Introducing New Methodologies for Identifying Design Patterns for Internationalization and Localization

This paper describes a new methodology for deriving interaction design patterns from an analysis of ethnographic data. It suggests using inductive and deductive analysis processes to identify and articulate patterns that address the needs of culturally diverse users of interactive, collaborative systems. This might inform the internationalization and localization process of computer supported collaboration systems

Readiness of the Port of Colombo as a Mega Hub Port for Transshipment Containers

The Colombo Port has become a hub port for transshipment containers in the South-Asia region mainly due to its location advantage and have further carved out a niche linking feeder connections in the Indian subcontinent trade to main sea routes on the back of its access to the Indian Ocean. During past couple of decades major ports around the world have faced significant challenges due to rapid evolvement in marine technology and international logistical system. Primarily there were two major thrusts have been impacting the seaports which identified as ‘Increased specialization of ship design’ and the ‘Growth in ship size’. These two aspects of ship specialization and capacity enhancement that were continued to progress resulted a greater demand in Ports and container terminals to invest on improvements to equipment and ports infrastructure. Each subsequent generation of containership which evolved has not only created new challenges to ports around the world, but also limited the number of port calls. Presently only one deep water container terminal available in Port of Colombo to handle modern day Ultra large container carriers (ULCC’s)

Malaria and land use: a spatial and temporal risk analysis in Southern Sri Lanka

Malaria / Waterborne diseases / Disease vectors / Land use / Water use / GIS / Statistical analysis / Risks / Mapping / Public health / Sri Lanka / Uda Walawe / Thanamalvila / Embilipitiya

Small irrigation tanks as a source of malaria mosquito vectors: a study in north-central Sri Lanka

Watersheds / Tank irrigation / Rehabilitation / Malaria / Waterborne diseases / Disease vectors / Sri Lanka / Yan Oya

Health Damage Cost of Rice Processing Industry of the North Central Province

Rice is the staple food for Sri Lankans and rice industry is the largest agro based industry in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka currently produces 3.8 million metric tons of paddy annually. The total land devoted for paddy is estimated to be about 0.70 Hectares million ha at present. Sri Lanka has around 7,000 rice mills and North Central Province has about 1,000 rice mills. Although the rice industry supplies food for the nation, it generates considerable pollution to three media (air water and soil). Rice mills generate fugitive emissions from various sections during handling of paddy, cleaning and milling of paddy, handling and storage of husk and handling, storage and disposal of boiler ash etc. During wet processing, it generates waste water. Present study attempted to estimate the health damage cost, mainly cost of air pollution from rice processing industry. An isolated rice mill located in Lankapura Divisional Secretariat Division of the Polonnaruwa District was selected to avoid impacts from other industries. The mill had a total daily production capacity of 175 Mt/d and there were total affected population of 1,599 around the mill. Present study selected 120 households, 30 households each from the distances from 250 m, 500 m, 750 m and 1000 m away from the mill. Both contingent valuation method and human capital approach was adopted for the damage cost estimation. Information on distance to rice mill, health issues due to the mill, monthly health damage costs, monthly income level and willingness to pay for an environmental improvement program to prevent health damage costs were collected using pre tested questionnaire. Twenty eight asthma patients were found in the sample and estimated number in the affected population is 88 patients. Annual health damage cost was estimated from human capital approach is LKR 2,112,000. Mean willingness to pay for an environmental improvement under the contingent valuation survey was LKR 908.00 per household. The study also discusses implications for policy, especially on providing incentives for pollution control of rice processing industry.Keywords: Health damage cost, Rice mills, Air pollutio

EVALUATION OF URBAN AIR POLLUTION COST A CASE STUDY IN THE COLOMBO CITY

Air pollution is arguably the most important. in terms of economics cost, of thevarious types of pollution caused by transport and industrial activities and itseffects have been widely studied in other countries. However, direct studies havenot been undertaken to measure the economics cost of air pollution in Sri Lanka.Concern for air pollution in Sri Lanka is focused mainly in Colombo. AlthoughColombo air pollution level is less than many Asian countries, recent monitoringresults show that air pollution from particulate matter and Sulfur is well above theWHO recommended levelThe contingent valuation method was used to estimate the air pollution cost anddata was collected from a contingent valuation survey carried out in the Fort andPettah areas. Respondents' willingness to pay values were obtained for ahypothetical market presented. The results were consistent with the economictheory. Aggregated cost of air pollution for the country was Rs.55 million peryear. This value may help cost benefit analysis of air quality managementprogrammes and other related development policy and programs in Sri Lanka.

