National Finance Commission Awards in Pakistan : A Historical Perspective

This study explores the evolution of fiscal resource distribution in Pakistan. Pakistan is a federation comprising four provinces, federallyadministered areas, and the Islamabad Capital Territory. Being a central type of government, most of the revenues are collected by the centre and then redistributed vertically between the federal and the provincial governments, and horizontally among the provinces. Provinces then also redistribute revenues among lower tiers of the government, through a revenue-sharing formula. A thorough look at the history indicates that this process has been complex and has a far-reaching impact. A less systematic approach has been adopted to decentralise the financial matters. Over time, the divisible pool has expanded due to heavy reliance on indirect taxes as well as improvement in the collection. Population is the sole distribution criteria, adopted in all NFC awards from the divisible pool. This has raised friction among the provinces, necessitating inclusion of other potential variables evolved from international best practices. In addition to that, absence of technical experts and permanency of the NFC is another impediment. The NFC is supposed to provide the framework for amicable distribution of resources between the federal and the provincial governments for the joint goal of development and prosperity.NFC, Pakistan, fiscal federalism, Rule and Discretion, political economy, Population, Subventions, Doing the Business of Government

National Finance Commission Awards in Pakistan: A Historical Perspective

This study explores the evolution of fiscal resource distribution in Pakistan. Pakistan is a federation comprising four provinces, federally-administered areas, and the Islamabad Capital Territory. Being a central type of government, most of the revenues are collected by the centre and then redistributed vertically between the federal and the provincial governments, and horizontally among the provinces. Provinces then also redistribute revenues among lower tiers of the government, through a revenue-sharing formula. A thorough look at the history indicates that this process has been complex and has a far-reaching impact. A less systematic approach has been adopted to decentralise the financial matters. Over time, the divisible pool has expanded due to heavy reliance on indirect taxes as well as improvement in the collection. Population is the sole distribution criteria, adopted in all NFC awards from the divisible pool. This has raised friction among the provinces, necessitating inclusion of other potential variables evolved from international best practices. In addition to that, absence of technical experts and permanency of the NFC is another impediment. The NFC is supposed to provide the framework for amicable distribution of resources between the federal and the provincial governments for the joint goal of development and prosperity.NFC, Pakistan, Fiscal Federalism, Rule and Discretion, Political Economy, Population, Subventions, Doing the Business of Government

Patient satisfaction in outpatient medical care: the case of Iraq

  Background: Healthcare providers are increasingly interested in patient satisfaction as an indicator to assess the quality of health services. This study investigates the level of satisfaction among Iraqi patients attending the outpatient (OP) clinic. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study conducted from October to December 2019 among outpatient attendees in two busiest centers in Iraq. A convenience sample of 235 (response rate of 88.0%) completed the self-administered short-form patient satisfaction questionnaire (PSQ-18). The independent variables included socio-demographic, economic, and self-perceived health status. Data were analyzed in SPSS, where descriptive analysis (mean ± standard deviation) and univariate (independent sample t-test, ANOVA test) and multivariate linear regression “Enter technique” was done at 0.05 level of significance and 95% confidence interval. Results:  The mean age of respondents was 39.3 (±14.8). The sample was mostly women (55.3%), and 37.4% in the age group of 30-49 years.  More than half of participants residing in the urban regions (54.5%) from families of monthly household income less than 500,000 Iraq Dinars (USD 400). However, the majority (70.6%) have the first visit to the OP clinic, and 53.6% self-perceived health as good or very good. Results of multiple linear regression showed that patients residents in rural regions (B= 5.4 , P <0.001), married (B= 4.8, P <0.001), unemployed (B= 4.7, P <0.001)  and low educated (B= 1.5, P <0.051)  exhibited higher service satisfaction score compared to urban residents, single, employed and high educated participants respectively. However, patients aged fifty years and more (B= -2.1, P <0.001) and those with poor health (B=-2.5, P <0.001) exhibited lower service satisfaction scores compared to young age patients and the healthy participants, respectively. Conclusion: The high demand for the use of health resources in metropolitan cities by the rural population indicates inequality in the distribution of health services and an increase in the rural-to-urban displacement

MOTIVATION ENHANCING HRM PRACTICES’ AND EMPLOYEE DEMOGRAPHICS ON AFFECTIVE COMMITMENT AMONG EMPLOYEES IN TEXTILE MANUFACTURING IN PAKISTAN

