Effects of Taxation as an Alternative to the Dwindling Oil Revenue in Nigeria

The study investigated the effect of taxation as an alternative to the dwindling oil revenue in Nigeria for the period of 24 years covering 1994 to 2017; examine the effect of value added tax on economic growth in Nigeria; investigate the effect of petroleum profit tax on economic growth in Nigeria; determine the impact of company income tax on economic growth in Nigeria. The study employed Johansen cointegration and error correction model technique and specified real gross domestic product (RGDP) on petroleum profit tax (PPT), company income tax (CIT) and value added tax (VAT). The result of unit root test indicated that there is presence of stationarity among the variables at 2nd difference. The Johansen cointegration analysis indicated that there is a longrun relationship between tax variable and economic growth in Nigeria. However, the relationships between the variables were negatively related to economic growth in Nigeria. The ECM result was correctly signed and significant thereby incorporating the shortrun inconsistency in the model. However, the overparameterized error correction model result showed that the variables have short run association which effect can actually be felt in the long run. The result further showed that the short-run dynamics in the model has been corrected; giving the correctly signed and statistically significant ECM coefficient of about 48.73% increase. The result of parsimonious ECM showed that the ECM coefficients of the series is significant and correctly signed, thus validating the presence of long run relationship amidst the variables and that about 57.46% of the short run inconsistencies are corrected and incorporated into the long run dynamics, annually. Based on the result of the longrun cointegration, the study concluded that taxation have negative effects on economic growth in Nigeria but can impact positively if government give possible attention to it thereby serving as an alternative to the dwindling oil revenue. The study therefore recommended that government should ensure that taxation is properly managed in a manner that will accelerate economic growth, reduce inflation rate and generate employment in the country. The study further suggested that government should diversify the economy from being solely oil dependent, to other streams of income generation such as agriculture, solid minerals and gas, otherwise the ripple effect of our over reliance on crude export to the USA, will be devastating to the economy

Cassava Farmers’ Perception of Cassava Initiative: Implication for Cassava Transformation in Nigeria.

Cassava gained a leading role among cash crops in Nigeria following the establishment of the cassava initiative, making the crop become a white gold. The initiative aimed at making the crop a source of foreign exchange earner for the country. The study was carried out in Nigeria among members of the cassava growers association. The study covered those who had being members of the association for at least 10 years. Multi-stage sampling was used to select 290 respondents for the study. Males constituted 72.8% of the respondents, 76.9% were married with mean age of 48.4±12.8years, 65.5% had farming as their primary source of income and 53.8% had at least secondary school education. The initiative was favourably perceived among 55.2% of the respondents. For the success of the cassava transformation, respondents perceived that issues such as training on quality standards for export need to be adequately provided, agro-chemicals should be available at subsidised rate any time they are needed by the farmers. In addition, assistance of cassava inputs provided by the government should be adequate while strategies that ensure fair distribution of the resources be implemented. Adequate marketing channels for cassava were available with the initiative, Training on quality standards for export was adequately provided. Cassava initiative should reduce the cost of production in the cassava sub-sector. Key word: Initiative, Cassava, Perceptio

Production and Marketing Performance of Farmers Participating in Cassava Initiative across Agricultural Zones in Nigeria

This study investigated the production and marketing performance of farmers participating in cassava initiative. Data were obtained from individuals who had at least 10 years membership of Cassava Growers Association (CGA) which constituted the target group in the implementation of the initiative. A total of 290 respondents were selected from the three cassava-growing zones (central, southwest and southeast) in Nigeria using multistage sampling procedure. Interview schedule was used to elicit information on cassava farmers’ enterprise characteristics, change in cassava production and marketing activities before and during initiative (performance). Descriptive statistics, production and marketing indices and ANOVA were used to analyse the data at p = 0.05. Mean farm size before the initiative was 1.2±1.1ha and  2.3±2.4ha after the initiative while mean yield was 14.1±7.1 and 20.3±8.4 tonnes/ha, respectively. Production performance was high for 14.5% ( ³12.58), moderate for 68.6% (1.8< <12.58) and low for 16.9% ( £1.8). Also, 17.2% ( ³14.98), 28.3% (0.56< <14.98) and 54.5% ( £0.56) had high, moderate and low marketing performance, respectively. There were significant differences in marketing performance (F=26.47) but no difference in production performance (F=0.795) across the cassava growing zones. The cassava initiative improved the production and marketing performance of the cassava farmers. Keywords: Cassava, production, marketing, performance

