Search results for: regional tourist activities

Authors: Jacob J. Shila, Xiaoyu O. Wu

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As the applications of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) continue to increase across the world, it is critical to understand the factors that contribute to incidents and accidents associated with these systems. Given the variety of daily applications that could utilize the operations of the UAV (e.g., medical, security operations, construction activities, landscape activities), the main discussion has been how to safely incorporate the UAV into the national airspace system. The types of UAV incidents being reported range from near sightings by other pilots to actual collisions with aircraft or UAV. These incidents have the potential to impact the rest of aviation operations in a variety of ways, including human lives, liability costs, and delay costs. One of the largest causes of these incidents cited is the human factor; other causes cited include maintenance, aircraft, and others. This work investigates the key human factors associated with UAV incidents. To that end, the data related to UAV incidents that have occurred in the United States is both reviewed and analyzed to identify key human factors related to UAV incidents. The data utilized in this work is gathered from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) drone database. This study adopts the human factor analysis and classification system (HFACS) to identify key human factors that have contributed to some of the UAV failures to date. The uniqueness of this work is the incorporation of UAV incident data from a variety of applications and not just military data. In addition, identifying the specific human factors is crucial towards developing safety operational models and human factor guidelines for the UAV. The findings of these common human factors are also compared to similar studies in other countries to determine whether these factors are common internationally.

Keywords: human factors, incidents and accidents, safety, UAS, UAV

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Authors: Ismail Becenen

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Air pollution, a consequence of urbanization brought about by modern life, is as global as it is local and regional. Because of the adverse effects of air pollution on human health, air quality is given importance all over the world. According to the decision of the World Health Organization, clean air is the basic necessity for human health and well-being. It poses a very high risk especially for heart diseases and stroke cases. In this study, the positive effects of natural gas usage on air pollution in cities are explained by using literature scans and air pollution measurement values. Natural gas is cleaner than other types of fuel. It contains less sulfur and organic sulfur compounds. When natural gas burns, it does not leave ashes, it does not cause problems in the rubbish mountains. It's a clean fuel, it easily burns and shines. It is a burning gas that is easy and efficient. In addition, there is not a toxic effect for people in case of inhalation. As a result, the use of natural gas needs to be widespread to reduce air pollution around the world in order to provide a healthier life for people and the environment.

Keywords: natural gas, air pollution, sulfur dioxide, particulate matter, energy

Procedia PDF Downloads 196

Authors: Fatih Ercin Guney, Hami Karagol

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Day by day, humanity's energy needs increase, to facilitate access to energy sources by energy importing countries is of great importance in terms of issues both in terms of economic security and political security. The geographical location of the oil exporting countries in the Middle East (Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar) today, it is observed that evaluated by emerging Arab Spring(from Tunisia to Egypt) and freedom battles(in Syria) with security issues arise sourced from terrorist activities(ISIS). Progresses related with limited natural resources, energy and it's transportation issues which worries the developing countries, the energy in the region is considered to how to transfer safely. North Region of the Black Sea , the beginning of the conflict in the regional nature formed between Russia and Ukraine (2010), followed by the relevant regions of the power transmission line (From Russia to Europe) the discovery is considered to be the east's hand began to strengthen in terms of both the economical and political sides. With the growing need for safe access to the west of the new energy transmission lines are followed by Turkey, re-interest is considered to be shifted to the Mediterranean and the Middle East by West. Also, Russia, Iran and China (three axis of east) are generally performing as carry out parallel policies about energy , economical side and security in both United Nations Security Council (Two of Five Permanent Members are Russia and China) and Shanghai Cooperation Organization. In addition, Eastern Mediterranean Region Tension are rapidly increasing about research new oil and natural gas sources by Israel, Egypt, Cyprus, Lebanon. This paper provides, new energy corridor(s) are needed to transfer sources (Oil&Natural Gas) by Europe from East to West. So The West needs either safe bridge country to transfer natural sources to Europe in region or is needed to discovery new natural sources in extraterritorial waters of Eastern Mediterranean Region. But in two opportunities are evaluated with secure transfer corridors form region to Europe in safely. Even if the natural sources can be discovered, they are considered to transfer in safe manner. This paper involved, Turkey’s importance as a leader country in region over both of political and safe energy transfer sides as bridge country between south and north of Turkey why natural sources shall be transferred over Turkey, Even if diplomatic issues-For Example; Cyprus membership in European Union, Turkey membership candidate duration, Israel-Cyprus- Egypt-Lebanon researches about new natural sources in Mediterranean - occurred. But politic balance in Middle-East is changing quickly because of lack of democratic governments in region. So it is evaluated that the alliance of natural sources researches may not be long-time relations due to share sources after discoveries. After evaluating over causes and reasons, aim to reach finding foresight about future of region for energy transfer periods in secure manner.