The current study is an attempt to probe the relationship of a setof motivation enhancing HRM practices & employee demographics with affective commitment among employees working in textile manufacturing organizations. A well-structured questionnaire tool was used to collect the data from 232 employees working on managerial positions. The Pearson coefficient of correlation and ANNOVA analyses revealed that system consisting of motivation enhancing HRM practices and demographic variable “age” were stronger predictors of employee affective commitment, the education level exhibited association at 0.08 significance level, the employee demographics: gender and job period posed no significant association with employee affective commitment. The findings are in relevance with past researches, practical implications and need for futureresearch are also discussed

Evaluation of health system in Iraq from people's point of view: a comparative study of two different eras

Background: Since the 2003 United States–British coalition military invasion, Iraq has been in a state of continuous deterioration at all levels, including the health sector. This study aimed to elicit the viewpoints of the Iraqi people on the current health system, focusing on many provided health services and assessing whether the public prefers the current health system or that was provided before the invasion. Methods: A cross-sectional survey designed to explore the Iraqi people’s opinions on their health system. A self-administered questionnaire using a multi-stage sampling technique was distributed in five geographical regions in Iraq to collect the data from the head of household between 1st October and 31st of December 2019. Multiple logistic regressions were recruited to determine the significant contributing variables in this study. Results: A total of 365 heads of households (response rate: 86.1%) with the mean age of 48.36 + 11.92 years (ranged 35-78) included in the study. Most of the respondents (61.4%) complained of healthcare inaccessibility, 59.7% believed that health resources were not available, 53.7% claimed a deterioration in the quality of care, and 62.2% believed that the political / media position did not contribute to positive changes during the past two decades. Indeed, most respondents (66.0%) believe that the current healthcare system is worse than before. In the multivariate analysis, there was a statistically significant relationship between the characteristics and opinions of the respondents. Old age group (p = 0.003), men (p = < 0.001), married (p = 0.001), low educated (p = < 0.001), rural resident (p = < 0.001), unemployed (p = 0.003), monthly income of less than USD 400 (p = < 0.001), consider themselves to be unhealthy (p = 0.001),  and those who think that people are unhappy now than two decades ago (p = 0.012) have a more negative opinion of the health system. Conclusion: Most Iraqis surveyed expressed disappointment from the health system after the 2003 United States–British Coalition military invasion. The current health system is faltering at all levels and does not meet the citizens' basic needs. Health Transformation Program (HTP) has become inevitable to develop an accessible, affordable, high-quality, efficient, and effective health system

Effect of medium type and foliar spray with concentrations of nano zinc, chelated iron and normal on the mineral content for strawberry seedlings Duch. Fragaria×ananassa

The study was conducted in a greenhouse at the department of Horticulture and Landscape Gardening, College of Agriculture, University of Anbar for the growing season 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 to study the effect type of the growth media and spraying with nano and normal zinc and iron on mineral content of Strawberry leaves. First factor (M) included three of agricultural media: (River soil and Peat moss 3:1), (River soil and 50% Coantail + 50% Alfalfa 3:1) and (River soil and poultry waste 3:1). The second factor (S) consisted of spraying with zinc and iron nano and normal with the following concentrations (0 mg L-1 spraying with distilled water, normal-Zn 50 mg L-1 , nano-Zn 10 and 20 mg L-1 , normal-Iron 150 mg L-1 , and nano-iron 20 and 40 mg L-1 ) in addition to the control treatment (distilled water) at dates (1/12, 20/12, 10/1 and 1/2).The test media culture showed a significant influence of mineral content of Strawberry leaves for both seasons except for the content of the leaves of zinc for first season. The medium (M3) has contributed to achieving the best results for leaves content of N, P, K and Fe ( for the two seasons and zinc for the second season. On the other hand, the treatments of spraying with Nano and ordinary zinc and iron showed a significant effects, while the treatments (S6 and S4) for two seasons achieved the highest values of Nitrogen, the treatments (S6 and S4) for first season and the treatment (S5) for second season achieved the highest values of Phosphor, the treatments (S2, S6, S1, S3 and S5) for first season and the treatments (S6 and S3) for second season achieved the highest values of potassium, the treatment (S3) for first season and the treatments (S3, S1 and S2) for second season achieved the highest values of Zink, while the treatments (S6 and S4) for two seasons achieved the highest values of Iron

Knowledge, attitude, and practice of mothers about complementary feeding for infants aged 6-12 months in Anbar Province, Iraq

