The Foreign-Income and Real-Exchange-Rate Elasticities of Bangladesh Exports

Bangladesh began implementing trade-reform policies in the mid 1980s, leading to a gradual change in its anti-export-policy. Since then the share of exports in her GDP has been rising steadily with the economy growing at about 5 percent per annum. This growth is associated with structural change in the country’s export composition favouring non-traditional exports, namely garments and frozen foods. This paper specifies and estimates an aggregate export-demand function; deploys Pesaran’s bounds-testing approach to estimate export-elasticities of foreign income and the exchange rate; and tests for the stability of the estimated function. The empirical results, based on annual data for the period 1973-2010, suggest a long-run relationship between real exports and export-weighted foreign real income. Similarly, real exports and the real effective exchange rate of the taka are found to be related. Finally, the results suggest that the dynamic behaviour of exports possesses an error-correction representation. The CUSUM and CUSUMSQ tests suggest no significant instability in the export-demand function. However, the recursive and rolling-regression coefficients indicate that the export-demand function has undergone some structural change since the early 1990s. This is reflected in the decreasing sensitivity of real exports vis á vis the exchange rate. JEL classification: C32, F11 Keywords: Exports’ Elasticities, Pesaran’s Bounds Test, Export-demand Stability, Banglades

Some aspects of gastro-oesophageal reflux in anaesthetized sheep

Gastro-oesophageal reflux is a serious problem associated with ruminant anaesthesia. The results of the present investigation of this problem are summarised below.Management of animals prior to and during anaesthesia influenced the incidence of reflux. Depriving the sheep of food and water for 24 hours prior to induction of anaesthesia significantly reduced the incidence of reflux. The occurrence of reflux was also influenced by the positioning of the animal during anaesthesia. Dorsal recumbancy with the head tilted down was the most vulnerable position. In this position reflux occurred in 100% of cases as compared with right lateral recumbancy with head up position where the occurrence of reflux was only 12%.Intraruminal pressure built up during anaesthesia was monitored over a period of 60 minutes. Two planes of anaesthesia, light and deep, were maintained for two 30 minute periods in a single anaesthetic session. Intraruminal pressure build up in deep followed by light anaesthesia was significantly greater than that in light followed by deep anaesthesia. The maximum pressure gradient between the rumen and thoracic oesophagus and the occurrence of reflux were recorded and it was found that only 24% of refluxes were associated with the maximum pressure gradient. The intraruminal pressure build up in the starved sheep was significantly lower when compared with that of the unstarved sheep.The effects of intraruminal insufflation on the occurrence of reflux were investigated and it was found that the intraruminal pressure required to produce reflux was unusually high (about 40 mmHg) in comparison with pressures that can be built up during normal periods of anaesthesia lasting for 2-3 hours.The influence of halothane anaesthesia on the motor functions of the oesophagus and rumen was studied using manometric and electromyographic techniques in both light and deep planes of anaesthesia. The motility of these organs was frequently present in light anaesthesia while it was almost totally abolished in deep anaesthesia. The oesophageal pressure waves in light anaesthesia were always peristaltic in nature, the velocity being 25 cm/sec.A zone of high pressure was detected at the gastro-oesophageal junction in the anaesthetized sheep using balloon tip catheter and a pull through technique. The length of this zone was 2.9 cm. The resting LOS pressure measured by balloon tip catheter was significantly greater than that measured by open tip catheter. The resting LOS pressure was not significantly influenced by the depth of anaesthesia. The LOS usually contracted prior to rumen contraction in light anaesthesia. In deep anaesthesia, when the oesophageal and ruminal contractions were totally abolished, the LOS still showed rhythmic fluctuation in baseline pressure.The response of LOS to an increase in intraruminal pressure was studied. The LOS pressure was also increased with the increase of intraruminal pressure. The occurrence of reflux was associated with diminished LOS pressure.The influence of pentagastrin, atropine sulphate and propranolol hydrochloride on LOS pressure was studied. The LOS pressures were increased within one minute of pentagastrin injection while after atropine, the pressure was decreased within one minute. These changes in LOS pressure however were not statistically significant. Propranolol (after atropine) also had no significant influence on LOS pressure.The motor activities of the oesophagus, gastro-oesophageal junction and reticulorumen were studied by electromyography (EMG). These activities in the cervical oesophagus were characterised by individual spikes in light anaesthesia which were almost abolished in deep anaesthesia. The reticular and ruminal EMGs comprised of regular spike bursts, the reticular bursts usually preceded the ruminal ones. These activities were usually present in light anaesthesia while in deep anaesthesia they were totally abolished. The electromyographic activity of the gastro-oesophageal junction was characterised by continuous spike discharges which were present in both light and deep planes of anaesthesia.The influence of intravenous anaesthetic agents (pentobarbitone, thiopentone, chloral hydrate-magnesium sulphate and alphaxalone/ alphadolone) on the intraruminal pressure build up, oesophageal and ruminal motility and gastro-oesophageal reflux was studied. The largest intraruminal pressure build up was found in alphaxalone/ alphadolone anaesthesia and the smallest with thiopentone anaesthesia. The highest incidence of reflux was found with thiopentone (70%) and the lowest with alphaxalone/alphadolone (40%) anaesthesia.The barbiturates (pentobarbitone and thiopentone) caused total abolition of oesophageal and ruminal motor functions in both light and deep planes of anaesthesia. These activities, however, were frequently present in light chloral hydrate and alphaxalone/alphadolone anaesthesia. The direction of the oesophageal pressure waves in these studies was peristaltic

