Assessing the impact of the National Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS) in the Uganda rural livelihoods:

"The National Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS) program of Uganda is an innovative public-private extension service delivery approach, with the goal of increasing market oriented agricultural production by empowering farmers to demand and control agricultural advisory services. Although initial evaluations of NAADS have been quite favourable, these evaluations have been primary qualitative in nature. This study quantifies the initial impacts of NAADS in the districts and sub-counties where the program was operating by 2005. It is based on descriptive analyses of results of a survey of 116 farmer groups and 894 farmers in sixteen districts where the program was operating at the time and four districts where NAADS had not yet begun operating to control for factors that may have contributed to differing initial conditions among the communities. Based on observed differences across the NAADS and non-NAADS sub-counties, it appears that the NAADS program is having substantial positive impacts on the availability and quality of advisory services provided to farmers, promoting adoption of new crop and livestock enterprises as well improving adoption and use of modern agricultural production technologies and practices. NAADS also appears to have promoted greater use of post-harvest technologies and commercial marketing of commodities, consistent with its mission to promote more commercially-oriented agriculture. Despite positive effects of NAADS on adoption of improved production technologies and practices, no significant differences were found in yield growth between NAADS and non-NAADS sub-counties for most crops, reflecting the still low levels of adoption of these technologies even in NAADS sub-counties, as well as other factors affecting productivity. However, NAADS appears to have helped farmers to avoid the large declines in farm income that affected most farmers between 2000 and 2004, due more to encouraging farmers to diversify into profitable new farming enterprises such as groundnuts, maize and rice than to increases in productivity caused by NAADS. NAADS appears to be having more success in promoting adoption of improved varieties of crops and some other yield enhancing technologies than in promoting improved soil fertility management. This raises concern about the sustainability of productivity increases that may occur, since such increases may lead to more rapid soil nutrient mining unless comparable success in promoting improved soil fertility management is achieved. Continued emphasis on improving the market environment, promoting adoption of more remunerative crop enterprises, and applied agronomic research identifying more effective ways to profitably combine inorganic and organic soil fertility measures in different crop systems can help to address this problem. Shortage of capital and credit facilities was often cited by farmers as a critical constraint facing them, in addition to scarcity of agricultural inputs, lack of adequate farmland, unfavorable weather patterns and problems of pests and diseases. These emphasize that the quality of advisory services is not the only important factor influencing technology adoption and productivity, and the need for complementary progress in other areas, especially development of the rural financial system. Implications are drawn for enterprise targeting and ensuring sustainability of improvements in productivity, as well as for designing and implementing service provision programs in other parts of the Uganda and in other countries." from Author's AbstractImpact assessment, Agricultural extension,

Associations Between County-Level Socioeconomic Status and Opioid Overdose Rates in Northern New England

Background – The opioid epidemic persists as a significant concern to public health as the proliferation of fentanyl presents additional risks for illicit opioid users. States such as Maine and New Hampshire experience far greater opioid overdose rates compared to the overall US opioid overdose rate. Many studies on the opioid epidemic use socioeconomic and macroeconomic factors individually but few use a composite index of multiple of these measures. Limited attention has been paid to the need for a composite index of socioeconomic status at the small area (county) level designed to quantify the impact of socioeconomic status on the opioid epidemic. Methods – Negative binomial regression was used to compare the opioid overdose rate between quartiles of county-level socioeconomic status (SES) amongst the 40 counties of the three northern New England states of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont between the years of 2015 and 2017. Data sources include CDC Wonder, NIH SEER*Stat, US Census, and SAMHSA. Results– Counties in the lowest two quartiles of county-level SES had 1.35 (95% CI=1.02, 1.79) and 1.31 (95% CI=1.01, 1.71) times the opioid overdose death rate compared to counties in the third quartile respectively after controlling for county-level urbanicity and county-level population density of practitioners waived to prescribe buprenorphine. Metropolitan counties had 1.24 (95% CI=1.01, 1.55) times the opioid overdose death rate compared to rural counties after controlling for county-level SES and county-level population density of level practitioners waived to prescribe buprenorphine. Conclusions – County-level SES and county urbanicity may play a role in the opioid epidemic within the Northern New England Region of the United States. Studies designed to consider the longitudinal implications of increased access to buprenorphine treatment are required to properly assess the effect of the availability of this treatment on the opioid crisis. Fentanyl also poses a substantial threat to public health and safety, especially amongst illicit drug users who may be unaware to the presence of fentanyl in their drug supply

