Stability Through Economic Growth in Afghanistan

This thesis analyzes the Afghan public’s opinion to identify the overall direction of the country, whether the country, in terms of economic growth, is moving in a positive direction or not. How do economic factors affect the public’s views on the direction of the country? Based on that, this study finds that economic growth has an effect on the Afghan public’s opinion on the country’s direction. Afghans are not enjoying stability in their country yet, after the majority of Afghans accepted U.S. military intervention in 2001 and the establishment of the new government to end instability. It was not an easy transformation for the Afghan people. Some communities welcomed U.S. military intervention and the establishment of a new government. However, some Afghan communities became opposed to this transformation. This thesis informs us about the differences, opportunities, barriers, and gaps related to those two camps which have delayed democratization, state-building, and political and economic transformation processes. Due to some strategic mistakes and shortcomings related to the opportunities and barriers that were within those two camps, the chances of economic investment, state-building, job creation, and investing in the safe-zone region in Afghanistan were wasted

Impact Of Information Technology on BPR: A Study Of Information Technology As BPR Enabler in Tractor Industry In Pakistan

Business Process Reengineering (BPR) is defined as the fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of   business processes to achieve dramatic improvements in critical, contemporary measures of performance. Among the potential enablers of BPR is information technology (IT). IT makes it possible to obtain improvements in BPR, though not just by it. This study examines a series of relationships between information technology (IT) and business process reengineering (BPR). Specifically, it argues that those aspiring to do business process reengineering must begin to apply the capabilities of information technology. The purpose of this paper is to answer some questions regarding this issue, like: Is the use of information technology a critical success factor of reengineering ? Is it possible to reengineer the business without the existence of IT sophistications? What are the facilitations that have been contributed by IT to successful reengineering? The methodology that has been adopted in the study is reviewing the literature to explore answers for such questions. It was found that IT has a critical role in the success of BPR project in achieving dramatic improvements, at the same time BPR introduced well defined strategies to make an organization heavily extracts the benefits from such enablers with huge capabilities and to employ IT correctly and efficiently. The main objective of this study is to explore the possibilities for improvement in the processes of Cost Accounting Information System in Tractor industry after re-engineering through use of information technology. Data has been collected through unstructured interviews from the technical experts in the companies and from the website. Besides, extensive study has been carried out from the existing literature. By applying BPR techniques and technology, Most of the companies in tractor industry has achieved about 50% reduction in waste in production (WIP), 20% reduction in lead times and 90% reduction in overtime resulting into a lot of savings. Keywords: Businesses Process Reengineering; Information Technology; Manufacturing Companies; Tractor Industry in Pakistan

A Phonemic and Acoustic Analysis of Hindko Fricatives

The Hindko language is mainly spoken in the province of Khyber Pukhtunkhaw, Pakistan. It relates to the Indo-Aryan family of languages. This paper focusses on the phonemic and acoustic analysis of Hindko fricatives. The phonemic analysis identifies that Hindko has eight fricatives. The acoustic analysis aims to explore temporal and spectral characteristics of these fricatives. The acoustic analysis discloses that Hindko fricatives are distinguishable on the basis of the temporal properties such as friction duration and spectral cues like turbulence noise

Asynchronous Contact Tracing, Fighting Pandemics with Internet of Things

International audienc

The tonal system of Pahari

This paper reports on an acoustic study of the tonal system of the Pahari language. To achieve this aim, an experiment was conducted. Eight native speakers were given a set of monosyllabic triplets bearing three target tones to read them aloud for recording in a carrier sentence. The acoustic measures included F0, final velocity, and duration. The acoustic and statistical results show that (1) the average F0 demonstrates significant difference in the height of the pitch track of the three target words/tones; (2) final velocity shows three trends, namely falling, level, and rising associated with high, mid, and low tones, respectively; and (3) duration results indicate that high pitch track was significantly shorter than each of the other two pitch tracks. The study concludes that Pahari has three tones, namely high-falling, mid-level, and low-rising

