PEARL - THE NEW REGIONAL FORECASTING MODEL OF THE NETHERLANDS

The Netherlands has a rather long history of developing models in the field of regional forecasts. Among othter things, these forecasts are used as an instrument for planning of house-building. In 2004 Statistics Netherlands and the Spatial Planning Bureau started with the development of a new model, called PEARL (which stands for 'Population Extrapolations At Regional Level'). It is an integrated model for the forecast of the population (by ethnic group) and households. PEARL will be used to regionalize the official forecasts of population (by ethnic group) and households at the national level, which are compiled by Statistics Netherlands. The lowest level of the regional forecasts will be the municipal level, which permits the aggregation to larger NUTS regions, such as 'COROP' and 'province'. The forecast-horizon of the regional forecasts will be 15 to 20 years, although computations for a longer period are possible. An important objective of PEARL is to be considered as the official regional forecast, from 2007 onwards. Assumptions on demographic (growth) components (fertility, mortality, internal and external migration) and transition rates (with respect to the life course) will be formulated at the municipal level. These assumptions are used as input for PEARL. In this way transparency of the outcomes of the model is promoted. In order to achieve consistency between population and households, PEARL consists of both a macro- and a micro-layer. At the macro-layer (the municipal level) the assumptions are applied, while in the micro-layer (individual level) the resulting events are administrated. In this way the micro-layer consists of approximately 16 million persons and approximately 7 million households. In switching between the macro- and the micro-layer PEARL distinguishes itself from more conventional models. The primary goal is to use PEARL as a (robust) instrument for forecasting. However, it may also be used as a tool for compiling scenarios. This can be done at the macro level (by formulating alternative assumptions at the municipal level), but also at the micro level (by using alternative figures on risks). In the last application PEARL is used as a micro-simulation model. The software program PEARL is written in Delphi-5. The intention is to publish first outcomes (with a limited scope) in the second half of 2005

The inspection of (collective) tapwater installations in 2009 : Progress

Betreft een gewijzigde versie van rapport 703719057Voor het eerst sinds 2004 vertonen minder collectieve leidingwaterinstallaties in nieuwbouw gebreken. Dit geldt voor zowel de eerste (basis)controle als de hercontrole. Hiermee lijkt de trend dat steeds minder installaties aan de eisen voldoen voorzichtig te zijn doorbroken. Toch blijft meer dan eenderde van de bezochte installaties bij de basiscontrole gebreken vertonen. Deze gebreken kunnen een verhoogd of sterk verhoogd risico op verontreiniging van de installatie en/of het centrale distributienet veroorzaken. Dit blijkt uit de controles die de drinkwaterbedrijven in 2009 uitvoerden naar de kwaliteit van installaties in nieuwbouw en bestaande bouw. Het RIVM rapporteert het ministerie van I&M hierover sinds 2004. In het onderzochte jaar zijn meer dan 47.000 leidingwaterinstallaties in de bestaande bouw en nieuwbouw gecontroleerd. De controles hebben ertoe geleid dat meer dan 8000 (sterk) verhoogde risico's voor de volksgezondheid zijn geconstateerd en hersteld. In de bestaande bouw blijft het aandeel afgekeurde installaties bij de basiscontrole afnemen. Wel neemt het aantal installaties dat bij hercontrole wordt afgekeurd toe. De oorzaak hiervan is niet bekend en moet worden onderzocht. Slechts een kwart van de bezochte prioritaire installaties (zoals ziekenhuizen, zorginstellingen en zwembaden) is bij de basiscontrole in orde. Deze installaties moeten voldoen aan speciale eisen om legionellabesmettingen te voorkomen. Sinds januari 2009 worden deze installaties op een meer systematische manier gecontroleerd (Interventiestrategie). Het is nog te vroeg om het effect van deze werkwijze terug te zien in de cijfers van 2009.For the first time since 2004, less newly build collective tap water installations show shortcomings. This is true for both the first inspection and the follow-up inspections preformed by the water companies. This seems to indicate a break in the trend of previous years where less newly build installations pass inspection without shortcomings. Still, one-third of the inspected installations do not comply with legionella regulations when first inspected. These non-compliances can be the cause of high to very high risk of contamination of the installation or the public mains system. These conclusions are drawn from the inspections preformed in 2009 by the drinking water companies in newly build and existing installations. By order of the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment and the VROMInspectorate, the Institute for Public Health and the Environment of the Netherlands (RIVM) compile a yearly report since 2004 on the inspection of tap water installations. In 2009 more than 47.000 newly build and existing installations were inspected. The inspections have found and resolved more than 8000 situations of high to very high risk for public health. In existing installations, the number of non-compliance found at first inspections has decreased over the years. At the second inspection of installations that do not comply, the number of non-complying installations increases. The cause of this trend is unknown, and should be investigated. Only a quarter of the installations that must comply with special regulations for the prevention of Legionella (high-priority installations like hospitals, swimming pools, etc.) comply at first inspection. Starting from 2009, these installations are inspected according to a special intervention strategy. It is still too early to see results from this strategy.VROM-Inspecti

