Food security situation in northern Ghana, coping strategies and related constraints

This paper looks at the food security situation in three most deprived and poverty-stricken regions in the Northern parts of Ghana and examines how farmer households cope during food insecure periods. The study concludes that although farmers in these regions cultivate purposely for household consumption and sell the surplus, food was not available throughout the year in the farmer households interviewed. On the average staple foods produced lasted for seven months. Coping mechanisms during months of inadequate household food provision included migration to southern Ghana for wage labor, support from relatives and friends outside the regions, sales from livestock and household valuables as well as reduction of food intake and consumption of less preferred food. Erratic rainfall patterns, high cost of agrochemicals, lack of knowledge on improved farming and post harvest practices as well as lack of production credit and markets for farm produce were some of the constraints militating against increased production and improvement in food security. Measures to remove these constraints will therefore go a long way to improve the household food security situation in Northern Ghana

Exploring Possibilities to Enhance Food Sovereignty within the Cowpea Production-Consumption Network in Northern Ghana

Over the last years an important focus in the combat of hunger and malnutrition,particularly in Africa has been food security. This article explores possibilities for enhancing food sovereignty, as an alternative concept to food security and an alternative strategy for reversing hunger and malnutrition trends in developing countries. A combination of literature review, participatory appraisal and conventional survey methodologies are used to investigate the relevance of local cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) network regarding its importance vis-à-vis other crops, varietal choice, and consumption patterns in Northern Ghana from food sovereignty perspective. Findings reveal how people in poverty-stricken and hunger- hot- spot communities strive to conserve their biodiversity and production-consumption networks for posterity. Local cowpea varietal preferences are investigated for participatory breeding considerations to improve on seed access for sustainable production. Promotion of origin-based foods in the current fast growing globalised markets is recommended as a possibility to enhance food sovereignty for sustainable development in Afric

Assessment of Image Quality of a PET/CT scanner for a Standarized Image situation Using a NEMA Body Phantom. “The impact of Different Image Reconstruction Parameters on Image quality”

Radiologists and medical practitioners are working daily with images from integrated Positron Emission Tomography/ Computed Tomography (PET/CT) scanners in order to detect potentially lethal diseases. It is thus very important to ensure that these images have adequate image quality. For the staff responsible of quality assurance of the applied scanner, it is important to ensure that the reconstruction procedures and image protocols in use enable acquisition of image with a high quality with respect to resolution and contrast, while the data sets are containing as little noise as possible. The goal of the quality assurance work will be to continuously make sure that, data acquisition settings and especially the reconstruction procedure that is utilized for routine and daily clinical purposes, enables lesions or cancer cells and diseases to be detected. This master thesis project aims at evaluating a reconstruction algorithm (iterative reconstruction) and some key parameters applied in image reconstruction. These parameters include selected filters (Gaussian, median, Hann and Butterworth filter), selected full width at half maximum values (FWHM: 3, 5, and 7 mm) and image matrix sizes (128 x 128 and 168 x 168 pixels respectively), in order to provide information on how these key parameters will affect image quality. The National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA) International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) Body Phantom Set was used in this work. It consists of a lid with six fillable spheres (with internal diameters 37, 28, 22, 17, 13 and 10 mm respectively), lung insert, body phantom (which represent the background volume) and a test phantom. The work in this thesis project has been carried out using the radiopharmaceutical tracer an F-18 FDG, fluotodeoxyglucose, produced with a cyclotron, a General Electric’s PETtrace 6 cyclotron, at the Center for Nuclear Medicine/PET at Haukeland University Hospital in Bergen, Norway. The applied radiopharmaceutical F-18 FDG was produced in a 2.5 ml target volume at the cyclotron. After the production, this volume was delivered from the cyclotron into a 20 ml sealed cylindrical glass already containing 17.5 ml of non-radioactive water. The activity level in this new solution with 20 ml F-18 FDG and water was measured in a dose calibrator (ISOMED 2010TM). The solution was diluted further, in an iterative process, a number of times in order to acquire the necessary activity concentrations for both the selected hot spheres and the background volume. The aim was to obtain activity concentrations for sphere-to-background ratios of either 4:1 or 8:1. The sphere-to-background ratio in this work is the ratio between the radioactivity level in four small spheres (with diameters 22, 17, 13 and 10 mm respectively, and having a total volume of 9.8 ml for all the 4 spheres) and the radioactivity level in the main body of the applied phantom; the so-called background volume (9708 ml). The two bigger spheres (28 and 37 mm) were filled with non-radioactive water in order to represent areas without radioactivity, i.e. “cold spheres”. When the spheres and volumes under study were filled with the desired level of activity and the activity level was measured, the spheres were positioned into the applied body phantom and the phantom was sealed to avoid spillage. The prepared NEMA IEC body phantom was placed on the table of a Siemens Biograph 40 PET/CT scanner in a predetermined reproducible position and scanned using a standard clinical whole body PET/CT protocol. The acquired images were reconstructed. Three repetitive studies were done for each concentration ratio. For each experiment performed, the sphere-to-background ratios were either 4:1 or 8:1. A selection of different standardized reconstruction parameters and different image corrections were applied. This was done in order to study what impact changes of the reconstruction parameters will have on the image quality. The image quality being defined by a quantification of the measured relative contrast in the images studied. The procedures followed while performing the PET/CT were in compliance with the recommended procedure presented in the NEMA NU2 – 2007 manual (from the manufacturer of the NEMA IEC body phantom described above). The reconstructed images were analyzed manually on a PET/CT workstation and also analyzed automatically with python programming software specially developed for the purpose of this work. The image quality results obtained from analyzes of the reconstructed images when different reconstruction parameters were used, were thereafter compared to the standardized protocol for reconstruction of PET/CT images. Lastly, the results have been compared with other similar work on the same subject by Helmar Bergmann et al (2005).Master i Medisinsk biologiMAMD-MEDBIBMED39