Official Development Assistance and Poverty Alleviation in Nigeria (1981-2017)

The aim of this study is to examine the long run equilibrium relationship between official development assistant and poverty alleviation in Nigeria over the period of 1981 to 2017 which past studies have failed to explore. Consequently, the study utilized data from UNCTAD, World Bank database, CBN Statistical Bulletin and Cointegration, DOLS and Granger Causality approach was used to address the objective of this study. However, the major findings in this study are summarized as follows. Firstly, there is a significant negative relationship between official development assistance and poverty level in Nigeria. However, FDI which also constitutes a strategic part of foreign capital in Nigeria does not contribute to poverty alleviation in Nigeria. Furthermore, official development assistance and poverty level in Nigeria have a bidirectional feedback. Due to the findings that emerged from this study, the following recommendations are made for the policy makers that whenever alleviation of poverty is the target of the policy makers in the country, the Nigerian government should be committed to the provision of a sound environment and good governance that can facilitate further inflows of official development assistance from the developed countries, especially G 7 countries. Also, the policy makers in Nigeria should ensure that ODA should be tailored towards projects and programs that have trickle down effects on the masses in the country

An Exploration of Clustering Algorithms for Customer Segmentation in the UK Retail Market.

Recently, peoples’ awareness of online purchases has significantly risen. This has given rise to online retail platforms and the need for a better understanding of customer purchasing behaviour. Retail companies are pressed with the need to deal with a high volume of customer purchases, which requires sophisticated approaches to perform more accurate and efficient customer segmentation. Customer segmentation is a marketing analytical tool that aids customer-centric service and thus enhances profitability. In this paper, we aim to develop a customer segmentation model to improve decision-making processes in the retail market industry. To achieve this, we employed a UK-based online retail dataset obtained from the UCI machine learning repository. The retail dataset consists of 541,909 customer records and eight features. Our study adopted the RFM (recency, frequency, and monetary) framework to quantify customer values. Thereafter, we compared several state-of-the-art (SOTA) clustering algorithms, namely, K-means clustering, the Gaussian mixture model (GMM), density-based spatial clustering of applications with noise (DBSCAN), agglomerative clustering, and balanced iterative reducing and clustering using hierarchies (BIRCH). The results showed the GMM outperformed other approaches, with a Silhouette Score of 0.80

Synergistic broad-spectrum antibacterial activity of Hypoxis hemerocallidea-derived silver nanoparticles and streptomycin against respiratory pathobionts

Respiratory tract infections arise due to the introduction of microbes into the airway, disrupting the normal, healthy, complex interdependent microbiome. The selective disruption of this community can be either beneficial or dangerous. Nanoparticles are a potential tool for modifying this population. Coated silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) were synthesized using ethanolic extracts of Hypoxis hemerocallidea (EEHH), a Southern African plant used extensively in traditional medicine and the source of many bioactive secondary metabolites. The room temperature reaction between silver nitrate and EEHH forms largely spherical AgNPs with an average diameter of 6–20 nm. These nanoparticles show similar levels of antibacterial activity as the broad-spectrum antibiotic streptomycin against Bacillus cereus, Streptococcus pneumonia, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeuroginosa, and Moraxella catarrhalis. However, the AgNPs synergistically increase the antibacterial activity of streptomycin when they are applied in combination (30–52%). AgNPs are reiterated to be promising dual-function antibiotics, synergistically enhancing activity while also acting as delivery agents for small molecules

Large Outbreak of Neisseria meningitidis Serogroup C - Nigeria, December 2016-June 2017.

