Trade Performance of Fruit and Vegetable Industry in Selected ASEAN Countries

This paper examines the trade performance for thirteen commodities in the fruit and vegetable industry in relation to that of selected ASEAN countries (Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand), based on Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) indicator. The analysis shows that Singapore has comparative advantage in 5 commodities (ground-nuts, hazelnuts, plums, apricots and walnuts), Philippines has comparative advantage in 3 commodities (tomatoes nes prepared or preserved, tomatoes whole or in peaces and cherries), Thailand and Malaysia has comparative advantage in 2 commodities (citrus fruits, fruit and vegetable juice, and tomatoes and apple juice, respectively) while Indonesia has comparative advantage in 1 commodity (cashew nuts). Malaysia has comparative advantage only in tomatoes and apple juice but comparative disadvantage in other commodities such as cashew nuts, walnuts and fruit and vegetable juice. The RCA index for apple juice in Malaysia is increasing over the years 2000 to 2006 indicating improvement in comparative advantage. However, the comparative advantage of tomatoes is constant.Trade performance, fruit and vegetable sector, revealed comparative advantage and ASEAN

Assessing students’ abilities in interpreting the correlation and regression analysis

A case study was carried out on students who were being exposed to some theoretical concepts of the correlation and regression topics to investigate their ability to compute and interpret the Pearson’s correlation coefficient and the slope of regression. The findings revealed that a low percentage of students (19.43%) successfully completed their interpretation of correlation coefficient and 33.18% of the students managed to interpret the computed value of regression slope completely. It was also found that the students’ ability to interpret regression slope was significantly associated with the ability to interpret the correlation coefficient correctly. It is hoped that the findings obtained from this study will shed some light on improving teaching practices of statistics educators so as to help students in gaining better understanding on interpreting the correlation and regression analysis.Keywords: correlation; Pearson; regression; coefficients; interpretation; students’ abilit

Trade Performance of Fruit and Vegetable Industry in Selected ASEAN Countries

This paper examines the trade performance for thirteen commodities in the fruit and vegetable industry in relation to that of selected ASEAN countries (Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand), based on Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) indicator. The analysis shows that Singapore has comparative advantage in 5 commodities (ground-nuts, hazelnuts, plums, apricots and walnuts), Philippines has comparative advantage in 3 commodities (tomatoes nes prepared or preserved, tomatoes whole or in peaces and cherries), Thailand and Malaysia has comparative advantage in 2 commodities (citrus fruits, fruit and vegetable juice, and tomatoes and apple juice, respectively) while Indonesia has comparative advantage in 1 commodity (cashew nuts). Malaysia has comparative advantage only in tomatoes and apple juice but comparative disadvantage in other commodities such as cashew nuts, walnuts and fruit and vegetable juice. The RCA index for apple juice in Malaysia is increasing over the years 2000 to 2006 indicating improvement in comparative advantage. However, the comparative advantage of tomatoes is constant

Trade Performance of Fruit and Vegetable Industry in Selected ASEAN Countries

This paper examines the trade performance for thirteen commodities in the fruit and vegetable industry in relation to that of selected ASEAN countries (Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand), based on Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) indicator. The analysis shows that Singapore has comparative advantage in 5 commodities (ground-nuts, hazelnuts, plums, apricots and walnuts), Philippines has comparative advantage in 3 commodities (tomatoes nes prepared or preserved, tomatoes whole or in peaces and cherries), Thailand and Malaysia has comparative advantage in 2 commodities (citrus fruits, fruit and vegetable juice, and tomatoes and apple juice, respectively) while Indonesia has comparative advantage in 1 commodity (cashew nuts). Malaysia has comparative advantage only in tomatoes and apple juice but comparative disadvantage in other commodities such as cashew nuts, walnuts and fruit and vegetable juice. The RCA index for apple juice in Malaysia is increasing over the years 2000 to 2006 indicating improvement in comparative advantage. However, the comparative advantage of tomatoes is constant

Askey-Wilson Type Functions, With Bound States

The two linearly independent solutions of the three-term recurrence relation of the associated Askey-Wilson polynomials, found by Ismail and Rahman in [22], are slightly modified so as to make it transparent that these functions satisfy a beautiful symmetry property. It essentially means that the geometric and the spectral parameters are interchangeable in these functions. We call the resulting functions the Askey-Wilson functions. Then, we show that by adding bound states (with arbitrary weights) at specific points outside of the continuous spectrum of some instances of the Askey-Wilson difference operator, we can generate functions that satisfy a doubly infinite three-term recursion relation and are also eigenfunctions of $q$-difference operators of arbitrary orders. Our result provides a discrete analogue of the solutions of the purely differential version of the bispectral problem that were discovered in the pioneering work [8] of Duistermaat and Gr\"unbaum.Comment: 42 pages, Section 3 moved to the end, minor correction

The mediating effect of empowerment in the relationship between transformational leadership and service quality

