Cultural Diversity in Conflict and Peace Making in Africa

Contrary to common belief that Cameroon is a haven of peace in a turbulent Central African sub region, this paper demonstrates that the absence of war in the country does not imply that it is peaceful. Given the linguistic and cultural diversity of the country with its more than 289 ethnic groups and a colonial legacy of French and English cultures and languages, plus remnants of a German sub-stratum, it should be clear that there are many potential ingredients for conflicts in Cameroon. The politicians seem to have nurtured these cultural and/or linguistic diversities in ways that fuel conflict and can even spark civil war. The tension that results from these ethnic and/or linguistic and religious splinters is not overt, however, due to the repressive nature of the regime in place. However, this tension continues to grow, to the detriment of the country's socio-economic development. There is therefore an acute need for measures to defuse such cultural conflicts which have the potential of sparking future civil strife in the country.African Journal on Conflict Resolution Vol. 7 (2) 2007: pp. 193-21

Proton-pump inhibitor use is associated with a broad spectrum of neurological adverse events including impaired hearing, vision, and memory.

Proton-pump inhibitors, PPIs, are considered effective therapy for stomach acid suppression due to their irreversible inhibition of the hydrogen/potassium pump in the gastric parietal cells. They are widely prescribed and are considered safe for over-the-counter use. Recent studies have shown an association between PPI use and Alzheimer dementia, while others have disputed that connection. We analyzed over ten million United States Food and Drug Administration Adverse Event Reporting System reports, including over forty thousand reports containing PPIs, and provided evidence of increased propensity for memory impairment among PPI reports when compared to histamine-2 receptor antagonist control group. Furthermore, we found significant associations of PPI use with a wide range of neurological adverse reactions including, migraine, several peripheral neuropathies, and visual and auditory neurosensory abnormalities

Internal Controls, and the Incidence of Fraud in Microfinance Inststutions in the Southwest Region of Cameroon

This paper aims at investigating how internal controls affect the incidence and the levels of fraud in selected microfinance institutions in Cameroon. The primary method of data collection was implemented where questionnaires were issued to employees of selected microfinance institutions. The Ordinary Least Square technique of data estimation was implemented from which a regression analysis was run. Correlation analysis and descriptive statistical analysis were also among the analytical tools used for the paper. The finding shows a statistically significant negative relationship between sound internal control and fraud management policies and the incidence of fraud in the microfinance institutions

Implications of Infrastructural Development on Cameroon’s Economic Emergence

Coming at the wake of the quest for emergence in the country, this paper examines the implications of infrastructural development on the emergence of Cameroon. The paper uses secondary data from 1990 to 2012 collected from the World Development Indicators. Through the adoption of the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and subsequent application of the single equation Instrumental Variable General Method of Moments (IVGMM) and the VECM methodology and associated Impulse-Response predictions, the study finds that all strands of infrastructure (economic, social and financial) positively and significantly affect economic growth in Cameroon. Moreover, the study finds that in the class of economic infrastructure, telephone network, road infrastructure and energy (electricity) production are the most significant forms of infrastructure worth emphasizing in the growth process; education and health infrastructure are the main growth-promoting social infrastructures while the mobilizations of savings and granting of domestic credits are more profound in the class of financial infrastructures that promote economic growth in the country. Based on the forecasts provided by the Impulse-Response graphs, the paper further finds that the current state of infrastructural development would slowly plunge the economy to emergence as solicited by 2035. On the basis of this, the study recommends that while security infrastructure expenditures are being reduced, there should be a joint and simultaneous provision of economic, social and financial infrastructures to drive Cameroon towards the highly solicited emergence. Key Words: Infrastructure, Economic Growth, Principal Component Analysis, Cameroon, Emergence

Innovation, Quality Management and Competitiveness in the Food Processing Industry of Cameroon

With the intensification of global and national competition, the focus of companies is on how to achieve competitive advantage. This led the foundation of studies on innovation and competitiveness but there are inconclusive results. In this light, this study was out to examine the mediating effect of quality management in innovation and competitiveness in the food processing industry of Cameroon. This study adopted the cross sectional research design for the investigation. The primary source of data was used for this study through the distribution of questionnaires to the respondents. Data was collected from 335 managers drawn randomly from a population of 2564 food processing companies operating in Cameroon. Inferential statistics was used during the analysis of the data specifically the Baron and Kenny’s approach of testing mediation hypothesis. Based on the results, there were traces of a positive and significant direct effects of product, process and organizational innovations on competitiveness. In terms of the indirect effect, there was the partial mediation of quality management in the effect of product innovation on competitiveness. While quality management had no mediating effect on other innovations (process, market and organizational) on competitiveness

The Effect of Innovation on Competitiveness in the Food Processing Industry of Cameroon: A Mediating Effect of Quality Management