Keywords: Middle East, natural gas, oil, Turkey

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Authors: Benjamin Glasner, Carlos Henriquez, Fernando Alfaro, Nicole Trefault, Santiago Andrade, Rodrigo De La Iglesia

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A central question in ecology refers to the relative importance that local-scale variables have over community composition, when compared with regional-scale variables. In coastal environments, strong seasonal abiotic influence dominates these systems, weakening the impact of other parameters like micronutrients. After the industrial revolution, micronutrients like trace metals have increased in ocean as pollutants, with strong effects upon biotic entities and biological processes in coastal regions. Coastal picoplankton communities had been characterized as a cyanobacterial dominated fraction, but in recent years the eukaryotic component of this size fraction has gained relevance due to their high influence in carbon cycle, although, diversity patterns and responses to disturbances are poorly understood. South Pacific upwelling coastal environments represent an excellent model to study seasonal changes due to a strong influence in the availability of macro- and micronutrients between seasons. In addition, some well constrained coastal bays of this region have been subjected to strong disturbances due to trace metal inputs. In this study, we aim to compare the influence of seasonality and trace metals concentrations, on the community structure of planktonic picoeukaryotes. To describe seasonal patterns in the study area, satellite data in a 6 years time series and in-situ measurements with a traditional oceanographic approach such as CTDO equipment were performed. In addition, trace metal concentrations were analyzed trough ICP-MS analysis, for the same region. For biological data collection, field campaigns were performed in 2011-2012 and the picoplankton community was described by flow cytometry and taxonomical characterization with next-generation sequencing of ribosomal genes. The relation between the abiotic and biotic components was finally determined by multivariate statistical analysis. Our data show strong seasonal fluctuations in abiotic parameters such as photosynthetic active radiation and superficial sea temperature, with a clear differentiation of seasons. However, trace metal analysis allows identifying strong differentiation within the study area, dividing it into two zones based on trace metals concentration. Biological data indicate that there are no major changes in diversity but a significant fluctuation in evenness and community structure. These changes are related mainly with regional parameters, like temperature, but by analyzing the metal influence in picoplankton community structure, we identify a differential response of some plankton taxa to metal pollution. We propose that some picoeukaryotic plankton groups respond differentially to metal inputs, by changing their nutritional status and/or requirements under disturbances as a derived outcome of toxic effects and tolerance.

Keywords: Picoeukaryotes, plankton communities, trace metals, seasonal patterns

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Authors: Zeynep Selin Acar

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In international system, there has always been a cycle of violence, war and peace. As there travels the time, after Christianity and later Just War theorists, international relations theorists have been tried to limit violence and war. As pieces of international law, Peace of Augsburg, Kellog-Briand Pact, League of Nations Covenant and UN Charter were and are still not effective to prevent war. Moreover, in order to find a way around these rules, it is believed that a new excuse started to be used instead of violence or war, humanitarian intervention. However, it has neither a legal nor a universally accepted framework. As a result, it is open to be manipulated by states. In order to prevent this, Responsibility to Protect (RtoP) which gives a state the responsibility to protect its citizens against violence, is created. Additionally, RtoP transfers this responsibility to regional or international group of states at the time when a state is the origin of violence. In the lights of these, this paper analyzes RtoP as an ethical approach to war and peace studies because it provides other states as guardians and care-takers of people who do not belong to them or do not share any togetherness.

Keywords: ethics, humanitarian intervention, responsibility to protect, UN charter

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Authors: Wanlapha Phraibueng, Patrick Sentis, Geraldine Riviere-Giordano

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Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives have been widely discussed especially in investor-oriented firms. In contrast, cooperatives pay less attention to CSR because their activities have integrated the responsibility and the solidity of social, economic and environment. On the other hand, by adopting ownership theory and agency theory – cooperatives ignore CSR investment due to unclarified decision control in the governance and the limitation to acquire the capital financed. The unique governance and financial structures in cooperatives lead to the conflict among the stakeholders and long-term investment which have an impact on firm financial performance. As an illustration of cooperatives dilemmas, we address the question of Whether or not cooperatives in term of governance and financial structures are the constraints on implementing CSR policies. We find that the governance and financial structures in large cooperatives are the influence factors which predispose cooperatives to invest on CSR. In contrast, in the startup or small cooperatives, its governance and financial structures are the constraints on implementing CSR policies. We propose the alternative financial structure based on the trade-off between debt and equity which aims to relax the restrictions in cooperatives’ governance and allow cooperatives to acquire the capital financed either from its members or non-members. We suggest that engaging equity as a financial structure induces cooperatives to invest on CSR policies. Alternative financial structure eliminates not only cooperative ownership control problem but also the constraints in capital acquisition. By implementing CSR activities consistent with the alternative financial choice, cooperatives can increase firm’s value and reduce the conflict among their stakeholders.

Keywords: cooperatives, corporate social responsibility, financial, governance

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Authors: Dragos Ardeleanu, Silviu-Valentin Petre

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Written to satisfy the needs of Western powers, classical geopolitics bore the stint of Eurocentrism. Both Mackinder’s heartland and Nicholas Spykman’s rimland were intellectual creations set for the purpose of the Anglophone nations dealing with Eurasia. However, while today’s world is moving towards multipolarity, other emerging regional actors are following their own interests using a different geospatial map. Such is the case of Iran which has developed an engagement pattern in Africa, directed mostly towards costal states, in order to break the rimland grip of Arab states and also the international pressure established against Tehran’s nascent nuclear program. Capitalizing on literature review and analysing statements from key public figures, our paper argues that Iranian African geopolitics displays a dual message: on the one hand, it uses tiers-mondiste rhetoric to garner the support of different coastal African states and, on the other hand, it employs Shiism to gain a foothold in strategic parts of the black continent.

