Selected Precision Agriculture studies in oil palm: a 10-year summary

Precision Agriculture (PA) embodies a holistic field management strategy that allows adjustment of crop input use and cultivation methods, including seed, fertilizer, pesticide and water application, variety selection, planting, tillage and harvesting, to match varying soil, crop and other field attributes. PA involves mapping and analyzing field variability, and linking such variability to management actions. This contrasts with conventional agriculture that is based on uniform treatment(s) across a field. Oil palm is an excellent candidate for PA implementation simply because it consumes a large amount of chemical and physical inputs. However, a major constraint in implementing PA strategies on a detailed scale for oil palm is the typically large plantation size. The agronomic challenge of increasing oil palm yield productivity hinges on three primary issues: 1) fertilization, 2) cropping practices such as planting density, ground cover, pruning and drainage, and 3) pest and disease management. This paper presents a 10-year Abstract of selected PA studies carried out in Malaysian and Indonesian oil palm plantations. These studies are: spatial variability of soil fertility across topography, removal of spatial effects to improve interpretation of data from fertilizer trials, development of a non-destructive oil yield and oil quality estimation protocol, stand density assessment using remote sensing, spatial variability of soil organic carbon across different crop ages, spatial variability of orange spotting disease, discriminating between potassium deficiency and orange spotting disease symptoms using remote sensing, estimating fresh fruit bunch yields using remote sensing, and estimating palm oil quality and yield using proximal sensing

Exploration of rural physicians' lived experience of practising outside their usual scope of practice to provide access to essential medical care (clinical courage): an international phenomenological study

Objectives Rural doctors describe consistent pressure to provide extended care beyond the limits of their formal training in order to meet the needs of the patients and communities they serve. This study explored the lived experience of rural doctors when they practise outside their usual scope of practice to provide medical care for people who would otherwise not have access to essential clinical services. Design A hermeneutic phenomenological study. Setting An international rural medicine conference. Participants All doctors attending the conference who practised medicine in rural/remote areas in a predominantly English-speaking community were eligible to participate; 27 doctors were recruited. Interventions Semi-structured interviews were conducted. The transcripts were initially read and analysed by individual researchers before they were read aloud to the group to explore meanings more fully. Two researchers then reviewed the transcripts to develop the results section which was then rechecked by the broader group. Primary outcome measure An understanding of the lived experiences of clinical courage. Results Participants provided in-depth descriptions of experiences we have termedclinical courage. This phenomenon included the following features: Standing up to serve anybody and everybody in the community; Accepting uncertainty and persistently seeking to prepare; Deliberately understanding and marshalling resources in the context; Humbly seeking to know one's own limits; Clearing the cognitive hurdle when something needs to be done for your patient; Collegial support to stand up again. Conclusion This study elucidated six features of the phenomenon ofclinical couragethrough the narratives of the lived experience of rural generalist doctors

Student Engagement in Peer Dialogue About Diversity and Inclusion

Student engagement in peer dialogue is a key aspect of a transformative learning process. However, the dynamics of peer dialogue become more complex when applied to concepts of diversity and inclusion, due to increased risk of student vulnerability and exclusion. This study examined how curricular content and contextual features in educational settings facilitate peer dialogue by analyzing the learning narratives of eleven occupational therapy graduate students. Considered within a transformative approach to learning, findings suggest the need to consider how students experience and name diversity. Critical questions are raised about the value of and potential caveats about exposing students to first person accounts, as well as pedagogical strategies aimed at creating respectful learning classroom spaces that acknowledge the many intersecting social identities that students bring. Insights from this study informed the development of the linked concept of critical intersectional peer dialogue (CIPD)

Garotas de loja, história social e teoria social [Shop Girls, Social History and Social Theory]

Shop workers, most of them women, have made up a significant proportion of Britain’s labour force since the 1850s but we still know relatively little about their history. This article argues that there has been a systematic neglect of one of the largest sectors of female employment by historians and investigates why this might be. It suggests that this neglect is connected to framings of work that have overlooked the service sector as a whole as well as to a continuing unease with the consumer society’s transformation of social life. One element of that transformation was the rise of new forms of aesthetic, emotional and sexualised labour. Certain kinds of ‘shop girls’ embodied these in spectacular fashion. As a result, they became enduring icons of mass consumption, simultaneously dismissed as passive cultural dupes or punished as powerful agents of cultural destruction. This article interweaves the social history of everyday shop workers with shifting representations of the ‘shop girl’, from Victorian music hall parodies, through modernist social theory, to the bizarre bombing of the Biba boutique in London by the Angry Brigade on May Day 1971. It concludes that progressive historians have much to gain by reclaiming these workers and the service economy that they helped create

Peace and Justice through a Feminist Lens: Gender Justice and the Women’s Court for the Former Yugoslavia

