The Growth Enhancement Support Scheme: Productivity and Shortcomings among Rice Farmers in Ekiti State, Nigeria

Increasing access to improved farm inputs at a subsidized rate has urgently become the focus of government programmes. This study therefore examined the effect and shortcomings of GES Scheme on rice farmers’ productivity. A cross-sectional data of 160 smallholder rice farming households was selected through multistage random sampling technique from three major rice-producing local government areas. The total number of communities randomly selected was six. The data were collected using a well-structured questionnaire and the objectives were analysed using descriptive statistics and Total Factor Productivity (TFP) index. The results revealed that the average age of the rice farmers in the study area was about 46 years. More male farmers (73.1%) were involved in the Scheme than their female counterparts. Among the registered rice farmers, 58.7 percent received telephone alerts for the subsidized inputs (fertilizer and seeds), but not all the farmers were able to gain access to the inputs due to cash constraint, missing names at the redemption centres, untimely supply, among others. The results from the TFP index showed that the participants were productive. They had an average of 10% net gain from the cost incurred in production. Using the TFP index, it was revealed that rice farmers in Gbonyin local government area are the most (80%) productive among others. It was therefore recommended that timely supply of inputs should be ensured and an efficient monitoring team should be in place to check inadequacies in this Scheme

A functional genomics catalogue of activated transcription factors during pathogenesis of pneumococcal disease

Background: Association analysis is an alternative to conventional family-based methods to detect the location of gene(s) or quantitative trait loci (QTL) and provides relatively high resolution in terms of defining the genome position of a gene or QTL. Seed protein and oil concentration are quantitative traits which are determined by the interaction among many genes with small to moderate genetic effects and their interaction with the environment. In this study, a genome-wide association study (GWAS) was performed to identify quantitative trait loci (QTL)controlling seed protein and oil concentration in 298 soybean germplasm accessions exhibiting a wide range of seed protein and oil content. Results: A total of 55,159 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were genotyped using various methods including illumina Infinium and GoldenGate assays and 31,954 markers with minor allele frequency >0.10 were used to estimate linkage disequilibrium (LD) in heterochromatic and euchromatic regions. In euchromatic regions, the mean LD (r2) rapidly declined to 0.2 within 360 Kbp, whereas the mean LD declined to 0.2 at 9,600 Kbp in heterochromatic regions. The GWAS results identified 40 SNPs in 17 different genomic regions significantly associated with seed protein. Of these, the five SNPs with the highest associations and seven adjacent SNPs were located in the 27.6-30.0 Mbp region of Gm20. A major seed protein QTL has been previously mapped to the same location and potential candidate genes have recently been identified in this region. The GWAS results also detected 25 SNPs in 13 different genomic regions associated with seed oil. Of these markers, seven SNPs had a significant association with both protein and oil. Conclusions: This research indicated that GWAS not only identified most of the previously reported QTL controlling seed protein and oil, but also resulted in narrower genomic regions than the regions reported as containing these QTL. The narrower GWAS-defined genome regions will allow more precise marker-assisted allele selection and will expedite positional cloning of the causal gene(s)

The Growth Enhancement Support Scheme: Productivity and Shortcomings among Rice Farmers in Ekiti State, Nigeria

Increasing access to improved farm inputs at a subsidized rate has urgently become the focus of government programmes. This study therefore examined the effect and shortcomings of GES Scheme on rice farmers’ productivity. A cross-sectional data of 160 smallholder rice farming households was selected through multistage random sampling technique from three major riceproducing local government areas. The total number of communities randomly selected was six. The data were collected using a well-structured questionnaire and the objectives were analysed using descriptive statistics and Total Factor Productivity (TFP) index. The results revealed that the average age of the rice farmers in the study area was about 46 years. More male farmers (73.1%) were involved in the Scheme than their female counterparts. Among the registered rice farmers, 58.7 percent received telephone alerts for the subsidized inputs (fertilizer and seeds), but not all the farmers were able to gain access to the inputs due to cash constraint, missing names at the redemption centres, untimely supply, among others. The results from the TFP index showed that the participants were productive. They had an average of 10% net gain from the cost incurred in production. Using the TFP index, it was revealed that rice farmers in Gbonyin local government area are the most (80%) productive among others. It was therefore recommended that timely supply of inputs should be ensured and an efficient monitoring team should be in place to check inadequacies in this Scheme