Keywords: African geopolitics, Iran, Shiism, tiers-mondisme

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Authors: Aiydh Aljeddani, Fran Martin

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The critical time in which we live requires rethinking of many potential ways in order to make the concept of sustainability and its principles an integral part of our daily life. One of these potential approaches is how to attract community institutions, such as the private sector, to participate effectively in the sustainability industry by supporting public schools to fulfill their duties. A collaborative community of practice can support this purpose and can provide a flexible framework, which allows the members of the community to participate effectively. This study, conducted in Saudi Arabia, aimed to understand the process of a collaborative community of practice of involving the private sector as a member of this community to integrate the sustainability concept in school activities and projects. This study employed a qualitative methodology to understand this authentic and complex phenomenon. A case study approach, ethnography and some elements of action research were followed in this study. The methods of unstructured interviews, artifacts, observation, and teachers’ field notes were used to collect the data. The participants were three secondary teachers, twelve chief executive officers, and one school administrative officer. Certain contextual conditions, as shown by the data, should be taken into consideration when policy makers and school administrations in Saudi Arabia desire to integrate sustainability into school activities. The first of these was the acknowledgement of the valuable role of the members’ personality, efforts, abilities, and experiences, which played vital roles in integrating sustainability. Second, institutional culture, which was not expected to emerge as an important factor in this study, has a significant role in the integration of sustainability. Credibility among the members of the community towards the integration of the sustainability concept and its principles through school activities is another important condition. Fourth, some chief executive officers’ understanding of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) towards contribution to sustainability agenda was shallow and limited and this could impede the successful integration of sustainability. Fifth, a shared understanding between the members of the community about integrating sustainability was a vital condition in the integration process. The study also revealed that the integration of sustainability could not be an ongoing process if implemented in isolation of the other community institutions such as the private sector. The study finally offers a number of recommendations to improve on the current practices and suggests areas for further studies.

Keywords: community of practice, public schools, private sector, sustainable development

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Authors: Arturo Tobias Calizon Jr.

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The study investigated the practices in critical reflection being employed in teaching and learning mathematics in public and private schools for students to achieve perspective transformation in psychological, convictional and behavioral dimensions. There were 1,969 senior high school and college student-respondents selected at random from 33 schools. Process reflection is most commonly practiced in both public and private schools. Convictional dimension of perspective transformation is most frequently achieved. There is no significant difference in practices of process reflection between senior high school and college students. However, there is a significant difference in perspective transformation in behavioral dimension achieved by students from public and private schools. Also, there are significant differences in psychological, convictional and behavioral dimensions of perspective transformation achieved by senior high school and college students. There is a high and significant relationship between critical reflection practices and perspective transformation of students. The researcher concludes that there are teaching strategies that facilitate critical thinking, and there are learning activities that alter perspective of students about mathematics as an abstract field. The researcher further concludes that consistent use of appropriate teaching and learning activities could bring about perspective transformation in students with success.

Keywords: critical reflection, perspective transformation, process reflection, convictional dimension, teaching and learning mathematics

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Authors: Dila Ram Bhandari

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Throughout the 20th century, new governments were created where identities such as ethnic, religious, linguistic, caste, communal, tribal, and others played a part in the development of constitutions and the legal system of victim and criminal justice. Acute issues with extremism, poverty, environmental degradation, cybercrimes, human rights violations, crime against, and victimization of both individuals and groups have recently plagued South Asian nations. Everyday massive number of crimes are steadfast, these frequent crimes have made the lives of common citizens restless. Crimes are one of the major threats to society and also for civilization. Crime is a bone of contention that can create a societal disturbance. The old-style crime solving practices are unable to live up to the requirement of existing crime situations. Crime analysis is one of the most important activities of the majority of intelligent and law enforcement organizations all over the world. The South Asia region lacks such a regional coordination mechanism, unlike central Asia of Asia Pacific regions, to facilitate criminal intelligence sharing and operational coordination related to organized crime, including illicit drug trafficking and money laundering. There have been numerous conversations in recent years about using data mining technology to combat crime and terrorism. The Data Detective program from Sentient as a software company, uses data mining techniques to support the police (Sentient, 2017). The goals of this internship are to test out several predictive model solutions and choose the most effective and promising one. First, extensive literature reviews on data mining, crime analysis, and crime data mining were conducted. Sentient offered a 7-year archive of crime statistics that were daily aggregated to produce a univariate dataset. Moreover, a daily incidence type aggregation was performed to produce a multivariate dataset. Each solution's forecast period lasted seven days. Statistical models and neural network models were the two main groups into which the experiments were split. For the crime data, neural networks fared better than statistical models. This study gives a general review of the applied statistics and neural network models. A detailed image of each model's performance on the available data and generalizability is provided by a comparative analysis of all the models on a comparable dataset. Obviously, the studies demonstrated that, in comparison to other models, Gated Recurrent Units (GRU) produced greater prediction. The crime records of 2005-2019 which was collected from Nepal Police headquarter and analysed by R programming. In conclusion, gated recurrent unit implementation could give benefit to police in predicting crime. Hence, time series analysis using GRU could be a prospective additional feature in Data Detective.

Keywords: time series analysis, forecasting, ARIMA, machine learning

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Authors: Erica Siqueira, Adriana Bin, Rachel Stefanuto

