Search results for: disability policy

Authors: Mustapha Abdulkadir Gana, Jibrin Attahiru Alhassan, Adamu Musa Baba

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The exponential growth of information sources, resources and the continued Communication Technology (ICT) sophistication of libraries all over the world call for capable and ICT compliant librarians in Nigeria, this article assesses the digital literacy skills of librarians in tertiary institutions in Niger state. The survey research method was applied in the study using a random sampling technique to draw the sample. Fifty-eight copies of the questionnaire were administered while forty-nine copies were completed, returned, and used in the study, which represents 84% of the response rate. Two research questions were answered, and data were analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). The finding uncovered that the librarians lack the requisite digital literacy skills to access the wealth of digital information resources available. The study recommends some steps to turn around the situations amongst; librarians must be empowered with all necessary digital literacy skills, embark on rigorous training and retraining programs, workshops, conferences, and seminars, there should also be a coherent training policy for the librarians on a sustainable basis to increase their requisite digital literacy skills.

Keywords: digital, information, literacy, skills

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Authors: Rusne Kregzdaite, Erika Godlevska, Morta Vidunaite

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The main aim of this research is to explore existing methodologies for artists’ labour force and create artists’ socio-economic and creative conditions in an assessment model. Artists have dual aims in their creative working process: 1) income and 2) artistic self-expression. The valuation of their conditions takes into consideration both sides: the factors related to income and the satisfaction of the creative process and its result. The problem addressed in the study: tangible and intangible artists' criteria used for assessments creativity conditions. The proposed model includes objective factors (working time, income, etc.) and subjective factors (salary covering essential needs, self-satisfaction). Other intangible indicators are taken into account: the impact on the common culture, social values, and the possibility to receive awards, to represent the country in the international market. The empirical model consists of 59 separate indicators, grouped into eight categories. The deviation of each indicator from the general evaluation allows for identifying the strongest and the weakest components of artists’ conditions.

Keywords: artist conditions, artistic labour force, cultural policy, indicator, assessment model

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Authors: Kate Smith, Shuming Liu, Yi Liu, Dragan Savic, Gustaf Olsson, Tian Chang, Xue Wu

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In a water supply system, a great deal of care goes into sourcing, treating and delivering water to consumers, but less thought is given to the energy consumed during these processes. This study uses 2011 data to quantify energy use for urban water supply in China and investigates population density as a possible influencing factor. The objective is to provide information that can be used to develop energy-conscious water infrastructure policy, calculate the energy co-benefits of water conservation and compare energy use between China and other countries. The average electrical energy intensity and per capita electrical energy consumption for urban water supply in China in 2011 were 0.29 kWh/m3 and 33.2 kWh/cap•yr, respectively. Comparison between provinces revealed a direct correlation between energy intensity of urban water supply and population served per unit length of pipe. This could imply energy intensity is lower when more densely populated areas are supplied by relatively dense networks of pipes. This study also found that whereas the percentage of energy used for urban water supply tends to increase with the percentage of population served this increase is slower where water supply is more energy efficient and where a larger percentage of population is already supplied.

Keywords: china, electrical energy use, water-energy nexus, water supply

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Authors: Michael Ubale Cyril

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Challenges of embedding entrepreneurship in tertiary institutions in Nigeria requires a consistent policy for equipping schools with necessary facilities like establishing incubating technology centre, the right calibres of human resources, appropriate pedagogical tools for teaching entrepreneurship education and exhibition grounds where products and services will be delivered and patronised by the customers. With the death of facilities in public schools in Nigeria, educators are clamouring for a way out. This study investigated the challenges of embedding entrepreneurship education in Modibbo Adama University of Technology Yola, Nigeria. The population for the study was 201 comprising 34 industrial entrepreneurs, 76 technical teachers and 91 final year undergraduates. The data was analysed using means of 3 groups, standard deviation, and analysis of variance. The study found out, that technical teachers have not been trained to teach entrepreneurship education, approaches to teaching methodology, were not varied and lack of infrastructural facilities like building was not a factor. It was recommended that technical teachers be retrained to teach entrepreneurship education, textbooks in entrepreneurship should be published with Nigerian outlook.

