Efficiency of Farmer Organisations in Supplying Supermarkets with Quality Food in Vietnam

The development of supermarkets in Vietnam, as in other emerging countries, goes along with an increasing concern on the part of purchasers for food quality. The paper investigates whether farmer organisations are able to help small-scale farmers get access to supermarkets, and the role that supermarkets and public support play in their emergence and development. It is based on case studies involving a number of stakeholders marketing vegetables, flavoured rice and litchi fruit in Vietnam. The interviews investigated patterns of horizontal and vertical coordination that link farmers to supermarkets, the distribution of costs and benefits between farmers and traders along the chains in relation to the strategy of quality differentiation. Eight farmer associations that work in the form of private commercial organisations are regular supermarket suppliers for the selected products. Their ability to supply supermarkets is related to the combination of functions they make available to their members, especially as regards training to improve quality (appearance, taste, safety), quality promotion and control, for which they receive public support, as well as their participation in flexible contracts with supermarkets, shops and schools. Supermarket supply through farmer associations increases farmer incomes when compared with traditional chains, yet the situation is reported to change with the increase in supermarket competition. The paper argues that changes in farmer organisation are not only due to supplying supermarkets, but also to public and international support to food quality improvement, which have been of benefit to supermarkets.Agribusiness, Industrial Organization,

3D surface reconstruction using dense optical flow combined to feature matching: Application to endoscopy

International audienceIn structure from motion (SfM) algorithms, the surface reconstruction performance strongly depends on the quality of the determination of homologous points between images. Classical feature matching-based methods as integrated in the state-of the-art SfM-algorithms are often inoperative for scenes including weak structures and textures (e.g., as those in medical endoscopic videos). This contribution introduces an effective solution based on the combination of dense optical flow and feature matching. The accuracy and robustness of the proposed method were validated using results obtained for a phantom with known dimensions and with patient data, respectively. Apart from the high performance obtained for cystoscopy and gastroscopy, the proposed solution has a high potential in other medical and non-medical scenes.Dans les algorithmes de structures à partir du mouvement (SfM), la performance de la reconstruction des surfaces dépend fortement de la qualité de la détermination des points homologues entre images. Les méthodes SfM de référence sont souvent inopérantes pour les scènes avec peu de structures et textures faiblement contrastées car elles reposent uniquement sur l'appariement de caractéristiques. Cette contribution présente une solution associant un flot optique dense à la mise en correspondance de caractéristiques. La précision et la robustesse de la reconstruction ont été validées via des résultats obtenus pour un fantôme avec des dimensions connues et avec des données patient en cystoscopie et en gastroscopie, respectivement. Plus généralement, cette approche a un fort potentiel pour toute scène peu constrastée, médicales ou non

Minimize the load reduction considering the activities control of the generators and phase distance

This study shows how to calculate the minimum load that needs to be reduced to restore the frequency to the specified threshold. To implement this problem, the actual operation of the electricity system in the event of a generator outage is considered. The main idea of this method is to use the power balance equation between the generation and the load with different frequency levels. In all cases of operating the electrical system before and after the generator outage, the reserve capacity of other generators is considered in each generator outage situation. The reduced load capacity is calculated based on the reciprocal phase angle sensitivity or phase distance. This makes the voltage phase angle and voltage value quality of recovery nodes better. The standard IEEE 9-generator 37-bus test scheme was simulated to show the result of the proposed technique

REMOVAL OF Pb2+ FROM AQUEOUS SOLUTION BY ADSORPTION ONTO COMPOSITE BASED ON EUCALYPTUS LEAF AND POLYANILINE

Composite based on eucalyptus leaf and polyaniline (EL-PANi) was prepared by chemical polymerization method. It showed that the function groups belonging to polyaniline and eucalyptus leaf were found through IR analysis and the nanostructure of composite was explained by SEM images. The adsorption of  Pb2+ was carried out onto composite in aqueous solution via varying pH, contact time, and its initial concentration. The experimental adsorption data fitted well into Freundlich adsorption isotherm model (r2 = 0.9873). The adsorption process followed pseudo-second order kinetic with r2 = 0.9995. The maximum adsorption capacity of Pb2+ onto that composite was 172.4138 mg/g  by Langmuir equation and KF was 58.7527 mg/g by Freundlich one

Application of AHP algorithm on power distribution of load shedding in island microgrid

This paper proposes a method of load shedding in a microgrid system operated in an Island Mode, which is disconnected with the main power grid and balanced loss of the electrical power. This proposed method calculates the minimum value of the shed power with reference to renewable energy sources such as wind power generator, solar energy and the ability to control the frequency of the generator to restore the frequency to the allowable range and reduce the amount of load that needs to be shed. Computing the load importance factor (LIF) using AHP algorithm supports to determine the order of which load to be shed. The damaged outcome of load shedding, thus, will be noticeably reduced. The experimental results of this proposed method is demonstrated by simulating on IEEE 16-Bus microgrid system with six power sources

On the Out of Distribution Robustness of Foundation Models in Medical Image Segmentation

Constructing a robust model that can effectively generalize to test samples under distribution shifts remains a significant challenge in the field of medical imaging. The foundational models for vision and language, pre-trained on extensive sets of natural image and text data, have emerged as a promising approach. It showcases impressive learning abilities across different tasks with the need for only a limited amount of annotated samples. While numerous techniques have focused on developing better fine-tuning strategies to adapt these models for specific domains, we instead examine their robustness to domain shifts in the medical image segmentation task. To this end, we compare the generalization performance to unseen domains of various pre-trained models after being fine-tuned on the same in-distribution dataset and show that foundation-based models enjoy better robustness than other architectures. From here, we further developed a new Bayesian uncertainty estimation for frozen models and used them as an indicator to characterize the model's performance on out-of-distribution (OOD) data, proving particularly beneficial for real-world applications. Our experiments not only reveal the limitations of current indicators like accuracy on the line or agreement on the line commonly used in natural image applications but also emphasize the promise of the introduced Bayesian uncertainty. Specifically, lower uncertainty predictions usually tend to higher out-of-distribution (OOD) performance.Comment: Advances in Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS) 2023, Workshop on robustness of zero/few-shot learning in foundation model

Risk Factors for Human Infection with Avian Influenza A H5N1, Vietnam, 2004

TOC Summary: Risk factors include direct or household contact with sick or dead poultry and absence of an indoor water source

Planning for Developing Students’ Statistical Literacy: A Research-Informed Framework Development

Teachers’ planning as a research area still receives little attention. This study focuses on developing a research-informed framework to assess teachers’ statistics lesson plans. Using a design-based research approach, we developed a framework that includes (a) two criteria related to learning intentions (clear and comprehensive), (b) four criteria related to task features (statistical literacy, statistical investigation, real data, multiple representations), and (c) one related to constructivist lessons. Then, the team provided professional development on statistical literacy and ways to elicit and develop it in the classroom. After that, the teachers discussed the framework and used it to revise their lesson plans. Also, teachers provided feedback to revise the framework. We discuss how the framework can offer a tool for researchers to examine teacher planning competence and teachers to reflect on their practice