IMPACT OF PROJECT INITIATION ON PERFORMANCE OF OUTPUT-BASED FUNDED SABASABA URBAN WATER SUPPLY PROJECT

Sabasaba urban water supply project was undertaken in order to increase the number of people in low-income areas within Murang’a County with access to improved water supply; to enable them to have clean water at their doorstep. In carrying out the project, World Bank employed Output-Based Aid scheme to make sure the project achieves its goals. Output-Based Aid funds predetermined project outputs unlike the conventional way of funding inputs. It serves to ensure prudent utilization of funds by shifting performance risk to the organization mandated to deliver services; it also does so by linking outputs to the ultimate payments; hence transparency during project implementation. The study sought to examine the influence of project initiation, project planning, project implementation, and project monitoring on the project performance of Output-Based Aid funded Sabasaba urban water supply project. The study adopted value chain and resource-based theories. A predictive correlation design was used. The target population was 56 employees drawn from Murang’a South Water and Sewerage Company which is the implementing agency for Sabasaba water supply project. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from the respondents. The study results were analysed using SPSS.  The study found that the project initiation had a statistically significant influence on the project performance.  The findings revealed that a unit change in the project initiation would lead to 0.404 changes in the project performance holding the other independent variables constant.  Article visualizations

On urban population densities: some sociepetal and sociofugal components of human interaction.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of City and Regional Planning. Thesis. 1965. M.C.P.M.C.P

Coffee is Men’s Business

AusAI

Gender Challenges to Financial Inclusion in Papua New Guinea

This paper draws on research undertaken in 2015 among coffee smallholders in Eastern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea (PNG), focusing specifically on some of the challenges faced by women coffee farmers in accessing financial services. Considering the importance given to financial inclusion in women’s economic empowerment programming by donors and other development practitioners, this research highlights that attention is needed to increase women’s literacy and numeracy. However, other factors play an important part, such as local gender norms which constrain women’s decision-making and movements.Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trad

Oil Price Slump: Investigating the Market Dynamics of the Role of the Oil Titans and its Global Impact

The oil price decline has been the subject of major captions in the last months and has been outlined virtually in terms of the economics of oil market with a number of media outlets accusing Saudi Arabia and its OPEC Trojan horse of deliberately bringing low the price of crude oil. The widely reported aim of this oil price slump brought about by Saudi Arabia and OPEC is to initiate severe harm to the world's major oil exporters – particularly Russia. Also, Saudi Arabia and its OPEC cartel have a vested desire in getting rid of higher-cost competitors, such as US shale oil producers, who will definitely be hurt by the slump in oil price. High prices spurred companies in North America to begin production of “difficult to produce crude” in the shale formation of North Dakota and oil sand of Alberta. Before the price slump, Saudi Arabia was selling its oil to China at a rebate. OPEC's rejection to reduce production looked like the plainest evidence yet that the oil price decline was indeed an oil price battle between Saudi Arabia and the US. This paper looked at the role of the various oil titans in the current oil price decline and investigates if the reasoning behind it goes beyond OPEC simply driving down the price of crude oil to gain back lost market share and get rid of US shale oil competition. Keywords: Crude Oil Price, OPEC, Shale Oi

Predictors of Length of Hospital Stay among Burns Patients in Mulago National Referral Hospital, Kampala- Uganda

Background: According to WHO (2014), burn injuries are a major problem to health care worldwide. Ninety five per cent of all burn cases occur in LMICs leading to prolonged and expensive hospital stays (WHO, 2009). In Uganda, burn injuries account for 11% of all childhood injuries (Nakitto & Lett, 2010). Burns Unit at Mulago National Referral Hospital is the only specialized burns care unit in the country. However, it was observed that patients in this unit spends unusually longer time in admission than the WHO (2015) recommended time. Thus the objective of this study was to determine the predictors of length of hospital stay among burn patients in Mulago National Referral Hospital Kampala, Burns Care Unit from July, 2014 to June, 2015.Methods: A retrospective study design was used by reviewing medical records of patients discharged from the Burns Care Unit from July, 2014 to June, 2015. Results: More than half (57.1%) of the patients in the study were male with children 5 years and below constituting 55.2%. The majority of patients (86.2%) got burnt at home. The average length of stay for patients was 24.3 days (±22.1 days). The degree/ depth of burns (OR=44.22, 95% CI =10.86-180.08, P=0.000) was the single most significant predictor of length of stay of patients with burns at multivariate analysis level. Keywords: Burns, length of stay, predictor