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The paper aims to identify and to discuss the impact and results of ex-ante, mid-term and ex-post evaluation initiatives in Brazilian Social Enterprises from the point of view of the entrepreneurs and investors, highlighting the processes involved in these activities and their aftereffects. The study was conducted using a descriptive methodology, primarily qualitative. A multiple-case study was used, and, for that, semi-structured interviews were conducted with ten entrepreneurs in the (i) social finance, (ii) education, (iii) health, (iv) citizenship and (v) green tech fields, as well as three representatives of various impact investments, which are (i) venture capital, (ii) loan and (iii) equity interest areas. Convenience (non-probabilistic) sampling was adopted to select both businesses and investors, who voluntarily contributed to the research. The evaluation is still incipient in most of the studied business cases. Some stand out by adopting well-known methodologies like Global Impact Investing Report System (GIIRS), but still, have a lot to improve in several aspects. Most of these enterprises use nonexperimental research conducted by their own employees, which is ordinarily not understood as 'golden standard' to some authors in the area. Nevertheless, from the entrepreneur point of view, it is possible to identify that most of them including those routines in some extent in their day-by-day activities, despite the difficulty they have of the business in general. In turn, the investors do not have overall directions to establish evaluation initiatives in respective enterprises; they are funding. There is a mechanism of trust, and this is, usually, enough to prove the impact for all stakeholders. The work concludes that there is a large gap between what the literature states in regard to what should be the best practices in these businesses and what the enterprises really do. The evaluation initiatives must be included in some extension in all enterprises in order to confirm social impact that they realize. Here it is recommended the development and adoption of more flexible evaluation mechanisms that consider the complexity involved in these businesses’ routines. The reflections of the research also suggest important implications for the field of Social Enterprises, whose practices are far from what the theory preaches. It highlights the risk of the legitimacy of these enterprises that identify themselves as 'social impact', sometimes without the proper proof based on causality data. Consequently, this makes the field of social entrepreneurship fragile and susceptible to questioning, weakening the ecosystem as a whole. In this way, the top priorities of these enterprises must be handled together with the results and impact measurement activities. Likewise, it is recommended to perform further investigations that consider the trade-offs between impact versus profit. In addition, research about gender, the entrepreneur motivation to call themselves as Social Enterprises, and the possible unintended consequences from these businesses also should be investigated.

Keywords: evaluation practices, impact, results, social enterprise, social entrepreneurship ecosystem

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Authors: Hong Chen, Li Heping

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China's urbanization rate has exceeded 60%, and in the long term, China's urbanization development will enter a new stage of transformation and development focusing on quality improvement, and urban renewal has become an important part of China's urban development. In the past, many cities in the process of renewal in order to maximize the pursuit of economic interests, large-scale demolition of the old to build new, accelerating the disappearance of regional history and culture, aggravating the homogenization of the city. With the changes in the economic and social development environment, urban renewal requires a more comprehensive perspective of action. Starting from the perspective of the core of urban management theory, this paper is oriented to culture-enabled urban renewal and takes the urban renewal of Changbin Road Area in Yuzhong District of Chongqing as an example to expound the problems and renewal strategies in its urban renewal, so as to provide references for the urban renewal of other Chinese cities in the new period.

Keywords: Urban management, Urban culture, Urban renewal in mountainous areas, urban renewal

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Authors: Samir Falhi, Neji Gharsallah, Adel Kadri

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Ruta chalpensis L. is a medicinal plant in the family of Rutaceae, has been used as an important traditional in the Mediterranean basin in the treatment of many diseases. The current study was devoted to investigate and evaluate the chemical composition, total phenolic, flavonoid and tannin contents, and in vitro antioxidant activities of ethyl acetate, ethanol and hydroalcoholic extracts and essential oil from the aerial parts of Ruta chalpensis from Tunisian Sahara. Total phenolic, flavonoid and tannin contents of extracts ranged from 40.39 ± 1.87 to 75.13 ± 1.22 mg of GAE/g, from 22.62 ± 1.55 to 27.51 ± 1.04 mg of QE/g, and from 5.56 ± 1.32 to 10.89 ± 1.10 mg of CE/g respectively. Results showed that the highest antioxidant activities was determined for ethanol extract with IC50 value of 26.23 ± 0.91 µg/mL for 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl assay, and for hydroalcoholic extract with EC50 value of 412.95±6.57 µg/mL and 105.52±2.45 mg of α-tocopherol/g for ferric reducing antioxidant power and total antioxidant capacity assays, respectively. Furthermore, Gas Chromatography–Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis of essential oil led to identification of 20 compounds representing 98.96 % of the total composition. The major components of essential oil were 2-undecanone (39.13%), 2-nonanone (25.04), 1-nonene (13.81), and α-limonene (7.72). Spectral data of Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy analysis (FT-IR) of extracts revealed the presence of functional groups such as C= O, C─O, ─OH, and C─H, which confirmed its richness on polyphenols and biological active functional groups. These results showed that Ruta chalpensis could be a potential natural source of antioxidants that can be used in food and nutraceutical applications.

Keywords: antioxidant, FT-IR analysis, GC-MS analysis, phytochemicals contents, Ruta chalpensis

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Authors: Jocelyn Floresca

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This paper aimed to present the by-product of the introduction of environmental ecology awareness on a formal education level utilizing the program course of Physical Education, particularly in the tertiary level. It is based on the premise that the radical need for environmental protection may not only necessarily be the work of people in the pure sciences but also deemed necessary to look into more avenues of the school setting particularly in the field of Physical Education. In the Philippines, most schools’ Physical Education focuses on the advancement of sports, fitness and wellness which are mostly done in the confines of a closed building. The paper dwells into the introduction of Physical Education as an outdoor recreation activity where in the participants of the study had the opportunity to indulge in activities undertaken outside the confines of buildings and going into large areas of the environment. It looked into the individual participant’s environmental social behaviour and effects on the participant’s perceptions in terms of the set objectives of Physical Education before and after the study’s intervention. The study utilized the formal course in Physical Education on nature walks, mountaineering and bird watching as interventions to gain perceptions and understanding. The introduction of the environmental ecology activities as a formal Physical Education course has resulted in deeper awareness that led to understanding the need to protect the environment, appreciation of the value of natural areas and acquiring behaviour for a sustainable use of the environment during the practice of Physical Education. Also, prior to the introduction of environmental ecology in Physical Education as a formal study; participants have no knowledge of what dwells in the identified sites of intervention. Whereas after the study, participants were able to identify various species of birds and plants found in the sites of the study that may lead to further conservation of the particular species.