On February 16, 2017, the Ministry of Health in Zamfara State, in northwestern Nigeria, notified the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) of an increased number of suspected cerebrospinal meningitis (meningitis) cases reported from four local government areas (LGAs). Meningitis cases were subsequently also reported from Katsina, Kebbi, Niger, and Sokoto states, all of which share borders with Zamfara State, and from Yobe State in northeastern Nigeria. On April 3, 2017, NCDC activated an Emergency Operations Center (EOC) to coordinate rapid development and implementation of a national meningitis emergency outbreak response plan. After the outbreak was reported, surveillance activities for meningitis cases were enhanced, including retrospective searches for previously unreported cases, implementation of intensified new case finding, and strengthened laboratory confirmation. A total of 14,518 suspected meningitis cases were reported for the period December 13, 2016-June 15, 2017. Among 1,339 cases with laboratory testing, 433 (32%) were positive for bacterial pathogens, including 358 (82.7%) confirmed cases of Neisseria meningitidis serogroup C. In response, approximately 2.1 million persons aged 2-29 years were vaccinated with meningococcal serogroup C-containing vaccines in Katsina, Sokoto, Yobe, and Zamfara states during April-May 2017. The outbreak was declared over on June 15, 2017, after high-quality surveillance yielded no evidence of outbreak-linked cases for 2 consecutive weeks. Routine high-quality surveillance, including a strong laboratory system to test specimens from persons with suspected meningitis, is critical to rapidly detect and confirm future outbreaks and inform decisions regarding response vaccination

Mieszanina miejska w trzech nigeryjskich miastach: Studium percepcji aktywności kontrolujących rozwój w Ibadanie, Osogbo i Ado-Ekiti

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine residents’ perception of development control activities in threecapital cities in Nigeria (Ibadan, Osogbo and Ado-Ekiti). This came about based on the recognition that jumbledevelopment hinders economic and environmental sustainability in cities. The perception study becomes imperativesince perception is adjudged a tool for proffering solution to different problems in the different human endeavoursand a method of getting policy information from the people that will be eventual subjects of the policy.Design/methodology/approach– The study used household survey through questionnaire administration. The threecapital cities were stratified into local government areas (LGAs). One local government area was selected in eachof the cities. Due to homogeneity of the cities in the nomenclature of political wards, two political wards wereselected in each of the local government in the capital cities. Across the cities, a total of 223 residents weresystematically sampled on which the designed questionnaires were administered.Findings – The study revealed that residents agreement and satisfaction with function of development controlagencies decreases with the age of the city. Impliedly the age of the city is inversely proportional to residents’agreement and satisfaction with development control activities. The study concluded that economic andenvironmental sustainability of cities is dependents on citizens’ embracement of development control activities.Research implications – The study is capable of generating hypotheses for future research in the area ofenvironmental studies, especially in the global south.Practical implications – The findings and recommendations of this study can provide information on future policymaking, review and implementation on development control and other related issues in environmental studies bothin the cities and others with similar setting.Cel – Celem artykułu jest zbadanie percepcji mieszkańców dotyczącej działalności kontrolującychrozwój w trzech miastach w Nigerii (Ibadan, Osogbo i Ado-Ekiti). Podstawą projekcji badań byłospostrzeżenie, iż chaotyczny rozwój utrudnia zrównoważony ekonomicznie i środowiskoworozwój miejski. Studium percepcji zostało uznane za słuszne, ponieważ percepcja jest rozpoznanajako narzędzie uzasadniające rozwiązania różnych problemów związanych z różnymi ludzkimistaraniami i jako metoda pozwalająca uzyskać politykom informacje od osób będącychewentualnymi podmiotami ich polityki.Układ / metodologia / /podejście – W badaniu wykorzystano badania ankietowe przeprowadzonewśród gospodarstw domowych za pomocą kwestionariusza. Do badań wybrano trzy stołecznemiasta w Nigerii i wyodrębniono w nich po jednym lokalnym obszarze rządowym. Ze względu nahomogeniczność miast co do nomenklatury dzielnic politycznych, w każdym obszarze rządowymwyselekcjonowano dwie dzielnice polityczne. Łącznie we wszystkich miastach dobrano próbę 223mieszkańców, wśród których przeprowadzono badania ankietowe.Wyniki – Badania wskazały, że zgoda i satysfakcja mieszkańców co do funkcjonowania agencjikontrolujących rozwój maleje wraz z wiekiem miasta. Na tej podstawie można stwierdzić, że zgodai zadowolenie mieszkańców z aktywności kontrolujących rozwój jest odwrotnie proporcjonalne dowieku miasta. We wnioskach stwierdzono, że ekonomiczna i środowiskowa podtrzymywalność wmiastach zależy od troski mieszkańców o działalności kontrolujące rozwój.Implikacje badań – Badania mogą służyć do stawiania i testowania hipotez w przyszłychbadaniach w obszarze środowiskowym, zwłaszcza w odniesieniu do globalnego Południa.Implikacje praktyczne – Wyniki i rekomendacje zaprezentowane w artykule mogą dostarczyćinformacji co do przyszłego kształtowania polityki, opiniowania oraz wdrażania rozwiązań narzecz kontroli rozwoju oraz innych powiązanych kwestii w ramach badań środowiskowych

