Review – Cities and Agriculture

As people increasingly migrate to urban settings and with more than half of the world’s population now living in cities, it is vital to plan and provide for sustainable and resilient food systems which reflect this challenge. The book ‘Cities and Agriculture’ presents experience and evidence on key dimensions of urban food challenges and types of intra-and peri-urban agriculture, in 15 extremely well-researched and written chapters. The book has shed light on an urban challenge that has been ignored for a long time in urban studies as well as in urban policies and planning, i.e. food-provisioning. Neglecting the dynamics and sustainability of food provisioning in scientific research on sustainable urban development is a serious omission, because feeding cities arguably has a greater social and physical impact on us and our planet than anything else we do

Readability, Contracts of Recurring Use, nd the Problem of Ex Post Judicial Governance of Health Insurance Policies

While the rhetoric surrounding the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act focused on core issues such as cost, quality, and access to care, the dialog rarely acknowledged a key problem-the fact that most Americans do not understand their health insurance. Simply put, consumers do not fully grasp their health insurance coverage because the jargon found in many health insurance contracts is impenetrable to most Americans. This is disconcerting because consumer-oriented information is central to our increasingly consumer-directed health care system. Consumers are expected to make cost-effective choices among the array of health insurance plans that may be available to them, utilize health care services in a cost-effective manner, navigate provider networks, minimize their out-of-pocket expenses, and effectively appeal denials of coverage. Furthermore, unlike other types of insurance agreements, health insurance policies are contracts of recurring use. That is, health insurance policies are routinely and repeatedly invoked by consumers to finance their health care. Yet, such contracts are written at a level that is beyond the reading skills of most Americans. As such, insureds not only have difficultly understanding the details of their coverage, they do not fully comprehend the benefits and rights afforded by the policy. Consequently, the traditional approach of ex post judicial governance of insurance agreements (as adhesion contracts) by interpreting ambiguities in favor of insureds provides inadequate protection for health insurance consumers. If consumers do not understand their coverage rights and benefits, they cannot reasonably be expected to know when those benefits have been wrongly denied. The better, ex ante solution is to make health insurance contracts readable in the first instance by requiring that health insurance contracts meet an eighth grade readability standard as a condition of state approval

Demographic Variations in Achievement Goal Orientations among Prisoners on Formal and Vocational Training in Uganda

Educating Prisoners has become a worldwide concern as a measure that can save community costs associated with criminal behavior. In Uganda, there is low participation in formal and vocational training among prisoners which can be associated with lack of knowledge on achievement goal orientations. This is central for adequate implementation of academic and vocational education in prisons, otherwise it may lead to wasted Government initiative and commitment on education as a rehabilitation strategy for prisoners. The purpose of the study was to assess demographic variations in achievement goal orientations among prisoners on formal and vocational training in Uganda. This study adopted across sectional survey design with a mixed methods approach. The population was adult male and female prisoners enrolled on both formal and vocational training in Luzira prison using census sampling strategy. Measures used included the bio data section and the Patterns of Adaptive Learning Survey. Permission was sought from all relevant authorities and data analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Scientists (SPSS) version 20. The study found out that there is no statistically significant relationship between mastery goals and demographic information; and between performance approach goals and demographic information reflected in the P values. However, there is a statistically significant relationship between performance avoidance goals and gender (P=.013). There is no statistically significant relationship between Approach avoidance goals and other demographic variables as reflected in their P values. The findings of this study may be used by prison education instructors, administrators and curriculum planners in bridging the gap between demographic variations and achievement goal orientations. This study posit to the importance of understanding prisoners goal orientations and how these goals influence their learning and academic outcomes. It is generally acknowledged that setting achievement goal orientations may be integrated into instructional materials to promote better academic achievement. Prisoners participating in academic and vocational education should be encouraged to adopt achievement goals according to the broader social and psychological horizon which shall help to direct their attention towards activities that will help them energies performance there by motivating prisoners expend greater effort in line with difficulties of achieving goals, spend more time and persist longer working on tasks to improve the overall performanc

