Mobile Banking is a New Dimension in Banking System of Bangladesh: A Case Study on DBBL and bKash

This study is an earnest effort to find out the potentiality of mobile banking to provide basic banking services to the vast majority of unbanked people. This study is an exploratory research based on primary dat from field as well as secondary data from various publications, adopted with descriptive in nature. Research was gone through over 120 respondents focusing the point of using the mobile in banking, its safety, speedyness, cost, service nature, and of user class. Of two Mobile banking Bank, DBBL and BRAC’s subsidiary bKash, 120  respondents were selected for information acquiring.  61 % respondents think it saves time than traditional banking, the highest number of respondents use mobile banking for ‘fund transfer ’ service, that is 22%,. Out of 120 respondents 56%  replied it is less costlier than traditional banking, 100% respondents did agree that it is speedy, and 38% respondents are of upper class. Although this concept is new in Bangladesh but its potentiality is high due to handset availability and convenience. From this research, other researchers and policy makers will get an insight about the problems and prospects of mobile banking in Bangladesh.

Analysis of Longitudinal Data and Model Selection

An important issue in regression analysis of longitudinal data is model parsimony, that is, finding a model with as few regression variables as possible while retaining good properties of the parameter estimates. In this vein, joint modelling of mean and variance taking into account the intra subject correlation has been standard in recent literature (Pourahmadi, 1999, 2000; Ye and Pan, 2006; and Leng, Zhang, and Pan, 2010). Zhang, Leng, and Tang (2015) propose joint parametric modelling of the means, variances and correlations by decomposing the correlation matrix via hyperspherical co-ordinates and show that this results in unconstrained parameterization, fast computation, easy interpretation of the parameters, and model parsimony. We investigate the properties of the estimates of the regression parameters through semiparametric modelling of the means and variances and study the impact of this to model parsimony. An extensive simulation study is conducted. Three datasets, namely, a biomedical dataset, an environmental dataset and a cattle dataset are analysed. In longitudinal studies, researchers frequently encounter covariates that are varying over time (see for example Huang, Wu, and Zhou, 2002). We consider a generalized partially linear varying coefficient model for such data and propose a regression spline based approach to estimate the mean and covariance parameters jointly where the correlation matrix is decomposed via hyperspherical co-ordinates. A simulation study is conducted to investigate the properties of the estimates of the regression parameters in terms of bias and standard error and to analyse a real data set taken from a multi-center AIDS cohort study. The problem of model selection in regression analysis through the use of forward selection, backward elimination and stepwise selection has been well developed in the literature. The main assumption in this, of course, is that the data are normally distributed and the main tool used here is either a t test or an F test. However, properties of these model selection procedures in the framework of generalized linear models are not well-known. We study here the properties of these procedures in generalized linear models, of which the normal linear regression model is a special case. The main tools that is being used are the score test, the F-test, other large sample tests, such as, the likelihood ratio test and the Wald test; the AIC and the BIC are included in the comparison. A systematic study, through simulations, of the properties of this procedure is conducted, in terms of level and power, for normal, Poisson and binomial regression models. Extensions for over-dispersed Poisson and over-dispersed binomial regression models are also given and evaluated. The methods are applied to analyse three data sets. In practice, it often occurs that an abundance of zero counts arise in data where a discrete generalized linear model may fail to fit but a zero-inflated generalized linear model can be the ideal choice. Researchers often encounter a large number of covariates in such model and need to decide which are potentially important. To find a parsimonious model we develop a model selection procedure using the score test, the Wald test and the likelihood ratio test; also the AIC and the BIC are included in the comparison. Simulation studies are carried out to investigate the performance of these procedures, in terms of level and power, for zero-inflated Poisson and zero-inflated binomial regression models. The methodology is illustrated through two real examples

An explorative treatment of idiosyncratic supposition of management values in banking sector in light of Hofstede philosophy

