Food Security and Livelihood in Coastal Area under Increased Salinity and Frequent Tidal Surge

Food availability is a crucial dimension of food security in an agrarian society. It is largely realized through own food production of a specific society. Seasonality plays an important role in food security. This article analyzes the existing threat to food security and livelihood in coastal areas of developing countries, particularly in Bangladesh, with a focus on climate change and seasonality. There is persistent food shortage during the sowing season and the pre-harvest period. Food deficit remains high during mid-August to end of October (68–95 per cent) while it is the lowest in December (21 per cent). During the pre-harvest period, farmers have to invest a lot of money at a time though they cannot afford it. Evidence suggests that food loans are common among the poor or small farmers during the food deficit period or in the event of flood. Over 78 per cent of the respondents had taken loans from microfinance institutions and local individual moneylenders. Problem remains as salinity and overfishing has drastically depleted open-water fisheries. Reviving livelihoods still remain a challenge for the vulnerable households especially in areas where agricultural diversity is very limited. Therefore, alternative livelihoods initiatives such as homestead or community-based cage fishing, cash grant and training on non-farm activities of women and men, generating employment through public work programmes need to be in place to ensure food security and livelihood of vulnerable people living in coastal areas. </jats:p

Assessment of Open Source GIS Software for Water Resources Management in Developing Countries

The European Commission is developing, under the responsibility of the Joint Research Centre and in close collaboration with international and national partners, the Water Knowledge Management Platform. This platform will integrate a dynamic management of different support tools and guidelines for the water management sector in developing countries. The support tools will be based on open source desktop GIS technologies in order to provide the final users in developing countries with a sustainable technology from both financial and technological points of view. In this study, a comprehensive list of several hundred open sources GIS software packages are put together by an extensive search and then screened to obtain a list of 31 packages for further consideration. Various criteria were developed to exclude 17 packages and the remaining 14 went through a series of installation and performance tests; firstly, on a six years old PC (AMD Athlon¿XP 2800+, 2.13GHz, 512MB of RAM, under MS XP). Several packages were dropped due to the general suitabilities and functionalities. Four packages (QGIS, gvSIG, MapWindow and openJUMP) performed well in map rendering of large file sizes (up to 125Mb) and were further tested on a Pentium III computer. The QGIS package outperformed others in very poor computing conditions. The gvSIG and openJUMP packages performed reasonably well but their start-up times were long, while MapWindow struggled. QGIS, gvSIG and MapWindow were recommended for the EU Water Knowledge Management Platform (WKMP).JRC.H.3-Global environement monitorin

Assessment of Temporal and Spatial Variation of Pan Evaporation with Related Climatological Factors in Bangladesh

AbstractPan evaporation is an effective way to analyze the multidimensional impact of climate change on irrigation water requirement since pan evaporation measures the integrated effect of radiation, wind, temperature and humidity on the evaporation from an open-water surface. The characteristic trends of pan evaporation and related climatological factors, as developed in this paper, indicate that most of the regions of Bangladesh have undergone a significant amount of decrease in evaporation through the years. The reduction in sunshine duration as a consequent of climate change can be attributed to be the principal reason for the decrease in evaporation. The spatial distribution of seasonal variation of pan evaporation along with solar radiation and humidity was analyzed, and solar radiation seemed to have the major influence on evaporation. The study also reveals that summer and spring are the seasons of highest evaporation in most of the regions. The characteristic trend and spatial distribution of seasonal pan evaporation correlated with related climatological factors developed in this study could aid in water resources development and planning for irrigation purposes

Green Roof Retrofit: A Case Study

Retrofitting green roofs on existing buildings efficiently reduces building energy consumption, and variation of indoor temperature. Despite such clear benefits, green roof is not widely practiced, probably due to a number of reasons. Different types of green roofs vary from as simple and thin as 5-cm thick grass covering to as complex as a fully designed park with trees, with weight varying from 15 kg/m2 to over 350 kg/m2, and significantly different installation cost. Moreover, the load capacity may be the predominant constraint, and a structural survey may be required to allow the retrofit. In other words, a thorough investigation is needed to examine roof load capacity, identify green roof type, and determine the cost involvement. Therefore, this paper demonstrates a step-wise decision-making process for a green roof retrofit/construction project, through a case study, in terms of accessibility to roof, structural capacity, type of green roof, ease of construction and maintenance and cost involvement, to suit the prevailing conditions of existing building. Within the allowable load capacity and availability in the local market, the study revealed that semi-intensive type of green roof is the cheapest, with installation cost of Brunei $208/m2 and monthly maintenance cost of Brunei$1/m2, compared to ‘modular extensive’ and ‘intensive’ types. The outcomes ae expected to allow policy makers to devise suitable program in Brunei for undertaking green roof retrofit projects to improve energy performances of existing buildings. Although the outcomes cannot be generalized elsewhere, the methodology developed can be applied for investigating specific cases under certain condition and targeting suitable solutions

Physical risk assessment for urban water supply in a developing country: a case of Mega City Dhaka