Rural Labour Market Developments, Agricultural Productivity, and Real Wages in Bangladesh, 1950–2006

This paper provides an overview of recent developments in rural labour markets in Bangladesh and also examines the trends and movements of agricultural productivity and real wages with annual data for the period 1950–2006. The paper links the movements of agricultural real wages to macroeconomic developments in general and agricultural development in particular. As part of empirical investigation, the paper develops a simple model of agricultural real wages that depend on agricultural productivity. In order to examine the long-run relationship between agricultural productivity and real wages, the paper applies the Autoregressive Distributed Lag Bounds testing approach. Empirical results suggest that there exists a long-run relationship between agricultural productivity and real wages, and that agricultural productivity can be treated as a ‘long-run forcing variable’ in explaining agricultural real wages. In the dynamic specification of real wages, the coefficient on oneperiod lagged error-correction term bears the expected negative sign and is significant. The forecasting ability of the error correction model is satisfactory with respect to the level or the percentage change of real wages. The overall results are consistent with the findings of earlier studies that agricultural productivity is a key determinant of real wages in Bangladesh.Rural Labour Markets, Agricultural Wages, Agricultural Productivity, ARDL Bounds Testing Approach, Bangladesh

The Monetarist versus the Neo-Keynesian Views on the Acceleration of Inflation: Some Evidence from South Asian Countries (with Special Emphasis on Pakistan)

This paper tests the monetarist versus the neo-Keynesian views on the acceleration of inflation, using annual data for Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka (mostly) for the period 1961—88, within the framework of the theoretical model of Stein (1978, 1982). The empirical results consistently support the monetarist view that changes in real money balances contribute to an acceleration of inflation. Another important finding is that except for Bangladesh, contrary to the neo-Keynesian view, bond-financed government expenditure does not have an independent significant effect on the acceleration of inflation.

Organoleptic qualities and proximate composition of fish grown in good aquaculture practice-based carp fattening pond

Organoleptic qualities and proximate composition of fish grown in carp fattening pond were studied under three treatments of feed and fertiliser management. Treatment T1 was designed with the use of organic fertiliser and stocking of silver carp, T2 with both organic and inorganic fertilisers and silver carp and T3 with both organic and inorganic fertilisers but excluding silver carp. One day in a week feeding restriction was followed in all the treatments.  Fishes were stocked with a stocking density of 2470 fishes ha–1. Three fishes (Gibelion catla, Labeo rohita and Cirrhinus cirrhosus) were selected for organoleptic and proximate assessment. Cyanobacteria along with total phytoplankton cell density was significantly higher at treatment T2 followed by T3 and T1. However, in terms of productivity (Chl-a) treatment T2 was 27.1 and 13.3% higher compared to T1 and T3 respectively. Parameters assessed for proximate composition analysis did not vary across treatments and organoleptic test revealed comparatively higher acceptability of fishes collected from treatment T1 followed by T2 and T3 for all the fishes. Overall acceptability was higher for L. rohita from treatment T1. This study concluded that, inorganic fertilisation along with silver carp can improve the organoleptic properties of carps in pond

