The effect of audit committee attributes and audit quality on the financial performance of banks in Nigeria

The topic of corporate governance and financial performance has always been an essential and critical component for the Nigerian banking industry. Good corporate governance practices are considered important in mitigating risk for investors, improving investment capital and performance. This study examined the effects of audit committee attributes and audit quality on the financial performance of banks in Nigeria. The research used secondary data obtained from the Data Stream and annual reports of all banks in Nigeria for the year 2018-2020 with 66 firm-years observations. In addition, the regression was based on Panel Corrected Standard Error. The result showed that the audit committee size has a negative and significant association with bank financial performance. However, audit committee independence and audit quality exhibited significant and positive association with banks performance. This study provided suggestions for future research work and several recommendations for regulators and the Iraqi banking industry

A robust Bayesian analysis of the impact of policy decisions on crop rotations.

We analyse the impact of a policy decision on crop rotations, using the imprecise land use model that was developed by the authors in earlier work. A specific challenge in crop rotation models is that farmer’s crop choices are driven by both policy changes and external non-stationary factors, such as rainfall, temperature and agricultural input and output prices. Such dynamics can be modelled by a non-stationary stochastic process, where crop transition probabilities are multinomial logistic functions of such external factors. We use a robust Bayesian approach to estimate the parameters of our model, and validate it by comparing the model response with a non-parametric estimate, as well as by cross validation. Finally, we use the resulting predictions to solve a hypothetical yet realistic policy problem

Socioeconomic Consequences of Corruption and Financial Crimes

Corruption and financial crimes are major obstacles to the socioeconomic development of many countries in the world. This study employed descriptive research design to assess the socioeconomic consequences of these crimes. The data were collected through questionnaire from 200 respondents. The study results indicate that financial crimes and corruption both have significant socioeconomic consequences by destroying public confidences, weakening public service delivery such as education, health service, it also demolishes private sector particularly small business growth which ultimately affect employment level, GPD and, life expectancy, defeat culture, values, ethics of the society and finally eliminates trust, partnership and collaboration among business organization, public institutions, and society. Moreover, the socioeconomic consequences of these crimes include inequality and poverty in the country. The study recommends strengthening the capacity of public institutions, good governance, strengthening internal control systems, establishing effective monitoring frameworks, promoting accountability and transparency of the public sector, establishing legal frameworks and anti-corruption strategies, and supervision mechanisms in public institutions

A Review of Strategies to Prevent On-Site Construction Waste

One of the most important concerns that improves building profitability is the implementation of a positive approach to minimize construction waste. This paper will discuss the roots of construction waste, current waste reduction strategies, and lastly the possible use of waste management. Furthermore, the key environmental priority for this issue should be to control and mitigate construction waste generation. The purpose of this study is to provide prevention measures, and the rising tide of public awareness is all conspiring to modify the face of waste management. Clients, contractors, suppliers, and designers Architects & Engineers all have opportunities and duties to reduce construction waste. The outcomes of this study will assist academics in furthering their research into important management strategies for reducing on-site building waste

Consumer Preferences regarding Country of Origin Labelling of Meat - FA0156

In this report we present our findings and conclusions on the economics of country of origin food labels (CoOL) as they apply to meat sold to consumers in the UK. The need for this research was motivated by recent EU legislation regarding how meat products can and might be labelled with respect to CoOL. The main objectives of the research were: 1. To review and synthesise the existing literature to identify and understand UK consumer preferences regarding CoOL of meat products. 2. To design and implement a series of hypothetical choice experiments (CEs) to ascertain consumer perception of the relative importance of different labelling requirements in terms of average UK consumer willingness-to-pay (WTP). 3. To cover a broad range of meat products (i.e., unprocessed swine, sheep, goat and poultry) in fresh, chilled, frozen format plus meat used as an ingredient (including beef). To address these objectives we undertook three specific but related pieces of research: 1. We designed and conducted 12 hypothetical CEs via six online survey instruments. To inform the design and implementation of our CEs we undertook an extensive review of the antecedent literature. This review revealed an extensive set of attributes to consider for use in our CEs. We then refined this set of attributes after extensive discussions and a small pilot study. The scope and coverage of products examined reflect the wide ranging scope of the legislation. For all 12 products we estimated WTP for CoOL and various other product attributes. 2. We designed and implemented an additional hypothetical CE employing eyetracking (ET). The ET CE examined respondent attention and attendance to attributes during the CE. The results from the ET were compared to the online survey results yielding information in relation to how well respondents engaged with the CEs, magnitude of estimates as well as consistency. The results from our ET CE provide a means by which to assess the internal validity of the results provided by our 12 online CEs. 3. We undertook an analysis of market transaction data; a revealed preference study using data obtained from Kantar. This piece of analysis allowed us to see the extent to which consumers have already responded to CoOL and if there exists a price premium being paid for CoOL in the UK. The results obtained from the Kantar data allowed us to assess the external validity of our CE results

