The role of institutional systems and government policy in securing inward foreign direct investment in Kuwait. The impact of institutional and government policy systems on the inward foreign direct investment decision in Kuwait

Promoting economic diversity is important for states reliant on natural resources as the major source of economic development. Many of these states suffer from the Dutch disease leading to negative effects, which hinders economic diversification. One of the ways to reduce dependency on national resources is to encourage Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) inflows, which aids diversification by the transfer of technology, the creation of new employment opportunities, and the adoption of modern management practices. The Gulf Council Cooperation (GCC) countries recognised the necessity and benefits of FDI as an aid to economic diversification; it seems, however, that Kuwait is lagging behind in this endeavour. The government of Kuwait has engaged in a series of policy measures to induce Multinational Companies (MNCs) to invest in Kuwait, but the results, thus far, have been disappointing. The formal and informal institutions interact in a variety of ways. However, ineffective formal rules can create different outcomes; particularly, in the presence of strong informal institutions. In such a case, formal rules and procedures are not enforced systematically, that is, enabling actors who are involved in the policy process to ignore or violate them, which subsequently results in a failure to attract inward FDI to a host country. Thus, this study investigates the reasons behind this failure by examining the role of formal and informal institutions on FDI policy and on decisions on whether to grant FDI licences by means of using a New Institutional Economics (NIE) approach. The conceptual framework is used as a guide for an inquiry into the subject of study by constructing a category of intellectual scaffolding, which would provide a coherent structure (Schlager, 2007). The conceptual framework in this study systematically organises the investigation into how a MNC examines a potential investment location by dividing the host country assessments into four distinct ¿stages¿. When systematically conducted, the respective approach is grounded in the existing literature, which provides theories regarding the behaviour of MNCs in relation to their decision-making processes for considering locations for their FDI projects. The research questions derived from the conceptual framework are answered using a mixed methods research approach that uses three sets of data survey, semi-structured interviews, and secondary data. Firstly, the findings show that almost that all MNCs in the Gulf region have a limited awareness regarding investment opportunities in Kuwait, FDI laws and regulations. Secondly, the findings reveal a number of attractive and unattractive locations, and institutional factors of Kuwait. Finally, it is discovered that the high rejection rate of FDI applications is linked to unsuccessful policy implementation, which is a result of interaction of both formal and informal institutions in Kuwait. Subsequently, the results are utilised to make a number of recommendations for government policy makers, administrators, and for MNCs regarding how to improve FDI inflows into Kuwait. The results are also used to contribute towards the international business literature concerning the institution based view of FDI, and for government policy connected to attracting FDI.Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC

Essays on religious beliefs and stock market outcomes

This thesis consists of three essays that investigate the influence of religious beliefs on investor behavior and stock market outcomes. To this end, we avail of data from the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries. Our dataset is collected from highly religious societies that have clear religious investment rules and explicit identification of both institutional investors and stocks as either “Islamic” or “non-Islamic”. The first essay of this thesis investigates whether religious-based trading practices impede market development. Our results show that non-Islamic stocks in the markets of our study are relatively neglected, have higher returns, lower liquidity, and face higher liquidity risk compared to Islamic stocks. Our overall evidence, therefore, supports the hypothesis of market segmentation. Our results highlight a potential challenge for the stock markets of religious Islamic societies in seeking to become globally competitive. The second essay investigates whether religiosity affects stock market speculation. We find that an increase of Muslims’ religiosity during the holy month of Ramadan leads to lower levels of trading frequency, market volatility, and idiosyncratic volatility, as well as higher risk-adjusted returns. Our results indicate that religiosity is negatively related to stock market speculation. The third essay investigates whether religiosity influences the preference of institutional investors to hold lottery-type stocks. We find that Islamic institutional investors deviate from their religious norms by holding more lottery-type stocks than do non-Islamic institutional investors. This deviation may be explained by the evidence that Islamic institutional investors have stronger information signals to induce them to trade lottery-type stocks. Our results highlight a challenge for the regulators and Islamic Shariah auditors in countries that have Islamic institutions, namely, to ensure that the operations of Islamic institutions are free from prohibited excessive uncertainty (Gharar)

