Agro-materials : a bibliographic review

Facing the problems of plastic recycling and fossil resources exhaustion, the use of biomass to conceive new materials appears like a reasonable solution. Two axes of research are nowadays developed : on the one hand the synthesis of biodegradable plastics, whichever the methods may be, on the other hand the utilization of raw biopolymers, which is the object of this paper. From this perspective, the “plastic” properties of natural polymers, the caracteristics of the different classes of polymers, the use of charge in vegetable matrix and the possible means of improving the durability of these agro-materials are reviewed

The development of a health care delivery system model that would best meet the health needs of the rural communities in Cavite

The study develops a model of health care delivery system (HCDS) that would best meet the health needs of the rural communities in Cavite, namely: the lowland, the upland, and the resettlement areas.The study combined the descriptive and developmental methods of research. It dealt with several groups of respondents, namely: representative households RHU staff of the selected municipalities health staff of NGOs having health programs in the selected areas and faculty members of the Colleges of Medicine, Nursing and Midwifery. The study used a three-stage stratified random sampling scheme using a 10 percent margin of error. Two sets of questionnaires were prepared by the researcher, one for the Health Care Recipients (HCRs) and one for the Health Care Providers (HCPs). This was supplemented with interview, records review, key informant panel and the actual experiences and observations of the writer. Main statistical treatment used mean, t-test, Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and Least Significant Difference (LSD).The study found out the following: 1) The significant difference in the perceptions among the HCRs in the three agroecosystems regarding the characteristics of their communities in terms of health needs and coping abilities show that the different approaches to health care should be applied. 2) The significant difference in the perceptions of the HCRs and HCPs regarding the characteristics of the HCDS show that the HCPs are not meeting the needs of the HCRs holistically. 3) The significant difference in perceptions on the characteristics of the HCDS in the three agroecosystems implies that the HCPs do not have any coordination in terms of the activities that they were implementing in each of the community. 4) There are significant differences between the perceptions of the HCRs and HCPs regarding the characteristics of the HCDS, in terms of health services delivered, physical resources and human resources. The programs implemented were based on the agenda or priorities of the institution, thus the real situation of each of the community they were dealing with were not considered. 5) There is not significant difference in the overall perceptions of the HCRs and the HCPs in the roles performed by the latter, which shows that the roles performed by the different groups of health care providers are overlapping. 6) HCRs themselves perceive they are not involved in the management of the HCDS. This shows that social mobilization is still far off. On the part of the HCPs, the personnel are basically involved in all aspects of HCDS management. The Rural Health Unit (RHU) is found to be strongly involved only in the lowland area, while the College is more involved in the upland and resettlement communities. 7) The HCRs reveal that HCDS is effective despite their weaknesses. This implies that the HCRs\u27 dissatisfaction of the existing HCDS was due to their lack of awareness of the actual health situations. Therefore, there is really a need to modify the kind of HCDS