Achieving food security and climate change mitigation through entrepreneurship development in rural Nigeria: Gender perspective

Globally, problem of food security and climate change demands innovative strategies that seek to promote an integrated approach of supporting the full continuum of production, processing and marketing of food to be done. For this reason this paper contends that rural entrepreneurial development could serve as panacea to achieving food security and climate change mitigation. Gender perspective is viewed as significant to achieving this goal since there are more females engaged in rural entrepreneurial practices than male. In 2008, agriculture contributed about 42% to the GDP with a growth rate of 6.54%. Of the 66% of the populace engaged in agriculture, 92% is male and 8% is female. Further, data shows that there are over 75 million females, both adults and children, amongst the about 150 million Nigerians. The population of people living in rural Nigeria is estimated at about 48% as at 2007, meaning that over 72 million persons live there, made up of approximately 35 million females and 37 million males. Agricultural practices through food and livestock production contribute to climate change. As at 2002, arable land in the country was about 34% of the total land mass of about 910,768 km2. As 2003 livestock and poultry inventory was estimated at about 290 million. In addition, the competing uses of the various food and cash crops, as well as grain from Nigeria’s agricultural farmland have added pressure to the need for more land for food and cash crop as well as grain production. Desert encroachment and reduced rainfall have also affected livestock production. These factors have created food security challenges, with threats of hunger and poverty: 70% of the population lives on less than N100 (US $ 0.7) per day, about 60.8% of the population is malnourished; even though smallholder farmers constitute 80% of all farm holdings their production system is inefficient and it always results in regular shortfall in national domestic production; this makes food importation a common feature in the country. Secondary data were sourced to analyze the current situation and to proffer recommendations for achieving food security and climate change mitigation. Inventory of greenhouse gases emission from agricultural practices and livestock production in the country was assessed using Inter-governmental panel of climate change (IPCC) methodology. Cost-benefit analysis was then conducted for identified options that enabled informed suggested recommendations for entrepreneurship development in rural Nigeria viewed with gender perspective.Key words: Food security, climate change mitigation, rural entrepreneurship development, gender perspective

Experimental study on strain distribution in externally bonded FRP for shear strengthening of RC beams

2003-2004 > Academic research: refereed > Publication in refereed journalVersion of RecordPublishe

A hybrid numerical scheme for fractional-order systems

In this work we present a hybrid numerical scheme for the solution of systems of fractional differential equations arising in several fields of engineering. The numerical scheme can deal with both smooth and non-smooth solutions, and, the idea behind the hybrid method is that of approximating the solution as a linear combination of non-polynomial functions in a region near the singularity, and by polynomials in the remaining domain. The numerical method is then used to study fractional RC electrical circuits.The first, third and fourth authors would like to thankthe funding by FCT-Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology throughscholarship and projects: SFRH/BPD/100353/2014 and UID/Multi/04621/2013, UID/MAT/00297/2013 (Centro de Matem ́atica e Aplica ̧c ̃oes), respectively

Rare Z-decay into light CP-odd Higgs bosons: a comparative study in different new physics models

Various new physics models predict a light CP-odd Higgs boson (labeled as $a$) and open up new decay modes for Z-boson, such as $Z \to \bar{f} f a$, $Z\to a\gamma$ and $Z\to aaa$, which could be explored at the GigaZ option of the ILC. In this work we investigate these rare decays in several new physics models, namely the type-II two Higgs doublet model (type-II 2HDM), the lepton-specific two Higgs doublet model (L2HDM), the nearly minimal supersymetric standard model (nMSSM) and the next-to-minimal supersymmetric standard model (NMSSM). We find that in the parameter space allowed by current experiments, the branching ratios can reach $10^{-4}$ for $Z \to \bar{f} f a$ ($f=b,\tau$), $10^{-9}$ for $Z\to a\gamma$ and $10^{-3}$ for $Z\to aaa$, which implies that the decays $Z \to \bar{f} f a$ and $Z \to a a a$ may be accessible at the GigaZ option. Moreover, since different models predict different patterns of the branching ratios, the measurement of these rare decays at the GigaZ may be utilized to distinguish the models.Comment: Version in JHEP (discussions added, errors corrected