The dynamics and determinants of Kuwait's long-run economic growth

This paper develops a quarterly macro-econometric model for the Kuwaiti economy estimated over the period 1979Q2-2013Q1, allowing us to investigate the long-run role of oil income in the development of Kuwait as well as the direct effects of oil revenue, foreign output, and equity price shocks on real output. More specifically, we examine to what extent Kuwaiti real output in the long run is shaped by oil revenue through their impact on capital accumulation, and technological transfers through foreign output. Using the same modelling strategy we also explore the role of oil income in terms of long-run private and public sector output growth (separately). The estimates suggest that real domestic output in the long run is influenced by oil revenues and foreign output (a proxy for technological progress), and technological growth in Kuwait is on a par with the rest of the world. Furthermore, while we show that both oil revenues and foreign output drive growth in the public sector, it seems that technological progress is the main (and only) driver for private sector real growth. Finally, our results show that oil revenue and global equity market shocks have a large and significant long-run impact on Kuwait's real output and public sector GDP. In comparison, the effects of the foreign output shock is muted

Building Energy Model Generation Using a Digital Photogrammetry-Based 3D Model

Buildings consume a large amount of energy and environmental resources. At the same time, current practices for whole-building energy simulation are costly and require skilled labor. As Building Energy Modeling (BEM) and simulations are becoming increasingly important, there is a growing need to make environmental assessments of buildings more efficient and accessible. A building energy model is based on collecting input data from the real, physical world and representing them as a digital energy model. Real-world data is also collected in the field of 3D reconstruction and image analysis, where major developments have been happening in recent years. Current digital photogrammetry software can automatically match photographs taken with a simple smartphone camera and generate a 3D model. This thesis presents methods and techniques that can be used to generate a building energy model from a digital photogrammetry-based 3D model. To accomplish this, a prototype program was developed that uses 3D reconstructed data as geometric modeling inputs for BEM. To validate the prototype, an experiment was conducted where a case-study building was selected. Photographs of the building were taken using a small remotelycontrolled Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) drone. Then, using photogrammetry software, the photographs were used to automatically generate a textured 3D model. The texture map, which is an image that represents the color information in the 3D model, was semantically annotated to extract building elements. The window annotations were iii used as inputs for the BEM process. In addition, a number of algorithms were applied to automatically convert both the 3D model and the annotated texture map into geometry that is compatible for a building energy model. Through the prototype, pre-defined templates were used with the geometric inputs to generate an EnergyPlus model (as an example building energy model). The feasibility of this experiment was verified by running a successful energy simulation. The results of this thesis contribute towards creating an automated and user-friendly photo-to-BEM method

Investigating Calotropis Procera natural dye extracts and PDOT:PSS hole transport material for dye-sensitized solar cells

Received: February 24th, 2021 ; Accepted: May 2nd, 2021 ; Published: May 4th, 2021 ; Correspondence: [email protected] this work, natural dye extracts from Calotropis Procera are used as the main dyesensitizer in solar cells. The Calotropis plant is a non-food item capable of surviving the harsh climate of the United Arab Emirates. Its incorporation into dye-sensitized solar cells is tested by constructing various cells, whose performance was also compared to that of more common chlorophyll-based dye extracts (i.e. spinach) as well as compared against a baseline cell sensitized with a synthetic ruthenium dye. The performance of the Calotropis-based cells was in general better than those with other natural sensitizers, but of course scored lower efficiency results when compared to cells built with synthetic dyes (0.075% compared to 5.11%). The advantage in using a natural sensitizer include facile extraction and preparation, low cost and abundance, since the Calotropis source has no competing applications in terms of food, livestock feed, etc. The figureof-merit of cell output vs. cost for such cells makes them a good contender for further research and development effort to overcome the obvious drawbacks of stability and service longevity. Adding a hole-transport material to the cells in the form of PEDOT:PSS was also attempted to assess the enhancement it could provide to the cells. This did not yield the desired results and more experiments have to be done to better understand the interaction of each added layer to the original cell design

A web-based graphical food frequency assessment system: design, development and usability metrics