Keywords: challenges, embedding, entrepreneurship pedagogical, technology incubating centres

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Authors: Maryam Hazrati, Tengku Aizan Hamid, Rahimah Ibrahim, Siti Aishah Hassan, Farkhondeh Sharif, Zahra Bagheri

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Background: Emotional abuse is the most common type of spousal abuse. In a long-term marriage which lasts several decades, the couple will be faced with greater vulnerability due to illness, disability, and dependence. Emotional abuse can have a devastating impact on victims, leading to low self-esteem, depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder. Research Aim: The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of an emotional-focused psychoeducational intervention (EFPEI) on emotional abuse and marital satisfaction among older adults couples and also to examine the dyadic effects of each partner’s emotional abuse behaviors (EAB) on his/her marital satisfaction (MS) in Shiraz-Iran. Methodology: The study was a randomized controlled trial (RCT). A total of 57 eligible couples were randomly assigned to either the experimental group or the control group. The experimental group received EFPEI, which consisted of 12 sessions, each lasting 90 minutes. The control group did not receive any intervention. Data were collected using demographic questionnaire, Multidimensional Measure of Emotional Abuse (MMEAQ), and Marital Satisfaction Questionnaire for Older People (MSQFOP). The data was analyzed using a variety of statistical methods, including repeated measures ANOVA, path analysis, and correlational analyses. Findings: The results of the study showed that the EFPEI was effective in reducing emotional abuse and increasing marital satisfaction among older adults couples. Specifically, the mean scores for emotional abuse and marital satisfaction were significantly lower in the experimental group than in the control group at the end of the intervention. These effects were maintained at a 3-month follow-up. Moreover, the dyadic analysis revealed that husbands’ EAB had no significant effects on his own marital satisfaction but a significant negative partner effect, while wives’ EAB had significant negative actor and partner effects. Conclusion: The findings of this study provide support for the use of EFPEI as an effective intervention for decreasing emotional abuse and improving marital dissatisfaction among older adults. EFPEI is a short-term, evidence-based intervention that can be delivered by trained professionals. The intervention focuses on helping couples to improve their communication skills, resolve conflict, and build a stronger emotional connection.

Keywords: spouse abuse, emotion, aged, satisfaction, dyadic effect

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Authors: Isaac Kofi Mensah, Mi Jianing

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The lack of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) infrastructure in African countries is hampering the successful adoption, development and implementation of e-government in Africa. Electronic government is the use of ICTs to modernize government public administration processes and to provide government services to citizens with a purpose to enhance efficiency, accountability, and transparency in government’s interaction with the citizenry. ICT application in public administration has the potential to modernize and create smarter government and improvement in public service delivery. China’s Internet Plus policy and One Belt One Road strategy present a golden opportunity for countries in Africa to attract the huge financial investment through Chinese IT companies to develop and close Africa’s ICT infrastructure gap. This study recommends the establishment of One Belt One Road ICT Infrastructure Fund for Africa (OBOR ICT Fund for Africa) to enable countries in Africa to source solely for the purpose of ICT infrastructure development in the public sector/government machinery which would in turn promote the adoption and development of e-government in the public sectors of respective countries in Africa.

Keywords: e-government, public service delivery, internet plus, one belt one road initiative, China, Africa

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Authors: Claudio D'Alonzo

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According to recent tendencies, progress on resource efficiency is possible and it will lead to economic, environmental, and social benefits. The passage to a circular economy system, in which all the materials and energy will maintain their value for as long as possible, waste is reduced and only a few resources are used, is one of the most relevant parts of the European Union's environmental policy to develop a sustainable, competitive and low-carbon economy. A definition of circular economy can be found in Decision 1386/2013/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council on a General Union Environment Action Programme to 2020 named “Living well, within the limits of our planet”. The purpose of renewing waste management systems in the UE and making the European model one of the most effective in the world, a revised waste legislative framework entered into force in July 2018. Regarding the Italian legislation, the laws to be modified are the Legislative Decree 3 April 2006, n. 152 and the laws ruling waste management, end-of-waste, by-products and, the regulatory principles regarding circular economy. European rules on end-of-waste are not fully harmonised and so there are legal challenges. The target to be achieved is full consistency between the laws implementing waste and chemicals policies. Only in this way, materials will be safe, fit-for-purpose and designed for durability; additionally, they will have a low environmental impact.

Keywords: circular economy, end-of-waste, legislation, secondary raw materials

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Authors: Ing-Jen Hung, Tzu-Chien Wang

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Nowadays, customers can interact with firms through miscellaneous online ads on different channels easily. In other words, customer now has innumerable options and limitless time to accomplish their commercial activities with firms, individualizing their own online customer journey. This kind of convenience emphasizes the importance of online advertisement allocation on different channels. Therefore, profound understanding of customer behavior can make considerable benefit from optimizing fund allocation on diverse ad channels. To achieve this objective, multiple firms utilize numerical methodology to create data-driven advertisement policy. In our research, we aim to exploit online customer click data to discover the correlations between each channel and their sequential relations. We use LSTM to deal with sequential property of our data and compare its accuracy with other non-sequential methods, such as CART decision tree, logistic regression, etc. Besides, we also classify our customers into several groups by their behavioral characteristics to perceive the differences between all groups as customer portrait. As a result, we discover distinct customer journey under each customer portrait. Our article provides some insights into marketing research and can help firm to formulate online advertising criteria.

