Effect of Fulani Herdsmen Grazing Activities on Food Crop Production among Farm Youth in Nigeria

This study investigated the effect of herdsmen grazing activities on food crop production among farm youth in Nigeria. Data were collected from 120 farm youth through a structured interview schedule with a multi-stage selection process. Data analysis was done using appropriate statistics. The results reveal mean age and experience in farming of the youth were 29.03± 1.9 years and 11.11 ±7.22 years, respectively. Many (69.2%) of them were male with at least 77.5% having primary school education, and 60.88% had experienced the occurrence of Fulani herdsmen grazing activities in the past three years. In addition, 98.3 percent experienced a high effect of Fulani herdsmen grazing activities on their food crop production. Verbal warning (mean = 2.96) ranked highest among coping strategies adopted by farm youth, followed by local security (mean = 1.94) among others. At p<0.01, the perception of the grazing activities (r = 0.595), experience in farming (r = 0.411), and coping strategies (r = 0.446) had a substantial association with the effect of the Fulani herdsmen grazing activities on food crop production. The study then concluded that the Fulani herdsmen grazing activities had a high effect on the food crop production of the farm youth

Political Clientelism, Political Culture and Development in Africa

Culture, society and development are the three most pertinent factors associated with every human civilization; however, they are distinctive and relative. Thus, development exists distinctively in every society. Today, globalization has promoted and consolidated democracy – ‘liberal democracy’ – almost across the globe as the single ideology and the best form of government that must be practised for the protection of individuals’ fundamental human rights. However, the adoption of liberal democracy varies and continues to create a dichotomous marginality between the ‘capitalist West’ and the so-called developing nations with respect to its results. The pertinent questions are: what is the relevance of liberal democracy to Third World development? How important are the desirability, feasibility, conditions and possibilities of liberal democracy for a country where democracy is alien to its political culture? And how is the cultural and historical backdrop of the developing world different from that of the West? We will explore the importance of political clientelism in African political development and look beyond liberal democracy for an African-like democracy. This essay aims to contribute to our collaborative intellectual efforts by looking at the existence of development in human cultural patterns, the historical perspective of liberal democracy, its meaning, its validity, its relationship to African development, neo-colonialism and the global clientelistic structure for continuous dependency, as well as political clientelism importance to African development; by reconstructing the ontological notion of development to the Third World nations as envelopment- overt control of the progress of Third World nations by Global West and by suggesting a possible alternative for a sustainable development

Thin film ZnO-based resonators for integrated wireless applications

Ph.D.William D. Hun

Evaluation of aqueous leaf extracts of two antifungal plants for the control of powdery mildew on infested exotic peas (Pisum sativum L)

No Abstract. Plant Products Research Journal Vol. 10, 2006: 40-4

Pattern and Physiotherapy Management of Shoulder Pain A 5-Year Retrospective Audit of a Nigerian Tertiary Hospital

Shoulder Pain (SP) is a common musculoskeletal problem and it constitutes a source of referral and workload for physiotherapy. This study investigated the pattern and management of SP in a physiotherapy department of a tertiary hospital. A five-year case chart review (January 2005 to December 2009) of patients with SP referred to the outpatient physiotherapy clinic of University College Hospital, Ibadan, Nigeria was conducted. Data were gleaned on patients age, gender, occupation, referring diagnosis, physiotherapists impression, side of affectation, functional limitation, associated co-morbidities and impairments, pattern of treatment and outcome assessment tools. A total of 4.316 case charts were reviewed over the time period, SP accounts for 2.8% with a female to male ratio of 6:4. The mean age of the patients was 50.6±26.2 years and the age group for peak prevalence (43.8%) was 41-60 years. There was higher preponderance of left SP (51.2%) than right in the ratio of 5:4. SP resulted mostly from fracture (19.6%), osteoarthritis (10.7%) and dislocation (6.6%). SP led to functional limitation in personal care (23.1%), work (14.0%) and sleep (9.0%). The most prevalent musculoskeletal condition associated with SP was elbow pain (8.3%), knee pain (6.6%) and neck pain (5.0%) while hypertension (16.5%), diabetes (6.6%) and sickle cell (2.5%) were co-morbid medical conditions with SP. Reduced range of motion (73.6%), muscle atrophy (28.1%) and muscle weakness (27.3%) were the most associated impairments resulting from SP. Mobilization technique (76.0%), reciprocal pulley (62.8%) and hydro collator pack (62.0%) were often employed in the management for SP. The mean treatment duration of patients was 5.2±2.4 weeks. Outcome assessments were documented in 82.6% of the cases. Goniometer (28.9%), oxford muscle grading (19.0%) and verbal rating scale (15.7%) were the most frequently used assessment tools. Shoulder pain is not an uncommon condition presenting for physiotherapy among Nigerian patients and it constitutes a small burden on the physiotherapy care at a tertiary hospital. The pattern and management of shoulder pain in this study is similar to findings from previous studies from around the world. [Med-Science 2016; 5(1.000): 12-26