Validation of the Sustainable Development Goal 6 Monitoring Structures across East and Southern Africa Using Fuzzy Logic Analysis

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and World Health Organisation (WHO) Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) reports that only three African countries are on track to achieve universal access to at least basic water services by 2030 and only one country, Botswana, within the East and Southern Africa region (ESAR). Monitoring is crucial to advancing progress on SGD 6 in the region through providing reliable data to decision makers for policy, planning and much needed investment in the sector. This paper presents findings of the rapid assessment termed SDG 6 + 5 which relates to monitoring systems for Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) in 21 countries of ESAR, five years into the SDGs. The paper presents the results of a fuzzy logic analysis applied to aspects and findings from the rapid assessment. Fuzzy logic benefits the study by managing unconscious bias from qualitative assessment and evaluating the strengths of countries’ WASH monitoring systems. The paper demonstrates similarities and variations between results from the rapid assessment and fuzzy analysis including Angola and Botswana scoring more favourably in enabling environments for monitoring from the analysis. The paper provides methods of rapid assessment of key aspects that impact on effective WASH monitoring and recommends the use of fuzzy logic to reduce data bias from qualitative methods. The methodology presented in the paper can be adapted and applied to other regions of the world and settings to enhance evaluations on the strength of systems within other sectors

Validation of the UNICEF fiscal diagnostic tool for SDGs 6.1 and 6.2 in East and Southern Africa using the analytical hierarchy process (AHP)

The UN High Level Panel on Water notes that a total annual capital expenditure (CAPEX) of $114 billion and operation and maintenance expenditure (OPEX) of$129 billion is required globally to meet the safe drinking water and sanitation targets 1 and 2 of Sustainable Development Goal 6 (SDG 6). In Sub-Saharan Africa, $36 billion is required and UNICEF estimates$15 billion is required to meet these targets in 21 countries in East and Southern Africa. Currently, only 15% of the financial investments in the sector are accounted for, which falls significantly short of delivering SDG 6. Consequently, innovative finance tools that maximise taxes, tariffs and transfers (3ts) are required to mobilise finances for the region's sector. This paper presents a diagnostic methodology for identifying bankable and blended finance projects in East and Southern Africa's water and sanitation sector. Potential projects were identified in Malawi, Mozambique and Ethiopia. Findings from applying the AHP (analytical hierarchy process) analysis recommend the use of the decision-making tool for prioritisation and selection of water and sanitation projects in the context of multiple projects requiring blended finance. The methods are applicable to other parts of Sub-Saharan Africa to enhance project pipelines whose collective cost and revenue mitigate investment risk

Within-Canopy Distribution of Incidence and Damage of Pests and Diseases of Robusta Coffee, Coffea Canephora and Implications for their Management

Due to its perennial and robust vegetative growth nature, the Robusta coffee harbors a diversity of pests and diseases that are not necessarily evenly distributed within the coffee canopy and this has management implications. We thus, conducted a study in a Kaweri Coffee Plantation Limited in central Uganda to determine the distribution of incidence and damage caused by the pests and diseases within the Robusta coffee canopy. In each of the four section of plantation (Kitagweta, Kyamutuma Luwunga and Nonve), a plot measuring 100 x 100 m was demarcated and 20 Robusta coffee trees were systematically selected along two diagonals in each of the plots. All the stems on each of the selected coffee tree were assessed for pest and disease incidence and damage on the leaves, berry clusters and berries. The coffee canopy was divided into three sections (lower, middle and upper) and incidence and damage of the pests and diseases were determined on coffee leaves, berry clusters and berries. Results showed that the pests and diseases were not evenly distributed within the canopy. On the leaves, the incidence and damage caused by Leucoptera coffeella, Leucoplema dohertyi and Hemilleia vastatrix varied significantly (p?0.05) across the canopy sections, with the highest levels (23.1, 36.1 and 30.5%) being recorded in the lower section. On the other hand, though the damage caused by Epicampoptera andersoni and the leaf eating beetles was not significantly (p?0.05) different within the canopy, the highest infestation was recorded in the upper (26.9%) and middle (19.3%) sections, respectively. For the berry cluster, only damage caused by Planococcus spp. varied significantly (p=0.0188) across the canopy, with the highest infestation (18.6%) being recorded in lower section. However, incidence and damage caused by Prophantis smaragdina and Cercospora coffeicola were not significantly (p?0.05) different within the canopy but, the highest levels were recorded in the upper section of the canopy (15.8 and 24.4%, respectively). On the coffee berries, the incidence and damage of both Hypothenemus hampei and Cercospora coffeicola did not significantly (p?0.05) across the canopy sections but the highest levels were recorded in the lower (28.5%) and upper (20.7%), respectively. Our findings enlightened the understanding of the vertical distribution of the incidence and damage of pest and disease within the Robusta coffee canopy. This information will contribute to developing and implementing monitoring techniques and regimes as well as ecologically-informed management strategies for these pests and diseases

