A framework to assess the authenticity of subjective information in the integration of blockchain technology - an application in supply chain management.

Blockchain technology has burgeoned due to the booming value of cryptocurrency capitalisation. It enables financial transactions to be carried out without a bank or a third party regulating them. Aspects such as privacy, trust, security, and transparency of a transaction are ensured by its immutability characteristics. These features of blockchain have resulted in it being used in other domains, such as supply chains. As the adoption of blockchain has expanded, it is currently being applied in domains where there is an equal chance of opinions, facts, and personal commitment being part of the business operation. One such area is proactive supply chain risk management (SCRM). Previous researchers have often highlighted the fraudulent behaviour of supply chain partners who do not disclose information on the risks that impact their operations. Despite this, very few researchers consider subjective information in the processing of blockchain. Those who take this into consideration acknowledge the presence of such information but do not utilize it in the processing of blockchain. Blockchain can address this problem by encoding each partner's commitment to SCRM and achieving consensus. However, before this can be achieved, a key challenge to address is the inability of existing consensus mechanisms such as Proof of Work (PoW), Proof of Authority (PoA) and Proof of Stake (PoS) to deal with information that does not have a digital footprint such as claims, opinions, promises, or communications between supply chain partners when they form a Service Level Agreement (SLA). This type of information is called subjective information. Addressing this research gap is very important if the true potential of blockchain in providing a single source of truth in a domain, irrespective of what type of information is used, is to be achieved. Thus, future research should investigate a new consensus mechanism with a unified framework that not only stores this information but determines its trustworthiness. This thesis addresses this gap by proposing the Proof of Earnestness (PoE) consensus mechanism which accounts for the authenticity, legitimacy and trustworthiness of information that does not have a digital footprint. This thesis also proposes the Subjective Information Authenticity Earnestness Framework (SIAEF) as the overarching framework that assists PoE in achieving its aim. SIAEF comprises four modules, namely the Identification module, the Mapping module, the Data collection & Impact determination module and Local consensus & Global legitimacy module. These modules provide a complete solution to identify subjective information in an SLA, detect the potential operational risk term which may potentially impact a responsible partner who commits to the subjective information, collate its real-world occurrences in the geographic region of interest, then determine the responsible partner's adherence to what it had recommitted. SIAEF assists in achieving PoE's aim of generating a digital footprint of a responsible partner’s earnestness in communicating subjective information. Once this footprint is generated, existing consensus mechanisms such as PoW, PoS or PoA are used to encode this information in blockchains. Each module is computed in the application of machine learning and natural language processing with recent techniques, metrics and evaluation. The applicability of SIAEF and PoE is tested in a real-world blockchain environment by deploying it as a Decentralized application (Dapp) and applying it in BscScan Testnet which is an official test blockchain network. The thesis will contribute to the existing literature by proposing a new consensus mechanism and its framework to assist the existing blockchain framework in verifying and validating the truthfulness of subjective information. Supply chain partners can use the SIAEF framework as a reference to choose a potential partner with whom to form an SLA, preventing opportunistic and fraudulent behaviours in supply chain management

Applying conflict coaching to handle Vietnamese family’s conflicts

Analisa diferentes processos de “conflict coaching”, bem como a possibilidade e a importância de implementação de “conflict coaching” no Vietnã, analisando os valores do método

Factor substitution in rice production function: the case of Vietnam

Vietnamese rice production has achieved remarkable success over the last couple of decades. This is due to land and market reforms, known as ‘Doi Moi’. There were noticeable changes in policies, such as land and production systems, which were transformed from a collective to an individual contract system in the 1980s. Vietnam made progress in rice production through the legalisation of the privatisation of farm properties and a huge investment in irrigation systems. The country not only ensured its domestic demand, but also started exporting rice and gradually became the second largest exporter in the world. An estimate of the Constant Elasticity of Substitution function (CES) for Vietnam’s rice production is essential for the government to design effective policy on agricultural production. This study makes the first attempt to estimate the nested CES model for Vietnamese rice production in 2012. The paper finds that the elasticity of substitution of Vietnam’s nested CES model lies between 0.44 and 0.46. The results indicate the weak substitutability between land and the capital-labour composite in the nested CES model. This also suggests that it is impossible to take labour as the substitutable factor for land and capital

Investigation of the estrogenic activity of Pueraria candollei variety mirifica extract on rats

Background: Pueraria candollei variety mirifica (PM) has been widely used as ingredient in many rejuvenating products. In this study, we aimed to assess the estrogenic activity of PM extract grown in Vietnam.Methods: Estrogenic activity of PM extract was estimated on immature female rats by using uterotrophic method to measure the weight of the reproductive organs. Estrogenic activity of PM extract also was investigated in mature female ovariectomized rats by evaluating the vaginal cells growth, reproductive organs weight, serum estradiol concentration.Results: Our results showed that PM extract at doses of 100 mg/kg, 200 mg/kg had increased the reproductive organs weight in immature rats and female ovariectomized rats. In addition, PM extract had increased the serum estradiol concentration and the vaginal cells growth by increasing the percentage of keratinocytes in female ovariectomized rats.Conclusions: Our results showed that PM extract has strong estrogenic activity in rats

The Relationship Between Corporate Social Responsibility and Employee Organizational Commitment in Multinational Corporations in Ho Chi Minh City