Keywords: LSTM, customer journey, marketing, channel ads

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Authors: Lamis Kattan, Joanne Haddad

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This paper examines the impact of gender focused labor legislation on women's labor force participation and economic empowerment. We rely on historical legislative acts passed by state legislatures and exploit whether or not states passed regulatory laws regulating overall and industry specific employment and work conditions for women, night work laws and labor laws requiring provision of seats for working women. We exploit the fact that not all states enacted these laws as well as the variation in the timing of enactment of such laws. Our results show that women in comparison to men in treated states are more likely to be in the labor force post introduction of night work laws in comparison to control states. We also document the effect of industry-specific labor policies on women's likelihood to be employed in the affected industry and in higher-wage occupations within the industry of interest. Policy implications of our findings endorse the adoption of labor laws in favor of women to advocate their empowerment through a higher involvement in the labor market and financial independence.

Keywords: female employment, labor laws, marriage, fertility

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Authors: Hatane Semuel, Hartmann H. Ngono, Sautma R. Basana

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The effect of capital structure on profitability is often debated by many financial investigators. The application of the trade-off theory and pecking order theory to analyze this relationship may generate different views. Each company has its own strategies to achieve its objectives and the external environment, such as state policy has a broad impact on the relationship with the capital structure of the company's profitability. Malaysia is the country closest to Indonesia that had a similar growth rate of GDP and industrial production with Indonesia, but Malaysia has lower inflation rate than Indonesia. This study was conducted to compare the performance of manufacturing sector between two countries when entering the era of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC). The samples for this study were 69 companies in Indonesia and 242 companies in Malaysia that engaged in manufacturing sector. The study uses panel data analysis. The study found that the capital structure have positive effect on profitability of manufacturing company in Indonesia, and it turns to negative effect on manufacturing companies in Malaysia. The results also showed that there are significant differences in short-term debt towards profitability of manufacturing companies in the two countries Indonesia and Malaysia.

Keywords: capital structure, Indonesia, Malaysia, manufacturing, profitability

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Authors: Ruth Yunji Nange

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Tourism has continued to increase as a significant industry, enhancing economic growth and development in Cameroon; due to the tremendous success of this industry, community participation (CP) has enhanced tourism development (TD). While gaining augmented attractiveness, considering how local CP is encouraged in such initiatives has become imperative. It has become essential to examine the importance of CP in the development of policies and planning processes for the equitable distribution of benefits and the effects of TD in the country. This study will exactly explore the cases of CP in the most populated cities in Cameroon (Douala and Yaoundé) and also understand how local CP is incorporated into tourism to enhance development in the tourism industry in particular and Cameroon in general. This paper is based on a qualitative research method, semi-structured interviews, and in-depth, face-to-face interviews carried out with the top administrators of tourism, both in the public and private sectors, such as the minister, provincial and regional delegates of tourism, non-governmental organizations (NGO), leaders of local community associations and tour operators. The forms and surveys were open-ended with a high level of flexibility. The findings of this study will pose implications for the development of CP in tourism initiatives programs in Cameroon and other developing economies.

Keywords: Cameroon, local community, participation and planning, tourism

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Authors: Md. Kamal Uddin

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Bangladesh is trying to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. Environmental Education (EE) is very vital to reaching the agenda of SDGs. However, a lack of environmental awareness and gaps in theoretical knowledge and its practices still exists in Bangladesh. Therefore, this research aims to understand the students’ perceptions of whether and how their behaviour is environment-friendly to achieve SDGs. It also addresses teachers’ perceptions of what are the shortcomings of environmental education in Bangladesh. It uses the qualitative and quantitative techniques of data collection and analysis based on in-depth interviews, surveys among different categories of participants and classroom observation. The paper finds that the level of EE and students’ awareness of the environment is inadequate. Some teachers believe that the EE is not better in Bangladesh due to the absence of practical learning of EE, lack of the motivations and actions, institutional weakness, inadequate policies, poor implementation, and cultural and traditional beliefs. Thus, this paper argues that Bangladeshi EE is not adequate to change the behaviour of the students towards the environment, which makes it difficult for the country to ensure SD. Thus, this research suggests that there is a need to revise the environmental education policy to change the behaviour and structure of the country for sustainable development.

