The Importance of Migration to Small Fragile Economies

Most small fragile states have their own unique circumstances that predispose them to social conflict or frequent economic disruptions. These disruptions end up imposing a large cost on regional neighbours and on the international community more broadly. Therefore the development community is in search of ways to reduce the risk of conflict but this search has proved elusive thus far. This paper explores the potential for migration to serve as a safety valve as well as a medium term strategy for employment creation in conflict-prone states. It draws together the analytical and empirical arguments needed to make the case for enhancing the labour mobility options for these vulnerable populations.Fragile states, export diversification, small states, migration, remittances

How to Strengthen and Reform Indian Medical Education System: Is Nationalization the Only Answer?

As India marches towards an exciting new future of growth and progress, medical education will play pivotal role in crafting a sustained development agenda. Efforts have to be undertaken to create a medical educational system that nourishes innovation, entrepreneurship and addresses the skill requirement of the growing economy. Last decade has been witness to phenomenal growth in numbers of the medical colleges, nursing colleges and other similar training institutions. This unregulated rapid growth in number of medical colleges has adversely impacted quality of training in India’s medical institutions. The policy of privatization of medical care has seriously undermined health services and further limited the access of the underprivileged. Therefore the only solution is centralization or nationalization or globalization of the entire medical education and health sectors or to join hands with world health organization, So that a uniform health cares facility can be given to each and every human being

Line protection in inverter supplied networks

New protection methods are required to protect a distribution system when supplied by current limited converters. In this paper, a method of converter control is proposed to limit the current by reducing the voltage in the faulted phase or phases while keeping the voltage of the healthy phases unaltered. Unsymmetrical fault analysis is performed to calculate the sequence currents and voltages at the relay location, when system is supplied by a converter. Based on that converter control, distance relay performances have been evaluated in both grid-connected and islanded mode operations. Distance relay, combined with MHO and negative sequence impedance directional characteristics, is proposed as a protection scheme for the distribution system for different types of faults under the current limited environment. The results are validated through PSCAD/EMTDC simulation and MATLAB calculations

Data Preprocessing in Multi-Temporal Remote Sensing Data for Deforestation Analysis

In recent years, the contemporary data mining community has developed a plethora of algorithms and methods used for different tasks in knowledge discovery within large databases. Furthermore, algorithms become more complex and hybrid as algorithms combining several approaches are suggested, the task of implementing such algorithms from scratch becomes increasingly time consuming. Spatial data sets often contain large amounts of data arranged in multiple layers. These data may contain errors and may not be collected at a common set of coordinates. Therefore, various data pre-processing steps are often necessary to prepare data for further usage. It is important to understand the quality and characteristics of the chosen data. Careful selection, preprocessing, and transformation of the data are needed to ensure meaningful analysis and results

The cost of air pollution abatement

Using data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the authors have developed comprehensive estimates of pollution abatement costs by industry sector for several major air pollutants. Their results provide conservative benchmarks for benefit-cost analysis of pollution control strategies in developing countries. They also provide striking evidence of inefficiency in U.S. command-and-control regulation. The cost estimates reflect the experience of about 100,000 U.S. manufacturing facilities under actual operating conditions. They are based on a complete accounting of costs - including capital, labor energy, materials, and services. So, they should be more useful for benefit-cost analysis than idealized engineering estimates. But they also reflect strict pollution control regulation and input prices which are probably somewhat higher, on average, than those in developing countries. They should be interpreted as conservative estimates for environmental planning in developing countries. Regulatory options that are judged to have high net benefits using these numbers would probably look even better if local abatement cost data were available. The estimates in this paper can provide useful information for pollution charges. They can also help make targeted regulation more cost-effective. With scarce resources for monitoring and enforcement, new regulatory institutions in developing countries will want to focus initially on industry sectors that are the main sources of locally-dangerous pollutants. After those sectors are identified, targeted regulation should be informed by sectoral differences in abatement cost. The estimates suggest, for example, that cost-effective control of suspended particulate emissions will focus on wood pulping rather than steelmaking when both are major sources of suspended particulates. The reason: average particulate abatement costs are four times higher in steelmaking.Pollution Management&Control,Transport and Environment,Montreal Protocol,Environmental Economics&Policies,Energy and Environment

Status of smear positive pulmonary tuberculosis patients after chemotherapy under the ndistrict tuberculosis programme

In North Arcot district, where Short Course Chemotherapy (SCC) had been introduced in 1983, a cross sectional survey was carried out in respect of smear positive patients put on SCC or traditional regimens between April 1986 and March 1988. It was found that 19% of the treatment cards from the D . T . C . w e r e i n r e s p e c t o f d u p l i c a t e registrations. The address given was inadequate in 13% of the cards. Only 69% of the smear positive patients had accepted short course chemotherapy and the rest were given traditional regimens. The cross sectional survey covered the period 6 to 36 months after the start of treatment. Overall mortality in patients with tuberculosis was 28% during 36 months. It was 3-5 times as high in those who had taken less than 50% of chemotherapy, irrespective of age. Thirty one percent of the patients were smear positive at the time of the home visit. However, among those who had taken 80% or more of chemotherapy, 20% on SCC and 26% placed on conventional treatment were sputum positive. Nonetheless, even among those who had taken less than 50% of chemotherapy about 58% were sputum negative

