Utilising the Surging Potential of E-commerce: A Case of Hour Glass Supply Chain

Decade of nineties saw two significant developments with far reaching implications; bringing down of iron curtain and the exponential growth of “Internet”. However, the impact of the latter has been phenomenal. It would not be wrong to say that Internet has redesigned the way we live and undertake economic activities. Ever since the launch of Windows 95 and Intel Pentium chip, the Internet has grown at an exponential rate, never witnessed before in any industry. At the turn of the century as many as 387 million people were hooked to Internet [UNCTAD (2003), p. 2]. As this bubble of Internet expanded, it started engulfing every aspect of life and business. The sheer difference of processes on Internet resulted in new terms as e-commerce and e-business to be coined up. In five years since 1995, Internet grew from simple information searching to controlling under sea robots. The biggest market penetration however, has been online retail stores and business to business (B2B) commerce. Online shopping has its potential because of its easy access by the customers and B2B commerce has its attraction in the savings achieved by implementing e-processes. Another advantage of doing business on Internet is the audit trail, with which any dubious transactions, from anywhere in the world could be traced back to its originator. In the beginning of this decade, the e-commerce was estimated to the tune of US$354 billion. This is slated to expand to US$ 9 trillion in just five years and continuing at the same pace through this decade, see Figure 1. This paper looks into the exponential growth of e-commerce, different sectors and e-supply chains. It develops a new concept in e-supply chain—Hour Glass Supply Chain (HGSC); detailing how this e-supply chain can help in the transition of Pakistan’s economy into e-economy. In this context this paper also elaborates as how

Labour Market Issues in Pakistan: Unemployment, Working Conditions, and Child Labour

Pakistan’s labour market is showing its inability to continue the past trend of labour absorption. Generation of additional work opportunities commensurate with labour supplies, increasing by over 3 percent annually, has emerged as the most formidable challenge of the nineties. The labour market is presently confronted with the twin menace of unemployment and underemployment. Although, the rate of unemployment has not as yet assumed serious proportions, the worrying aspect of this 5 percent unemployment is its concentration amongst the youth, and educated and trained. The under-utilisation of manpower, however, is manifested in the form of under-employment. There are more than a-tenth of the employed who find their work unable to keep them busy for 35 hours a week [FBS (1994)]. Further, those employed a-quarter of them find their employment income only meeting half of the subsistence requirements, while a similar proportion find their employment income barely managing to meet the subsistence requirements [NMC (1989)]. Lesser productive and low remunerative work opportunities is thus emerging as the major characteristic of the labour market in Pakistan. The situation in the labour market is serious on yet another account. The working conditions of those lucky found employed, by and large, are not satisfactory, rather they are deplorable. Long working hours and poor working conditions are the normal features of a significant number of work places. A number of them also carry occupational safety and health hazards.

Making Globalisation Inclusive of People: A Trade Union Prespective

The greatest tragedy is to treat the unequal as equal”, says Aristotle. In a different perspective, similar concerns have found an echo centuries later—” the free play of market forces between unequal trading partners would only punish poorer commodity exporters at the same time as it brings advantages to the rich industrial countries”.1 New modalities of participation for developing countries in the trading system were suggested decades ago to attack the persistent trade imbalance and to create essential external conditions for accelerating the rate of economic growth. These included: (1) guaranteeing price stabilisation and improving market access for primary exports; (2) allowing greater policy space to develop local industries and reducing barriers to their exports; (3) establishing more appropriate terms of accession to the multilateral system, and (4) reducing the burden of debt-servicing. The developments as unfolded over the years, and more so since 1990s, are found as largely drifting away from these assertions of yester years. Market access to the agricultural products still has to materialise. Greater policy space to developing countries almost stands abandoned. Debt burden of the developing poor countries, the HIPC initiative notwithstanding, remains at volatile level.

IFIs’ Conditionalities, Poverty Reduction, and Employment

the great depression of 1930s, the Bretton Woods twins—international monetary fund (IMF) and the world bank; rather the world bank group1—have over the years emerged as important players of the international financial arena. They are the major component of international financial architecture in addressing global macro and financial stability. The Bank together with the regional multi-lateral development banks (MDBs), such as the Asian Development Bank (ADB) for the Asian and the Pacific region, is making its contribution in building necessary infrastructure needed to initiate and support the development process, the recent reduced emphasis on such projects notwithstanding.