Transformational leadership has two salient characteristics: intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration. Recent studies in this area reveal that the effect of such leadership characteristics on job performance is indirectly affected by empowerment. The nature of this relationship is interesting, but little is known about the mediating effect of empowerment in leadership management models. Therefore, this study was conducted to measure the effect of transformational leadership characteristics and empowerment on service quality by using 110 usable questionnaires gathered from employees working in a city based local authority (CBLAUTHORITY) in Sarawak, Malaysia. Outcomes of a stepwise regression analysis showed that the relationship between empowerment and selected transformational leadership characteristics (i.e. intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration) is positively and significantly correlated with service quality. The result confirms that empowerment does act as a full mediating variable in the leadership model of the organization under study. This paper also discusses implications and limitations, as well as directions for future research

Evaluation of in vitro cytotoxicity effect of Clinacanthus nutans (Brum. f.) Lindau standardized leaf extracts

Purpose: To standardize Clinacanthus nutans (CN) leaf extracts, evaluate their contents of orientin, vitexin and isovitexin using a reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC) method, and also to investigate in vitro cytotoxicity of CN. Methods: CN leaf powder was macerated in distilled water, methanol, methanol (50 %), ethanol, and ethanol (50 %) over a hot water bath at 50 - 55 °C for 24 h. The extracts were standardized for total phenolic, flavonoid, proteins and polysaccharides content by ultra-violet (UV) spectrophotometry. Moreover, RP-HPLC was used to determine the contents of orientin, vitexin and isovitexin in the extracts. The anti-proliferative effect of the extracts against human colorectal carcinoma cell line (HCT116) and human colon normal cell line (CCD-18Co) was assessed using 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)- 2,5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay. The most active extract was fractionated using silica gel flash column chromatography to produce 20 fractions. All the fractions were subjected to the MTT test. Results: The extracts showed modest cytotoxicity against HCT-116 and non-cytotoxicity against CCD18Co cell lines. Of all the extracts tested, the methanol extract (CN-M) showed the highest activity of all the extracts and had the highest content of flavonoid and phenolic compounds. Twenty fractions were obtained from this extract. Fraction nos. F3, F4, F14 and F16 showed significant (p < 0.05) cytotoxicity against HCT-116, with F14 having the highest activity. Conclusion: Fraction F14 has the potential to be developed to anti-colon cancer agent. However, further studies including chemical profiling, mechanism of action and safety profile of this fraction are required

Cat's whiskers tea (orthosiphon stamineus) extract inhibits growth of colon tumor in nude mice and angiogenesis in endothelial cells via suppressing VEGFR phosphorylation

Cat's whiskers (Orthosiphon stamineus) is commonly used as Java tea to treat kidney stones including a variety of angiogenesis-dependent diseases such as tumorous edema, rheumatism, diabetic blindness, and obesity. In the present study, antitumor potential of standardized 50% ethanol extract of O. stamineus leaves (EOS) was evaluated against colorectal tumor in athymic mice and antiangiogenic efficacy of EOS was investigated in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC). EOS at 100 mg/kg caused 47.62 ± 6.4% suppression in tumor growth, while at 200 mg/kg it caused 83.39 ± 4.1% tumor regression. Tumor histology revealed significant reduction in extent of vascularization. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay showed EOS (200 mg/kg) significantly reduced the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) level in vitro (211 ± 0.26 pg/ml cell lysate) as well as in vivo (90.9 ± 2 pg/g tissue homogenate) when compared to the control (378 ± 5 and 135.5 ± 4 pg, respectively). However, EOS was found to be noncytotoxic to colon cancer and endothelial cells. In vitro, EOS significantly inhibited the migration and tube formation of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). EOS suppressed VEGF-induced phosphorylation of VEGF receptor-2 in HUVECs. High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) analysis of EOS showed high rosmarinic acid contents, whereas phytochemical analysis revealed high protein and phenolic contents. These results demonstrated that the antitumor activity of EOS may be due to its VEGF-targeted antiangiogenicity

STUDIES ON BACTERIAL POLLUTION IN LAKE MANZALA

Lake Manzala in Egypt have shown great changes in water properties including pH (7.4 to 8.4), total suspended solids (19 to 350 mg/l), total dissolved salts (1578 to 33480 mg/l), dissolved oxygen (2.25 to 8.45 mg/l), ammonia (0.00 to 44.8 mg/l) and nitrate (0.00 to 8.96 mg/l). In addition there has been quite high bacterial density in water and fish of the lake, including total viable bacterial counts and indicator organisms such as total coliforms, faecal coliforms and some other organisms such as Aeromonas spp., Vibrio spp. and Staphylococcus spp. However, the magnitude number of bacteria in water and fish was found to vary sometimes considerably and sometimes slightly depending on the site of sampling. Our results herein showed that LakeManzala is highly contaminated