Keywords: environmental education, sustainable development, environmental practice, environmental behaviour, Bangladesh

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Authors: Jasper C. Dioco

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The study was done to investigate the relationship of taxi company safety climate and drivers’ safety motivation and knowledge on taxi drivers’ safety performance. Data were collected from three Taxi Companies with taxi drivers as participants (N = 84). The Hiligaynon translated version of Transportation Companies’ Climate Scale (TCCS), Safety Motivation and Knowledge Scale, Occupational Safety Motivation Questionnaire and Global Safety Climate Scale were used to study the relationships among four parameters: (a) Taxi company safety climate; (b) Safety motivation; (c) Safety knowledge; and (d) Safety performance. Correlational analyses found that there is no relation between safety climate and safety performance. A Hierarchical regression demonstrated that safety motivation predicts the most variance in safety performance. The results will greatly impact how taxi company can increase safe performance through the confirmation of the proximity of variables to organizational outcome. A strong positive safety climate, in which employees perceive safety to be a priority and that managers are committed to their safety, is likely to increase motivation to be safety. Hence, to improve outcomes, providing knowledge based training and health promotion programs within the organization must be implemented. Policy change might include overtime rules and fatigue driving awareness programs.

Keywords: safety climate, safety knowledge, safety motivation, safety performance, taxi drivers

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Authors: Olivia Meeschaert

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The Conference of the Parties (COP) refers to the countries that signed on to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. This annual conference provides a platform for countries to voice their major climate concerns, negotiate on a number of global issues, and come to agreements with the world’s largest emitters on how to make incremental changes that will achieve global climate goals. Historically, the outcome of COP includes major climate pledges and international agreements. COP27 will take place in Egypt at the beginning of November 2022. The 197 parties will come together to develop solutions to the dire consequences of climate change that many people around the world are already experiencing. The war in Ukraine will require a different tone from last year’s COP, particularly given that major impacts of the war are being felt throughout Europe and have had a detrimental effect on the region’s progress in achieving the benchmarks set in their climate pledges. Last year’s COP opened with many climate advocates feeling optimistic but the commitments made in Glasgow have so far remained empty promises, and the main contributors to climate change – China, the European Union, and the United States of America – have not moved fast enough.

Keywords: environment, law and policy, climate change, greenhouse gas, conference of the parties, China, United States, European Union

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Authors: Aqleem Fatimah

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The purpose of study was to find out the impact of teachers’ gender on students’ score achievement. Focusing on primary level’s teachers & students, a survey research was conducted by using convenient sampling technique. All the students of grade four (1500) and fifty-six teachers (equally divided by gender) from the 50 randomly selected coeducational schools from Lahore were taken as sample. The academic performance was operationalized using a t-test on standardized achievement tests of the students in language, science mathematics and social studies. In addition, all those gender based characteristics of teachers that count a lot in classroom interactions (taking Multi-grade classes, classroom strategies, feedback strategies and evaluation method) that influence students’ achievement were also analyzed by using a questionnaire and an observation schedule. The results of the study showed better academic achievement of students (girl &boy) of female teachers comparatively to the students of male teachers. Therefore, as the female teachers’ number lacks in Pakistan, the study suggests policy makers to seek guidelines to induct more specialized and professionally competent female teachers because their induction will prove highly beneficial for the betterment of students’ score achievement.

Keywords: gender, teacher, competency, score achievement

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Authors: Peter Brink

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Much of the research examining sexuality in long-term care focus on individual experiences, specifically their past, present, and future lived experiences. We know little about long-term care home policies, how they relate to the LGBT community, or how accommodating long-term care homes are to the LGBT+ community. In many ways, residents who identify as LGBT+ have been invisible in long-term care homes. Up until the not-to-distant past, homosexuality was illegal, and discrimination was acceptable. Canada’s LGBT population has also suffered because of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. For these and other reasons, members of the LGBT community might resist entering long-term care or attempt to keep their sexuality secret. The goal of any long-term care home is to be a welcoming place, to display signs of inclusion, and to help residents and staff feel that they are embraced. From the perspective of the long-term care home, it is possible that many of these facilities do not necessarily see the need to mention gender identity or sexual orientation in their welcoming materials. However, from the perspective of the invisible minority, it may be important that these homes be more than just welcoming. This study examined the role of institutional policies in long-term care for residents who identify as LGBT.