Intestinal, Airway, and Cardiovascular Relaxant Activities of Thymoquinone

Thymoquinone (TQ) is a bioactive component found in many medicinal herbs. In this study, we report the smooth and cardiac muscle relaxant activities of this compound. TQ concentration dependently suppressed spontaneously contracting rabbit jejunum while also relaxed high K+-(80 mM) induced contractions in jejunum and guinea-pig ileum, indicating activity at voltage-operated Ca++ channels (VOCC). Further, TQ displaced Ca++ concentration-response curves, obtained in a Ca++-free environment, to the right, showing blockade of VOCC. Similar activity was observed with verapamil, a standard VOCC blocker. TQ also exhibited nonadrenergic relaxation of agonist-induced contractions in guinea-pig trachea. When tested in fluo-4-loaded mouse lung slices, TQ inhibited ACh-induced airway narrowing and Ca++ signalling in airway smooth muscle cells. In endothelium-intact and endothelium-denuded rat aorta, TQ inhibited high K+-induced contractions at significantly lower concentrations than phenylephrine-(PE-) (1 microM) induced contractions. Relaxation of PE-induced contractions was resistant to blockade by L-NAME and atropine. In guinea-pig atria, TQ showed noncholinergic relaxation of atrial force and rate of contractions. These data suggest smooth and cardiac muscle relaxant activity of TQ possibly mediated, in part, via blockade of VOCC. The results also justify the use of TQ containing plants in related health disorders like colic, diarrhoea, cough, and asthma

IFIs’ Conditionalities, Poverty Reduction, and Employment

Rising from the debris of the World War-II and also the devastations caused by the great depression of 1930s, the Bretton Woods twins—international monetary fund (IMF) and the world bank; rather the world bank group1—have over the years emerged as important players of the international financial arena. They are the major component of international financial architecture in addressing global macro and financial stability. The Bank together with the regional multi-lateral development banks (MDBs), such as the Asian Development Bank (ADB) for the Asian and the Pacific region, is making its contribution in building necessary infrastructure needed to initiate and support the development process, the recent reduced emphasis on such projects notwithstanding

Towards Good Governance: Developing an e-Government

Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), today, are seen as the miracle medicines for curing a nation from the ails of corruption, mismanagement, poor governance, inflation, monopolies, business stagnation, illiteracy and so on. One important aspect concerns development and implementation of ICTs for the EGovernance. E-Governance holds enormous potential in terms of improving service delivery and efficiency, better response to business and citizen needs, and provision of affordable government services. Defined as “Government’s use of technology, particularly web-based Internet applications, to enhance the access to and delivery of government information and service to citizens, business partners, employees, other agencies, and government entities [McClure (2000)]” or “the continuous optimisation of service delivery, constituency participation, and governance by transforming internal and external relationships through technology, the Internet, and new media [Gartner Group (2000)]”. The e-government makes it possible for a government’s different departments and organisations to have direct access to grassroots and vice-versa. It cuts down the costs and delivery times for the government and simultaneously becomes a tool for check and balances against the government. The e-government in short is a tool for good governance—transparency, participation, regulations and accountability

ROLE OF TRANSFORMING GROWTH FACTOR BETA IN PROTEINURIA

The incidence and prevalence of people suffering from end stage renal disease is increasing. Proteinuria, particularly the presence of albumin in urine is concerning because proteinuria is associated with the progression to end stage renal disease (ESRD). Understanding the mechanisms involved in damaging the glomerular filtration barrier is essential. Transforming growth factor beta (TGFB) is a key cytokine in mediating glomerulosclerosis and proteinuria. Not much is known about the downstream pathways that mediates the renal damage and proteinuria. I hypothesize that TGFB induces proteinuria through podocyte de-differentiation and this occurs through SMAD dependent and independent pathways. Methods: I used adenovirus mediated gene transfer of TGFB1 to rat renal artery to study the effects of TGFB1 on renal structure and functions. To study the importance of SMAD3 in mediating downstream effects of TGFB1 in proteinuria and podocyte effacement, I used an anti-glomerular basement membrane model in SMAD3+/+ and SMAD3-/- mice to induce glomerulonephritis and proteinuria. Results: Transient TGFB1 overexpression via AdTGFB1 induced significant proteinuria, podocyte foot process effacement, nephrin down-regulation, and nephrinuria. The expression of synaptopodin was also significantly down-regulated by TGFB1. TGFB1 increased the expression of the angiopoietin receptor, Tie2, in podocyte cell culture. In cultured podocytes, TGFB1 downregulated the gene and protein expression of both nephrin and synaptopodin. These findings suggest that locally produced TGFB1 can cause podocyte de-differentiation marked by a loss of synaptopodin, nephrin, and foot process effacement; this process is partly regulated by angiopoietins. This process represents a novel pathway that may explain proteinuria in a variety of common renal diseases. Both SMAD3+/+ and SMAD3-/- mice had proteinuria after induction of anti-GBM glomerulonephritis, though to a lesser extent in SMAD3-/- mice. SMAD3-/- and SMAD3+/+ mice developed significant glomerulonephritis with progressive interstitial fibrosis and chronic renal impairment. The SMAD3+/+ mice were found to be more prone to fibrotic changes, interstitial damage and tubular and glomerulosclerosis than the SMAD3-/- mice. This suggests that TGFB1 signals through pathways other than SMAD3 such as those triggered by hypoxia. Conclusion: I have shown that TGFB1 upregulation via AdTGFB1 induces proteinuria through podocyte dedifferentiation and FP effacement. Angiopoietins are essential for TGFB1 mediated podocyte injury. The effects of TGFB are partially mediated through SMAD3 as there is residual podocyte effacement and proteinuria in the SMAD3-/- mice. Hence there are SMAD3 dependent and independent pathways involved in proteinuria.Doctor of Science (PhD