Elite preferences and transparency promotion in Kazakhstan

This paper evaluates the factors that shape the establishment of transparent institutions in resource-rich countries with a specific focus on Kazakhstan. Specifically, it draws upon in-depth interviews and analysis of key institutions to understand the pace and intensity of transparency reforms in the Central Asian state. It argues that external transparency promotion can lead to institutional reform only when it is matched with strong elite incentives in favor of reforms. Kazakhstan has had few incentives to comply with Western-initiated norms before 2014, an era of relative economic security. As a consequence, the political elite often stalled the successful implementation of reforms. However, the economic turbulence following the fall of oil prices and Russia's annexation of Crimea have motivated the Kazakh government to embrace the norm of transparency in order to attract foreign investment

Manpower Procurement Programme in Private Hospitals: Procedures and Problems

Private hospitals are privately owned and run a business enterprise which employs human resources to provide health services so as to achieve their goals. In procuring such manpower, they adopt various strategies in their recruitment and selection processes and procedures. However, these processes and procedures vary according to the size of the hospitals and do not always conform to standard procedures. This is particularly the case in small private hospitals. In this study, it was found that medium and large private hospitals adopt manpower procurement procedures that largely conform to established standard while small private hospitals do not. Keywords: Manpower Procurement, Private Hospitals, Nigeri

Time-Honoured Management Principles of Organizing in Private Hospitals in Enugu State, Nigeria

This study focuses on the implementation of time-honoured management principles of organizing in private hospitals in Enugu State, as a way of effectively manage private hospitals and ensuring that adequate and timely health care services are provided to the citizenry of Enugu State. The study examined the organizational structures of private hospitals with a view to determining their extent of conformity with time-honoured management principles of organizing. The null hypothesis was formulated as, “there is no non-conformity of organizational structures of private hospitals with established management principles of organizing”. To achieve the objective of this study, the survey research design was adopted, where the simple random sampling technique was used in the selection of sampling units and the data collected were presented descriptively. The hypothesis statement was tested with Chi-Square test statistic, which gave chi-square result of 30.03 > X2 critical 26.296. Hence, the null hypothesis was rejected, indicating that organizational structures of private hospitals in Enugu State are being operated not in conformity with established management principles of organizing. The study concluded by pointing out the need to ensure the implementation of organizational structures that conform with established management principles of organizing, particularly the time-honoured management principle of organizing and the need to penalize defaulting hospitals, whether big or small. Keywords: Time-Honoured, Management, Private Hospitals, Nigeri

The Impact of Financial Education on Poverty Alleviation of the Poor and Low Income Earners in Ikere Local Government of Ekiti State, Nigeria

The main objective of this study was to find the impact of financial education on poverty alleviation of the poor and low income earners among the customers of Amoye Microfinance Bank, Ikere local government of Ekiti State. The study adopted a descriptive survey research design and the target population was 5000. A sample of 10% totaling 500 customers were randomly selected for the study. A semi-structured, structured questionnaire and interviews were used to collect data for the study. Hypotheses were formulated and tested at 0.05 level of significance. The finding suggested that there was a relationship between financial education and poverty eradication. Based on the finding, it was recommended that the Amoye Microfinance Bank should invest in the financial education of their customers in order to achieve the long term objective of poverty eradication. Keywords: Microfinance Loan, Financial Education and Poverty Alleviation

Skin lesion classification from dermoscopic images using deep learning techniques

The recent emergence of deep learning methods for medical image analysis has enabled the development of intelligent medical imaging-based diagnosis systems that can assist the human expert in making better decisions about a patient’s health. In this paper we focus on the problem of skin lesion classification, particularly early melanoma detection, and present a deep-learning based approach to solve the problem of classifying a dermoscopic image containing a skin lesion as malignant or benign. The proposed solution is built around the VGGNet convolutional neural network architecture and uses the transfer learning paradigm. Experimental results are encouraging: on the ISIC Archive dataset, the proposed method achieves a sensitivity value of 78.66%, which is significantly higher than the current state of the art on that dataset.Postprint (author's final draft

Evaluation of consumers’ choice of wooden dining furniture in Southwestern Nigeria: A market strategy for furniture manufacturers and marketers

This study evaluated consumers’ choice of wooden dining furniture in Southwestern Nigeria to provide information that could guide business decisions by manufacturers and marketers of wooden dining furniture. Data were collected using semi-structured questionnaires administered on 345 randomly selected respondents between July and December, 2008. These were analyzed using descriptive statistics, ANOVA and Chi-square on SPSS 15.0 software. The result showed that 84.38, 94.44 and 82.14% of the respondents in Lagos, Ibadan and Osogbo, respectively, would change their dining set when damaged. The chi-square analysis showed a significant relationship between respondents with high income and showroom, and respondents with high income and roadside purchases (p<0.05). The relationship between respondents with low income and special arrangement with furniture makers in workshops was also significant (p<0.05). The determinants of consumers’ choice for wooden dining furniture were: durability, 89.26%; design/finishing, 80.43%; colour/grain, 63.64%; wood species, 52.31%; and wood grade, 48.12%. Only 19, 25 and 18% of the respondents in Lagos, Ibadan and Osogbo, respectively, had knowledge of wood species used for furniture making. The preferred wood species were: Mansonia altissima, 89.00%; Khaya ivorensis, 80.00%; Cordia millenii, 54.00%; Milicia excelsa, 28.00%; Terminalia ivorensis, 18.00% and Gaurea cedrata, 5.00%, respectively. There was a significant difference (p<0.05) in consumers preference for these wood species both within and between the cities. The study recommended increase use of durable Lesser Used Species (LUS) oftrees for producing dining furniture and location of showrooms to target high income earners

Bioinformatic analysis of dihydrofolate reductase predicted in the genome sequence of Lactobacillus pentosus KCA1

 Physiologic studies of Lactobacillus species show that some species cannot synthesize folate de novo, which is required for growth. Folate plays a critical role in regulating the amount of tetrahydrofolate in the cell that is utilized for DNA replication, and proliferation of the erythropoietic system. We recently sequenced the genome of Lactobacillus pentosus KCA1, isolated from a Nigerian subject. The genome has open reading frames coding for the complete genes required for folate biosynthesis. Our previous study shows that rats fed with L. pentosus KCA1 led to enhancement of haematological parameters. Bioinformatic tool such as ClustalW algorithm was used to analyze dihydrofolate reductase (folA/dfrA) encoded in the genome sequence of L. pentosus KCA1 for comparative multiple sequence alignments. I-TASSER was used to predict the 3-D model structure of the protein and potential active binding site residues. Result show that two unique amino acid substitutions were found in KCA1_1610 sequence at position 85 with alanine (A-Ala85), while other strains have aspartic acid (D-Asp) for other L. pentosus and threonine (T-Thr) for L. plantarum strains at the same position. The result suggests that dihydrofolate reductase can be used as a distinguishing marker between L. pentosus KCA1 and other pentosus including L. plantarum strains. The secondary structure prediction with I-TASSER revealed 5 alpha helices and 8 beta-strands. Twelve binding site residues were predicted in KCA1_1610 relative to the template protein 2zzaA in protein database (PDB). The predicted structure of KCA1_1610 dihydrofolate reductase can serve as a new template as an addition to structural genomics and generation of models for use in drug screening and physiological function inference.Keywords: Lactobacillus pentosus, folate biosynthesis, dihydrofolate reductase, probiotic