Exploratory analysis of local geographies of need and the proximity of microfinance service providers in Nigeria

The significance of microfinance in driving important aspects of the Nigerian Vision 20-2020 and other national policy programs like the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) cannot be over-emphasized. The Vision 20-2020 seeks to position Nigeria in the league of world’s top 20 economies by the year 2020. The alleviation of poverty remains pivotal if this dream is to be achieved. Microfinance is therefore considered a veritable tool for mitigating the problems of poverty particularly amongst the rural poor, for stimulating economic growth, supporting human development and empowering women. This study illustrates the extent to which spatial analysis and geodemographic modeling may be of benefit for expounding real financial-related issues affecting the citizenry at localized spatial scales. Results show that local level disparities exist in the supply of microfinance for different community types

Economic analyses of maize storage innovations in southern Benin

Key words: Storage innovations, maize, information sources, farmers’ perceptions, adoption and modification, treatment effects, sample selection bias, correction function approach, technology abandonment, cross-sectional and panel data, Benin. Maize is a staple food and an important source of income for farmers in southern Benin. It is stored at village level in traditional storage structures and treated with conservation products. To improve control pest damage in stored maize, improved wooden granaries and a new product, Sofagrain®, were introduced in 1992. On-farm trials indicated that after six months of storage, the losses were reduced from 30% to only 5% for maize treated with Sofagrain® stored in an improved wooden granary. Although the effectiveness of storage innovations against pests is well documented, little is known about the socioeconomic aspects of promotion of these innovations in southern Benin. Using appropriate econometric models, this study investigates the perceptions of farmers regarding the characteristics of storage innovations and the causal effect of participation in extension on their formation, the adoption of storage innovations and effect of sources of information on the determinants of adoption, the impact of adopting storage innovation on schooling expenditure and the factors that affect the abandonment of storage innovations. First, the empirical results show that the effectiveness against pests and the length of the storage are the most important preferred characteristics and are provided by the storage innovation. Second, farmer’s participation in an extension program on these storage technologies has an important effect on the probability that positive perceptions of the quality of effectiveness against insects are provided by the improved wooden granary and the Sofagrain®. Third, there are differences in adoption and modification decisions between farmers who are informed by extension agents and those informed by other farmers. Fourth, adoption of a storage innovation increases the schooling expenditure of adopters. Finally, the study highlights the effect of road conditions, availability of family labor and availability of the protection measure Sofagrain® on the probability of abandonment of storage innovations. <br/

Is There a Problem When Transferring Tacit Knowledge by Email Within Distributed Groups in an Organisation?

This article is a work-in-progress report of a study that plans to explore the transfer of tacit knowledge electronically within distributed groups, i.e. groups of geographically dispersed organisational members who carry out the majority of their activities through information technology. With many organisations becoming international and global, there is an increasing need for Distributed Groups (DGs) and individuals to communicate with each other within those groups. Technology allows people and teams to work together at different locations and also allows the transfer of Tacit Knowledge (TK) within DGs in an organisation. The study will specifically investigate (a) possible problems that could be encountered when tacit knowledge is transferred by email or electronically mediated in DGs. (b) identify the problems and (c) make recommendations based on the findings

Improving the clinical pathway for Crohn’s perianal fistulas - novel approaches to aetiopathogenesis, treatment and outcome measurement

Crohn’s perianal fistulas are often complex and represent a challenging and disabling disease phenotype with unknown optimal treatment strategy. There are paucities in understanding of disease aetiopathogenesis, paucity in real word data on long-term outcomes in the biologic era, and the best medical / surgical treatment strategies remain unknown. There is limited ability to measure robust and comparative outcomes due to heterogeneity in outcome measurement with uncertain relevance to patients. Metabonomics (metabolic profiling/metabolomics) is a rapidly advancing field in systems biology that generates disease-relevant micro-molecular information downstream of the genome and proteome. Metabolic profiling studies utilising nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and mass spectrometry (MS) have demonstrated early promise in inflammatory bowel disease research. In this thesis, I have implemented a metabolic profiling strategy using mass spectrometry for evaluation of fresh frozen fistula tissue from idiopathic and Crohn’s fistula patients and in so doing have distinguished these two groups of fistula patients by their fistula metabolic phenotype, developing corroborative hypotheses on factors involved in pathogenesis. Using real world data from a single institution I have catalogued the disease course for a cohort of patients with Crohn’s perianal fistula on anti-TNF therapy over an 11 year period, representing one of the longest follow-up durations / largest cohorts investigated. I have also investigated and chronicled the disease course and natural history for a cohort of patients refractory to anti-TNF, who inevitably have limited options in management. I have also characterised the disease burden in this group, using novel disease states to model transition probabilities between these over time. In order to attempt to streamline patients into avoiding futile treatments and stemming the burden of futile treatment and potential side effects in refractory patients, I have investigated the potential of tissue levels as a biomarker of treatment response. I demonstrate the absence of tissue anti-TNF (infliximab and adalimumab) in a small cohort of Crohn’s fistula patients on maintenance anti-TNF therapy for Crohn’s perianal fistula. Further work is required to corroborate this interesting finding and relate it to clinical outcome as well as develop the search for such a biomarker to facilitate personalised treatment pathways for these patients. I have explored novel minimally invasive surgical treatment options for perianal fistulas, describing early success with FiLaC, VAAFT and OTSC for idiopathic fistulas but with even more limited evidence in Crohn’s fistulas. This thesis introduces the concept of symptom amelioration for symptom refractory Crohn’s perianal fistulas, demonstrating patient reported benefit in amelioration of symptoms of pain and discharge. However, this was limited by the absence of a control arm and the lack of a validated patient reported outcome measure. To address the latter issue I have developed a new patient reported outcome measure, the Crohn’s Anal Fistula Quality of Life (CAF-QoL) questionnaire, using a qualitative exploration into the lives of patients with Crohn’s perianal fistulas as well as a multidisciplinary nationwide consensus exercise to inform a process of item generation and psychometric testing, and investigating stability, reliability, construct and content validity and sensitivity to change.Open Acces