Heterogeneous Nitrogen Losses: Cost-Effectiveness Analysis of Changes in Management Across South Dakota

The loss of nitrogen fertilizer into the atmosphere and waterways is of increasing concern for citizens and policy makers. This is particularly relevant for hypoxia in rivers, lakes, and oceans, but also relevant for policy makers in reducing the increasing concentration of greenhouse gases (GHG) in the atmosphere. GHGs trap heat in the atmosphere and include: carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases. Overall, the estimated contribution from the agricultural sector to GHG emissions was 9% in 2013 (EPA, 2013). Further, the addition of nitrogen to the soil through the use of synthetic fertilizers is a main contributor to nitrous oxide (N20) emissions. Approximately 74% of U.S. N2O emissions were from synthetic fertilizer applications according to the EPA (2013). However, these emissions are not spatially homogenous, nor homogenous across crop production systems. The objective of this study is to begin to spatially account for the heterogeneous nitrogen losses from nitrogen fertilizer applications on South Dakota farms. This study conducts a cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) to determine the best strategies, and areas, to reduce GHG emissions from nitrogen application in South Dakota. This form of analysis is done by spatially comparing the amount of emissions reductions per acre across the state, assuming alternative mitigation strategies and adoption rates. Using the environmental factors (climate type, soil texture, soil organic carbon, soil drainage, soil pH and crop type), and management decisions (no till, conventional till, and reduced till, crop rotations, and application timing), we assess the areas and methods in South Dakota that can be targeted for considering management changes to gain the most cost effective continuous improvement in stemming nitrogen losses. The purpose is to minimize costs from changes in management, but provide the maximum reduction in nitrogen losses. Spatial heterogeneity in GHG Emissions can vary considerably. For example, the coefficient of variation for N2O emission measurements typically range between 100 to 300% (Thornton and Valente, 1996; Snyder, C.S. et al., 2009). A switch from conventional tillage to reduced tillage and to no-till is expected to mitigate GHG emissions across all areas. However, it is important to spatially examine the heterogeneous effect on emissions reduction from mitigation efforts, given factors that contribute to heterogeneous GHG flux. This is particularly relevant in light of efforts to develop standardized metrics for determining GHG rates, and reductions from baseline, that may be used by agri-businesses and retailers for sourcing agricultural inputs. The intent of such effort is to provide an efficient method to promote food products and verifiable, sustainable marketing claims to consumers (Field to Market 2012 V2). Consequently, universally accepted management mitigation metrics may result in heterogeneous impacts to reducing emissions and costs, depending on site-specific environmental and soil factors that cannot be altered. Findings from this study will aid land grant extension personnel in targeting educational programs to areas where it is cost effective to enhance sustainable agriculture and mitigate GHG emissions from nitrogen fertilizer application. Results of the study will also inform stakeholders of the costs and trade-offs of changes in management decisions, such as timing of fertilizer application and fertilizer efficiency improvement methods (e.g. Brink et al., 2005). Management techniques, yields, and fertilizer applications data used for this study have been retrieved from USDA-ARMS data. Soil characteristics were obtained from NRCS soil data (GSSURGO), and crop rotations and locations were derived from USDA-FSA certified acres and the National Land Cover Database (NLCD). Arc-GIS software was used to combine the multiple data sets, into spatially homogenous response units. The Environmental Policy Integrated Climate (EPIC) model was used to simulate the homogenous response units to calculate all emission values. Simetar was then used to derive certainty equivalence values for changes in management and nitrogen runoff, which helped determine most effective management practices and the costs from our management control

On the Preorganization of the Active Site of Choline Oxidase for Hydride Transfer and Tunneling Mechanism