Keywords: appreciation, conservation, environmental ecology, outdoor

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Authors: Farhad Azadi, Mohammad Mahdi Mohammadi, Mohsen Vahedi, Zahra Mahdiin

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Context: The aging population is growing all over the world and maintaining physical activity is essential for healthy aging. However, fear of falling is a major obstacle to physical activity among the elderly. The aim of this study is to investigate and compare the relationship between fear of falling and physical activity in Iranian urban and rural elderly. Research Aim: The main aim of this cross-sectional analytical study is to investigate and compare the relationship between fear of falling and physical activity in Iranian rural and urban elderly. Methodology: The study used simple non-probability sampling to select 350 participants aged 60 years and older from rural and urban areas of Konarak, Sistan and Baluchistan provinces in Iran. The Persian versions of the Falls Efficacy Scale - International, Rapid Physical Activity Assessment, Activities of Daily Living, and Instrumental Activities of Daily Living questionnaires were used to assess fear of falling and physical activity. The data were analyzed using Pearson correlation tests. Findings: The study found a statistically significant negative correlation between fear of falling and physical activity, as measured by ADL, IADL, and RAPA1(aerobic ), in all elderly and rural and urban elderly (p<0.001). Fear of falling was higher in rural areas, while physical activity levels measured by ADL and RAPA1 were higher in urban areas. No significant difference was found between the two groups in IADL and RAPA2 (strength and flexibility) scores. Theoretical Importance: This study highlights the importance of considering the fear of falling as a significant obstacle to proper physical activity, especially among the elderly living in rural areas. Furthermore, the study provides insight into the difference between rural and urban elderly people in terms of fear of falling and physical activity. Data Collection and Analysis Procedures: Data was collected through questionnaires and analyzed using Pearson correlation tests. Questions Addressed: The study attempted to answer the following questions: Is there a relationship between fear of falling and physical activity in Iranian urban and rural elderly people? Is there a difference in fear of falling and physical activity between rural and urban elderly? Conclusion: Fear of falling is a major obstacle to physical activity among the elderly, especially in rural areas. The study found a significant negative correlation between fear of falling and physical activity in all elderly and rural and urban elderly. In addition, urban and rural elderly have differences in aerobic activity levels, but they do not differ in terms of flexibility and strength. Therefore, proper interventions are required to ensure that the elderly can maintain physical activity, especially in rural and deprived areas.

Keywords: aged, fear of falling, physical activity, urban population, rural population

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Authors: Ngo Thi Thanh Mai, Nguyen Thu Ha, Frances Crawford

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The demand for developing international social work field education is on the rise. Global foreign universities have considered international collaboration and cross-cultural perspective as an essential part of their social work training curriculum. International placement program at Faculty of Social Work (FSW), Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE) has met the need of international social work students, as well as the institutions involved in achieving social work professional social work knowledge in the Vietnamese context. This program has also lead to a long-term collaboration between HNUE and several global institutions in developing social work education, research and practice skill. This paper focuses on the benefits and challenges of students who involved in the global placement programme at Faculty of Social Work (FSW), Hanoi National University of Education (HNUE) and content of international field education provided to the international students based on the experience of the authors. Study results indicated that the participants have opportunity them to explore a new culture and social work system abroad especially in the Vietnamese context. However, there are still difficulties that international students have to face during different phases of the exchange process such as language and communication barriers, cultural value differences, insufficient support and supervision during placement. Basing on these results, the authors intend to propose some recommendations to enhance the programme activities such as pre-departure orientation, support and supervision during placement, cultural exchange and follow-up activities.

Keywords: social work education, social work, international placement, field placement, Vietnam

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Authors: Chika C. Ogueke, Ijeoma M. Agunwah

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The antimicrobial activities and preservative potentials of crude extracts of Alstonia boonei stem bark and Euphorbia hirta leaves were studied. Soxhlet extraction and cold ethanol extraction methods were used for the extraction of the dried and ground plant samples. Well in agar diffusion method was used for the antimicrobial screening at different concentrations of 25mg/ml, 50mg/ml, 100mg/ml and 200mg/ml on E.coli and B.subtilis. The preservative effects of the extracts at 0.1%, 0.2% and 0.3% singly and in combination were determined in minced meat using E. coli and B. subtilis as test isolates. Phytochemical analysis was also conducted on the extracts using standard analytical methods. E.hirta cold and A.boonei cold extracts gave the highest zone of growth inhibition on E. coli and B.substilis with 20mm zone diameter at 200mg/ml concentration. Phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of alkaloids, flavonoids, tannins, saponins and cardiac glycosides. A.boonei at 0.1, 0.2 and 0.3% produced a log cycle reduction on the growth of E.coli. Mixture of A. boonei and E. hirta extracts (1:1) at 0.1% and 0.2% also produced a log cycle reduction on the growth of E.coli and B. subtilis, however the A. boonei extracts had more significant effect on the isolates. The observed antimicrobial activities are attributed to the phytochemicals identified in the extracts. The results reveal the potentials of plant extracts as natural antimicrobial preservatives in minced meat. Thus the crude extracts can act as inhibitors of bacteria in a food system. Upon further purification better results may be obtained.