Corporate social responsibility as a marketing strategy for enhanced performance in the Nigerian banking industry: A granger causality approach

This research study takes a look at corporate social responsibility as a marketing strategy for organizational performance.The study makes use of both primary and secondary data and granger causality test was adopted as the estimation techniques. However, the objective of the study is to examine the impact of corporate social responsibility on marketing strategy in an organization.The primary data make use of questionnaire that was distributed to 120 staff of Zenith bank of Nigeria plc and the raw data from the questionnaire were coded to become a grouped data.With the secondary data the study makes use of a simple regression model formulated to take care of the topic of the research study and granger causality test was used to analyse the issue and the result revealed that there is causality that run from corporate social responsibility and marketing strategy.The study concludes and recommends that there exist some inherent pitfalls in CSR regarding marketing operations of corporate organizations, which tend to negate the interest of consumers.It is concluded that firms should endeavour to apply best practices of CSR in their marketing activities to protect the interest of consumers and the society

Skills for Justice 2013 Employer Skills Survey: sector-wide headlines report

The Skills for Justice Employer Skills Survey (ESS) is a biennial consultation that seeks to provide insight and knowledge on trends of skills issues across the United Kingdom (UK) Justice and Community Safety sector (JCS sector). The purpose of this headlines report is to summarise the sector-wide findings for the 2013 ESS. The document does not provide detailed narratives on operational, strategic or other contextual factors associated with the variables analysed and reported in it. Detailed analysis will be available in a full report which will be published as soon as possible. Early findings presented in this headlines report signify that the skills agenda must continue to sit at the heart of a vibrant and efficient JCS sector and will continue to play a pivotal role in rebalancing the UK economy

Pre-Service Teachers’ Perceptions of Preparedness and Self-efficacy in Instructing Students From Diverse Cultural and Linguistic Backgrounds

This study aims to determine a connection between the pre-service teachers’ perception of preparedness and their self-efficacy in instructing students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. The researcher was guided by three research questions: 1) What are pre-service teachers\u27 perceptions of their abilities to teach culturally and linguistically diverse students? 2) To what degree do pre-service teachers believe their teacher education program prepared them to teach culturally and linguistically diverse students? 3) To what extent do pre-service teachers\u27 self-efficacy influence culturally and linguistically diverse students? Participants were pre-service teachers (education undergraduates in their last year or last semester of graduation), community colleges, and university faculty in the North Texas area. A total of sixty-three participants participated in the study by completing a Teacher Demographic Questionnaire (TDQ) and the Culturally Responsive Teacher Self-Efficacy scale (CRTSES) (Siwatu, 2006). Also, ten faculty participants participated in the study by completing a Faculty Member Questionnaire (FMQ). None of the faculty member participants expressed an interest in participating in the follow-up interviews. Demographic and preparedness questions from the TDQ were selected to identify similarities and differences. CRTSES data were totaled by the question, ranked based on mean score, and then grouped by means. Results of the study indicated many pre-service teachers feel a significantly strong and positive perception of their abilities to instruct culturally linguistically diverse students, a high degree of preparedness received from their program (cultural awareness of the needs of CLD students), and more confidence (self-efficacy) in instructing students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. The findings of this study are insightful for teacher preparation programs, faculty members in colleges and universities, coordinators and directors of field experience at the university level, and anyone tasked with mentoring and guiding pre-service teachers

Assessing The Effectiveness Of Low-Cost Sensors As Probable Alternatives For Conventional Air Monitoring Devices

In November 2022, Allegheny County residents raised concerns about increased air pollution, especially in the Clairton region area. Due to the recent air inversion, the Clairton region was regarded as a highly polluted area because of the concentrated hydrogen sulfide smell invading the area and the exceedance of the daily PM2.5 average. Consequently, Allegheny County Health Department installed low-cost sensors (PurpleAir) in Mon Valley regions to increase the air monitoring rate and verify the efficiency of federal Reference Methods in place. Low-cost sensors are a relatively new technology adopted in air monitoring. Therefore, this project seeks to assess the effectiveness of these sensors relative to the reference method (FRM) while considering only PM2.5 data for the two methods. According to the EPA, establishing a relationship between the sensor and FRM data requires plotting the variables on a correlation graph and generating an equation of a line with a coefficient of determination (R2). The coefficient of determination is given a value of 1 and the closer the value of R2 generated from the plot is to 1, the more likely the sensor behaves like FRM. According to the analysis of the data collected from Allegheny County Health Department using Microsoft Excel and Minitab, R2 = 0.52, 0.69, and 0.12 for three different sensors. Then, a correction was made to remove the effect of relative humidity consequently, R2 = 0.63, 0.67, and 0.09. Also, during the analysis, it was observed that the sensors did not generate data for a certain number of days, and as a result, the corresponding number of days was removed from the FRM data to enable correlation. For better visualization, an air quality index (AQI) was generated for the sensor data with corresponding AQI categories, and a heat map was developed for the sensor within the study area. Finally, analysis shows that the first-second sensor established moderate relationships with the reference instrument and the third sensor did not establish any relationship. The sensor was able to detect the presence of pollution but could not generate accurate concentration. This work could not establish why sensor three has a low R2 but an assumption was made to conclude that the poor performance of the third sensor is either due to the fact that the sensor is bad or early degradation occurred and probably the effect of an unforeseen environmental factor. Therefore, more work needs to be done in the future so that the sensors can be reassessed during other seasons to compare their performance