THE IMPLEMENTATION OF GRAMMATICAL FUNCTIONS IN FUNCTIONAL DISCOURSE GRAMMAR

underlying representation in a more or less across the board fashion, only taking into consideration the language dependent semantic function hierarchy. This approach bypasses a number of constraints on subject assignment that may be gathered from typological data, and observed from the actual behaviour of speakers. In this contribution, we make an attempt to reinterpret FG syntactic functions in the light of the FDG model. Following ideas from Givón (1997), we propose a treatment of Subject assignment on the basis of a combination of semantic and pragmatic factors of the relevant referents and other functional aspects of underlying representations. The assignment rules adhere to the respective hierarchies as discussed in the typological literature. In our proposal, Subject (and Object) assignment are now located in the expression component, more specifically in the dynamic version of the expression rules as proposed in Bakker (2001)

Bound person forms in ditransitive clauses revisited.

In a recent article Gensler (2003) has argued that little can be said about the ordering of bound person markers of the T(heme) and R(ecipient) relative to each other or relative to the verb stem apart from the fact that the outer markers are likely to be the result of a second-level cliticization process. We take issue with this claim and document that quite successful predictions with respect to the ordering of the T and R markers can be made on the basis of morphological alignment. Taking as our point of departure the typology of ditransitive alignment outlined in Haspelmath (2004; 2005), we show that the ordering patterns in which the R is placed closer to the verbal stem than the T are favoured in all relevant alignment types apart from the indirective, which exhibits a preference for positioning the T closer to the verbal stem than the R. These preferences for the ordering of the R and T are argued to relate directly to the frequency of use of the relative person forms and thus are seen as constituting yet another piece of evidence for the usage-based model of grammar being developed within the functional-cognitive typological paradigm (cf. e.g. Barlow & Kemmer 2000; Bybee & Hopper 2001; Tomasello 2003)

GAMBARAN PENGETAHUAN IBU TENTANG DAMPAK PENGGUNAAN DOT ATAU EMPENG PADA ANAK DI POSYANDU BUGENFIL 1 RW 08 DESA WARU KECAMATAN WARU SIDOARJO

Salah satu masalah yang terjadi di Posyandu Bugenfil 1 Rw 08 Desa Waru Sidoarjo adalah masih kurangnya pengetahuan ibu tentang dampak penggunaan dot pada anak. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui tingkat pengetahuan ibu tentang dampak penggunaan dot pada anak di Posyandu Bugenfil 1 Desa Waru Kecamatan Waru S idoarjo. Desain penelitian ini mengunakan penelitian deskriptif, dengan populsi semua ibu yang memiliki anak di Posyandu Bugenfil 1 Rw 08 Desa Waru S idoarjo, sebesar 21 responden. Pengambilan sampel yaitu dengan menggunakan teknik total sampling. Variabelnya adalah tingkat penggetahuan ibu terhadap dampak peggunaan dot. Instrumen pengumpulan data menggunakan kuisioner dan analisis data secara deskriptif menggunakan tabel distribusi frekuensi. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa dari 21 responden sebagian besar responden mempunyai tingkat pengetaguan kurang (64%). Tentang dampak penggunaan dot pada a nak, hampir setengahnya (29%) memiliki pengetahuan cukup, dan sebagian kecil (7%) memiliki penggetahuan yang baik. Bedasarkan hasil penelitian ini dapat disimmpulkan bahwa gambaran tingkat penggetahuan ibu tentang dampak penggunaan dot pada anak adalah sebagian besar masih kurang. Diharapkan petugas kesehatan lebih meningkatkan dalam pemberian informasi pada seluruh masyarakat terutama ibu melalui penyuluhan, leaflet, dan brosur