Keywords: antimicrobial preservative, crude extracts, minced meat, test isolates

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Authors: Muhammad nor Farhan Sa'At, Xin Y. Lim, Terence Y. C. Tan, Siti Hajar M. Rosli, Syazwani S. Ali, Ami F. Syed Mohamed

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INTRODUCTION: Hemp (Cannabis sativa subsp. sativa), commonly used for industrial purposes, differs from marijuana by containing lower levels of delta-9-tetrahydronannabidiol- the principal psychoactive constituent in cannabis. Due to its non-psychoactive nature, there has been growing interest in hemp’s therapeutic potential, which has been investigated through pre-clinical and clinical study modalities. OBJECTIVE: To provide an overview of the current landscape of hemp research, through recent scientific findings specific to the pharmacological effects of the medicinal hemp plant and its derived compounds. METHODS: This review was conducted through a systematic search strategy according to the preferred reporting items for systematic review and meta-analysis-ScR (PRISMA-ScR) checklist on electronic databases including MEDLINE, OVID (OVFT, APC Journal Club, EBM Reviews), Cochrane Library Central and Clinicaltrials.gov. RESULTS: From 65 primary articles reviewed, there were 47 pre-clinical studies related to medicinal hemp. Interestingly, the hemp derivatives showed several potential activities such as anti-oxidative, anti-hypertensive, anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-neuroinflammatory, anti-arthritic, anti-acne, and anti-microbial activities. Renal protective effects and estrogenic properties were also exhibited in vitro. CONCLUSION: Medicinal hemp possesses various pharmacological effects tested in vitro and in vivo. Information provided in this review could be used as tool to strengthen the study design of future clinical trial research.

Keywords: Preclinical, Herbal Medicine, Hemp, Cannabis

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Authors: Friman Hen, Banner Ifaa, Shalom-Tuchin Bosmat, Einav Yulia

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The action learning course is an academic course which involves academic learning and social activities. The courses deal with processes and social challenges, reveal different ideologies, and develop critical thinking and pragmatic ideas. Students receive course credits and a grade for being part of such courses. Participating students enroll in courses that involve action and activities to engage in the experiential learning process, thereby creating a dialogue and cross-fertilization between being taught in the classroom and experiencing the reality in the real world. A learning experience includes meeting with social organizations, institutions, and state authorities and carrying out practical work with diverse populations. Through experience, students strengthen their academic skills, formulate ethical attitudes toward reality, develop professional and civilian perspectives, and realize how they can influence their surrounding in the present and the hereafter. Under the guidance and supervision of Dr. Hen Friman, H.I.T. has built an innovative course that combines action and activities to increase the awareness and accessibility of the community in an experiential way. The end goal is to create Green Ambassadors—children with a high level of environmental awareness. This course is divided into two parts. The first part, focused on frontal teaching, delivers knowledge from extensive environmental fields to students. These areas include introduction to ecology, the process of electricity generation, air pollution, renewable energy, water economy, waste and recycling, and energy efficiency (first stage). In addition to the professional content in the environment field, students learn the method of effective and experiential teaching to younger learners (4 to 8 years old). With the attainment of knowledge, students are divided into operating groups. The second part of the course shows how the theory becomes practical and concrete. At this stage, students are asked to introduce to the first- and second-graders of ‘Revivim’ School in Holon a lesson of 90 minutes focused on presenting the issues and their importance during the course (second stage). This course is the beginning of a paradigm shift regarding energy usage in the modern society in Israel. The objective of the course is to expand worldwide and train the first and second-graders, and even pre-schoolers, in a wide scope to increase population awareness rate, both in Israel and all over the world, for a green future.

Keywords: air pollution, green ambassador, recycling, renewable energy

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Authors: Amritpal Slaich, Mark Elshaw

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This paper explores the development of a decision support framework for the introduction of business intelligence (BI) through operational research techniques for application by SMEs. Aligned with the goals of the new Midlands Enterprise Initiative of improving the skill levels of the Midlands workforce and addressing high levels of regional unemployment, we have developed a framework to increase the level of business intelligence used by SMEs to improve business decision-making. Many SMEs in the Midlands fail due to the lack of high quality decision making. Our framework outlines how universities can: engage with SMEs in the use of BI through operational research techniques; develop appropriate and easy to use Excel spreadsheet models; and make use of a process to allow SMEs to feedback their findings of the models. Future work will determine how well the framework performs in getting SMEs to apply BI to improve their decision-making performance.

Keywords: SMEs, decision support framework, business intelligence, operational research techniques

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Authors: Fatemeh Khalili Varnamkhasti

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Natural administration has outside impacts such that companies regularly respect natural input as a fetched with no clear advantage. In this manner, in case natural security can bring financial benefits, showing that natural security and financial interface are in concordance, companies will effectively fulfill their obligation to ensure the environment. Contamination is, for the most part, related to the squandering of assets, misplaced vitality, and crude materials not completely utilized. Contamination avoidance and clean innovation, as inner organizational hones, can offer assistance to play down taken toll and to develop economic aptitudes for the long run, whereas outside organizational hones (item stewardship and maintainability vision) can offer assistance to coordinated partner sees into trade operations and to define future commerce directions. Taken together, these practices can drive shareholder esteem while at the same time contributing to a more feasible world. On the off chance that the company's budgetary execution is nice, it'll draw in financial specialists to contribute and progress the company's execution. In this way, budgetary execution is additionally the determinant of the progression of a company. This can be because the monetary back gotten by the company gets to be the premise for the running of trade forms in the future. Moreover, A green picture can assist firms in pulling in more clients by influencing shopper choices and moving forward with buyer brand dependability. Numerous shoppers need to purchase items from ecologically inviting firms, in spite of the fact that there are, of course, a few who will not pay premium costs for green items.