Genetic analysis for resistance to Sitophilus zeamais (Motschulsky) among provitamin-A maize germplasm

Maize biofortification is adopted as strategy to circumvent the high risk of vitamin A deficienc, accentuated by high incidence food losses due to storage insect pests in most developing countries where maize is an important staple crop. This study was initiated to understand the mode of inheritance for resistance to storage weevils among provitamin-A germplasm. A total of 72 provitamin-A maize testcross hybrids were evaluated for agronomic and adaptive traits in three sites, Namulonge, Serere and Ngetta in Uganda during the main season of 2015. Based on genotype x environment analysis of field traits, resultant grain from two divergent environments (Namulonge and Serere) were screened for resistance against Sitophilus zeamais in a no-choice laboratory. Line by tester analysis of combining ability indicated that both additive and non-additive gene effects were important in controlling the resistance parameters, including adult mortality, F1 insects which emerged, Median Development Period, Index of Susceptibility and Grain damage. Two provitamin-A inbred lines, CLHP0014 and CLHP0005 showed high GCA effects for reduced infestation with storage weevil. Broad sense heritability was moderate (0.19 ≤ H2 ≤ 0.59) and Narrow sense heritability (h2) was low ranging from 0.19 to 0.24. The two inbred lines with desirable GCA effect for weevil resistance could be used in the development of resistant breeding population. However, the low heritability of the trait observed, suggested that effective breeding methods be deployed to increase resistance to storage weevil, concurrently with research efforts to develop high nutritional quality maize varieties

Standardizing assessment practices of undergraduate medical competencies across medical schools: challenges, opportunities and lessons learned from a consortium of medical schools in Uganda

Introduction: health professions education is gradually moving away from the more traditional approaches to new innovative ways of training aimed at producing professionals with the necessary competencies to address the community health needs. In response to these emerging trends, Medical Education for Equitable Services to All Ugandans (MESAU), a consortium of Ugandan medical schools developed key competencies desirable of graduates and successfully implemented Competency Based Education (CBE) for undergraduate medical students. Objectives: to examine the current situation and establish whether assessment methods of the competencies are standardized across MESAU schools as well as establish the challenges, opportunities and lessons learned from the MESAU consortium. Methods: it was a cross-sectional descriptive study involving faculty of the medical schools in Uganda. Data was collected using focus group discussions and document reviews. Findings were presented in form of themes. Results: although the MESAU schools have implemented the developed competencies within their curricular, the assessment methods are still not standardized with each institution having its own assessment procedures. Lack of knowledge and skills regarding assessment of the competencies was evident amongst the faculty. The fear for change amongst lecturers was also noted as a major challenge. However, the institutional collaboration created while developing competencies was identified as key strength. Conclusion: findings demonstrated that despite having common competencies, there is no standardized assessment blue print applicable to all MESAU schools. Continued collaboration and faculty development in assessment is strongly recommended