Keywords: long-term care, LGBT, HIV/AIDS, policy

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Authors: Toyin Cotties Adetiba

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Notably, China is a major global economy, thus increasing debate parlance of foreign policy that sees China as a superpower. China’s investment in Africa is visibly seen in African markets with substantial involvement of its multinationals in key commercial sectors such as infrastructure, telecoms, and agriculture. Not minding its positive economic impact on Africa, the debate around the China-African relationship has continued to be filled with some sort of inconsistency and ambiguity. This work engaged a qualitative research method while answering the question of whether the socioeconomic marriage of convenience between African states and China, is a means and the end to the Chinese control of African economy? Can China-Africa’s relationship engender Africa’s economic development or is it a threat to Africa’s development? The paper argued that through the secret dealings of the Chinese companies with African leaders, couched as palace diplomacy, the Chinese have cornered African economy. Concluding that there is need for the reform of the approaches to curtailing socio-economic and political corruption in Africa in the form of applications of ideas molded and refined to transparency in dealing with the Chinese, while economic institutions in African is empowered to effectively fight corruption.

Keywords: Africans, corruption, diplomacy, companies, development

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Authors: Zhou Mo, Dennis Chow

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In the dynamic positioning system (DPS) for vessels, the reliable information transmission between each note basically relies on the wireless protocols. From the perspective of cluster-based routing protocols for wireless sensor networks, the data fusion technology based on the sleep scheduling mechanism and remaining energy in network layer is proposed, which applies the sleep scheduling mechanism to the routing protocols, considering the remaining energy of node and location information when selecting cluster-head. The problem of uneven distribution of nodes in each cluster is solved by the Equilibrium. At the same time, Classified Forwarding Mechanism as well as Redelivery Policy strategy is adopted to avoid congestion in the transmission of huge amount of data, reduce the delay in data delivery and enhance the real-time response. In this paper, a simulation test is conducted to improve the routing protocols, which turn out to reduce the energy consumption of nodes and increase the efficiency of data delivery.

Keywords: DPS for vessel, wireless sensor network, data fusion, routing protocols

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Authors: Qianwei Cheng, A. K. M. Mahbubur Rahman, Anis Sarker, Abu Bakar Siddik Nayem, Ovi Paul, Amin Ahsan Ali, M. Ashraful Amin, Ryosuke Shibasaki, Moinul Zaber

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Thomas Friedman, in his famous book, argued that the world in this 21st century is flat and will continue to be flatter. This is attributed to rapid globalization and the interdependence of humanity that engendered tremendous in-flow of human migration towards the urban spaces. In order to keep the urban environment sustainable, policy makers need to plan based on extensive analysis of the urban environment. With the advent of high definition satellite images, high resolution data, computational methods such as deep neural network analysis, and hardware capable of high-speed analysis; urban planning is seeing a paradigm shift. Legacy data on urban environments are now being complemented with high-volume, high-frequency data. However, the first step of understanding urban space lies in useful categorization of the space that is usable for data collection, analysis, and visualization. In this paper, we propose a pragmatic categorization method that is readily usable for machine analysis and show applicability of the methodology on a developing world setting. Categorization to plan sustainable urban spaces should encompass the buildings and their surroundings. However, the state-of-the-art is mostly dominated by classification of building structures, building types, etc. and largely represents the developed world. Hence, these methods and models are not sufficient for developing countries such as Bangladesh, where the surrounding environment is crucial for the categorization. Moreover, these categorizations propose small-scale classifications, which give limited information, have poor scalability and are slow to compute in real time. Our proposed method is divided into two steps-categorization and automation. We categorize the urban area in terms of informal and formal spaces and take the surrounding environment into account. 50 km × 50 km Google Earth image of Dhaka, Bangladesh was visually annotated and categorized by an expert and consequently a map was drawn. The categorization is based broadly on two dimensions-the state of urbanization and the architectural form of urban environment. Consequently, the urban space is divided into four categories: 1) highly informal area; 2) moderately informal area; 3) moderately formal area; and 4) highly formal area. In total, sixteen sub-categories were identified. For semantic segmentation and automatic categorization, Google’s DeeplabV3+ model was used. The model uses Atrous convolution operation to analyze different layers of texture and shape. This allows us to enlarge the field of view of the filters to incorporate larger context. Image encompassing 70% of the urban space was used to train the model, and the remaining 30% was used for testing and validation. The model is able to segment with 75% accuracy and 60% Mean Intersection over Union (mIoU). In this paper, we propose a pragmatic categorization method that is readily applicable for automatic use in both developing and developed world context. The method can be augmented for real-time socio-economic comparative analysis among cities. It can be an essential tool for the policy makers to plan future sustainable urban spaces.

