Ontology-based islamic banking product information for informed decision making and product innovation / Ahmad Shaharudin Abdul Latiff

The Islamic banks need to remove the grievances on them and gain support of their customers. There were presumptions that the issues were due to the customers’ lack of understanding. Hence, there was need to identify the actual root causes of the issues and the factors that had been impeding the customers’ understanding. The issue of the grievances could be attended by improving the customers’ decision making with the use of information systems. Yet, such systems need to hold the information on the banking products. The information on the Islamic banking products could be modelled in form of a domain ontology. The objectives of this research were to ascertain the real issues of the grievances on the Islamic banks, the effect of lack of understanding of the product on the grievances, and then build a domain ontology on the Islamic banking products which is capable to facilitate customers’ informed decision making and innovation of new products. The research was done qualitatively to identify the issue of the customers’ grievances by identifying the factors that are causing the grievances and also the factors that have been hindering the understanding. Among the factors that had hindered the customers’ understanding was due to the distinct concepts and terminologies, predominant use of Arabic terms, variation of practices by different banks and also the diverse Shariah concepts adopted by products of similar nature. With the use of software engineering approach, the research studied the characteristics of the Islamic banking products to design an ontology on the Islamic banking products. The conceptualised ontology includes knowledge on the prevailing Islamic banking Shariah concepts and contracts, the commercial banking processes and others. It also defined the roles played by the bank and its customers respectively according to the different Shariah concepts. The ontology was evaluated with the use of competency questions related to the information needed for decision making and interviews were conducted with customers, non-customers and also the bank staff. With such ontology, the customers will be supported to make informed decision making which would satisfy their need and the banks may innovate more new products. These would eventually remove the grievances in the long run

Prediction of Marine Traffic Density Using Different Time Series Model From AIS data of Port Klang and Straits of Malacca

In the study of ocean engineering, marine traffic is referring to the study of the pattern of the density of ships within the particular boundaries at certain periods. The Port Klang and Straits of Malacca are known for one of the heaviest traffics in Malaysia and the world. The study of traffic within this area is important, because it enables ships to avoid traffic congestion that might happen. Thus, this study is mainly aimed at   predicting or forecasting the density of the ships using the route through this waterway by using quantitative methods which are time-series models and the associative models from the Automatic Identification System (AIS) data. The moving averages, weight moving average, and exponential smoothing for the time series model and associative model have used multiple regression. The results show an exponential smoothing alpha 0.8 and give the lowest MAPE as 20.701%, thereby making this method to be the best in forecasting the future traffic density among the method categories

Entrepreneurship as a Sustainable Solution for the Female Graduates in the SME Sector of Bangladesh

Female entrepreneurship is a sustainable entrepreneurial activity by women, individually or in a group. This relatively new phenomenon has been gaining attention in developing countries like Bangladesh. The female graduates of the country represent an important yet untapped segment of entrepreneurship. The paper critically reviews the existing literature and evaluates the current situation of this segment and finds that issues from social, cultural, legal, political, workplace and educational system contexts limit their capacity to participate in the labor-force besides their male counterparts. The issues, if not treated prudently, might adversely affect the socio-economic goals of Bangladesh. Entrepreneurship may stand as a sustainable employment solution for the female graduates, which would enable them to contribute to the Small and Medium-sized enterprises (SME) sector of the country. The article proposes practical recommendations to reinforce the initiatives by the stakeholders and suggests to make necessary policy changes in order to facilitate graduate female entrepreneurship in the SME sector, enhance sustainability of the sector and convert it into a catalyst for economic growth of Bangladesh

Fitting statistical distribution of extreme rainfall data for the purpose of simulation

In this study, several types of probability distributions were used to fit the daily torrential rainfall data from 15 monitoring stations of Peninsular Malaysia from the period of 1975 to 2007. The study of fitting statistical distribution is important to find the most suitable model that could anticipate extreme events of certain natural phenomena such as flood and tsunamis. The aim of the study is to determine which distribution fits well with the daily torrential Malaysian rainfall data. Generalized Pareto, Lognormal and Gamma distributions were the distributions that had been tested to fit the daily torrential rainfall amount in Peninsular Malaysia. First, the appropriate distribution of the daily torrential rainfall was identified within the selected distributions for rainfall stations. Then, data sets were generated based on probability distributions that mimic a daily torrential rainfall data. Graphical representation and goodness of fit tests were used in finding the best fit model. The Generalized Pareto was found to be the most appropriate distribution in describing the daily torrential rainfall amounts of Peninsular Malaysia. The outputs can be beneficial for the purpose of generating several sets of simulated data matrices that mimic the same characteristics of rainfall data in order to assess the performance of the modification method compared to classical method