Post-conflict interventions to ‘deal with’ violent pasts have moved from exception to global norm. Early efforts to achieve peace and justice were critiqued as ‘gender-blind’—for failing to address sexual and gender-based violence, and neglecting the gender-specific interests and needs of women in transitional settings. The advent of UN Security Council resolutions on ‘Women, Peace and Security’ provided a key policy framework for integrating both women and gender issues into transitional justice processes and mechanisms. Despite this, gender justice and equality in (post-)conflict settings remain largely unachieved. This article explores efforts to attain gender-just peace in post-conflict Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). It critically examines the significance of a recent ‘bottom-up’ truth-telling project—the Women’s Court for the former Yugoslavia—as a locally engaged approach to achieving justice and redress for women impacted by armed conflict. Drawing on participant observation, documentary analysis, and interviews with women activists, the article evaluates the successes and shortcomings of responding to gendered forms of wartime violence through truth-telling. Extending Nancy Fraser’s tripartite model of justice to peacebuilding contexts, the article advances notions of recognition, redistribution and representation as crucial components of gender-just peace. It argues that recognizing women as victims and survivors of conflict, achieving a gender-equitable distribution of material and symbolic resources, and enabling women to participate as agents of transitional justice processes are all essential for transforming the structural inequalities that enable gender violence and discrimination to materialize before, during, and after conflict

Promoting urinary continence in women after delivery: randomised controlled trial

OBJECTIVES: To test the effectiveness of a physiotherapist delivered intervention designed to prevent urinary incontinence among women three months after giving birth. DESIGN: Prospective randomised controlled trial with women randomised to receive the intervention (which entailed training in pelvic floor exercises and incorporated strategies to improve adherence) or usual postpartum care. SETTING: Postpartum wards of three tertiary teaching hospitals in the Hunter region, New South Wales, Australia. PARTICIPANTS: Women who had forceps or ventouse deliveries or whose babies had a high birth weight (⩾4000 g), or both—676 (348 in the intervention group and 328 in the usual care group) provided endpoint data at three months. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Urinary incontinence at three months measured as a dichotomous variable. The severity of incontinence was also measured. Self report of the frequency of performance of pelvic floor exercises was recorded. RESULTS: At three months after delivery, the prevalence of incontinence in the intervention group was 31.0% (108 women) and in the usual care group 38.4% (125 women); difference 7.4% (95% confidence interval 0.2% to 14.6%, P=0.044). At follow up significantly fewer women with incontinence were classified as severe in the intervention group (10.1%) v (17.0%), difference 7.0%, 1.6% to 11.8%). The proportions of women reporting doing pelvic floor exercises at adequate levels was 84% (80% to 88%) for the intervention group and 58% (52% to 63%) for the usual care group (P=0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The intervention promoting urinary continence reduced the prevalence of urinary incontinence after giving birth, particularly its severity, and promoted the performance of pelvic floor exercises at adequate levels; both continence and adherence to the programme were measured at three months after delivery in women who had forceps or ventouse deliveries or babies weighing 4000 g or more

Prescribing behaviour in clinical practice : patients' expectations and doctors' perceptions of patients' expectations : a questionnaire study

Objectives: To examine the effect of patients' expectations for medication and doctors' perceptions of patients' expectations on prescribing when patients present with new conditions. Design: Questionnaire study of practitioners and patients. Setting: General practice in Newcastle, Australia. Subjects: 22 non­randomly selected general practitioners and 336 of their patients with a newly diagnosed medical condition. Main outcome measures: Prescription of medication and expectation of it. Results: Medication was prescribed for 169 (50%) patients. After controlling for the presenting condition, patients who expected medication were nearly three times more likely to receive medication (odds ratio = 2.9, 95% confidence interval 1.3 to 6.3). When the general practitioner thought the patient expected medication the patient was 10 times more likely to receive it (odds ratio = 10.1, 5.3 to 19.6). A significant association existed between patients' expectation and doctors' perception of patients' expectation (χ2 = 52.0, df = 4, P = 0.001). For all categories of patient expectation, however, patients were more likely to receive medication when the practitioner judged the patient to want medication than when the practitioner ascribed no expectation to the patient. Conclusions: Although patients brought expectations to the consultation regarding medication, the doctors' opinions about their expectations were the strongest determinants of prescribing

Factors associated with accessing professional help for psychological distress in midlife Australian women

Background: Given the high prevalence of mental health problems in midlife women it is important to understand the factors that motivate and inhibit seeking professional help. Aim: To identify factors associated with and barriers to seeking professional help for psychological distress amongst midlife Australian women. Method: Qualitative and quantitative data were gathered using semi-structured telephone interviews in NSW Australia. Results: Seeking help from a GP was associated with poorer mental (p = 0.002) and physical health scores (p = 0.005). But in contrast seeking help from a mental health professional was associated with being out of paid employment (p = 0.035), being mostly able to talk about one's deepest problems (p = 0.015), being dissatisfied with family relationships (p = 0.008), and feeling understood by family/friends (p = 0.002). The barriers to seek help for these women were thinking they should cope alone (64%); thinking the problem would get better by itself (43%); embarrassment (35%); believing no help available (34%); not knowing where to go for help (30%); and fear of what others might think (28%). Qualitative data also highlighted attitudinal barriers to help-seeking. Conclusions: Although level of need predicted GP contacts, attitudinal factors were more important in contacts with mental health services. These attitudinal barriers need to be addressed to enable midlife women to more easily seek and access mental health care when needed. Declaration of interest: There are no known conflicts of interest