Background: Food frequency questionnaires (FFQs) are well established in the nutrition field, but there remain important questions around how to develop online tools in a way that can facilitate wider uptake. Also, FFQ user acceptance and evaluation have not been investigated extensively. Objective: This paper presents a Web-based graphical food frequency assessment system that addresses challenges of reproducibility, scalability, mobile friendliness,security, and usability and also presents the utilization metrics and user feedback from a deployment study. Methods: The application design employs a single-page application Web architecture with back-end services (database,authentication, and authorization) provided by Google Firebase’s free plan. Its design and responsiveness take advantage of the Bootstrap framework. The FFQ was deployed in Kuwait as part of the EatWellQ8 study during 2016. The EatWellQ8 FFQ contains 146 food items (including drinks). Participants were recruited in Kuwait without financial incentive. Completion time was based on browser timestamps and usability was measured using the System Usability Scale (SUS), scoring between 0 and 100. Products with a SUS higher than 70 are considered to be good. Results: A total of 235 participants created accounts in the system, and 163 completed the FFQ. Of those 163 participants, 142 reported their gender (93 female, 49 male) and 144 reported their date of birth (mean age of 35 years, range from 18-65 years). The mean completion time for all FFQs (n=163), excluding periods of interruption, was 14.2 minutes (95% CI 13.3-15.1 minutes). Female participants (n=93) completed in 14.1 minutes (95% CI 12.9-15.3 minutes) and male participants (n=49) completed in 14.3 minutes (95% CI 12.6-15.9 minutes). Participants using laptops or desktops (n=69) completed the FFQ in an average of 13.9 minutes (95% CI 12.6-15.1 minutes) and participants using smartphones or tablets (n=91) completed in an average of 14.5 minutes(95% CI 13.2-15.8 minutes). The median SUS score (n=141) was 75.0 (interquartile range [IQR] 12.5), and 84% of the participants who completed the SUS classified the system either “good” (n=50) or “excellent” (n=69). Considering only participants using smartphones or tablets (n=80), the median score was 72.5(IQR 12.5), slightly below the SUS median for desktops and laptops(n=58), which was 75.0 (IQR 12.5). No significant differences were found between genders or age groups (below and above the median) for the SUS or completion time. Conclusions: Taking into account all the requirements, the deployment used professional cloud computing at no cost, and the resulting system had good user acceptance. The results for smartphones/tablets were comparable with desktops/laptops. This work has potential to promote wider uptake of online tools that can assess dietary intake at scale

Factors Affecting the Uptake of COVID-19 Vaccine amongDubai Airport's Professionals

Aim: Comprehending the elements that influence COVID-19 vaccination acceptability and recognizing expediters for vaccination decisions are critical components of developing effective ways to increase vaccine coverage in the general population. This study aims to investigate the main factors affecting COVID-19 vaccination uptake among Dubai 'Airport's employees. In addition, it seeks to explore the main signs and symptoms that appeared on vaccinated employees after taking the COVID-19 vaccination, hence, track the vaccine's safety. Methods: Employees at Dubai's airport in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), mainly in Dubai, provided data. To gather data online utilising the Google Forms platform, a questionnaire was used as the main quantitative tool. As 2000 questionnaires got distributed, 1007 employees participated in the survey, yielding a 50.4% response rate. Results: The results show that employees overwhelmingly agree with the assertion that the factors of accessibility and affordability have a significant effect on their decision to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, followed by a trust in vaccine, knowledge, vaccine safety, advice and information, and beliefs on the vaccine. In this study, the agreement level on factors affecting the COVID-19 vaccine uptake was found significantly to be higher in females (88.6%) who were married (91.6%) and those aged over 60 years (89.2%) at P <.05. In addition, the results show that 53.7% of vaccinated staff was found to have one or more side effects of the vaccine, where none of them was hospitalized after immunization. The binary logistic regression analysis in this study shows that females were two times more likely to have 'vaccine's symptoms after vaccination than males (Exp (B): 1.6; 95%CI: 1.127 - 2.351, P< .01). It further reveals that participants in the age group over 50 were three times more likely to have 'vaccine's symptoms after vaccination than participants in the age group 20-29 (Exp (B): 2.9; 95%CI: 2.497-9.681, P< .001). Finally, it indicates that individuals with previous SARS-CoV-2 infection were 2 times more likely to have 'vaccine's symptoms after vaccination than those without known past infection (Exp (B): 1.9; 95%CI: 1.272 - 2.542, P< .01). Conclusion: There are several factors that playing a significant role in population’s decision to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, where the accessibility and affordability factors were found to have the greatest effect on their decision to uptake the vaccine. The current study concluded that COVID-19 vaccination is safe and that adverse effects from a vaccine are usually modest and affected by several factors such as age, gender, and COVID-19 infection history. &nbsp

The Impact of Hospital Demographic Factors on Total Quality Management Implementation: A Case Study of UAE Hospitals