Keywords: semantic segmentation, urban environment, deep learning, urban building, classification

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Authors: Reshma Parvin Nuri, Heather Michelle Aldersey, Setareh Ghahari

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Objectives: Worldwide, it is well known that taking care of children with disabilities (CWD) can have a significant impact on the entire family unit. Over the last few decades, an increased number of studies have been conducted on families of CWD in higher income countries, and much of this research has identified family needs and strategies to meet those needs. However, family needs are incredibly under-studied in developing countries. Therefore, the aims of this study were to: (a) explore the needs of families of children with cerebral palsy (CP) in Bangladesh; (b) investigate how some of the family needs have been met and (c) identify the sources of supports that might help the families to meet their needs in the future. Methods: A face to face, semi-structured in-depth interview was conducted with 20 family members (12 mothers, 4 fathers, 1 sister, 2 grandmothers, and 1 aunt) who visited the Centre for the Rehabilitation of the Paralysed (CRP), Bangladesh between June and August 2016. Constant comparison method of grounded theory approach within the broader spectrum of qualitative study was used to analyze the data. Results: Participants identified five categories of needs: (a) financial needs, (b) access to disability-related services, (c) family and community cohesion, (d) informational needs, and (e) emotional needs. Participants overwhelmingly reported that financial need is their greatest family need. Participants noted that families encountered additional financial expenses for a child with CP, beyond what they would typically pay for their other children. Participants were seeing education as their non-primary need as they had no hope that their children would be physically able to go to school. Some participants also shared their needs for social inclusion and participation and receiving emotional support. Participants further expressed needs to receive information related to the child’s health condition and availability/accessibility of governmental support programs. Besides unmet needs, participants also highlighted that some of their needs have been met through formal and informal support systems. Formal support systems were mainly institution-based and run by non-governmental organizations, whereas participants identified informal support coming from family, friends and community members. Participants overwhelmingly reported that they receive little to no support from the government. However, participants identified the government as the key stakeholder who can play vital role in meeting their unmet needs. Conclusions: In the next phase of this research, the plan is to understand how the Government of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh is working to meet the needs of families of CWD. There is also need for further study on needs of families of children with conditions other than CP and those who live in the community and do not have access to the CRP Services. There is clear need to investigate ways to enable children with CP have better access to education in Bangladesh.

Keywords: Bangladesh, children with cerebral palsy, family needs, support

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Authors: Jiaqi Zhang, Zhi Dong, Pan Xing

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With the continuous development of urban agglomerations, higher demands are placed on intercity public transport travel services. To improve these services, it is necessary to comprehensively understand the views and evaluations of travelers. Taking the Guanzhong Plain urban agglomeration in China as the object, this study explores subjective attitude indicators from self-administrated survey data and examines the relationship among perceived accessibility, preference, and satisfaction for intercity public transport using a structural equation model. The results show that perceived service quality has a direct positive impact on perceived accessibility and satisfaction. Perceived accessibility and preference significantly affect satisfaction. In addition, perceived accessibility mediates the effect of service quality on satisfaction. This study provides valuable insights from a policy perspective to improve the subjective evaluation of intercity public transport travelers while emphasizing the importance of subjective variables in transport system evaluation and advocates for their subdivision to more comprehensively improve the travel experience.

Keywords: intercity public transport, perceived accessibility, satisfaction, structural equation model

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Authors: P. Senthil Kumari

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Main concerns in data mining investigation are social controls of data mining for handling ambiguity, noise, or incompleteness on text data. We describe an innovative approach for unplanned text data detection of community networks achieved by classification mechanism. In a tangible domain claim with humble secrecy backgrounds provided by community network for evading annoying content is presented on consumer message partition. To avoid this, mining methodology provides the capability to unswervingly switch the messages and similarly recover the superiority of ordering. Here we designated learning-centered mining approaches with pre-processing technique to complete this effort. Our involvement of work compact with rule-based personalization for automatic text categorization which was appropriate in many dissimilar frameworks and offers tolerance value for permits the background of comments conferring to a variety of conditions associated with the policy or rule arrangements processed by learning algorithm. Remarkably, we find that the choice of classifier has predicted the class labels for control of the inadequate documents on community network with great value of effect.

Keywords: text mining, data classification, community network, learning algorithm

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Authors: Adetoun Adedotun Amubode

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Nigeria's Textile Industry was the second largest in Africa after Egypt, with above 250 vibrant factories and over 50 percent capacity utilization contributing to foreign exchange earnings and employment generation. Currently, multifaceted challenges such as epileptic power supply, inconsistent government policies, growing digitalization, smuggling of foreign textiles, insecurity and the inability of the local industries to compete with foreign products, especially Chinese textile, has created a hostile environment for the sector. This led to the closure of most of the textile industries. China's textile industry has experienced institutional change and industrial restructuring, having 30% of the world's market share. This paper examined the strategies adopted by China in transforming her textile and clothing industries and designed a model for the integration of these strategies to improve the competitive strength and growth of the Nigerian textile and clothing industries in a dynamic and changing market. The paper concludes that institutional support, regional production, export-oriented policy, value-added and branding cultivation, technological upgrading and enterprise resource planning be integrated into the Nigerian clothing and textile industries.