Water supply access in many developing countries is yet to fulfill Millennium Development Goals. Many local governments are incapable of managing their water resources either due to funding constrains or lack of adequate work force. This often results into poor services with low quality, insufficient and inconsistent delivery of water, leakage and wastage creating water shortages. The water stress resulting from urbanization is more acute in terms of Dhaka city due to its capital city-centric development strategies attracting rural-urban migration, which have resulted into an unplanned horizontal and vertical expansion of the city without having facilities for relevant infrastructures. Therefore, it is important to carry out a risk assessment on existing water supply distribution systems to address the challenges of frequent leaks contributing to cross contamination and system loss arising from unplanned development and aging of pipes. The objective of this study is to identify the physical risk for various zones under Dhaka City based on existing distribution systems and its susceptibility to leakage. The assessment requires analyses of distribution system, its length, number of leaks in the pipes detected every month, population density, number of consumers, characteristics of areas whether industrial or residential areas, low lying and vulnerable to flooding. The study finds that Zone IV possesses a very high risk due to an average leak of 93 per month with 1,571,960 people are exposed to vulnerability while Zone II, III, V, VI having average monthly leaks of 39, 36, 26, and 34 respectively are high risk zones

Big data-driven strategic orientation in international marketing

Purpose: Big data is one of the most demanding topics in contemporary marketing research. Despite its importance, the big data-based strategic orientation in international marketing is yet to be formed conceptually. Thus, the purpose of this study is to systematically review and propose a holistic framework on big data-based strategic orientation for firms in international markets to attain a sustained firm performance. Design/methodology/approach: The study employed a systematic literature review to synthesize research rigorously. Initially, 2,242 articles were identified from the selective databases, and 45 papers were finally reported as most relevant to propose an integrative conceptual framework. Findings: The findings of the systematic literature review revealed data-evolving, and data-driven strategic orientations are essential for performing international marketing activities that contain three primary orientations such as (1) international digital platform orientation, (2) international market orientation and (3) international innovation and entrepreneurial orientation. Eleven distinct sub-dimensions reflect these three primary orientations. These strategic orientations of international firms may lead to advanced analytics orientation to attain sustained firm performance by generating and capturing value from the marketplace. Research limitations/implications: The study minimizes the literature gap by forming knowledge on big data-based strategic orientation and framing a multidimensional framework for guiding managers in the context of strategic orientation for international business and international marketing activities. The current study was conducted by following only a systematic literature review exclusively in firms' overall big data-based strategic orientation concept in international marketing. Future research may extend the domain by introducing firms' category wise systematic literature review. Originality/value: The study has proposed a holistic conceptual framework for big data-driven strategic orientation in international marketing literature through a systematic review for the first time. It has also illuminated a future research agenda that raises questions for the scholars to develop or extend theory in this area or other related disciplines

Qualitative analysis of plastic debris on beaches of Brunei Darussalam

Plastic debris is one of the major environmental concerns for the coastal area of Brunei Darussalam. It reduces the aesthetic appeals of the beaches in the country. The current study investigates marine debris on six different beaches of Brunei Darussalam along the South China Sea. Plastic was found the most abundant among whole debris by number (90.02%) and by weight (39.12%). It was classified by size (micro (100 mm)), colour (transparent, coloured, white and black). Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) was used to investigate the types of plastics and additives present in it. Statistical analysis using Minitab 17 and Kruskal-Wallis test was performed for comparison of data at different study sites. All major types of plastics were found in different forms with varying quantities from which toxic chemicals may leach out during degradation. The highest abundance by the number of plastic debris was found on Muara beach with a mean value 74.428 n/m2 ± 34.33 n/m2, while the lowest abundance was found on Lumut beach 53 n/m2 ± 20.9 n/m2. The study shows beaches used for recreational facilities are likely to have more debris as compared to other beaches

Association of halitosis with dental caries in pediatric patients in a tertiary level hospital

Halitosis refers to bad breath is induced by volatile molecules due to pathological or non-pathological factors, prevalent in all ages. It can originate from either oral or non-oral sources. However, dental hygiene, periodontal disease, impacted food, tongue coat, and caries are among the oral-related sources, accounting for 90% of cases of halitosis. Therefore, this study aimed to evaluate the association between halitosis and caries among pediatric patients. This cross-sectional descriptive study documented clinical data from 45 pediatric patients at Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University (BSMMU). The selected patients were evaluated with the Specific Caries Index (SCI) to detect the caries involvement. A halimeter was used to evaluate halitosis. According to halimeter, the mean value of halitosis in relation to sex was 169.58 ppb, while participants with very strong halitosis were observed in 12.5% of males and 33.3% of females. Patients over the age of 13 manifested extreme halitosis than other selected age groups. The result demonstrated that halitosis increased significantly with a higher score of the caries index. Hence, this study indicated an association between halitosis and the caries index in pediatric patients, highlighting the need for more research to assess its applicability in broader and diverse groups BSMMU J 2021; 14(3): 62-6