Effects of Dietary Crude Protein on Performance and Nitrogen Economy of Broilers

This study assessed the effects of dietary crude protein on performance and nitrogen economy of broilers. Chicks were allotted to 22, 20, 18 and 16% crude protein corn-soy diets in a completely randomized design for forty-two days. Several essential amino acids were observed to be deficient compared to recommendations for broiler chicks as the dietary crude protein level reduced. Feed intake, weight gain, feed to gain ratio, faecal nitrogen, nitrogen retention, anthropogenic potential and dressing percentage were influenced (P 0.05). Feed intake, weight gain, nitrogen intake and output were significantly (P < 0.05) depressed as the CP level reduced. However, the best (P < 0.05) nitrogen retention and percentage faecal nitrogen was recorded for broilers fed 20% crude protein diet. Serum total protein, albumin, uric acid, creatinine and glucose were affected (P < 0.05) across treatments. It was concluded that there is a limit to which dietary crude protein of broilers could be reduced without any detrimental effects on the performance and nitrogen economy of the birds, even when the requirements for methionine and lysine has been met, as several other amino acids could be limiting. Consequently, to achieve significant improvement in nitrogen economy and reduction in amount of faecal nitrogen, 20% crude protein diets could be fed to broilers. However, there may be need to further manipulate the amino acid profile of the diet so as to improve its performance to be at par with higher crude protein diets

Incorporating new technologies into teaching in South Africa

The constantly evolving technology landscape inevitably calls for technological integration in learning and education. It is essential in the world we live in today for every learning method to include the use of new technologies. The study's primary goal is to examine strategies to integrate modern technologies into teaching in South Africa. The paper strives to understand the state of education in South Africa; the government’s contribution to education so far; teachers’ attitudes and competencies; as well as, and the benefits that new technologies can offer the education system in South Africa. A systematic review of literature that relates to the infusion of conventional technologies into educational settings has been adopted. The research conducted in this paper demonstrated that integrating technology into the teaching-learning process can be a useful strategy for training educators and learners for improved learning and educational outcomes in South Africa. Furthermore, the study's findings revealed that many South African instructors have a negative attitude regarding the usage of modern technologies for teaching. The paper recommended that the government should prioritizes funding for education; and concluded that blended learning is best used as the instructional strategy in South African classes

Growth and carcass characteristics of Japanese quails (Coturnix coturnix japonica) fed natural propriety premix based diets

This study was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of two natural proprietary vitamin-mineral premixes on growth and carcass characteristics of Japanese quails. Four hundred (10 day-old) quails were randomly allotted to dietary treatments with 5 replicates of 20 chicks per treatment and the birds were fed ad libitum for 28 days. Four dietary treatments formulated with different vitamin mineral premixes; T1 -Optimum (commercial premix), T2- DietPro (natural premix), T3 - DietMix (natural premix) while T4 was without premix (control). The design of the experiment was a complete randomized design. The experimental diets were offered to the respective birds with water given ad libitum. Daily feed intake, body weight gain and feed conversion ratio of the growing quail were not significantly different (P&gt;0.05) among treatments. However, the eviscerated weight, warm carcass weight and dressing percent of quails varied significantly (P&lt;0.05) with the type of vitamin-mineral premix with DietMix (T3) having the highest values (89.12, 86.56 and 64.49%) while birds fed without premix (T4) had the lowest values (78.36, 75.16, 57.98) for all the parameters. The values of other primal cuts were statistically similar (P&gt;0.05). Therefore, it is concluded that substituting synthetic vitamin mineral premixes with natural vitamin mineral premixes in diets is possible with no adverse effects on performance and carcass characteristics of growing Japanese quail.Key words: Proprietary Premix, Growth, Natural premi

Incorporating new technologies into teaching in South Africa

The constantly evolving technology landscape inevitably calls for technological integration in learning and education. It is essential in the world we live in today for every learning method to include the use of new technologies. The study's primary goal is to examine strategies to integrate modern technologies into teaching in South Africa. The paper strives to understand the state of education in South Africa; the government’s contribution to education so far; teachers’ attitudes and competencies; as well as, and the benefits that new technologies can offer the education system in South Africa. A systematic review of literature that relates to the infusion of conventional technologies into educational settings has been adopted. The research conducted in this paper demonstrated that integrating technology into the teaching-learning process can be a useful strategy for training educators and learners for improved learning and educational outcomes in South Africa. Furthermore, the study's findings revealed that many South African instructors have a negative attitude regarding the usage of modern technologies for teaching. The paper recommended that the government should prioritizes funding for education; and concluded that blended learning is best used as the instructional strategy in South African classes