Keywords: environmental activities, financial performanance, advantage, clients

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Authors: Breanna Wright, Peter Bragge

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Diagnostic error rates in healthcare are approximately 10% of cases. Diagnostic errors can cause patient harm due to inappropriate, inadequate or delayed treatment, and such errors contribute heavily to medical liability claims globally. Therefore, addressing diagnostic error is a high priority. In most cases, diagnostic errors are the result of faulty information synthesis rather than lack of knowledge. Specifically, the majority of diagnostic errors involve cognitive factors, and in particular, cognitive biases. Emergency Departments are an environment with heightened risk of diagnostic error due to time and resource pressures, a frequently chaotic environment, and patients arriving undifferentiated and with minimal context. This project aimed to develop a behavioural, evidence-informed intervention to reduce diagnostic error in Emergency Departments through co-design with emergency physicians, insurers, researchers, hospital managers, citizens and consumer representatives. The Forum Process was utilised to address this aim. This involves convening a small (4 – 6 member) expert panel to guide a focused literature and practice review; convening of a 10 – 12 person citizens panel to gather perspectives of laypeople, including those affected by misdiagnoses; and a 18 – 22 person structured stakeholder dialogue bringing together representatives of the aforementioned stakeholder groups. The process not only provides in-depth analysis of the problem and associated behaviours, but brings together expertise and insight to facilitate identification of a behaviour change intervention. Informed by the literature and practice review, the Citizens Panel focused on eliciting the values and concerns of those affected or potentially affected by diagnostic error. Citizens were comfortable with diagnostic uncertainty if doctors were honest with them. They also emphasised the importance of open communication between doctors and patients and their families. Citizens expect more consistent standards across the state and better access for both patients and their doctors to patient health information to avoid time-consuming re-taking of long patient histories and medication regimes when re-presenting at Emergency Departments and to reduce the risk of unintentional omissions. The structured Stakeholder Dialogue focused on identifying a feasible behavioural intervention to review diagnoses in Emergency Departments. This needed to consider the role of cognitive bias in medical decision-making; contextual factors (in Victoria, there is a legislated 4-hour maximum time between ED triage and discharge / hospital admission); resource availability; and the need to ensure the intervention could work in large metropolitan as well as small rural and regional ED settings across Victoria. The identified behavioural intervention will be piloted in approximately ten hospital EDs across Victoria, Australia. This presentation will detail the findings of all review and consultation activities, describe the behavioural intervention developed and present results of the pilot trial.

Keywords: behavioural intervention, cognitive bias, decision-making, diagnostic error

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Authors: Paradigm Shift

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In an overwhelmingly import oriented content bazaar of Arabian TV industry, Musalsalat stand unique in their indigenousness and mass popularity, being rivalled only by movies and football. The Arabic term ‘Musalsalat’ stands for drama series with episodes of 30-45 minutes duration; the format being close to Latin American Telenovela concept-clear cut stories with definitive endings that permit narrative closures. Traditionally Musalsalat were either situational comedies or religiously inspired. Present-day productions have started addressing historical, creative and socially progressive issues targeting the young and well-travelled audiences. Though these soaps get prime ratings throughout the year, it is during Ramadan, that they become a raving success in securing viewership. That Musalsalat have become paramount Ramadan programming is evident by their dominance on the grid and attracting heavy ad-spend. The number of Musalsalats produced specifically for Ramadan reached over 100 last year with Ramadan TV advertising amounting to USD1, 947bn constituting 21% of the total regional TV Adspend of USD 9,189bn.

Keywords: Musalsalat, drama, pan Arab, television

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Authors: Raihan Zahirah Mauludy Ridwan, Frisca Devi Choirina

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Indonesia is an agrarian country endowed by fertile soil, supportive weather, and natural resources which can support agricultural activities. There are commodities which produced by local farmers. Even though Indonesia had commodities, it still imports stocks of staple food. To reduce the dependency on imported staple food, President Joko Widodo wants to generate more locally-produced staple food by giving 69.000 tractors, free seeds, and fertilizers to the local farmers. In Indonesia, the problem revolves around the amount of food production especially rice derived from farmers who cannot afford technologies which can support the agricultural activities. Moreover, they cannot afford seeds and fertilizers which can make the production of commodities more effective and have high quality. Therefore, the paper would like to answer how agriculture equipment assistance during President Joko Widodo era can give significant impact towards food security. The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of agriculture equipment assistance and its impact towards Indonesia’s food security. This paper uses Boserup and Ruthenberg theory of agricultural intensification to link agriculture equipment and intensification of production which in the end will have impact towards food security through case study method. The paper affirms that the role of agricultural equipment assistance toward food security in Indonesia is significant toward Indonesia’s food production and security.

Keywords: agricultural equipment, agricultural intensification, Boserup, Indonesia, Joko Widodo, Ruthenberg

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Authors: Charlotte Lülf

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Migration flows cannot be tackled by single states but need to be addressed as a transnational and international responsibility. However, the current international framework staggers. Widely excluded from legal protection are people that flee from the indiscriminate effects of an armed conflict as well as people fleeing natural disasters. This paper as part of an on-going PhD Project deals with the current and partly contradicting approaches to the protection of so-called war- and climate refugees in the European Union. The analysis will emphasize and evaluate the role of the European judiciary to define, redefine and potentially expand legal protection. Changing jurisprudential practice of national and regional courts will be assessed, as will be their dialogue to interpret the international obligations of human rights law, migration laws and asylum laws in an interacting world.