Vulnerability of Urban Informal Sector: Street Vendors in Yogyakarta, Indonesia

This study has been focusing on the vulnerability of street vendors in Java since the time when Java was hit severely by the economic crisis in 1997/1998, which also had reversed the trend of economic formalization in Indonesia. For this aim, a survey was conducted during the month of February 2007 in Yogyakarta and Sleman districts in Yogyakarta Special Province. The survey covered 122 street vendors in several streets in both areas. These samples consist of three groups of street vendors: food seller, non-food seller, and services providers. Based on this survey, vulnerability index of street vendors is measured. The study found that most of street vendors in Yogyakarta experience vulnerability at the medium level. In general, vulnerability of food seller vendors is higher than other vendors. Vulnerability also varies across the locations of vending.informal sector, street vendor, vulnerability, Indonesia

Social networks and innovation (handicraft industry in Bantul, Yogyakarta)

This research found most of the handicraft producers have conducted various innovations during last five years. The newest innovations are managerial innovation, marketing innovation and product innovation. Meanwhile, product innovation and managerial innovation are the most important innovations in enhancing the business performance. Based on the actors, innovation in this case could be classified as producer driven innovation. The main information source of product innovation, process innovation, and service innovation is the producer’s experiences itself. The study found that the role of social networks in the process of innovation activities is rather limited. This finding is also supported by a fact that the strongest social network of the producers is only the relation with family and close friend in term of their closeness, trust, and willingness to share information. Regression analysis also indicates the aggregate of social network elements does not influence the number of innovations. Components of social network that still show positive impact on the innovation are only the closeness with business partners and with members of other association. The study also suggest that research on the role of social network or social capital on innovations is need to consider more appropriate indicators of social networks. At the empirical level, differences in location or industry may require different indicators of social networks.social network, innovation, handicraft industry

Creating New Regions, Improving Regional Welfare Equality?

In concurrent with reformation and decentralization, number of sub-national administrative in Indonesia increase significantly. Existing regions has been splitting to create new regions. As the result, number of municipalities and districts in Indonesia in recent years are more than 450. The creation of new regions has been expected will increase citizens’ welfare in the regions and reduce regional inequality. However, indicative evidences shows negative impacts of this reform such as increase of inefficient administration cost of government, decrease capacity to deliver public services and increase potential for inter-group conflict. All of these indicative evidences will affect the welfare of citizens as seen on the human development indicators. Based on this background, the aim of this article is to analyze the relation of creation of new regions with the evolution of regional welfare inequality. The study employed human development index (HDI) at sub-national level (kota/kabupaten) as the indicator of welfare. The evolution of regional inequality of the HDI is analyzed by comparing coefficient of variation in the HDI from 1996 to 2005. This paper also estimated a preliminary empirical model to assess the impact of pemekaran on the within province inequality. The policy implication of this finding is that pemekaran should be controlled.new region, ‘pemekaran’, human development index, inequality

VULNERABILITY OF URBAN INFORMAL SECTOR: STREET VENDORS IN YOGYAKARTA, INDONESIA

This study has been focusing on the vulnerability of street vendors in Java since the time when Java was hit severely by the economic crisis in 1997/1998, which also had reversed the trend of economic formalization in Indonesia. For this aim, a survey was conducted during the month of February 2007 in Yogyakarta and Sleman districts in Yogyakarta Special Province. The survey covered 122 street vendors in several streets in both areas. These samples consist of three groups of street vendors: food seller, non-food seller, and services providers. Based on this survey, vulnerability index of street vendors is measured. The study found that most of street vendors in Yogyakarta experience vulnerability at the medium level. In general, vulnerability of food seller vendors is higher than other vendors. Vulnerability also varies across the locations of vending.informal sector, street vendor, vulnerability, Indonesia.