Keywords: clothing, industry, integration, Nigerian, textile, transformation.

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Authors: Stefanie Kasparek

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The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is probably the most recognized international security organization. It is also profoundly misunderstood and undervalued in its effort to promote peace and security. With the rising involvement of non-state actors and the way states fight wars, international governance has become increasingly complex. However, the formal UNSC agenda has long remained static, reflecting states' unwillingness to entertain more conflicts. Nevertheless, resolutions remain the scholarly measure of states' interests and policies, neglecting the significant share of issues the Council entertains informally. This project builds on a rational institutionalism framework. It provides a systematic analysis of how and under what conditions states use informal governance instead of, or in combination with, formal rules at the agenda-setting stage of the policy process. Data for this project comes from elite interviews and a newly created dataset on governance choices. The results show that counter existing arguments, weaker states successfully circumvent formal institutional roadblocks and use informal governance mechanisms to pursue vital interests, thereby countering institutional restrictions and power asymmetries present informal governance settings.

Keywords: agenda-setting, decision-making, international governance, UNSC

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Authors: Jordan Georgiev Deliversky

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Fight against migrant smuggling has been put as a priority issues at the European Union policy agenda for more than a decade. The trafficked person, who has been targeted as the object of criminal exploitation, is specifically unique for human trafficking. Generally, the beginning of human trafficking activities is related to profit from the victim’s exploitation. The objective of this paper is to present measures that could result in the limitation of corruption mainly through analyzing the existing legislation framework against corruption in Europe. The analysis is focused on exploring the multiple origins of factors influencing migration processes in Europe, as corruption could be characterized as one of the most significant reasons for refugees to flee their countries. The main results show that law enforcement must turn the focus on the financing of the organized crime groups that are involved in migrant smuggling activities. Corruption has a significant role in managing smuggling operations and in particular when criminal organizations and networks are involved. Illegal migrants and refugees usually represent significant sources of additional income for officials involved in the process of boarding protection and immigration control within the European Union borders.

Keywords: corruption, influence, human smuggling, legislation, migration

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Authors: Ahmad Al-Issa

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Our world is now operating under the auspices of globalization with its attendant language of ‘global English.' In many parts of the world, the need for English is often accepted without much thought given to native languages. Indeed, this is the current situation in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), with English encroaching into all areas of society, and especially forcefully into the education sector, where English as a medium of instruction (EMI) is on the rise. At the same time, Arabic literacy (i.e., the ability to read and write in Arabic) is declining among the UAE youth. Using a mixed-methods design, a study was conducted to gain insights into the use of Arabic by Emirati University students. The study examines how often Emiratis, males and females, use their native language (Arabic) in their daily lives, how they view their reading and writing skills in Arabic vis-à-vis their English literacy skills, and the extent to which they can demonstrate their literacy skills in Arabic. Clear evidence emerged showing that while Arabic as a dialect continues to be spoken on a daily basis, Arabic literacy is unquestionably losing ground. This was found to be motivated by educational, political, societal, and personal forces. These findings and their implications to language policy and existing bilingualism programs will be discussed. Suggestions for further research will also be made.

Keywords: Arabic, globalization, global English, literacy attrition, United Arab Emirates

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Authors: Ugabi John Ibak, Odey Boniface Ugbem

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Education is considered the bedrock of any meaningful developments and teacher education plays a critical role in this direction. Teacher education is the master keys that can alleviate poverty, promote peace, conserve the environment, improve the quality of life for all and help achieve all round sustain enable development in Nigeria and the world over. This paper X-rays the nature and character of the teaching profession, historical background to teacher education in Nigeria, national policy on education, problems of teacher education in Nigeria and prospects of teacher education for sustainable national development. The study shows that the misfortunes of the teacher education owes much to it historical antecedent. Also majorly, is the failure of government to adequately fund education at the various levels in the country. It was discovered that in the history of the nation no government has budgeted 13% of its annual budget (half of 26% UNESCO minimum) to education. This has resulted to poor infrastructure, inadequate equipment and poorly motivated personnel in all the nations public schools at all levels. Hence, the paper concludes that in spite of these overwhelming challenges, teachers have a lot of prospects both in the teaching profession and outside teaching.