Does agricultural cooperative membership impact technical efficiency of maize production in Nigeria: An analysis correcting for biases from observed and unobserved attributes

Publication history: Accepted - 31 December 2020; Published online - 22 January 2021The formation of agricultural cooperatives has been widely promoted as an agricultural development policy initiative to help smallholder farmers cope with multiple production and marketing challenges. Using a nationally representative survey dataset of smallholder maize producers from rural Nigeria, this study assesses the impact of agricultural cooperative membership on technical efficiency (TE). We based our estimation approach on the combination of a newly developed sample selection stochastic production frontier model with propensity score matching to control for possible selectivity biases from both observables and unobservables. We estimate stochastic meta-frontiers to examine TE differences between cooperative members and non-members. Our results reveal that TE levels of members are consistently higher than that of non-members. This calls for continued policy incentives targeted at encouraging farmers to form as well as participate in agricultural cooperatives

What Drives Households’ Payment forWaste Disposal and Recycling Behaviours? Empirical Evidence from South Africa’s General Household Survey

Publication history: Accepted - 22 July 2020; Published - 1 October 2020.Safeguarding the environment and its citizens’ health remains one of the key policy priorities of the governments of many developing and emerging countries. Using the 2017 General Household Survey (GHS) dataset, this study examines the driving factors a ecting households’ recycling behaviour and payment for waste disposal in South Africa. The methods of data analysis were based on descriptive statistics and a Bivariate Probit regression model. The descriptive statistics results indicate that there are 56.29% male-headed and 43.71% female headed households, with an average age of 49 years. In addition, the study shows that 89.97% of household heads had formal education with a mean monthly income of 11,099.07 ZAR/650.504 USD. The study also revealed that 22% of the households sampled had access to social grants. The results from the Bivariate Probit regression model show that household’s income, access to social grants, formal educational attainment and the age of the household were significant (p < 0.01) driving factors a ecting households’ recycling behaviour and payment for waste disposal. The study concludes that the households’ socio-economic factors a ect their recycling behaviour and willingness to pay for waste management in South Africa. Actions targeted at poverty alleviation and environmental sensitization programmes are key for facilitating environmental conservation behaviours of households in South Africa in order to achieve the environmental sustainability Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target of the United Nations

Complete Genome Sequence of a Hepatitis E Virus Genotype 1e Strain from an Outbreak in Nigeria, 2017

Hepatitis E virus genotype 1 (HEV-1) is associated with large epidemics. Notably, HEV subtype 1e (HEV-1e) has caused HEV outbreaks in sub-Saharan Africa. We report here the second full-length genome sequence of an HEV-1e strain (NG/17-0503) from a recent outbreak in Nigeria in 2017. It shares 94.2% identity with an HEV-1e strain from Chad.Peer Reviewe

The pneumococcal alpha-glycerophosphate oxidase enhances nasopharyngeal colonization through binding to host glycoconjugates

Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus) is a major human pathogen, causing a broad spectrum of diseases including otitis media, pneumonia, bacteraemia and meningitis. Here we examined the role of a potential pneumococcal meningitis vaccine antigen, alpha-glycerophosphate oxidase (SpGlpO), in nasopharyngeal colonization. We found that serotype 4 and serotype 6A strains deficient in SpGlpO have significantly reduced capacity to colonize the nasopharynx of mice, and were significantly defective in adherence to human nasopharyngeal carcinoma cells in vitro. We also demonstrate that intranasal immunization with recombinant SpGlpO significantly protects mice against subsequent nasal colonization by wild type serotype 4 and serotype 6A strains. Furthermore, we show that SpGlpO binds strongly to lacto/neolacto/ganglio host glycan structures containing the GlcNAcβ1-3Galβ disaccharide, suggesting that SpGlpO enhances colonization of the nasopharynx through its binding to host glycoconjugates. We propose that SpGlpO is a promising vaccine candidate against pneumococcal carriage, and warrants inclusion in a multi-component protein vaccine formulation that can provide robust, serotype-independent protection against all forms of pneumococcal disease

Identification of genes that contribute to the pathogenesis of invasive Pneumococcal Disease by In Vivo transcriptomic analysis

Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus) continues to be responsible for a high level of global morbidity and mortality resulting from pneumonia, bacteremia, meningitis, and otitis media. Here we have used a novel technique involving niche-specific, genome-wide in vivo transcriptomic analyses to identify genes upregulated in distinct niches during pathogenesis after intranasal infection of mice with serotype 4 or 6A pneumococci. The analyses yielded 28 common, significantly upregulated genes in the lungs relative to those in the nasopharynx and 25 significantly upregulated genes in the blood relative to those in the lungs in both strains, some of which were previously unrecognized. The role of five upregulated genes from either the lungs or the blood in pneumococcal pathogenesis and virulence was then evaluated by targeted mutagenesis. One of the mutants (ΔmalX) was significantly attenuated for virulence in the lungs, two (ΔaliA and ΔilvH) were significantly attenuated for virulence in the blood relative to the wild type, and two others (ΔcbiO and ΔpiuA) were completely avirulent in a mouse intranasal challenge model. We also show that the products of aliA, malX, and piuA are promising candidates for incorporation into multicomponent protein-based pneumococcal vaccines currently under development. Importantly, we suggest that this new approach is a viable complement to existing strategies for the discovery of genes critical to the distinct stages of invasive pneumococcal disease and potentially has broad application for novel protein antigen discovery in other pathogens such as S. pyogenes, Haemophilus influenzae type b, and Neisseria meningitidis

A transcription factor contributes to pathogenesis and virulence in streptococcus pneumoniae

To date, the role of transcription factors (TFs) in the progression of disease for many pathogens is yet to be studied in detail. This is probably due to transient, and generally low expression levels of TFs, which are the central components controlling the expression of many genes during the course of infection. However, a small change in the expression or specificity of a TF can radically alter gene expression. In this study, we combined a number of quality-based selection strategies including structural prediction of modulated genes, gene ontology and network analysis, to predict the regulatory mechanisms underlying pathogenesis of Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus). We have identified two TFs (SP_0676 and SP_0927 [SmrC]) that might control tissue-specific gene expression during pneumococcal translocation from the nasopharynx to lungs, to blood and then to brain of mice. Targeted mutagenesis and mouse models of infection confirmed the role of SP_0927 in pathogenesis and virulence, and suggests that SP_0676 might be essential to pneumococcal viability. These findings provide fundamental new insights into virulence gene expression and regulation during pathogenesis.Layla K. Mahdi, Esmaeil Ebrahimie, David L. Adelson, James C. Paton, Abiodun D. Ogunniy

In vitro Antimicrobial Activity of Robenidine, Ethylenediaminetetraacetic Acid and Polymyxin B Nonapeptide Against Important Human and Veterinary Pathogens

The emergence and global spread of antimicrobial resistance among bacterial pathogens demand alternative strategies to treat life-threatening infections. Combination drugs and repurposing of old compounds with known safety profiles that are not currently used in human medicine can address the problem of multidrug-resistant infections and promote antimicrobial stewardship in veterinary medicine. In this study, the antimicrobial activity of robenidine alone or in combination with ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) or polymyxin B nonapeptide (PMBN) against Gram-negative bacterial pathogens, including those associated with canine otitis externa and human skin and soft tissue infection, was evaluated in vitro using microdilution susceptibility testing and the checkerboard method. Fractional inhibitory concentration indices (FICIs) and dose reduction indices (DRI) of the combinations against tested isolates were determined. Robenidine alone was bactericidal against Acinetobacter baumannii [minimum inhibitory concentrations (MIC) mode = 8 μg/ml] and Acinetobacter calcoaceticus (MIC mode = 2 μg/ml). Against Acinetobacter spp., an additivity/indifference of the combination of robenidine/EDTA (0.53 &gt; FICIs &gt; 1.06) and a synergistic effect of the combination of robenidine/PMBN (0.5 &lt; FICI) were obtained. DRIs of robenidine were significantly increased in the presence of both EDTA and PMBN from 2- to 2048-fold. Robenidine exhibited antimicrobial activity against Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and Pseudomonas aeruginosa, in the presence of sub-inhibitory concentrations of either EDTA or PMBN. Robenidine also demonstrated potent antibacterial activity against multidrug-resistant Gram-positive pathogens and all Gram-negative pathogens isolated from cases of canine otitis externa in the presence of EDTA. Robenidine did not demonstrate antibiofilm activity against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. EDTA facilitated biofilm biomass degradation for both Gram-positives and Gram-negatives. The addition of robenidine to EDTA was not associated with any change in the effect on biofilm biomass degradation. The combination of robenidine with EDTA or PMBN has potential for further exploration and pharmaceutical development, such as incorporation into topical and otic formulations for animal and human use