Infusing social media in Teaching and Learning (TnL) at tertiary institutions: A case of effective communication in Universiti Sains Islam Malaysia (USIM)

In Teaching and Learning (TnL) process, the success of disseminating fast information to the students seem to be hampered by the infrequent use of its e-learning system.Students are more likely to engage and communicate through social media. This paper aims to investigate the frequency of social media use among undergraduates in USIM and analyze their perception on the effect of social media towards effective communication in TnL. Data were collected using survey.From the students’ perspectives, this paper intends to highlight the findings on benefits of infusing the social media in ensuring effective communication among lecturers-students-lecturers and students-peers

A Systematic review of ontology-based approach and decision-making (DM) to improve public service delivery (PSD)

A systematic review of the DM literature on PSD was performed with the aim to build an operational ontology-based for decision makers. Five public administration journals were screened on the subject with more than 200 articles found. 29 articles were shortlisted, categorised, summarised, and applied to outline the influential factors in DM for PSD. The result of the systematic reviews also provided a brief clarification on the requirement for the creation of a more citizen-centric and coordinated eco-system for efficient PSD underpinned by effective DM

Circular Supply Chain Management and Circular Economy: A conceptual model

This study develops a circular supply chain management model. The review shows how CSCM promotes green supply chain management and sustainability by extending its sustainable dimension beyond the original producer. Closed-loop and open-loop supply chains are CSCM components. Using contingency theory and transaction cost theory, the CSCM model proposes that product circularity in closed-loop and open-loop supply chains affects a company's circular economy performance. This model explains CSCM's popularity in current literature, which supports the circular economy. Keywords: Circular, Closed-loop, Open-loop, Sustainability, Supply Chain eISSN: 2398-4287© 2022.. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open-access article under the CC-BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under the responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians/Africans/Arabians), and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ebpj.v7iSI7.376

Definitions and Concepts of Organizational Sustainability: A Literature Analysis

This research paper provides a comprehensive literature review that thoroughly examines the definitions and different concepts of organizational sustainability. This paper also looks at how research gaps are addressed in the literature with a particular emphasis on issues of organizational sustainability. Overall, organizational sustainability, including issues and aspects related to sustainability, is discussed. Individual authors provide their perspectives on various aspects of organizational sustainability from their field research, case analysis, and creative search. It also includes a greater knowledge of how real economic activity concerns and political dynamics can inhibit decision-making related to operational or practical sustainability. Several sustainability viewpoints from around the world have provided a genuine mechanism for organizations to increase their financial success while minimizing their impact on the environment and society. This study urges that knowing an organization's ability to change and self-regulate on critical issues for long-term sustainability can help solve the socio-ecological dilemma. This study shows how firms approach sustainability and what fundamental issues still need to be resolved. The research has provided novel and unusual insights into the factors contributing to organizational sustainability. Additional value is generated by estimating progress toward the idea of organizational sustainability, identifying impediments, and analyzing various real-world examples of measures to enhance advancement toward that concept

Identification of rainfall patterns on hydrological simulation using robust principal component analysis

A robust dimension reduction method in Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to rectify the issue of unbalanced clusters in rainfall patterns due to the skewed nature of rainfall data. A robust measure in PCA using Tukey’s biweight correlation to downweigh observations was introduced and the optimum breakdown point to extract the number of components in PCA using this approach is proposed. A set of simulated data matrix that mimicked the real data set was used to determine an appropriate breakdown point for robust PCA and compare the performance of the both approaches. The simulated data indicated a breakdown point of 70% cumulative percentage of variance gave a good balance in extracting the number of components. The results showed a more significant and substantial improvement with the robust PCA than the PCA based Pearson correlation in terms of the average number of clusters obtained and its cluster quality