Is There a Disability Gap in Employment Rates in Developing Countries?

This paper examines differences in employment rates between persons with and without disabilities in 15 developing countries using the World Health Survey. We find that people with disabilities have lower employment rates than persons without disabilities in nine countries. Across countries, disability gaps in employment rates are more often found for men than women. The largest disability gap in employment rates is found for persons with multiple disabilities. For countries with a disability gap, results from a logistic decomposition suggest that observable characteristics of persons with/without disabilities do not explain most of the gap

Synthesized technical and socio-economic efficient evaluation of water quality improving devices and technologies: an example of the lake Kasumigaura Basin

In this study, we analyze an optimal policy and evaluate new devices and technologies to improve the water quality of Lake Kasumigaura, considering both - the total ecological system in and around the lake and the socio-economic situational changes over a certain period of time. The optimal policies are derived so as to maximize the objective function (GRP) subject to the structural equations, which describe both the ecosystem and socio-economic system.

An Optimal Investment Policy to Control the Land-based Water Pollutant into the Sea of Japan

Northeast Asia countries (e.g. around the Sea of Japan area) cooperate in economic and environmental policies, etc., because the comprehensive problems like the climate change and global warming occur in recent years. The ring Sea of Japan area consists of Japan, Republic of Korea, China, and Far East Russia in Northeast Asia, and the countries have to join forces in order to control the ocean environment and attain the sustainable development in the region. In this study, we try to evaluate the policy measure to control the land-based water pollutant into the Sea of Japan through a system simulation approach. The system simulation model is formulated a definition of an objective function and the structure of water pollutants inflow and the socio-economic system of the target countries and regions of the ring Sea of Japan. We present an optimal international policy for environmental investment taking account of economic situations and environmental influences of this area over a certain period of time through the dynamic simulation.

Towards Inclusive Education : The impact of disability on school attendance in developing countries

The paper aims to reduce the global knowledge gap pertaining to the impact of disability on school attendance, using cross-nationally comparable and nationally representative data from 18 surveys in 15 countries that are selected among 2,500 surveys and censuses.These selected surveys administered the Washington Group Short Set (WGSS) of disability-screening questions, covering five functional domains of seeing, hearing, mobility, self-care, and remembering, and collected information on educational status. Using both descriptive and econometric approaches, the paper finds that (i) the average disability gap in school attendance stands at 30% in primary and secondary schools in 15 countries; (ii) more than 85% of disabled primary-age children who are out of school have never attended school; (iii) the average marginal effect of disability on primary and secondary school attendance is negative and significant (-30%), and (iv) countries that have reached close to universal primary education report high ratios of disabled to non-disabled out-of-school children indicating that general education policies to improve access do not effectively mainstream disabled children in education, and (v) disabled children confront the same difficulties in participating in education, regardless of their individual and socio-economic characteristics

Comprehensive Evaluation of Environmental Policy for Water Pollutants and Greenhouse Gases Reduction in Jiaxing city, China

Recently, various environmental problems have been generated with the rapid economic development in China. That’s because China currently over-emphasized economic development beyond environmental issues; therefore, now it is important to enforce optimal environmental policies in order to achieve economic development as well as environmental improvement. In this study, we selected Jiaxing city as research area for that the environmental pollution problem has become prominent with economic high growth, and we constructed environmental system model and social economic model to establish the scenarios. Through computer simulation, we can evaluate the efficiency of the comprehensive environmental policies from both environmental preservation and social economic development aspects. While the social-economic model shows the socioeconomic activities which are vital events, fortune and service, such as production, finance and budget; the environmental system model shows the water pollutants and the greenhouse gas movement in the region. The dynamic optimization simulation is accomplished based on this environmental and socio-economic system model. In view of the restriction on water pollutants, greenhouse gas total exhausted amount, and economic activity in the catchment area, the simulation we practiced can provide concrete inner-generating optimal policies which can achieve the best economic and environment improvement with the consideration of policy, regional and timing choice in Jiaxing City, China.

Using Remote Sensing for Identifying Suitable Areas for Flood Shelter: A Case Study of Thatta, Sindh Pakistan

The most recurring type of disaster in the world these days is flood because of the spread and extent of its effect on people, among all-natural disasters of the world. Human activities have paved the way for many of these flood behavior to change as they used to be in the past. Pakistan experienced one of the most devastating natural disasters in its history all across the country in 2010, but Thatta district in southern part got severely affected during this flood. For the research, a simple yet efficient methodology Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) by using remote sensing images for identifying flood hazard areas was utilized. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) helps in finding shelter areas with a minimum effect of floods. It is essential to realize the importance of mapped results in consideration of manual flood management in future. The method used in this study is robust enough to explain the flood hazard for suggesting suitable shelter sites in case of flooding events. This would help disaster management bodies and other related agencies to formulate the development plans while keeping the hazard areas, which are unsuitable for development due to flood risk in the future

東大寺南大門仁王像の迎角が有する構造

前紀要にて、東大寺南大門仁王像の迎角は確かに存在し、その迎角を想定して当初より造像されていると述べた。しかし、それは実証的根拠に乏しいものであった。この度美術院より「東大寺南大門金剛力士像修理報告資料写真」をお借りすることができた。それらの資料写真が見せる東大寺南大門仁王像の各部位が有する傾斜角を調べた結果、迎角があると結論するとともに前紀要で想定した傾斜角度はさらに急激であり、仁王像は当初より東西に向かいあう立ち位置にあったと判断した

Evaluation of Integrated Air Pollution and Climate Change Policies: Case Study in the Thermal Power Sector in Chongqing City, China

The cost of environmental degradation has already had a dramatic impact on the Chinese economy. In order to curb these trends, the government of China has introduced stricter regulations. With this in mind, it is important to quantify the potential co-benefits of introducing air pollution and climate change mitigation policies. This study proposes relevant scenarios ranging from the current trends (baseline) to the introduction of different policies in the thermal power sector, including different carbon tax rates, technology innovation promotion, and technology cost reduction methods. We aim to comparatively evaluate the impact of the proposed policies within the thermal sector and within the entire socio-economic system. To this end, we used a dynamic input–output (I-O) model, into which high-efficiency technologies were incorporated as new thermal power industries in order to estimate policy impact during the time period 2010–2025. The results of this study demonstrated that the introduction of one or more of the following policies: carbon taxes, subsidies, technology innovation, and technology cost reduction, has no notable impact on the environment or the economy without the implementation of environment regulations. In contrast, the strong support of a government subsidy coupled with strict environmental regulations will promote technological innovation, for example through the natural gas combined cycle (NGCC) and the integrated coal gasification combined cycle (IGCC). Our study also showed that the reduction of air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions as well as energy consumption would curb economic development to a certain extent. Taking this into consideration, innovation must also be promoted in other economic sectors. This research provides a strong reference for policy-makers to identify effective polices under different types of environmental regulations

迎角から探る興福寺阿修羅像の立ち位置

興福寺阿修羅像はその特異な姿と少年らしい顔によって多くの人から愛される仏像である。だがこの像については不明な点も多い。筆者はこれまで、仏像が置かれる場所によってその形や傾きを変える事実を「迎角」として追究してきた。本研究では、阿修羅像の「迎角」を追究することにより、阿修羅像の置かれた場所を想定することである。その結果阿修羅像は向かって左奥、拝観者に斜め左側を見せて立つ位置にあったと想定した。この位置は興福寺曼荼羅に描かれた阿修羅の立ち位置に極めて近いと結論した