Aim:  Maintaining service quality and value using quality and management tools is crucial in any organization. In essence, improving service quality boosts both efficiency of organizations and consumer pleasure. The deployment of quality development programs such as Total Quality Management (TQM) is one technique that businesses may employ to deliver exceptional customer service. The health sector, in particular, is one of the industries that require TQM adoption due to its complexity and the need for constant service improvement. TQM helps to improve service quality in health facilities through advanced clinical and administrative procedures. This research comprehensively assesses TQM levels and the impact of hospital demographics on its implementation process in hospitals in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).   Methods:  The study used a quantitative research strategy based on a survey study design. Questionnaires were used to gather primary data from respondents deployed a self-administered technique. 1850 questionnaires were delivered to the hospital's senior staff based on their number in each hospital. Of the 1850 questionnaires distributed, 1238 usable questionnaires were analyzed, yielding a response rate of 66.9%. The study used a binary logistic regression model to determine if hospital demographics affected TQM implementation. The study data were examined and analysed using version 25.0 of the SPSS software.   Results: The results show that most of the health facilities with an overall TQM between 4.12 and 4.82 were utilized, governmental, accredited and utilized and large hospitals, while the hospitals with a mean between 2.91 and 3.45 were small, unaccredited private, and non-specialised. Thus, large hospitals have a higher TQM utilization rate than small hospitals. In addition, the findings of the t-test revealed that a high TQM is represented by means of 4.68, 4.67, 4.43, and 4.12 for accredited, utilized, governmental and large hospitals. The binary regression analysis also reveals similar results: large, governmental, utilized and accredited hospitals have greater chances of TQM adoption than other categories of hospitals (Exp (B): 1.2; 95%CI: 1.001 – 1.421, P< .05); (Exp (B): 1.3; 95%CI: 1.012 – 1.721, P< .05); (Exp (B): 1.5; 95%CI: 1.127 – 2.051, P< .01); and (Exp   (B): 1.5; 95%CI: 1.102 – 2.012, P< .05); correspondingly. Another observation from the results is that hospitals that implemented technological tools had a greater chance of successfully executing the TQM program than hospitals that did not utilize advanced technologies due to the limited availability of resources (Exp (B): 1.7; 95%CI: 1.332 – 2.187, P< .01). Conclusion: Even though health facilities need to adopt TQM, its implementation depends on the hospital size and demographics that significantly influence the adoption of TQM programs. However, this study will help bridge the current gap on the usage of TQM in the health context by examine the influence of demographic factors on adopting TQM in hospitals. Hence, provide adequate information to help the UAE hospital administrators appropriately execute the TQM program in the hospitals and enhance the efficacy of their operations. &nbsp

The Impact of Hospital Demographic Factors on Total Quality Management Implementation: A Case Study of UAE Hospitals

Aim:  Maintaining service quality and value using quality and management tools is crucial in any organization. In essence, improving service quality boosts both efficiency of organizations and consumer pleasure. The deployment of quality development programs such as Total Quality Management (TQM) is one technique that businesses may employ to deliver exceptional customer service. The health sector, in particular, is one of the industries that require TQM adoption due to its complexity and the need for constant service improvement. TQM helps to improve service quality in health facilities through advanced clinical and administrative procedures. This research comprehensively assesses TQM levels and the impact of hospital demographics on its implementation process in hospitals in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).   Methods:  The study used a quantitative research strategy based on a survey study design. Questionnaires were used to gather primary data from respondents deployed a self-administered technique. 1850 questionnaires were delivered to the hospital's senior staff based on their number in each hospital. Of the 1850 questionnaires distributed, 1238 usable questionnaires were analyzed, yielding a response rate of 66.9%. The study used a binary logistic regression model to determine if hospital demographics affected TQM implementation. The study data were examined and analysed using version 25.0 of the SPSS software.   Results: The results show that most of the health facilities with an overall TQM between 4.12 and 4.82 were utilized, governmental, accredited and utilized and large hospitals, while the hospitals with a mean between 2.91 and 3.45 were small, unaccredited private, and non-specialised. Thus, large hospitals have a higher TQM utilization rate than small hospitals. In addition, the findings of the t-test revealed that a high TQM is represented by means of 4.68, 4.67, 4.43, and 4.12 for accredited, utilized, governmental and large hospitals. The binary regression analysis also reveals similar results: large, governmental, utilized and accredited hospitals have greater chances of TQM adoption than other categories of hospitals (Exp (B): 1.2; 95%CI: 1.001 – 1.421, P< .05); (Exp (B): 1.3; 95%CI: 1.012 – 1.721, P< .05); (Exp (B): 1.5; 95%CI: 1.127 – 2.051, P< .01); and (Exp   (B): 1.5; 95%CI: 1.102 – 2.012, P< .05); correspondingly. Another observation from the results is that hospitals that implemented technological tools had a greater chance of successfully executing the TQM program than hospitals that did not utilize advanced technologies due to the limited availability of resources (Exp (B): 1.7; 95%CI: 1.332 – 2.187, P< .01). Conclusion: Even though health facilities need to adopt TQM, its implementation depends on the hospital size and demographics that significantly influence the adoption of TQM programs. However, this study will help bridge the current gap on the usage of TQM in the health context by examine the influence of demographic factors on adopting TQM in hospitals. Hence, provide adequate information to help the UAE hospital administrators appropriately execute the TQM program in the hospitals and enhance the efficacy of their operations.     Conflict of interest: None declare