EFFECTS OF FUND ATTRIBUTES ON FUND RETURN: AN ANALYSIS OF CLOSE-END MUTUAL FUNDS OF PAKISTAN

Mutual funds have become an attractive investment option particularly for small investors to diversify their portfolio. The aim of this study is to explore the determinants of close ended mutual funds return in Pakistan. For this purpose secondary data is used from 2007-2013. Multiple regression analysis is carried out to measure the determinants (fund size, liquidity, expense ratio and fund turnover) of fund return. The findings of the study revealed that expense ratio and fund turnover significantly influences the return of the fund. Moreover, fund size is positively related to fund return whereas expense ratio, fund turnover and liquidity are inversely related to fund return

REVISITING THE ENIGMA OF WORKING CAPITAL, PROFITABILITY AND RISK: EVIDENCE FROM PAKISTAN

This study investigates the relationship between working capital management and firm profitability. We incorporate moderating effect of systematic and unsystematic risk to ascertain the impact of risk on working capital decisions. The study uses secondary data of 244 listed non-financial firms over 10 years from 2009 to 2018. The findings reveal that inventory turnover, receivable collection period and cash conversion cycle negatively influence firm performance. However, accounts payable period has significant and positive effect on firm performance. Systematic risk negatively moderates the relationship between accounts payable period and return on assets and positively moderates relationship among accounts collection period, cash conversion cycle and return on assets. Unsystematic risk has insignificant effect on the relationship between working capital and profitability

REVISITING THE ENIGMA OF WORKING CAPITAL, PROFITABILITY AND RISK: EVIDENCE FROM PAKISTAN

This study investigates the relationship between working capital management and firm profitability. We incorporate moderating effect of systematic and unsystematic risk to ascertain the impact of risk on working capital decisions. The study uses secondary data of 244 listed non-financial firms over 10 years from 2009 to 2018. The findings reveal that inventory turnover, receivable collection period and cash conversion cycle negatively influence firm performance. However, accounts payable period has significant and positive effect on firm performance. Systematic risk negatively moderates the relationship between accounts payable period and return on assets and positively moderates relationship among accounts collection period, cash conversion cycle and return on assets. Unsystematic risk has insignificant effect on the relationship between working capital and profitability

DOES WORKING CAPITAL MANAGEMENT AFFECT CORPORATE PROFITABILITY?

Managing working capital efficiently and effectively is critical for modern organizations as it directly affects firm’s profitability, liquidity and riskiness. A vast majority of empirical studies have focused on developed countries whereas in case of developing countries like Pakistan it is somewhat under researched. The economy of Pakistan is passing through challenging times with rising inflation, energy crisis, poor law and order etc. Therefore, the purpose of the study was to investigate whether working capital policies adopted by listed organizations within the sugar industry of Pakistan (PSX) are efficient or not in these challenging conditions and what kind of effect (positive or negative) they have on the profitability of the firm. Data from 2006 to 2015 was collected for this study and Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) technique was used to analyse the effect of working capital management on firm profitability. Empirical results of the study show that all four components of working capital used in this study have statistically significant and negative relationship with firm’s profitability.Â

Dundee Ready Educational Environment Measure Tool for Evaluating the Educational Environment: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this systematic review was to study the literature evaluating the educational environment by using DREEM tool and compute overall mean DREEM score by using Meta-analysis. Further, variation in DREEM score was also studied by distributing studies into different time periods. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A systematic literature search was performed using PubMed and Web of Science databases, followed by review and analysis. All the studies which used DREEM as a tool, published from 1997 to December 2015 were included. Heterogeneity between the studies was assessed by I2-coefficient and Q-statistics. Where significant heterogeneity existed random effect, model was used. Egger’s symmetric test and Begg’s funnel plot was used to study possibility of publication bias. The PRISMA Guideline for systematics review was used. RESULTS: Out of 128 published DREEM studies, 43 passed the criteria and included in analysis. Overall mean DREEM score through Meta-analysis was 2.426 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.34-2.52). Studies were divided into two groups for analyzing the time effect. Mean score of the studies published during 1997 to 2009 (group 1) was 2.5 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.35-2.64) and for the studies from 2010 to 2015 (group 2) was 2.39 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.29-2.5). CONCLUSION: Overall DREEM score was more towards positive side than negative. Current review revealed that DREEM has not been used as predictor for achievement of any medical college instead it can be used to predict high and low achievers in a medical school. This review can signify DREEM to be suitable and consistent tool showing learning environment of institute and student’s prerequisites