Revealing the electroweak properties of a new scalar resonance

One or more new heavy resonances may be discovered in experiments at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. In order to determine if such a resonance is the long-awaited Higgs boson, it is essential to pin down its spin, CP, and electroweak quantum numbers. Here we describe how to determine what role a newly-discovered neutral CP-even scalar plays in electroweak symmetry breaking, by measuring its relative decay rates into pairs of electroweak vector bosons: WW, ZZ, \gamma\gamma, and Z\gamma. With the data-driven assumption that electroweak symmetry breaking respects a remnant custodial symmetry, we perform a general analysis with operators up to dimension five. Remarkably, only three pure cases and one nontrivial mixed case need to be disambiguated, which can always be done if all four decay modes to electroweak vector bosons can be observed or constrained. We exhibit interesting special cases of Higgs look-alikes with nonstandard decay patterns, including a very suppressed branching to WW or very enhanced branchings to \gamma\gamma and Z\gamma. Even if two vector boson branching fractions conform to Standard Model expectations for a Higgs doublet, measurements of the other two decay modes could unmask a Higgs imposter.Comment: 23 pages, two figures; v2: minor revision and version to appear in JHE

Light dark matter in the NMSSM: upper bounds on direct detection cross sections

In the Next-to-Minimal Supersymmetric Standard Model, a bino-like LSP can be as light as a few GeV and satisfy WMAP constraints on the dark matter relic density in the presence of a light CP-odd Higgs scalar. We study upper bounds on the direct detection cross sections for such a light LSP in the mass range 2-20 GeV in the NMSSM, respecting all constraints from B-physics and LEP. The OPAL constraints on e^+ e^- -> \chi^0_1 \chi^0_i (i > 1) play an important role and are discussed in some detail. The resulting upper bounds on the spin-independent and spin-dependent nucleon cross sections are ~ 10^{-42} cm^{-2} and ~ 4\times 10^{-40} cm^{-2}, respectively. Hence the upper bound on the spin-independent cross section is below the DAMA and CoGeNT regions, but could be compatible with the two events observed by CDMS-II.Comment: 17 pages, 3 figure

Effective Dark Matter Model: Relic density, CDMS II, Fermi LAT and LHC

The Cryogenic Dark Matter Search recently announced the observation of two signal events with a 77% confidence level. Although statistically inconclusive, it is nevertheless suggestive. In this work we present a model-independent analysis on the implication of a positive signal in dark matter scattering off nuclei. Assuming the interaction between (scalar, fermion or vector) dark matter and the standard model induced by unknown new physics at the scale $\Lambda$, we examine various dimension-6 tree-level induced operators and constrain them using the current experimental data, e.g. the WMAP data of the relic abundance, CDMS II direct detection of the spin-independent scattering, and indirect detection data (Fermi LAT cosmic gamma-ray), etc. Finally, the LHC reach is also explored

Correlation Between Anesthesia Methods and Adverse Short-Term Postoperative Outcomes Depending on Frailty: A Prospective Cohort Study

Yan Feng,* Jia-Feng Sun,* Hai-Chao Wei,* Ying Cao, Lei Yao, Bo-Xiang Du The Affiliated Hospital 2 of Nantong University, Nantong City, Jiangsu Province, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Bo-Xiang Du; Lei Yao, Email [email protected]; [email protected]: This study aims to investigate how the type of anesthesia used during major orthopedic surgery may impact adverse short-term postoperative outcomes depending on frailty.Methods: To conduct this investigation, we recruited individuals aged 65 years and older who underwent major orthopedic surgery between March 2022 and April 2023 at a single institution. We utilized the FRAIL scale to evaluate frailty. The primary focus was on occurrences of death or the inability to walk 60 days after the surgery. Secondary measures included death within 60 days; inability to walk without human assistance at 60 days; death or the inability to walk without human assistance at 30 days after surgery, the first time out of bed after surgery, postoperative blood transfusion, length of hospital stay, hospital costs, and the occurrence of surgical complications such as dislocation, periprosthetic fracture, infection, reoperation, wound complications/hematoma.Results: In a study of 387 old adult patients who had undergone major orthopedic surgery, 41.3% were found to be in a frail state. Among these patients, 262 had general anesthesia and 125 had neuraxial anesthesia. Multifactorial logistic regression analyses showed that anesthesia type was not linked to complications. Instead, frailty (OR 4.04, 95% CI 1.04 to 8.57, P 0.05).Conclusion: In different frail populations, neuraxial anesthesia is likely to be comparable to general anesthesia in terms of the incidence of short-term postoperative adverse outcomes.Keywords: anesthesia, frailty, major orthopedic surgery, death, impaired walking abilit