GLOBAL VALUES FOR LOCAL RESOURCES A CONTINGENT VALUATION APPROACH FOR SINHARAJA RAIN FOREST RESERVE IN SRI LANKA

Tropical forests are sources of important global use and non-use values. However. thesevalues are not often reflected in global markets, thus creating global externalities. In orderto demonstrate glohal values of tropical rain forests. this study sought to estimate globalnon-use values of the Sinharaja Rain Forest Reserve in Sri LankaA contingent valuation survey was carried out in the United Kingdom in order to obtainexistence and bequest values for the forest. Open ended questions were asked from theselected sample of respondents 10 obtain their maximum willingness 10 pay.The non use values elicited for the forest were related to variation in respondents' socioeconomic status. Multiple regression analysis showed that income and education hadpositive coefficients for hoth existence and bequest values.The results showed that remote populations have positive values for tropical rain forest.Thc implications of these results to the use of contingent valuation methodology forestimating total economic values of forests in developing countries is discussed. and theparticular implications of demonstrating the magnitude of external benefits that couldprovide insights into the correction of global economic failures highlighted

AGRO·FORESTRY HOME·GARDENS IN KALUTARA DISTRICT A PARTICIPATORY RURAL APPRAISAL (PRA)

Promotion of agro-Iorestry in home-gardens has been greatly emphasized as a nationalpriority. in the new amendments of forest-policy in Sri Lanka. Further, development ofhomestead gardens is one of the major component or the Participatory Forestry Project ofthe Forest Department. Evidently, the home gardens contribute a substantial amount offood, timber, fuel-wood, fodder etc., of the country. In most of these home-gardens, thecanopy cover is dense with a closure of over 75 percent.The total extent of land under the home-gardens in Kalutara District has significantlydecreased during the last decade. However, the remaining home-gardens are a majorsource of food. timber, and fuel-wood required for household consumption. Moreover,exportable products of the perennial agricultural crops, and fruits required to cater theincreasing demand in the tourism are becoming attractive sources of income from the agroforestryhome-gardens in the district. To improve sustainable agro-Iorcstry home-gardens,an assessment of the present agro-forestry home-gardens in the district is essential.Home centred spatial arrangement in agro-Iorestry reflects different interactions amonghousehold, garden. and gardening as well as socio-economics and indigenous resourcemanagement strategies. Hence, the paper discusses the agro-Iorcstry home-gardens inKal utara district based on the data and information collected through Participatory RuralAppraisal (PRA). The PRA administered the main steps and methods: discussions groupmaps. aggregate maps. wealth runkings, transect walks, participatory transects. venndiagrams. direct matrix, pair-wise ranking and scoring.

Limit behaviour of upper and lower expected time averages in discrete-time imprecise Markov chains

We study the limit behaviour of upper and lower bounds on expected time averages in imprecise Markov chains; a generalised type of Markov chain where the local dynamics, traditionally characterised by transition probabilities, are now represented by sets of ‘plausible’ transition probabilities. Our main result is a necessary and sufficient condition under which these upper and lower bounds, called upper and lower expected time averages, will converge as time progresses towards infinity to limit values that do not depend on the process’ initial state. Remarkably, our condition is considerably weaker than those needed to establish similar results for so-called limit—or steady state—upper and lower expectations, which are often used to provide approximate information about the limit behaviour of time averages as well. We show that such an approximation is sub-optimal and that it can be significantly improved by directly using upper and lower expected time averages

The Dynamics of Zeroth-Order Ultrasensitivity: A Critical Phenomenon in Cell Biology

It is well known since the pioneering work of Goldbeter and Koshland [Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, vol. 78, pp. 6840-6844 (1981)] that cellular phosphorylation- dephosphorylation cycle (PdPC), catalyzed by kinase and phosphatase under saturated condition with zeroth order enzyme kinetics, exhibits ultrasensitivity, sharp transition. We analyse the dynamics aspects of the zeroth order PdPC kinetics and show a critical slowdown akin to the phase transition in condensed matter physics. We demonstrate that an extremely simple, though somewhat mathematically "singular" model is a faithful representation of the ultrasentivity phenomenon. The simplified mathematical model will be valuable, as a component, in developing complex cellular signaling network theory as well as having a pedagogic value.Comment: 8 pages, 3 figure