Urban-Rural Disparities in Achievement at the Basic Education Level: The Plight of the Rural Child in a Developing Country

This paper is just a sample template for the prospective authors of IISTE Over the decades, the concepts of Academic achievement provides a generally accepted indicator for measuring the performance or efficiency of any education system. To this effect, most developing nations including Nigeria conduct national assessment of learning achievement at the basic education level periodically to monitor the efficiency of their educational systems. Evidence from such assessments from five South –Eastern states of Nigeria indicates glaring urban-rural disparities which tilt against the rural child in all the areas of learning achievement. This paper therefore examined these disparities in the context of the underlying factors to portray the plight of the rural child in a developing nation who is educationally disadvantaged. The paper argued that this phenomenon which is a reflection of the neglect or marginalization of our rural communities and schools will, if unmitigated, have adverse effects on the development of rural communities in these nations. It thus underscored the necessity for an urgent and well-articulated pro-rural development strategy that will include a well-funded Rural Education Programme in developing nations. Keywords: urban-rural disparity, environment, field theory, rural area, monitoring of learning achievement, social exclusion, economic exclusion, disparity analysi

PERCEPTION, EFFICIENCY, EFFECTIVENESS AND CHALLENGES OF MICRO INSURANCE SERVICES IN NIGERIA

This study evaluates the level of penetration of insurance firms in Nigeria using the Integrated Theoretical Review Design approach. The study similarly evaluates the mitigating factors to macro-insurance actualization in Nigeria and ends by recommending activities, models and frameworks that should be put in place to ensure a higher level of micro-insurance penetration in Nigeria. The study uncovers the fact micro-insurance operation in Nigeria is very fallow judging by the presence of only one stand-alone micro-insurance firm in the whole of Nigeria while other micro-insurance activities are subsumed under various insurance institutions. Various model of micro-insurance implementation was employed and it was discovered that the community – based/mutual micro-insurance model is the most potent as it provides an avenue for the micro-insurance provider to develop products which serve the peculiar needs of each individual community. There is also the added advantage of community participation, which aside from involving the ‘clients’ or ‘policyholders’ in the management and operations of the product, also serves as a medium of intimating the rural dwellers on the necessity and functions of insurance.  The study recommends that; Insurance firms should ensure efficient distribution channels, an informed price reviews of its services, they should ensure thorough Scrutiny of Micro-Insurance Claims and Applicants, there should be a more flexible payment of premiums, Niche Marketing should be encouraged, Micro-insurance firms should Partner with Other Intermediaries in the Value Chain, There should be adequate Public Awareness, micro-insurance firms should be Re-Insured, NAICOM should embrace Responsive Regulation and there should be Development of Risk Measurement Models and government should back micro-insurance firms by the provision of social Welfare (Sponsorship)

EMPIRICAL EVALUATION OF THE DEBT OVERHANG AND VICIOUS CYCLE HYPOTHESIS IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICAN COUNTRIES

This study aims to empirically evaluate the debt overhang and vicious cycle hypothesis in sub-Saharan African countries by examining the relationship between debt and macroeconomic variables. The model used in this study includes the growth rate of GDP, government consumption, inflation rate, financial development index, and exchange rate as independent variables, while debt serves as the dependent variable. The study used a panel data analysis covering 15 sub-Saharan African countries over the period 2007-2021. The results indicate that government consumption and financial development index have a positive and significant effect on debt, while the growth rate of GDP, inflation rate, and exchange rate have a negative and significant effect. These findings support the debt overhang and vicious cycle hypothesis, which suggests that high levels of debt can lead to lower economic growth and create a vicious cycle of debt accumulation

Does Open Market Operations as a Monetary Policy tool have Impact on Price Stability in Nigeria?

Open market operation was introduced as a monetary policy tool in Nigeria in 1993. Since then, it has been extensively used in conjunction with other tools such as reserve requirement, discount window operation, and moral suasion as an instrument of price stability; however, inflation in Nigeria has not reduced to the desired single digit level on a consistent basis. It is against this background that, our paper investigated the impact of OMO as a tool for monetary policy on price stability in Nigeria from 1993-2007. Using OLS regression model, our result reveals that open market operation has positive non-significant impact on consumer price stability as proxied by inflation rate in Nigeria. Our result also reveals that there was a positive correlation between open market operation and consumer price stability of the Central Bank of Nigeria for the period, therefore remains a useful tool, hence our recommendation is that it should be used in conjunction with other relevant ones in the maintenance of price stability in Nigeria. Keywords: Open Market Operation, Price Stability, Nigeri

Hydrodynamics is Needed to Explain Propulsion in Chemophoretic Colloidal Rafts

Active particles driven by a chemical reaction are the subject of intense research to date due to their rich physics, being intrinsically far from equilibrium, and their multiple technological applications. Recent attention in the field is now shifting towards exploring the fascinating dynamics of mixture of active and passive systems. Here we realize active colloidal rafts, composed of a single catalytic particle encircled by several shells of passive microspheres assembled via light activated, chemophoretic flow. We show that considering only diffusiophoresis can explain the cluster kinetics but not the cluster propulsion behavior. Thus, using the Lorenz reciprocal theorem, we show that propulsion emerges by considering hydrodynamics via the diffusioosmotic answer of the substrate to the generated chemophoretic flow. While diffusioosmotic flows are often relegate to a secondary role, our work demonstrates their importance to understand the rich physics of active catalytic systems