Multivariate Joint Models and Dynamic Predictions

The joint modeling of longitudinal and time-to-event data is an active area of statistical research that has received a lot of attention. The standard joint models, referred to as univariate joint models, allow simultaneous modeling of a single longitudinal outcome and a single time-to-event under an assumption of independent censoring. The majority of the joint modeling research in the last two decades has focused on extending and improving the univariate joint models. While many of the practical applications involve data on multivariate longitudinal outcomes and multiple timeto- events possibly informatively censored by some other terminal time-to-event, the developments of joint models to analyze such complex data structure have not received deserved attention. One other area of statistical joint modeling methods that remained understudied is the joint analysis of multivariate longitudinal outcomes and multiple ordered time-to-events. The joint models for recurrent events in existing literature can be applied to analyze ordered time-to-events of the same type under an assumption that all occurrences of the time-to-event are homogeneously influenced by the covariates. However, in problems of ordered time-to-events of different types or of the same kind where different occurrences may be impacted differently by the covariates, the current methods may not be applied. Given the limitations in the existing body of joint modeling literature, this research work aims to present joint modeling extensions with the potentials of filling in the noted literature gaps. In Chapter 2 of this dissertation, we presented a shared parameters Bayesian latent trait joint frailty model for analyzing multivariate longitudinal outcomes and multiple unordered non-terminal time-to-events in the presence of a terminal event inducing dependent right censoring. We adopted a semiparametric latent trait generalized mixed-effects approach to define the longitudinal submodel. Semiparametric hazard regression models are used to model the non-terminal and terminal time-to-event risks with multivariate non-terminal event frailties to account for the inter-event associations. Chapter 4 introduces an extension of the joint model presented in Chapter 2 for multivariate longitudinal outcomes and multiple ordered time-to-events. For both the proposed models, Bayesian approaches of parameter estimation are discussed, and Bayesian Monte Carlo Markov Chain (MCMC) dynamic prediction algorithms for longitudinal outcomes and time-to-event risks are outlined. The finite sample performances of the parameter estimation methods and dynamic prediction algorithms are studied through statistical simulations for both the proposed models. Before presenting the joint frailty model for multiple ordered time-to-events in Chapter 4, we revisited a long-studied problem of estimating the survival functions for multiple ordered time-to-events in Chapter 3. Given the complexities and unbecomingness under certain assumptions of the current methods, we discussed two straightforward and easy to compute approaches of estimating survival functions of multiple ordered time-to-events. The first approach is non-parametric, based on Kaplan-Meier survival estimates, and assumes independence between the consecutive event times to estimate the marginal survival curves. The second approach is fully parametric, assumes the consecutive event gap times to be log-normally distributed, and estimates the marginal and conditional survival functions when the consecutive event times may not be expected to be independent. Simulations studies were performed to evaluate the finite sample properties of both the non-parametric and parametric approaches at different sample sizes and censoring rates. In addition to the extensive simulation studies, we have demonstrated applications of all the proposed joint models, and survival function estimation approaches using statewide surveillance data from South Carolina (SC) HIV/AIDS patients

Chronic kidney disease prevalence and nephrology service delivery in Newfoundland and Labrador health regions

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a major cause of morbidity and mortality among kidney patients in Newfoundland and Labrador (NL). This study aims to investigate the burden of CKD across geographic areas in NL and the utilization pattern for nephrology services. The ultimate goal is to inform future service planning in NL. This is a retrospective cohort study of 40,465 CKD patients’ administrative data recorded over a 5-year period (2011-15). We compared the differences in nephrology service accessibility and frequency of nephrologist visit follow-up among the four health regions. P<0.05 was considered statistically significant. This study found that only 7.3% of NL CKD patients were in contact with nephrologists within one year of CKD being identifiable based on estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR). Male CKD patients have a 1.4-fold (OR, 1.4; 95% CI, 1.3-1.5 (p < 0.05) higher chance of seeing a nephrologist than female CKD patients. Among diabetic patients, only 12.8% of patients were tested for their urine albumin-creatinine ratio. On the other hand, only 4.5% of all CKD patients had a urine analysis performed. This is an underutilization of urine testing, which is a key diagnostic test that care-providers are failing to offer. Except for in the Eastern Regional Integrated Health Authority (ERIHA), patients from all other health regions faced difficulties in accessing nephrology care in their own regions. Development of telehealth and e-health programs and decentralizing CKD early detection and risk identification and care by a robust kidney outreach program would be useful for optimal CKD care in NL

Fractal dimension of fractal functions on the real projective plane

In this article, we consider an iterated functions system on the non-Euclidean real projective plane which has a linear structure. Then, we study the fractal dimension of the associated curve as a subset of the projective space and like a set of the Euclidean space. At the end, we initiate a dual real projective iterated function system and pose an open problem