Keywords: teacher education, teaching profession, sustainable national development, education, development

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Authors: Mohammad Y. Badiee, Saeed Golestani, Mir Saman Pishvaee

Abstract:

In recent years consumers and governments have been pushing companies to design their activities in such a way as to reduce negative environmental impacts by producing renewable product or threat free disposal policy more and more. It is therefore important to focus more accurate to the optimization of various aspect of total supply chain. Modeling a supply chain can be a challenging process due to the fact that there are a large number of factors that need to be considered in the model. The use of multi-objective optimization can lead to overcome those problems since more information is used when designing the model. Uncertainty is inevitable in real world. Considering uncertainty on parameters in addition to use multi-objectives are ways to give more flexibility to the decision making process since the process can take into account much more constraints and requirements. In this paper we demonstrate a stochastic scenario based robust model to cope with uncertainty in a closed-loop multi-objective supply chain. By applying the proposed model in a real world case, the power of proposed model in handling data uncertainty is shown.

Keywords: supply chain management, closed-loop supply chain, multi-objective optimization, goal programming, uncertainty, robust optimization

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Authors: Liu Junzhu

Abstract:

In contemporary China,city is expanding with an amazing speed. And because of the unexpected events’ interference, spatial structure could change itself in a short time, That will lead to the new urban district livingness and unfortunately, this phenomenon is very common.On the one hand,it fail to achieve the goal of city planning, On the other hand,it is unfavourable to the sustainable development of city. Bill Hillier’stheory Space Syntax shows organzation pattern of each space,it explains the characteristics of urban spatial patterns and its transformation regulation from the point of self-organization in system and also, it gives confirmatory and predictive ways to the building and city. This paper used axial model to summarize Hangzhou City’s special structure and enhanced comprehensive understanding of macroscopic space and environment, space structure,developing trend, ect, by computer analysis of Space Syntax. From that, it helps us to know the operation law in the urban system and to understand Hangzhou City’s spatial pattern and indirect social effect it has mad more clearly, Thus, it could comply with the tendency of cities development in process and planning of policy and plan our cities’ future sustainably.

Keywords: sustainable urban design, space syntax, spatial network, segment angular analysis, social inclusion

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Authors: Annalise Weckesser, Alex Wade, Clara Joergensen, Jerome Turner

Abstract:

Introduction: Digital mobile technologies afford Generation M a number of opportunities in terms of communication, creativity and connectivity in their social interactions. Yet these young people’s use of such technologies is often the source of moral panic with accordant social anxiety especially prevalent in media representations of teen ‘sexting,’ or the sending of sexually explicit images via smartphones. Thus far, most responses to youth sexting have largely been ineffective or unjust with adult authorities sometimes blaming victims of non-consensual sexting, using child pornography laws to paradoxically criminalise those they are designed to protect, and/or advising teenagers to simply abstain from the practice. Prevention strategies are further skewed, with sex education initiatives often targeted at girls, implying that they shoulder the responsibility of minimising the risks associated with sexting (e.g. revenge porn and sexual predation). Purpose of Study: Despite increasing public interest and concern about ‘teen sexting,’ there remains a dearth of research with young people regarding their experiences of navigating sex and relationships in the current digital media landscape. Furthermore, young people's views on sexting are rarely solicited in the policy and educational strategies aimed at them. To address this research-policy-education gap, an interdisciplinary team of four researchers (from anthropology, media, sociology and education) have undertaken a peer-to-peer research project to co-create a sexual health intervention. Methods: In the winter of 2015-2016, the research team conducted serial group interviews with four cohorts of students (aged 13 to 15) from a secondary school in the West Midlands, UK. To facilitate open dialogue, girls and boys were interviewed separately, and each group consisted of no more than four pupils. The team employed a range of participatory techniques to elicit young people’s views on sexting, its consequences, and its interventions. A final focus group session was conducted with all 14 male and female participants to explore developing a peer-to-peer ‘safe sexting’ education intervention. Findings: This presentation will highlight the ongoing, ‘old school’ sexual double standards at work within this new digital frontier. In the sharing of ‘nudes’ (teens’ preferred term to ‘sexting’) via social media apps (e.g. Snapchat and WhatsApp), girls felt sharing images was inherently risky and feared being blamed and ‘slut-shamed.’ In contrast, boys were seen to gain in social status if they accumulated nudes of female peers. Further, if boys had nudes of themselves shared without consent, they felt they were expected to simply ‘tough it out.’ The presentation will also explore what forms of supports teens desire to help them in their day-to-day navigation of these digitally mediated, heteronormative performances of teen femininity and masculinity expected of them. Conclusion: This is the first research project, within UK, conducted with rather than about teens and the phenomenon of sexting. It marks a timely and important contribution to the nascent, but growing body of knowledge on gender, sexual politics and the digital mobility of sexual images created by and circulated amongst young people.

Keywords: teens, sexting, gender, sexual politics

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