Within the differences in culture, impeccable managing capacities leads to be innovative in business practices, better learning opportunities within the organizations and ensure sustainable sources of competitive advantages. Organizational stability and control mechanism, rules and policies, flexibility, discretion, innovation, creativity, risk taking ability, professional growth and the acquisition of new professional knowledge and skills, result oriented, coordination, efficiency and hard driving competitiveness that are aligned with the culture. This paper is based on the opportunity to make compare cultural dimension in banking sector in Bangladesh with the assist of Hofstede philosophy. Primary data has been used for determining the idiosyncratic supposition of management values in banking sector, but for accomplishing this explorative treatment there is inconsistency and disparity between the two categories in banks in values, philosophy, appreciative people’s conceptions, control mechanism, role and affiliation. Adaptability and appreciating values and attitudes consequence to advancing competencies and capabilities that leads to ensure sustainable growth and achieving competitive advantages. Key words: competitive advantages, innovation, creativity, control mechanism, values, attitud

Reducing the environmental impact of surgery on a global scale: systematic review and co-prioritization with healthcare workers in 132 countries

Abstract Background Healthcare cannot achieve net-zero carbon without addressing operating theatres. The aim of this study was to prioritize feasible interventions to reduce the environmental impact of operating theatres. Methods This study adopted a four-phase Delphi consensus co-prioritization methodology. In phase 1, a systematic review of published interventions and global consultation of perioperative healthcare professionals were used to longlist interventions. In phase 2, iterative thematic analysis consolidated comparable interventions into a shortlist. In phase 3, the shortlist was co-prioritized based on patient and clinician views on acceptability, feasibility, and safety. In phase 4, ranked lists of interventions were presented by their relevance to high-income countries and low–middle-income countries. Results In phase 1, 43 interventions were identified, which had low uptake in practice according to 3042 professionals globally. In phase 2, a shortlist of 15 intervention domains was generated. In phase 3, interventions were deemed acceptable for more than 90 per cent of patients except for reducing general anaesthesia (84 per cent) and re-sterilization of ‘single-use’ consumables (86 per cent). In phase 4, the top three shortlisted interventions for high-income countries were: introducing recycling; reducing use of anaesthetic gases; and appropriate clinical waste processing. In phase 4, the top three shortlisted interventions for low–middle-income countries were: introducing reusable surgical devices; reducing use of consumables; and reducing the use of general anaesthesia. Conclusion This is a step toward environmentally sustainable operating environments with actionable interventions applicable to both high– and low–middle–income countries

A novel prototype and simulation model for real time solid waste bin monitoring system

This research deals with an exclusive solution to monitor the solid waste bin condition on real time. The system architecture is designed using wireless sensor networks. A set of carefully chosen sensors are used to measure the status of the bins and ZigBee and GPRS are used as communication technologies. The physical architecture of the system contains three levels such as smart bins for the measurement and transmission of bin status, gateways for storing and forwarding bin data to server and control station for storing and analyzing the data. After the framework design, a simulation is performed using Castalia to ensure the feasibility and accuracy of the system. The simulation is performed for ten bins and taking ten samples from each bin where a fi ll level threshold of 15 is considered. The simulation result shows that, the proposed system would be able to automate the solid waste monitoring process that helps to optimize waste collection route

Recovery and Reuse of Chromium from Tannery Waste Chrome-liquor using Solar Evaporation Process

Recovering and reusing chrome from chrome effluent is critical for improving the mass balance of the tanning process and implementing the zero liquid discharge concept in the tanning industry. Conventional chrome recovery methods require a large amount of chemicals or energy to recycle the chromium. Chrome recovery by solar evaporation has not been implemented yet in the tanning industry. It is mainly practised in seawater salt extraction. In this study, we demonstrate the construction of highly efficient solar evaporators, using photothermal materials. Our focus is on efficient solar-to-vapour conversion and chrome recovery. The average evaporation rate was calculated and found 38.69 mL/hour, which remained almost steady within 2.5 months of data collection. The highest temperature observed during the process was 108 °C and 62°C in the focal region and condenser respectively. After collecting the solid chromium, basicity was measured at 85.02%, and treated with sulphuric acid to achieve 33% basicity. Recovered chrome and fresh chrome at 0:8, 5:3, and 8:0 were used for chrome tanning and tested for various chemical and physical parameters of tanned leather. The shrinkage temperature of the produced leather was found to be more than 100 °C. Physical characteristics such as tensile strength and percentage of elongation test, stitch tear strength, ball bursting strength and flexing endurance showed better results than conventional methods. This new kind of research offers a promising solution that can reduce the environmental impact of the tanning industry while also providing a sustainable source of chromium for a low-cost strategy and high-performance evaporation approach