N-P co-limitation of primary production and response of arthropods to N and P in early primary succession on Mount St. Helens Volcano

Background: The effect of low nutrient availability on plant-consumer interactions during early succession is poorly understood. The low productivity and complexity of primary successional communities are expected to limit diversity and abundance of arthropods, but few studies have examined arthropod responses to enhanced nutrient supply in this context. We investigated the effects of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) addition on plant productivity and arthropod abundance on 24-yr-old soils at Mount St. Helens volcano. Methodology/Principal Findings:We measured the relative abundance of eight arthropod orders and five families in plots that received N, P, or no nutrients for 3-5 years. We also measured plant % cover, leaf %N, and plant diversity. Vegetation responded rapidly to N addition but showed a lagged response to P that, combined with evidence of increased N fixation, suggested P-limitation to N availability. After 3 yrs of fertilization, orthopterans (primarily Anabrus simplex (Tettigoniidae) and Melanoplus spp (Acrididae)) showed a striking attraction to P addition plots, while no other taxa responded to fertilization. After 5 yrs of fertilization, orthopteran density in the same plots increased 80%-130% with P addition and 40% with N. Using structural equation modeling, we show that in year 3 orthopteran abundance was associated with a P-mediated increase in plant cover (or correlated increases in resource quality), whereas in year 5 orthopteran density was not related to cover, diversity or plant %N, but rather to unmeasured effects of P, such as its influence on other aspects of resource quality. Conclusions/Significance:The marked surprising response to P by orthopterans, combined with a previous observation of P-limitation in lepidopteran herbivores at these sites, suggests that P-mediated effects of food quantity or quality are critical to insect herbivores in this N-P co-limited primary successional system. Our results also support a previous suggestion that the availability of N in these soils is P-limited. © 2010 Bishop et al

Seasonal H2O and CO2 Ice Cycles at the Mars Phoenix Landing Site: 1. Prelanding CRISM and HiRISE Observations

The condensation, evolution, and sublimation of seasonal water and carbon dioxide ices were characterized at the Mars Phoenix landing site from Martian northern midsummer to midspring (Ls ∼ 142° – Ls ∼ 60°) for the year prior to the Phoenix landing on 25 May 2008. Ice relative abundances and grain sizes were estimated using data from the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars and High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment aboard Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and a nonlinear mixing model. Water ice first appeared at the Phoenix landing site during the afternoon in late summer (Ls ∼ 167°) as an optically thin layer on top of soil. CO2 ice appeared after the fall equinox. By late winter (Ls ∼ 344°), the site was covered by relatively pure CO2 ice (∼30 cm thick), with a small amount of ∼100 μm diameter water ice and soil. As spring progressed, CO2 ice grain sizes gradually decreased, a change interpreted to result from granulation during sublimation losses. The combined effect of CO2 sublimation and decreasing H2O ice grain sizes allowed H2O ice to dominate spectra during the spring and significantly brightened the surface. CO2 ice disappeared by early spring (Ls ∼ 34°) and H2O ice by midspring (Ls ∼ 59°). Spring defrosting was not uniform and occurred more rapidly over the centers of polygons and geomorphic units with relatively higher thermal inertia values

Seasonal H2O and CO2 Ice Cycles at the Mars Phoenix Landing Site: 1. Prelanding CRISM and HiRISE Observations

The condensation, evolution, and sublimation of seasonal water and carbon dioxide ices were characterized at the Mars Phoenix landing site from Martian northern midsummer to midspring (Ls ∼ 142° – Ls ∼ 60°) for the year prior to the Phoenix landing on 25 May 2008. Ice relative abundances and grain sizes were estimated using data from the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars and High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment aboard Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and a nonlinear mixing model. Water ice first appeared at the Phoenix landing site during the afternoon in late summer (Ls ∼ 167°) as an optically thin layer on top of soil. CO2 ice appeared after the fall equinox. By late winter (Ls ∼ 344°), the site was covered by relatively pure CO2 ice (∼30 cm thick), with a small amount of ∼100 μm diameter water ice and soil. As spring progressed, CO2 ice grain sizes gradually decreased, a change interpreted to result from granulation during sublimation losses. The combined effect of CO2 sublimation and decreasing H2O ice grain sizes allowed H2O ice to dominate spectra during the spring and significantly brightened the surface. CO2 ice disappeared by early spring (Ls ∼ 34°) and H2O ice by midspring (Ls ∼ 59°). Spring defrosting was not uniform and occurred more rapidly over the centers of polygons and geomorphic units with relatively higher thermal inertia values