Choline oxidase catalyzes the two-step oxidation of choline to glycine betaine, one of limited osmoprotectants, with the formation of betaine aldehyde as an enzyme bound intermediate. Glycine betaine accumulates in the cytoplasm of plants and bacteria as a defensive mechanism to withstand hyperosmolarity and elevated temperatures. This makes the genetic engineering of relevant plants which lack the property of salt accumulation of economic interest, and the biosynthetic pathway of the osmolyte a potential drug target in microbial infections. The reaction of alcohol oxidation occurs via a hydride ion tunneling transfer from the substrate donor to a flavin acceptor within a highly preorganized active site environment in which choline and FAD are in a rigidly close proximity. In this dissertation, factors contributing to the enzyme-substrate preorganization which is required for the hydride ion tunneling reaction mechanism in choline oxidase have been investigated. Crystallographic studies of wild-type choline oxidase revealed a covalent linkage between C8M atom of the FAD isoalloxazine ring and the N(3) atom of the side chain of a histidine at position 99, and a solvent excluded cavity in the substrate binding domain containing glutamic acid at position 312 as the only negatively charged amino acid residue in the active site of the enzyme. The role of the histidine residue and the contribution of the 8á-N(3)-histidyl covalent linkage of the flavin cofactor to the reaction of alcohol oxidation was investigated in a variant form of choline oxidase in which the histidine residue was replaced with an asparagine. The role of the glutamate residue and the importance of the spatial location of the negative charge at position 312 was investigated in variant forms of choline oxidase in which the negatively charged residue was replaced with glutamine and aspartate. Mechanistic data obtained for the variant enzymes and their comparison to previous data obtained for wild-type choline oxidase are consistent with the residues at positions 99 and 312 being important for relative positioning of the hydride ion donor and acceptor. The residues are important for the enzyme-substrate preorganization that is required for the hydride tunneling reaction in choline oxidase

Exploratory and multidisciplinary survey of the cowpea network in the Tolon-Kumbungu district of Ghana: A food sovereignty perspective

An exploratory survey of selected deprived communities in the Tolon-Kumbungu district of northern region of Ghana was conducted in August 2007 by a multi-disciplinary team of social scientist, food technologist, plant breeder and food nutritionist. The survey sought to identify with farmers their critical agronomic needs and production constraints in order to develop appropriate breeding strategies, as well as cowpea varietal preference for improved processing technology development. A rural participatory and conventional survey approaches were used. Close to half of the interviewed farmers cultivate both improved and local varieties. It was realized that 33 and 22% cultivated only local and improved varieties respectively. Generally, farmers indicated preference for improved varieties due to market value but rather preferred local varieties for household consumption and food sovereignty purposes. The top three most preferred varietal traits mentioned by farmers for breeding considerations included yield, tolerance to diseases and pests and seed colour. Processors preferred white seed coat varieties due to their good whipping ability and short cooking period. Farmers stressed the role of local varieties in food sovereignty with the early maturing ones being the most significant in household food provisio

An evaluation of congruency of nursing staff values and organizational Vincentian values

This case study was an exploration of values-congruence between personal and organizational values in a healthcare setting. Previous research has found that alignment between the two improves organizational effectiveness. The setting was a 384-bed urban Catholic hospital with Vincentian values. The efficacy of Vincentian values is found only in the academic and religious literature, not in that of healthcare. Published studies on registered nurses\u27 values focus primarily on ethical reasoning and decision making. Employee values were defined using Rokeach\u27s conceptual model for instrumental and terminal values. Both are based on enduring beliefs with specific modes of conduct or end-states of existence and are personally and socially preferable. A small (N = 27) sample of nurses completed an electronic survey. Demographics included age, gender, religion, and ethnicity. Organizational values were defined as the 5 Vincentian values of the sponsoring health system. Results revealed consistency between the survey tool\u27s instrumental and terminal values and Vincentian values (17 of 36), and alignment with the organizations\u27 values measured in high (9 of 17) and moderate (5 of 17) levels. There were varying levels of congruence between the nurses\u27 personal values and the organizational values. The values of self-respect, capable, helpful, honest, loyal, and responsible had high levels of congruence. Equality, family security, broadminded, courageous, forgiving, and loving had moderate levels of congruence, and inner harmony had low congruence. Few differences were found among the demographic subgroups within the sample. Recommendations for the organization include more extensive values assessment to enhance organizational effectiveness for future leadership strategies and management direction. Support for values-based patient/family-centered care, such as tool development for goal achievement, competency evaluation, staff development, planning for healthcare services, and program development are the desired end products. Recommendations for further research include assessing the relationship between Vincentian values and other key areas, including communication, management decisions, leadership, ethical decision making/judgment, and patient care quality and safety. The avenues for study of Vincentian values in healthcare are almost as endless as the challenges and opportunities in healthcare today

E-Marketing and its Influence in the Delivery of Services at Guaranty Trust Bank (GT Bank Cape Coast)

This paper specifically looks at how electronic marketing is affecting and contributing to the service delivery in Guaranty Trust Bank (GT Bank Cape Coast Branch). The study uses questionnaires to investigate the level of influence the internet has on consumers in their choice and decision-making on financial service and also to determine the amount of expenditure GT bank spend annually on the use of electronic marketing. In terms of GT Cash Machine (ATM), clients were satisfied about, how the machine works, always is on good condition and perfectly working. From the statistics it can be seen that 90% of the clients approved of their service through the ATM machine. Overall, the management of GT bank should increase its activities on the internet and more sensitisation should be given to clients about its operation on the internet, so that clients will patronize its electronic services