Price and Competition Regulation for Fijian Economy

The use of price controls is widespread across developing economies, including controls on basic food items, utility services and key imported commodities. Price control has been in Fiji for nearly 50 years. It is used as a tool for social policy and this can dampen investment and growth but can also incur heavy fiscal burdens. Price controls are efficient when used with competition law and policy. A new model of competition is presented to promote effective investment and competition together linking its outputs to consumer protection. Two institutions merged in the year 2010, namely the Prices and Incomes Board (PIB) and Commerce Commission (CC) into a newly formed Commission named as Fijian Commerce Commission (FCC). The collected data so far from the year 2010-2016 reveals that business traders are violating the price control legislation in terms of overcharging consumers and using misleading conduct to hide prices. The trend on average has decreased by 57% in 2016. The other variable of interest was cyclone WINSTON data in the year 2016, out of 680 inspections that were done, 81.1% of business traders were non-compliant. 34.5% of business traders were fined on the spot and through complaints respectively

The impact of immediate breast reconstruction on the time to delivery of adjuvant therapy: the iBRA-2 study

Background: Immediate breast reconstruction (IBR) is routinely offered to improve quality-of-life for women requiring mastectomy, but there are concerns that more complex surgery may delay adjuvant oncological treatments and compromise long-term outcomes. High-quality evidence is lacking. The iBRA-2 study aimed to investigate the impact of IBR on time to adjuvant therapy. Methods: Consecutive women undergoing mastectomy ± IBR for breast cancer July–December, 2016 were included. Patient demographics, operative, oncological and complication data were collected. Time from last definitive cancer surgery to first adjuvant treatment for patients undergoing mastectomy ± IBR were compared and risk factors associated with delays explored. Results: A total of 2540 patients were recruited from 76 centres; 1008 (39.7%) underwent IBR (implant-only [n = 675, 26.6%]; pedicled flaps [n = 105,4.1%] and free-flaps [n = 228, 8.9%]). Complications requiring re-admission or re-operation were significantly more common in patients undergoing IBR than those receiving mastectomy. Adjuvant chemotherapy or radiotherapy was required by 1235 (48.6%) patients. No clinically significant differences were seen in time to adjuvant therapy between patient groups but major complications irrespective of surgery received were significantly associated with treatment delays. Conclusions: IBR does not result in clinically significant delays to adjuvant therapy, but post-operative complications are associated with treatment delays. Strategies to minimise complications, including careful patient selection, are required to improve outcomes for patients

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Not AvailableThe Krishi Megh infrastructure and services has been jointly developed by ICAR-Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute (IASRI) and ICAR-National Academy of Agricultural Research Management (NAARM) under the National Agricultural Higher Education (NAHEP) component-2 Project Investment in ICAR leadership in higher education” project.NAHEP Comp-I