With the intensification of national and global competition, the focus of companies is now on how to achieve competitive advantage. With globalisation, Cameroon’s industry is facing specific difficulties such as unchecked competition from imports, internal weaknesses in output, low technology acquisition as well as poor links between industry and the institutional sector, making competition a problem for them. This led to the foundation of studies on innovation and competitiveness, but at this point, there are still inconclusive results. This paper focuses on examining the effect of innovation on competitiveness in the food processing industry of Cameroon, with a specific emphasis on the mediating effect of quality management. This study adopted the cross-sectional research design for its investigation. The primary source of data was used for this study, as it was current. This primary data was collected through the distribution of questionnaires to the respondents. Innovation in this study was captured in terms product, process, market, and organisational innovations. Quality management on the other hand was captured in terms of commitment to quality, employee involvement, customer focus, process monitoring, incentives, and recognition. In relation to competitiveness, the study focused on productivity, output growth, and market share. Data was collected from 335 managers of food processing companies drawn randomly after stratification from a population of 2564 food processing companies operating in Cameroon. This includes Douala, Yaounde, Ngaoundere, Buea, Bafoussam, Maroua, and Bertoua with 201, 40, 34, 3, 30, 17, and 10 as corresponding sample proportions respectively. Inferential statistics was used during the analysis of the data, specifically using Baron and Kenny’s approach of testing the mediation hypothesis. Based on the results, there were traces of positive and significant direct effects of product, process, and organisational innovations on competitiveness. On the other hand, market innovation was insignificant. In terms of the indirect effect, the study revealed a partial mediation of quality management in the effect of product innovation on competitiveness. Quality management, however, had no mediating role on other dimensions of innovation (process, market, and organisational) and competitiveness

Innovation, Quality Management and Competitiveness in the Food Processing Industry of Cameroon

With the intensification of global and national competition, the focus of companies is on how to achieve competitive advantage. This led the foundation of studies on innovation and competitiveness but there are inconclusive results. In this light, this study was out to examine the mediating effect of quality management in innovation and competitiveness in the food processing industry of Cameroon. This study adopted the cross sectional research design for the investigation. The primary source of data was used for this study through the distribution of questionnaires to the respondents. Data was collected from 335 managers drawn randomly from a population of 2564 food processing companies operating in Cameroon. Inferential statistics was used during the analysis of the data specifically the Baron and Kenny’s approach of testing mediation hypothesis. Based on the results, there were traces of a positive and significant direct effects of product, process and organizational innovations on competitiveness. In terms of the indirect effect, there was the partial mediation of quality management in the effect of product innovation on competitiveness. While quality management had no mediating effect on other innovations (process, market and organizational) on competitiveness

CAN EDUCATION CONTRIBUTE TO HOUSEHOLD FOOD SECURITY? THE CAMEROON EXPERIENCE

So many factors have affected the welfare of households such as environmental hazards, changes in agricultural production, price fluctuations and population growth which have prompted researches to ameliorate the situation of households. This research paper however seeks to investigate the effect of education on food security among households in Cameroon. Using the ECAM IV survey data collected by the National Institute of Statistics in 2014 from 10,303 households in Cameroon and the food security index was measured using a polychoric principal component analysis (PCA). A Two-Stage Instrumental Variable (IV) technique was used to establish the relationship between education and food security. The Average Household Educational Attainment (AHEA) was calculated by calculating the average length of time that household members above the age of 18 years have spent in school. The normalized index and AHEA were regressed and the results obtained showed that AHEA was very significant in influencing household food security. Also, education was observed to have a positive and very significant variable in building the welfare index of the households. It was recommended that household members should pursue longer years of education as a means to guarantee the food security of their households.  Article visualizations

Liderazgo y creación social: una aproximación a las principales aportaciones

La conceptualización del liderazgo y la creación social son los ejes funda- mentales de este artículo. Partiendo de la relevancia del liderazgo en las ciencias socia- les, se realiza una revisión de literatura científica sobre liderazgo en empresas, política y movimientos sociales, y organizaciones escolares. Además, se incluyen el concepto de creación social y algunos de los elementos comunes con el liderazgo. La presentación de conceptos y los avances en estos ámbitos sugieren la necesidad de seguir investigando sobre las dinámicas de cambio implícitas en estos conceptos. The conceptualization of leadership and social creation are the fundamental topics explored in this article. The relevance of leadership in the social sciences is the point of departure from which we undertake a review of the scientific literature on leadership in companies, political and social movements, and school organizations. We also include a discussion of the concept of social creation and some of the elements it shares in common with leadership. The presentation of concepts and the advances in these areas suggest the need to continue investigating the dynamics of change implicit in these concepts

An index based road feature extraction from LANDSAT-8 OLI images

Road feature extraction from the remote sensing images is an arduous task and has a significant role in various applications of urban planning, updating the maps, traffic management, etc. In this paper, a new band combination (B652) to form a road index (RI) from OLI multispectral bands based on the spectral reflectance of asphalt, is presented for road feature extraction. The B652 is converted to road index by normalization. The morphological operators (top-hat or bottom-hat) uses on RI to enhance the roads. To sharpen the edges and for better discrimination of features, shock square filter (SSF), is proposed. Then, an iterative adaptive threshold (IAT) based online search with variational min-max and Markov random fields (MRF) model are used on the SSF image to segment the roads and non-roads. The roads are extracting by using the rules based on the connected component analysis. IAT and MRF model segmentation methods prove the proposed index (RI) able to extract road features productively. The proposed methodology is a combination of saturation based adaptive thresholding and morphology (SATM), and saturation based MRF (SMRF), applied to OLI images of several urban cities of India, producing the satisfactory results. The experimental results with the quantitative analysis presented in the paper