Background: The understanding of what mothers think about breastfeeding helps in developing successful breastfeeding promotion programs. This study aims to assess the maternal knowledge, attitude, and practice about the complementary feeding for infants aged 6-12 months. Methods: A cross-sectional study designed to interview 219 mothers with children between 6-12 months. Data was collected between 1st March and 30th April 2019 from ten maternal and child health clinics (MCHCs) in Anbar Province, Iraq. SPSS version 16.0 was recruited to analyze the data. Descriptive and inferential statistics such as Chi-square used to present data with the significance level set at less than 0.05. Results:  The mean age of respondents was 27.76 ± 6.3 years, and 31% were at the primary school level. Two third (66.82%) of the surveyed mothers exclusively used breastfeeding to feed their infants. Most women (84.09%) have the correct knowledge about the best time to start complementary food. The vast majority of women (93.64%) refused to give vitamins to children even with signs of malnutrition. Conclusion: Although exclusive breastfeeding is common among mothers of the western region in Iraq, there is still a considerable percentage depend on the mixture of breastfeeding and bottle feeding. The positive impact of the family and society on mothers was evident. However, more attention should be given to improve knowledge, attitude, and practice through qualified healthcare providers

Toward Efficient Low Cost Highly Accurate Emotion Speech Synthesizer,

Abstract: A Text to Speech (TTS) system with the ability to express emotions is an interesting technology that is still under development. There have been multiple proposals to simulate emotion so far, and there are multiple dimensions for assessment. No system guarantees high score in all of these dimensions, this means that no system works in a direction to get low computation load, small database along with high accuracy and excellent voice quality. After all of these qualities are relative and fuzzy and there is no rigid grading system. In this paper we will propose a new path for research that will work toward improving all of the quality factors together, so that future work can come up with a more optimum solution for the emotional TTS systems

Association of smoking type, status, number times of smoking and their effect on infected people by COVID-19

Background: Smoking has a significant role in weakening the pulmonary immune system function. Infection with infectious agents can cause more serious outcomes in the pulmonary system among people who smoke than those who do not. Objective: To show the relationship between smoking and the progression of the infectious COVID-19. Patients and Methods: A questionnaire the following data was gathered from both sexes using a Google form: age, smoking status, smoking habits, blood type, and medical conditions. Results: Results: Statistical analysis indicated that there are highly significant differences between males and females, and older patients included in the study who are infected and non-infected with COVID-19 (P < 0.01), and there are significant differences among blood groups (P < 0.05). In regard to smoking status, there are highly significant differences in the disease severity between the never-smoking group compared to current smokers (P≤0.01, P≤0.05), respectively. This differences increase with the number of times of smoking, and there is no significant difference between types of smoking between infected and non-infected groups with COVID-19. Statistical analysis indicated that there are highly significant differences in the disease severity in the male and female groups who have not smoked compared to former smokers (P < 0.01). Conclusion: Recent studies have reported the real role of the virus in the health status of smokers. However, this study showed no strong relationship between the virus and smokers

CT angiographic determination of most frequent anatomic variations of coronary arteries in Erbil population

Background and objective: Computed tomography angiography is one of the best methods for knowing the detailed anatomy of coronary arteries and can successfully detect any variation of coronary arteries. Anatomic variations of coronary arteries have not been studied among Erbil population which is mostly inhabited by Kurds. This study was conducted to compare the incidence of the anatomic variations of coronary arteries in Erbil population with international standards. Methods: Variations of coronary arteries were retrospectively studied by using computed tomography angiography of 412 cases (214 males 198 females) with mean age 51.5 ± 13.5 years (mean ± SD) who underwent this procedure on suspicion of coronary artery disease. The main indication was chest pain in patients with low to intermediate probability of ischemic heart disease. The present study was carried out in the Department of Radiology, Surgical Specialty Hospital/Cardiac Center in Erbil city. Results: The right coronary artery was dominant in 86.4% of cases, while the left main coronary artery was dominant in 10.92% of cases. Co-dominance was observed in 2.67% of cases, and Double Ostia of right aortic sinus was observed in 25% of cases. Long left main coronary artery was observed in 10.68 % of cases. Myocardial bridging was observed in 7.04% of cases. Other variations were also observed, and their prevalence was recorded. Conclusion: Variations of coronary arteries among Erbil population were recorded and were near to the international standards