Knowledge of integrated management of childhood illnesses community and family practices (C-IMCI) and association with child undernutrition in Northern Uganda: a cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND: Childhood undernutrition is a major challenge in Uganda with a prevalence of wasting and stunting at 5% and 33%, respectively. Community and family practices of the Integrated Management of Childhood Illnesses (C-IMCI) was introduced in sub-Saharan Africa early after the year 2000. C-IMCI was postulated to address major childhood morbidity and mortality challenges with nutrition as one of the outcomes. The association between knowledge patterns of C-IMCI and undernutrition has not been fully established especially in sub-Saharan Africa. This study was done to address the prevalence of stunting and wasting and the association with the knowledge and practices of C-IMCI among caretakers in Gulu district, Northern Uganda. METHODS: This was a community-based cross-sectional study among 442 caretaker-child pairs. A standardized questionnaire was employed to assess the knowledge and practices of the C-IMCI among caretakers including four practices: breastfeeding, immunization, micronutrient supplementation and complementary feeding. Weight and height of children (6–60 months) were recorded. Wasting and stunting were defined as weight-for-height and height-for-age z-score, respectively, with a cut-off < -2 according to the World Health Organization growth standards. Logistic regression analysis reporting Odds Ratios (OR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI) was used to explore associations using SAS statistical software. RESULTS: The percentage of caretakers who had adequate knowledge on C-IMCI (basic knowledge within each pillar) was 13%. The prevalence of wasting and stunting were 8% and 21%, respectively. Caretakers’ lack of knowledge of C-IMCI was associated with both wasting (OR 24.5, 95% CI 4.2-143.3) and stunting (OR 4.0, 95% CI 1.3-12.4). Rural residence was also associated with both wasting (OR = 3.1, 95% CI 1.5-6.5) and stunting (OR = 1.7, 95% CI 1.0-2.7). Children younger than 25 months were more likely to be wasted (OR = 3.3, 95% CI 1.7-10.0). CONCLUSION: We found a low level of overall knowledge of the C-IMCI of 13.3% (n = 59). There is also a high prevalence of childhood undernutrition in Northern Uganda. Caretakers’ limited knowledge of the C-IMCI and rural residence was associated with both wasting and stunting. Interventions to increase the knowledge of the C-IMCI practices among caretakers need reinforcement

Prenatal development is linked to bronchial reactivity: epidemiological and animal model evidence

Chronic cardiorespiratory disease is associated with low birthweight suggesting the importance of the developmental environment. Prenatal factors affecting fetal growth are believed important, but the underlying mechanisms are unknown. The influence of developmental programming on bronchial hyperreactivity is investigated in an animal model and evidence for comparable associations is sought in humans. Pregnant Wistar rats were fed either control or protein-restricted diets throughout pregnancy. Bronchoconstrictor responses were recorded from offspring bronchial segments. Morphometric analysis of paraffin-embedded lung sections was conducted. In a human mother-child cohort ultrasound measurements of fetal growth were related to bronchial hyperreactivity, measured at age six years using methacholine. Protein-restricted rats' offspring demonstrated greater bronchoconstriction than controls. Airway structure was not altered. Children with lesser abdominal circumference growth during 11-19 weeks' gestation had greater bronchial hyperreactivity than those with more rapid abdominal growth. Imbalanced maternal nutrition during pregnancy results in offspring bronchial hyperreactivity. Prenatal environmental influences might play a comparable role in humans

Spectral Reflectance Reconstruction Using Fuzzy Logic System Training: Color Science Application

[EN] In this work, we address the problem of spectral reflectance recovery from both CIEXYZ and RGB values by means of a machine learning approach within the fuzzy logic framework, which constitutes the first application of fuzzy logic in these tasks. We train a fuzzy logic inference system using the Macbeth ColorChecker DC and we test its performance with a 130 sample target set made out of Artist's paints. As a result, we obtain a fuzzy logic inference system (FIS) that performs quite accurately. We have studied different parameter settings within the training to achieve a meaningful overfitting-free system. We compare the system performance against previous successful methods and we observe that both spectrally and colorimetrically our approach substantially outperforms these classical methods. In addition, from the FIS trained we extract the fuzzy rules that the system has learned, which provide insightful information about how the RGB/XYZ inputs are related to the outputs. That is to say that, once the system is trained, we extract the codified knowledge used to relate inputs and outputs. Thus, we are able to assign a physical and/or conceptual meaning to its performance that allows not only to understand the procedure applied by the system but also to acquire insight that in turn might lead to further improvements. In particular, we find that both trained systems use four reference spectral curves, with some similarities, that are combined in a non-linear way to predict spectral curves for other inputs. Notice that the possibility of being able to understand the method applied in the trained system is an interesting difference with respect to other 'black box' machine learning approaches such as the currently fashionable convolutional neural networks in which the downside is the impossibility to understand their ways of procedure. Another contribution of this work is to serve as an example of how, through the construction of a FIS, some knowledge relating inputs and outputs in ground truth datasets can be extracted so that an analogous strategy could be followed for other problems in color and spectral science.Samuel Morillas acknowledges the support of the Spanish Ministry of Science under grants PRX17/00384, PRX16/00050 and PID2019-107790RB-C22.Amiri, MM.; Garcia-Nieto, S.; Morillas, S.; Fairchild, MD. (2020). Spectral Reflectance Reconstruction Using Fuzzy Logic System Training: Color Science Application. Sensors. 20(17):1-18. https://doi.org/10.3390/s20174726S118201