Financing Small and Medium Enterprises in Bangladesh – Issues and Challenges

. Now-a-days, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) have become an important sector that is supposed to play a pivotal role in boosting the economy of Bangladesh. But, SME financing is still facing some remarkable challenges that limit its potential success in contributing to the economy. Lots of thinking has contributed to the initiation and development of SMEs in Bangladesh. Now is the time to identify the challenges and making adjustments to the initial thinking. This paper is, therefore, an attempt to analyze various issues and challenges of financing this particular sector and find some worthy ways out to overcome these challenges. It will also survey various literatures and reports on the concerned field and recommend supporting actions to help this highly prospective industrial sector operate in a fully yielding manner

Potentiality of the Usage of Compressed Natural Gas for Competitiveness in Service Delivery Industries

. With the rising costs of gasoline, many vehicle owners are looking for alternatives of it. Compressed natural gas (CNG) has been tested for this very purpose in some countries and found as a better alternative so far. CNG comes from country's natural resources and it is clean and less costly to use. This paper is mainly an analysis of the potential benefits of using natural gas as a transportation fuel by the service delivery industries. It will examine CNG's potential contribution in reducing delivery and vehicle maintenance cost, saving money in the long run projects, improving fuel efficiency, enhancing physical safety and assuring environment friendly emissions of carbon monoxide or reactive gases for the service delivery industries

Multicriterial ranking approach for evaluating bank branch performance

14 ranking methods based on multiple criteria are suggested for evaluating the performance of the bank branches. The methods are explained via an illustrative example, and some of them are applied to a real-life data for 23 retail bank branches in a large-scale private Turkish commercial bank

Oxidative torrefaction for pulverized palm biomass using air

Torrefaction is one of the promising ways to utilize abundant amount of empty fruit bunch (EFB) and palm kernel shell (PKS) while upgrading the combustion properties of both types of palm biomass. However, the supply of costly inert gas during torrefaction process such as nitrogen in large industrial sector may not be economical. Therefore, in the present study, air is used instead of nitrogen for the torrefaction process. The EFB and PKS were torrefied separately in a 60 mm diameter and 300 mm length of horizontal tubular reactor under various temperatures of 150°C to 190°C and 210°C to 250°C, respectively for 30 minutes using air. The torrefaction with nitrogen was also performed for comparison purpose. At the respective maximum temperature, energy yields of the torrefied EFB for the case of oxidative (air) torrefaction and nitrogen torrefaction are around 95% and 88%, respectively while energy yields of PKS for the case of oxidative(air) and nitrogen torrefaction are around 69% and 83%, respectively due to the weight loss after removal of volatile matter during torrefaction process. Besides that, the calorific values are enhanced after being torrefied with air (mere 4% for EFB and 18% for PKS when the respective maximum temperature was used)

Mortality from gastrointestinal congenital anomalies at 264 hospitals in 74 low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries: a multicentre, international, prospective cohort study

Summary Background Congenital anomalies are the fifth leading cause of mortality in children younger than 5 years globally. Many gastrointestinal congenital anomalies are fatal without timely access to neonatal surgical care, but few studies have been done on these conditions in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs). We compared outcomes of the seven most common gastrointestinal congenital anomalies in low-income, middle-income, and high-income countries globally, and identified factors associated with mortality. Methods We did a multicentre, international prospective cohort study of patients younger than 16 years, presenting to hospital for the first time with oesophageal atresia, congenital diaphragmatic hernia, intestinal atresia, gastroschisis, exomphalos, anorectal malformation, and Hirschsprung’s disease. Recruitment was of consecutive patients for a minimum of 1 month between October, 2018, and April, 2019. We collected data on patient demographics, clinical status, interventions, and outcomes using the REDCap platform. Patients were followed up for 30 days after primary intervention, or 30 days after admission if they did not receive an intervention. The primary outcome was all-cause, in-hospital mortality for all conditions combined and each condition individually, stratified by country income status. We did a complete case analysis. Findings We included 3849 patients with 3975 study conditions (560 with oesophageal atresia, 448 with congenital diaphragmatic hernia, 681 with intestinal atresia, 453 with gastroschisis, 325 with exomphalos, 991 with anorectal malformation, and 517 with Hirschsprung’s disease) from 264 hospitals (89 in high-income countries, 166 in middleincome countries, and nine in low-income countries) in 74 countries. Of the 3849 patients, 2231 (58·0%) were male. Median gestational age at birth was 38 weeks (IQR 36–39) and median bodyweight at presentation was 2·8 kg (2·3–3·3). Mortality among all patients was 37 (39·8%) of 93 in low-income countries, 583 (20·4%) of 2860 in middle-income countries, and 50 (5·6%) of 896 in high-income countries (p<0·0001 between all country income groups). Gastroschisis had the greatest difference in mortality between country income strata (nine [90·0%] of ten in lowincome countries, 97 [31·9%] of 304 in middle-income countries, and two [1·4%] of 139 in high-income countries; p≤0·0001 between all country income groups). Factors significantly associated with higher mortality for all patients combined included country income status (low-income vs high-income countries, risk ratio 2·78 [95% CI 1·88–4·11], p<0·0001; middle-income vs high-income countries, 2·11 [1·59–2·79], p<0·0001), sepsis at presentation (1·20 [1·04–1·40], p=0·016), higher American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) score at primary intervention (ASA 4–5 vs ASA 1–2, 1·82 [1·40–2·35], p<0·0001; ASA 3 vs ASA 1–2, 1·58, [1·30–1·92], p<0·0001]), surgical safety checklist not used (1·39 [1·02–1·90], p=0·035), and ventilation or parenteral nutrition unavailable when needed (ventilation 1·96, [1·41–2·71], p=0·0001; parenteral nutrition 1·35, [1·05–1·74], p=0·018). Administration of parenteral nutrition (0·61, [0·47–0·79], p=0·0002) and use of a peripherally inserted central catheter (0·65 [0·50–0·86], p=0·0024) or percutaneous central line (0·69 [0·48–1·00], p=0·049) were associated with lower mortality. Interpretation Unacceptable differences in mortality exist for gastrointestinal congenital anomalies between lowincome, middle-income, and high-income countries. Improving access to quality neonatal surgical care in LMICs will be vital to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 3.2 of ending preventable deaths in neonates and children younger than 5 years by 2030