Based on the theoretical background of previous studies and the increasing context of personnel turnover in multinational companies, the authors conduct this study with the research objective to test and measure the impact of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) on employee’s organizational commitment through the effect of organizational identification and organizational trust. The combined qualitative and quantitative research methods were used to process and analyse the data. Research data was collected from 271 employees working in multinational corporations in Ho Chi Minh City. The study also discusses and provides some governance implications to help MNCs improve their social responsibility towards social and non-social stakeholders, employees, customers and the government as well as increase employee organizational engagement through identification and trust in the organization. Keywords: corporate social responsibility, employee organizational commitment, organizational identification, organizational trus

A High-Quality Genome Assembly of Striped Catfish (Pangasianodon hypophthalmus) Based on Highly Accurate Long-Read HiFi Sequencing Data

The HiFi sequencing technology yields highly accurate long-read data with accuracies greater than 99.9% that can be used to improve results for complex applications such as genome assembly. Our study presents a high-quality chromosome-scale genome assembly of striped catfish (Pangasianodon hypophthalmus), a commercially important species cultured mainly in Vietnam, integrating HiFi reads and Hi-C data. A 788.4 Mb genome containing 381 scaffolds with an N50 length of 21.8 Mb has been obtained from HiFi reads. These scaffolds have been further ordered and clustered into 30 chromosome groups, ranging from 1.4 to 57.6 Mb, based on Hi-C data. The present updated assembly has a contig N50 of 14.7 Mb, representing a 245-fold and 4.2-fold improvement over the previous Illumina and Illumina-Nanopore-Hi-C based version, respectively. In addition, the proportion of repeat elements and BUSCO genes identified in our genome is remarkably higher than in the two previously released striped catfish genomes. These results highlight the power of using HiFi reads to assemble the highly repetitive regions and to improve the quality of genome assembly. The updated, high-quality genome assembled in this work will provide a valuable genomic resource for future population genetics, conservation biology and selective breeding studies of striped catfish

Effects of guava (Psidium guajava L.) and bhumi amla (Phyllanthus amarus Chum et Thonn) extracts on haematological parameters and oxidative stress of striped catfish (Pangasianodon hypophthalmus) fingerlings exposed to high-temperature stress

Effects of guava (Psidium guajava L.) and bhumi amla (Phyllanthus amarus Chum et Thonn) on haematology and thermal stress mitigation of striped catfish (Pangasianodon hypophthalmus) were investigated. In a 42-day trial, fish were administered 4 diets as control (without extract), 0.2% P. guajava (Pg0.2), 0.5% P. amarus (Pa0.5), and a mixture of Pg0.2 and Pa0.5 (Mix). Fish were then subjected to temperatures of 27°C, 31°C, and 35°C for another 42 days. Haematological parameters were highest at 35°C, but these parameters were not significantly different from values recorded at 31°C on day 14 post-temperature challenge. The Pg0.2 diet modified red blood cells, haematocrit, and haemoglobin (p<0.05). The lowest glucose concentration was recorded in Pg0.2 (57.4±1.34 mg/100 mL) and Mix (58.9±1.87 mg/100 mL) groups after 14 days of thermal exposure. Glucose concentration surged on the third-day post-temperature challenge, then declined, and was maintained at 35°C until the end of the experiment which was not significant if compared to those at 27°C. Pg0.2 and Mix diets significantly reduced lipid peroxidation and enhanced catalase in gill and liver after 42 days. In the case average water temperature in the Mekong Delta remains below 35°C, the feeding diets for P. hypophthalmus administered Pg0.2 or..

Selective breeding of saline-tolerant striped catfish (Pangasianodon hypophthalmus) for sustainable catfish farming in climate vulnerable Mekong Delta, Vietnam

peer reviewedStriped catfish (Pangasianodon hypophthalmus), a freshwater species cultured mainly in the Mekong Delta region in Southern Vietnam, is facing a significant challenge due to salinity intrusion as a result of climatic changes. Given these evolving environmental conditions, selecting new strains with a higher salinity tolerance could make production of striped catfish economically feasible in brackish environments. In this study, we carried out a selection program aimed at developing a striped catfish strain able to survive and grow fast in a saline environment. To implement the selection program, we first collected males and females from different provinces in the Mekong delta. We next performed a factorial cross of these breeders to produce half- and full-sib families. When fish reached fry stage (47 dph), we put them in a saline environment (10 ppt) and subsequently kept 50 % of the fastest-growing fish after 143 days post hatching (dph). We repeated this mass selection procedure after 237 dph and 340 dph. We maintained in parallel a randomly selected group in saline conditions and a group of fish reared in freshwater to serve as controls. After crossing the selected individuals, we performed several tests on the next generation of fish to evaluate the effectiveness of selection after one generation in saline conditions. Average direct responses to selection were 18.0 % for growth and 11.4 % for survival rate after one generation of selection. We estimated a moderate realized heritability (0.29) for body weight. The genetic gains obtained in our study for body weight and survival rate after one generation of selection under saline conditions suggest that selection can be effective to improve ability of striped catfish to cope with saline stress. We conclude that our selection program has succeeded in developing a productive strain of striped catfish with better tolerance to salinity. © 2022 The Author