Keywords: human rights law, asylum law, migration, refugee protection

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Authors: Mohammad Amin Hamedirad, Seyed Javad Vaziri Kang Olyaei

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Project planning and control are one of the most critical issues in the management of construction projects. Traditional methods of project planning and control, such as the critical path method or Gantt chart, are not widely used for planning projects with discrete and repetitive activities, and one of the problems of project managers is planning the implementation process and optimal allocation of its resources. Massive concreting projects is also a project with discrete and repetitive activities. This study uses the concept of simulating discrete events to manage resources, which includes finding the optimal number of resources considering various limitations such as limitations of machinery, equipment, human resources and even technical, time and implementation limitations using analysis of resource consumption rate, project completion time and critical points analysis of the implementation process. For this purpose, the concept of discrete-event simulation has been used to model different stages of implementation. After reviewing the various scenarios, the optimal number of allocations for each resource is finally determined to reach the maximum utilization rate and also to reduce the project completion time or reduce its cost according to the existing constraints. The results showed that with the optimal allocation of resources, the project completion time could be reduced by 90%, and the resulting costs can be reduced by up to 49%. Thus, allocating the optimal number of project resources using this method will reduce its time and cost.

Keywords: simulation, massive concreting, discrete event simulation, resource management

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Authors: Markéta Slováková

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The largest share of policy and money within the European Union goes to agriculture. The Union’s Common Agricultural Policy has undergone several transformations in the last five decades, with the main change taking place in the 1990's. This change influenced agriculture in the Czech Republic, inasmuch as the fledgling republic was preparing to join the European Union and adopt its policies. In the 1990s, Czech agriculture passed from a centrally planned economy to a market economy and subsequently adopted the terms of the Common Agricultural Policy. The Czech Republic is also characterized by a significant landscape sphere diversification. Agricultural entrepreneurs in the Czech Republic are still not used the possibility of grants from the European Union. They focus rather on national or regional subsidy titles. Only half of all agricultural entrepreneurs in the Czech Republic use European subsidies. This article focuses on the introduction of the Common Agricultural Policy to the Czech Republic and its subsequent influence on Czech agriculture. It is demonstrated on the implementation rate of the CAP in the EU Member States and the closer focus is on the Czech integration.

Keywords: common agricultural policy, agriculture, European Union, transformation

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Authors: Wiriranai Brilliant Masara

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The African Peace and Security Architecture is widely celebrated and revered as a paragon of the will to address peace and security challenges in Africa. However, like any other institution, it is embedded with operational and institutional challenges that prevent it from effectively carrying out its mandate and turning goals into achieved results. The article examines the fundamental flaws and weaknesses of the African Peace and Security Architecture by focusing on its institutions, norms, instruments, and its relationship to Africa’s Regional Economic Communities. Therefore, the article reviews the flaws of the five elements of the African Peace and Security Architecture which are the Peace and Security Council, Panel of the Wise, Continental Early Warning System, African Standby Force, and Peace Fund.

Keywords: African Union, African Peace and Security Architecture, peace and security council, continental early warning system, African Standby Force, Panel of the Wise, Peace Fund

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Authors: Jianhua Wang, Ying Zhou, Han Guo

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Translation underwent culture turn for more than half a century, which brought translation and its studies beyond intra-texts. Different cultures in recent years have developed towards a translation turn, which made a great contribution to relocate national or local cultures being localized to become regional or global cultures. As China grows quickly economically integrating into the world, it becomes urgent to relate China’s story and disseminate the Chinese culture. Due to the weaknesses and drawbacks of different existing cultural translation theories for Chinese culture to go out, a new perspective on translation turn for the go-out of Chinese culture should be drawn to spread better and disseminate Chinese culture to other countries. Based on the existing cultural translation theories, the equivalence of ideology, style of the translator and agency of the support are proposed to draw a new perspective: an innovative poly-system theory for Chinese culture translation.

Keywords: cultural translation theory, Chinese culture, innovative poly system, global cultures

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Authors: Navodit Goel, Prabir K. Paul

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Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) is attacked by Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato causing speck lesions on the leaves leading to severe economic casualty. In the present study, aqueous fruit extracts of Azadirachta indica (neem) were sprayed on a single node of tomato plants grown under controlled contamination-free conditions. The treatment of plants was performed with neem fruit extract either alone or along with the pathogen. The parameters of observation were activities of polyphenol oxidase (PPO) and lysozyme, and isoform analysis of PPO; both at the treated leaves as well as untreated leaves away from the site of extract application. Polyphenol oxidase initiates phenylpropanoid pathway resulting in the synthesis of quinines from cytoplasmic phenols and production of reactive oxygen species toxic to broad spectrum microbes. Lysozyme is responsible for the breakdown of bacterial cell wall. The results indicate the upregulation of PPO and lysozyme activities in both the treated and untreated leaves along with de novo expression of newer PPO isoenzymes (which were absent in control samples). The appearance of additional PPO isoenzymes in bioelicitor-treated plants indicates that either the isoenzymes were expressed after bioelicitor application or the already expressed but inactive isoenzymes were activated by it. Lysozyme activity was significantly increased in the plants when treated with the bioelicitor or the pathogen alone. However, no new isoenzymes of lysozyme were expressed upon application of the extract. Induction of resistance by neem fruit extract could be a potent weapon in eco-friendly plant protection strategies.

Keywords: Azadirachta indica, lysozyme, polyphenol oxidase, Solanum lycopersicum

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