation and purchase of tractors and tractor-related equipment were subsidised in one form or another [Aresvik (1967) and Kuhnen (1989)]. In the 1970s, some curtailment of subsidies occurred as a result of input price increases which followed the worldwide recession, a major oil shock, the credit crunch, the war with India, and the consequent steep devaluation of Pakistani Rupee [Chaudhry (1982)]. Although the subsidies had survived the onslaught of the Seventies and tended to persist on most inputs, the government became totally committed to their removal beginning with the 1980s, under pressures from the IMF and the World Bank [Government of Pakistan (1980)]. As a consequence, there was a total withdrawal of subsidy from seeds, insecticides, tubewells, and tractors. A phased-out withdrawal of fertiliser subsidy, culminating in 1984-85 in the case of nitrogenous fertilisers and in 1989-90 in the case of phosphatic and potash fertilisers, was also to be undertaken [World Bank (1986)]. The purpose of the present paper is to highlight the progress of withdrawal of input subsidies in Pakistan, to study the nature of the input subsidies and possibly analyse the impact of the withdrawal of subsidies on the farm sector. Needless to add that the study is also intended to make policy recommendations on the various aspects of subsidy withdrawal.

Optimization and Performance of the ATLAS Tau Trigger with Cosmics Data

Cosmics data are providing a valuable handle to optimize and commission the ATLAS detector before beam collissions. In this process the ATLAS Tau Trigger is also exercising and adjusting its different components, namely the hardware based first level trigger, and the second and third levels, implemented with software. In this contribution we summarize the performance at the different stages with cosmics events, and compare with Monte Carlo simulation and offline reconstructed muon candidates. We also describe the prospects for initial running with beam collisions, focusing on the commission of the second and third level tau triggers and the strategy to measure the first trigger efficiencies with data

Spontaneous breaking of time reversal symmetry in strongly interacting two dimensional electron layers in silicon and germanium

We report experimental evidence of a remarkable spontaneous time reversal symmetry breaking in two dimensional electron systems formed by atomically confined doping of phosphorus (P) atoms inside bulk crystalline silicon (Si) and germanium (Ge). Weak localization corrections to the conductivity and the universal conductance fluctuations were both found to decrease rapidly with decreasing doping in the Si:P and Ge:P $\delta-$layers, suggesting an effect driven by Coulomb interactions. In-plane magnetotransport measurements indicate the presence of intrinsic local spin fluctuations at low doping, providing a microscopic mechanism for spontaneous lifting of the time reversal symmetry. Our experiments suggest the emergence of a new many-body quantum state when two dimensional electrons are confined to narrow half-filled impurity bands

understanding and managing complications in neurosurgery

It is a well-known surgical maxim that only two types of surgeons do not have surgical complications; those who do not operate, and those who lie. Surgical complications in other words, are unwanted but undeniable part of surgery. There is not one operation with a 0% complication rate and therefore statistically, if a surgeon does not have complications, he probably has not operated enough. Despite their inevitability, complications convey a sense of gravity to the public, health professionals, and the policy makers alike

生化学ネットワークの確率論的ダイナミクスのシミュレーションと理論解析

九州工業大学博士学位論文（要旨）学位記番号：情工博甲第330号 学位授与年月日：平成29年9月22