Quality analysis of the aggregate imaging system (AIMS)

Coarse and fine aggregates form the skeleton of any type of pavement and influence the performance of the pavement structure. Characterization of the physical characteristics (shape, angularity, and texture) of coarse and fine aggregates is the first step towards the development of valid specifications for these characteristics. Current test methods used in practice have several limitations in quantifying the shape and texture properties. An imaging based test method ??Aggregate Imaging System (AIMS)?? has been recently developed and shown to be capable of directly measuring the characteristics of coarse and fine aggregates. In this thesis, the quality of AIMS measurements is evaluated through the analysis of repeatability, reproducibility, and sensitivity. The analysis results are also compared to the results from other available test methods. AIMS provides the distribution of shape characteristics in an aggregate sample. Statistical analysis is conducted in order to determine the distribution function that best describes the distribution of shape characteristics. The parameters of the distribution function can be related to the performance of pavement layers. A new method based on the ??Categorical Units?? isdeveloped to test differences between aggregate samples in terms of shape characteristics. It is demonstrated that this method is capable of quantifying the differences between aggregates and can be used to capture the influence of change in aggregate source or production techniques on aggregate characteristics

An exploratory study on how an accelerator program influences entrepreneurial learning: case of the Sri Lankan government accelerator

Entrepreneurs navigate through various phases of their new venture, starting with an idea, leading towards exploiting an opportunity and finally, for some managing the growth of the new venture or for others exiting the venture through harvest or closure. For first time entrepreneurs in particular, it is important to learn the multi-disciplinary skills of entrepreneurship during this process. While a body of literature on entrepreneurial learning exists, learning the implications and applications of these discrete learning constructs has not been explored in the context of the entrepreneur’s learning journey. However, the entrepreneurial journey and the resulting entrepreneurial learning during the journey must be seen as a continuum not as a series of isolated entrepreneurial learning constructs. This research examines how entrepreneurial learning is influenced in the context of a government accelerator program. This entrepreneurship program is vital, in the context of Sri Lanka, where the government is placing priority on the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector as the nation recovers economically from a 30 year civil war and the tragic effects of a tsunami. ICT is already among the top (five) 5 foreign exchange earners in Sri Lanka and the government actively focuses on supporting ICT entrepreneurs. The research methodology adopts an exploratory research design, using the case of the “one and only” government ICT entrepreneur accelerator in Sri Lanka. The primary means of data collection in this study was through semi-structured and open-ended interviews with stakeholders and texts from an on-going learning journal maintained by the participants in the accelerator program. Data was then analysed through concept mapping and thematic analysis following a perspective on theory building Entrepreneurial learning is relatively recent research area, in which publications on empirical and conceptual approaches began to appear from around the late 1990’s. While there is a body of knowledge available on entrepreneurial learning, researchers have called for further qualitative research in order to better understand the entrepreneurial learning process empirically. The study is the first of its kind to analyse and document the influence of a government accelerator on entrepreneurial learning. Firstly, the study findings reveal how the entrepreneurs perceive entrepreneurial learning in the given context. Secondly, the findings discuss how the entrepreneurial learning constructs are intervened during the temporal entrepreneurial process. Lastly, the thesis establishes the evidence that the government accelerator influences to strengthen the entrepreneurial mindset of entrepreneurs, supports building learning networks for entrepreneurs and facilitates the creation of a learning culture in their respective infant organisations. Based on these findings, the thesis identifies seven (7) propositions embedded in the government accelerator program when researching to seek the answers for the two research questions. The study contributes towards the theory of entrepreneurial learning on how government accelerators shape and influence entrepreneurial learning, particularly in the developing world. The study also integrates entrepreneurial learning theories by developing a conceptual model of how the facets of entrepreneurial learning are inter-related. This study makes recommendations on how future researchers could replicate, extend, and modify the findings. It also makes specific recommendations to governments and policy makers wishing to establish entrepreneurial accelerator programs.Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, Entrepreneurship, Commercialisation and Innovation Centre, 201

High Characteristics of Classical Literature

Classical literature helps us to understand the ancient Tamil society. The ancient Tamil community was a society that followed high characteristics. Classical literature shows that when people follow high qualities in a society where they live together, it leads to equality, development and unity of society. The so-called characteristic sing-and-run step emphasizes the idea that the world should know the state of the world and adapt to it. The uniqueness of Tamils is due to the high qualities they followed. Classical literature also highlights the need to possess the highest qualities from the individual to the king. The purpose of this article is to examine the high qualities mentioned in classical literature such as Sangam literature and Thirukkural