Kualitas Keagamaan Masyarakat Jambi dan Usaha untuk Memahami Alquran

This article is a part of a study to measure the quality of Muslim\u27s religious live in Jambi in terms of people\u27s understanding toward al-Quran and the study of their everyday social practices based on the Muslim holy book. Through a mix of data collection methods which consists of questionnaire, interviews with community leaders and experts as well as discussions with focus groups (FGD), the study found that the ability of Muslims in Jambi to understand the al-Quran and the community\u27s ability to implement socio-religious roles based on the understanding of al-Quran have been good enough at the level. Factors affecting the community did not reach a better level are due to the lack of ability to translate al-Quran, and understand al-Quran as a substantive source. Another factor why the quality of public understanding on the al-Quran is not maximal is the lack of motivation of the family and social environment to carry out religious activities, to socialize and improve behavior in worship

Pengukuran Kualitas Layanan Website EF2 Menggunakan Metode Webqual 4.0

Penyebaran COVID-19 menyembabkan pembatasan pada berbagai aspek kehidupan. Salah satunya adalah pendidikan. Pembelajaran secara daring merupakan Perubahan yang harus dilakukan. Tujuannya agar kualitas pendidikan tetap terjamin dengan baik. Penggunakan website dalam pembelajaran daring menjadi salah satu pilihan. Penggunaan website dalam media pembelajaran daring digunakan pada mata kuliah entrepreneurship di Universitas Bina Sarana Informatika. Website Entreprenuer Fair atau website EF2 digunakan sebagai penilaian proposal bisnis kelompok mahasiswa pada mata kuliah tersebut. Perlu dilakukan evaluasi dan pengembangan sehingga dilakukan pengukuran kualitas website. Webqual 4.0 digunakan untuk penilaian kualitas website EF2. Variabel Webqual yang digunakan adalah Kualitas Informasi, Kualitas Interaksi Layanan, Kualitas Antar Muka Pengguna, Usability dan Tingkat Kepuasan. Dari data yang didapatkan, terdapat 472 responden yang mengisi kuesioner dengan pertanyaan yang diajukan sebanyak 25 pertanyaan. Dalam mengolah data penelitian menggunakan aplikasi smatPLS untuk mengetahui tingkat validitas dan reabilitas dari data yang didapat. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa kualitas interaksi layanan, kualitas antar muka pengguna dan usability memiliki efek yang positif pada tingkat kepuasan, sedangkan kualitas informasi tidak berpengaruh positif pada tingkat kepuasan. Sehingga dapat disimpulkan bahwa bahwa kualitas interaksi layanan, kualitas antar muka pengguna dan usability mempengaruhi tingkat kepuasan pengguna website EF2. Sedangkan kualitas informasi perlu dilakukan perbaikan lebih lanjut.Kata Kunci : Website, Entrepreneur, Covid-19 dan Webqual The spread of COVID-19 causes restrictions on various aspects of life. One of them is education. Online learning is a change that must be made. The goal is that the quality of education is guaranteed to be good. The use of websites in online learning is an option. The use of websites in online learning media is used in entrepreneurship courses at Bina Sarana Informatika University. The Entrepreneur Fair website or the EF2 website is used as an assessment of student groups' business proposals for these courses. It is necessary to evaluate and develop so that the quality of the website is measured. Webqual 4.0 is used to assess the quality of the EF2 website. The Webqual variables used are Information Quality, Service Interaction Quality, User Interface Quality, Usability and Satisfaction Level. From the data obtained, there were 472 respondents who filled out a questionnaire with 25 questions asked. In processing research data using the SMATPLS application to determine the level of validity and reliability of the data obtained. The results showed that the quality of service interaction, user interface quality and usability had a positive effect on the level of satisfaction, while the quality of information did not have a positive effect on the level of satisfaction. So it can be concluded that the quality of service interaction, user interface quality and usability affect the level of satisfaction of EF2 website users. Meanwhile, the quality of information needs to be improved further