Estimation of Genetic Variability, Heritability and Genetic Advances for Short Duration and High Yielding Rice Genotypes

The goal of the study was to find genotypes of 18 different rice varieties that would yield a lot of rice in a short amount of time. With this in mind, the study genotypes' field performance as well as the relationships between various morpho-physiological and yield-contributing traits among the genotypes was assessed. The experiments were conducted from July to December 2018 at the Agronomy Field, Department of Agronomy and Agricultural Extension, Faculty of Agriculture, Rajshahi University. In genotype BRRI dhan 51, the maximum number of days to 50% flowering was discovered. The genotype BRRI dhan 56 had the lowest number of days required for 50% flowering. Genotypes showed a wide range of days to maturity (92.00–109.00), with an average of 98.96 days. The genotypes DRR 46, BINA 7, and DRR 44 are followed by the genotypes BRR1 dhan 66, BRR1 dhan 56, and BRR1 dhan 57, which have shorter maturity periods (i.e., 92.00 days), indicating earliness. The traits investigated in this study showed high heritabilities, with estimates ranging from 67.00 to 96.00 percent. Days to flowering and unfilled grain panicle-1 had the highest heritability among the traits (96.00%).The presence of high heritability values suggests that the expression of the traits under study is less influenced by the external environment. The unfilled grain panicle-1 had the highest genetic advance as a percentage of the mean (144.80%), while panicle length had the lowest genetic advance (10.48%) among the traits that affected yield. View Article DOI: 10.47856/ijaast.2022.v09i10.00

The Study of Genetic Divergence in Rice (Oryza Sativa L.) Genotypes with Grain Yield and Different Morpho-Physiological Traits using Mahalanobis’ D2 Analysis

The current study attempted to study genetic divergence in rice (Oryza sativa L.) genotypes with grain yield and different morpho-physiological traits among 18 rice varieties using Mahalanobis' D2 analysis. Keeping this in mind, the performance of the studied genotypes, as well as the association between various morpho-physiological and yield contributing traits among the genotypes, were evaluated in the field. The experiments were conducted from July to December 2018 at the Agronomy Field, Department of Agronomy and Agricultural Extension, Faculty of Agriculture, Rajshahi University. In terms of grain yield and other morpho-physiological traits, the genotypes differed significantly. The genotypes were classified into five clusters using Mahalonobis' D2 statistics and Tocher's method (Table 3). Cluster IV was the smallest of the clusters. Cluster l is the largest, with six genotypes. Clusters II and lV each contained three and two genotypes. The pattern of genotype distribution among various clusters reflected the significant genetic variability present in the genotypes, which may be due to adaptation of these genotypes to specific environmental conditions. Genotypes from different clusters are expected (inter-cluster). The intra (bold) and inter-cluster distances from D2 analysis (Table 4). Cluster I has the greatest intra cluster distance (0.956), while Cluster IV has the smallest (0.3583). The greatest inter-cluster distance is observed between cluster IV and (8.190), while the smallest inter-cluster distance is observed between cluster II and IV (2.924). In both vectors, the average inter-cluster distances were greater than the average intra-cluster distances, indicating the presence of greater genetic diversity among genotypes from different clusters than those from the same cluster. These findings indicated that these five traits contributed the most to the divergence among the eighteen rice genotypes. The results revealed that the clusters were remarkably distinct for the majority of the traits, indicating proper clustering. The most effective tiller, grain panicle, effective grain panicle, and days to maturity were found in Cluster V. The intra-cluster mean for grain yield was the lowest in this cluster. Cluster III had the lowest grain yield per acre. This was the cluster with the lowest initial grain yield. The intra-cluster mean for effective tiller and days to maturity was highest in this cluster. Cluster II had the smallest grain yield and the second smallest thousand grain weight. Cluster V had the shortest panicle length intra-cluster. View Article DOI: 10.47856/ijaast.2022.v09i10.00