Mieszanina miejska w trzech nigeryjskich miastach: Studium percepcji aktywności kontrolujących rozwój w Ibadanie, Osogbo i Ado-Ekiti

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine residents’ perception of development control activities in three capital cities in Nigeria (Ibadan, Osogbo and Ado-Ekiti). This came about based on the recognition that jumble development hinders economic and environmental sustainability in cities. The perception study becomes imperative since perception is adjudged a tool for proffering solution to different problems in the different human endeavours and a method of getting policy information from the people that will be eventual subjects of the policy. Design/methodology/approach – The study used household survey through questionnaire administration. The three capital cities were stratified into local government areas (LGAs). One local government area was selected in each of the cities. Due to homogeneity of the cities in the nomenclature of political wards, two political wards were selected in each of the local government in the capital cities. Across the cities, a total of 223 residents were systematically sampled on which the designed questionnaires were administered. Findings – The study revealed that residents agreement and satisfaction with function of development control agencies decreases with the age of the city. Impliedly the age of the city is inversely proportional to residents’ agreement and satisfaction with development control activities. The study concluded that economic and environmental sustainability of cities is dependents on citizens’ embracement of development control activities. Research implications – The study is capable of generating hypotheses for future research in the area of environmental studies, especially in the global south. Practical implications – The findings and recommendations of this study can provide information on future policy making, review and implementation on development control and other related issues in environmental studies both in the cities and others with similar setting.Cel – Celem artykułu jest zbadanie percepcji mieszkańców dotyczącej działalności kontrolujących rozwój w trzech miastach w Nigerii (Ibadan, Osogbo i Ado-Ekiti). Podstawą projekcji badań było spostrzeżenie, iż chaotyczny rozwój utrudnia zrównoważony ekonomicznie i środowiskowo rozwój miejski. Studium percepcji zostało uznane za słuszne, ponieważ percepcja jest rozpoznana jako narzędzie uzasadniające rozwiązania różnych problemów związanych z różnymi ludzkimi staraniami i jako metoda pozwalająca uzyskać politykom informacje od osób będących ewentualnymi podmiotami ich polityki. Układ / metodologia / /podejście – W badaniu wykorzystano badania ankietowe przeprowadzone wśród gospodarstw domowych za pomocą kwestionariusza. Do badań wybrano trzy stołeczne miasta w Nigerii i wyodrębniono w nich po jednym lokalnym obszarze rządowym. Ze względu na homogeniczność miast co do nomenklatury dzielnic politycznych, w każdym obszarze rządowym wyselekcjonowano dwie dzielnice polityczne. Łącznie we wszystkich miastach dobrano próbę 223 mieszkańców, wśród których przeprowadzono badania ankietowe. Wyniki – Badania wskazały, że zgoda i satysfakcja mieszkańców co do funkcjonowania agencji kontrolujących rozwój maleje wraz z wiekiem miasta. Na tej podstawie można stwierdzić, że zgoda i zadowolenie mieszkańców z aktywności kontrolujących rozwój jest odwrotnie proporcjonalne do wieku miasta. We wnioskach stwierdzono, że ekonomiczna i środowiskowa podtrzymywalność w miastach zależy od troski mieszkańców o działalności kontrolujące rozwój. Implikacje badań – Badania mogą służyć do stawiania i testowania hipotez w przyszłych badaniach w obszarze środowiskowym, zwłaszcza w odniesieniu do globalnego Południa. Implikacje praktyczne – Wyniki i rekomendacje zaprezentowane w artykule mogą dostarczyć informacji co do przyszłego kształtowania polityki, opiniowania oraz wdrażania rozwiązań na rzecz kontroli rozwoju oraz innych powiązanych kwestii w ramach badań środowiskowych