Sorghum and food security in Southern Africa: present and future research priorities of technical scientists

A research paper on sorghum and food security in Southern Africa.Maize, sorghum and pearl millet are important summer cereals in the SADCC region. Maize is by far the dominant crop. Generally, maize is grown in good farming environments, sorghum in drier areas and pearl millet in hot dry conditions. The yield potential of maize and sorghum is about the same, but that of pearl millet is less (50-60 percent) when all three crops are well managed and under conditions of no stress. Africa is a traditional sorghum - millet area but maize has encroached over the last 50-70 years and the process is still taking place. The reverse is true in Latin America, particularly Mexico, Argentina, and Brazil where sorghum has encroached into traditional maize growing areas. The Buenos Aires district of Argentina is an example where maize was the dominant crop and it was yielding 1750 kg/hectare. Over a period of years in the early-mid 1970s, the average yield of both sorghum and maize increased to 2250 kg/ha and sorghum replaced maize in the drier parts of the district

Trust in the US-EU fruit and vegetable chain: Do US exporters understand EU importers?

Research on organizational and inter organizational trust has become an important field in management and marketing literature, as it is perceived as a pivotal aspect of business transactions. However, clarifications are still needed on the issue of whom we trust; is the person whom we are trading with trusted, or the organization, or just the product‐quality? Not only has this question not been answered within this field of research, neither have cultural differences have been described to any great extent. Additionally, if the perceived factors important to establish trusting relationships may or may not be the same on the buyers and the sellers side in international business transaction in food chains. The primary objective of this research study therefore is to identify how well US exporters understand the elements of trust that establish strong relationships with EU importers. The Analytical Hierarchy Process was used to evaluate the importance of different trust elements in interviews conducted with US exporters and EU importers of fruits and vegetables. Results are compared, providing both a picture of the important facets of trust, as well as whether the partners understand the perspectives of the other partner

Comparing UK and 20 Western countries' efficiency in reducing adult (55-74) cancer and total mortality rates 1989-2010: Cause for cautious celebration? A population-based study.

OBJECTIVE: Every Western nation expends vast sums on health, especially for cancer; thus, the question is how efficient is the UK in reducing adult (55-74) cancer mortality rates and total mortality rates (TMR) compared to the other Western nations in the context of economic-input to health, the percentage of Gross-Domestic-Product-expenditure-on-Health. DESIGN: WHO mortality rates for baseline 3 years 1989-1991 and 2008-2010 were analysed, and confidence intervals determine any significant differences between the UK and other countries in reducing the mortalities. Efficiency ratios are calculated by dividing reduced mortality over the period by the average % of national income. SETTING: Twenty-one similar socio-economic Western countries. PARTICIPANTS: The 21 countries' general population. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Cancer mortality rates, total mortality rates Gross Domestic Product and Efficiency Ratios. RESULTS: Economic Input: In 1980, UK national income was 5.6% and the European average was 7.1%. By 2010, UK national income was 9.4% being equal 17th of 21 averaging 7.1% over the period. Europe's 1980-2010 average of 8.4% yields a UK to Europe ratio of 1:1.18. Clinical output 1989-2010: UK Cancer Mortality Rates was the sixth highest, but equal sixth biggest fall, significantly greater than 14 other countries. UK Total Mortality Rates was the fifth highest but third biggest decline, significantly greater than 17 countries. UK's cancer Efficiency Ratios is largest at 1:301 and second biggest for Total Mortality Rates at 1.1341; the USA ratios were 1:152 and 1:525, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: UK reduced mortalities indicate that the NHS achieves proportionally more with relatively less, but UK needs to match European average Gross-Domestic-Product-expenditure-on-Health to meet future challenges

Beyond clustering: mean-field dynamics on networks with arbitrary subgraph composition

Clustering is the propensity of nodes that share a common neighbour to be connected. It is ubiquitous in many networks but poses many modelling challenges. Clustering typically manifests itself by a higher than expected frequency of triangles, and this has led to the principle of constructing networks from such building blocks. This approach has been generalised to networks being constructed from a set of more exotic subgraphs. As long as these are fully connected, it is then possible to derive mean-field models that approximate epidemic dynamics well. However, there are virtually no results for non-fully connected subgraphs. In this paper, we provide a general and automated approach to deriving a set of ordinary differential equations, or mean-field model, that describes, to a high degree of accuracy, the expected values of system-level quantities, such as the prevalence of infection. Our approach offers a previously unattainable degree of control over the arrangement of subgraphs and network characteristics such as classical node degree, variance and clustering. The combination of these features makes it possible to generate families of networks with different subgraph compositions while keeping classical network metrics constant. Using our approach, we show that higher-order structure realised either through the introduction of loops of different sizes or by generating networks based on different subgraphs but with identical degree distribution and clustering, leads to non-negligible differences in epidemic dynamics

A Look Ahead into the 1980s

Our bas~c oblect~ve 1s to generate a posltlve change Thls may mean a shlft from tradltlonal to technical agrlculture lnvolvlng credlt and other goods and servlces It may mean the generation of new hybr~dsIn a competltlve marketing sltuatlon where export Interests are of concern As research sclentlsts from a range of backgrounds. there are many common features In our prlorltles Nevertheless there are some dlfferences We need to seek ways of worklng together to maxlmlze our return on the total Investment In sorghum Improvement and productlon An end result 1s to provlde a better llvlng for the people that make thew l~vel~huofdro m agrlcultur

Sorghum breeding an International programme outlined

In little more than ten years a massive international breeding programme has produced sorghums that crop much better under a range of local conditions, but yields are still ten times higher in some countries than others. An extensive collection of germplasm, gathered from around the world and now readily available to breeders, offers new and exciting opportunities for breeding cultivars which combine a number of desirable characters that are not incorporated in any of the existing cultivars