Search results for: private consumption on food

Authors: Safak Baykal

Abstract:

The purpose of this study is analyzing the relationship between trust and social capital of people with using Social Network Analysis. In this study, two aspects of social capital will be focused: Bonding, homophilous social capital (BoSC), and Bridging, heterophilous social capital (BrSC). These two aspects diverge each other regarding to the social theories. The other concept of the study is Trust (Tr), namely interpersonal trust, willing to ascribe good intentions to and have confidence in the words and actions of other people. In this study, the sample group, 61 people, was selected from a private firm from the defense industry. The relation between BoSC/BrSC and Tr is shown by using Social Network Analysis (SNA) and statistical analysis with Likert type-questionnaire. The results of the analysis show the Cronbach’s alpha value is 0.756 and social capital values (BoSC/BrSC) is not correlated with Tr values of the people.

Keywords: Social capital, interpersonal trust, social network analysis (SNA).

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Authors: Yibo Fan, Takeshi Ikenaga, Yukiyasu Tsunoo, Satoshi Goto

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This paper proposes a low-cost reconfigurable architecture for AES algorithm. The proposed architecture separates SubBytes and MixColumns into two parallel data path, and supports different bit-width operation for this two data path. As a result, different number of S-box can be supported in this architecture. The throughput and power consumption can be adjusted by changing the number of S-box running in this design. Using the TSMC 0.18μm CMOS standard cell library, a very low-cost implementation of 7K Gates is obtained under 182MHz frequency. The maximum throughput is 360Mbps while using 4 S-Box simultaneously, and the minimum throughput is 114Mbps while only using 1 S-Box

Keywords: AES, Reconfigurable architecture, low cost

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Authors: Navneet Singh Deora, Aastha Deswal, H. N. Mishra

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Pasta is one of the most widely consumed food products around the world. Rapid determination of the moisture content in pasta will assist food processors to provide online quality control of pasta during large scale production. Rapid Fourier transform near-infrared method (FT-NIR) was developed for determining moisture content in pasta. A calibration set of 150 samples, a validation set of 30 samples and a prediction set of 25 samples of pasta were used. The diffuse reflection spectra of different types of pastas were measured by FT-NIR analyzer in the 4,000-12,000cm^-1 spectral range. Calibration and validation sets were designed for the conception and evaluation of the method adequacy in the range of moisture content 10 to 15 percent (w.b) of the pasta. The prediction models based on partial least squares (PLS) regression, were developed in the near-infrared. Conventional criteria such as the R², the root mean square errors of cross validation (RMSECV), root mean square errors of estimation (RMSEE) as well as the number of PLS factors were considered for the selection of three pre-processing (vector normalization, minimum-maximum normalization and multiplicative scatter correction) methods. Spectra of pasta sample were treated with different mathematic pre-treatments before being used to build models between the spectral information and moisture content. The moisture content in pasta predicted by FT-NIR methods had very good correlation with their values determined via traditional methods (R² = 0.983), which clearly indicated that FT-NIR methods could be used as an effective tool for rapid determination of moisture content in pasta. The best calibration model was developed with min-max normalization (MMN) spectral pre-processing (R² = 0.9775). The MMN pre-processing method was found most suitable and the maximum coefficient of determination (R²) value of 0.9875 was obtained for the calibration model developed.

Keywords: FT-NIR, Pasta, moisture determination.

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Authors: Elham Rastegari, Amirmasood Rahmani, Saeed Setayeshi

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The hospital and the health-care center of a community, as a place for people-s life-care and health-care settings, must provide more and better services for patients or residents. After Establishing Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system -which is a necessity- in the hospital, providing pervasive services is a further step. Our objective in this paper is to use pervasive computing in a case study of healthcare, based on EMR database that coordinates application services over network to form a service environment for medical and health-care. Our method also categorizes the hospital spaces into 3 spaces: Public spaces, Private spaces and Isolated spaces. Although, there are many projects about using pervasive computing in healthcare, but all of them concentrate on the disease recognition, designing smart cloths, or provide services only for patient. The proposed method is implemented in a hospital. The obtained results show that it is suitable for our purpose.

Keywords: Pervasive computing, RFID, Health-care.

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Authors: Mohsen Bagheri, Ahmad Afifi

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This paper presents a new method for read out of the piezoresistive accelerometer sensors. The circuit works based on Instrumentation amplifier and it is useful for reducing offset In Wheatstone Bridge. The obtained gain is 645 with 1μv/°c Equivalent drift and 1.58mw power consumption. A Schmitt trigger and multiplexer circuit control output node. a high speed counter is designed in this work .the proposed circuit is designed and simulated In 0.18μm CMOS technology with 1.8v power supply.

Keywords: Piezoresistive accelerometer, zero offset, Schmitt trigger, bidirectional reversible counter

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Authors: Siripen Yiamjanya, Kevin Wongleedee

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This research paper aims to identify travel motivation by push and pull factors that affected decision making of international tourists in selecting Thailand as their destination choice. A total of 200 international tourists who traveled to Thailand during January and February, 2014 were used as the sample in this study. A questionnaire was employed as a tool in collecting the data, conducted in Bangkok. The list consisted of 30 attributes representing both psychological factors as “push- based factors” and destination factors as “pull-based factors”. Mean and standard deviation were used in order to find the top ten travel motives that were important determinants in the respondents’ decision making process to select Thailand as their destination choice. The finding revealed the top ten travel motivations influencing international tourists to select Thailand as their destination choice included [i] getting experience in foreign land; [ii] Thai food; [iii] learning new culture; [iv] relaxing in foreign land; [v] wanting to learn new things; [vi] being interested in Thai culture, and traditional markets; [vii] escaping from same daily life; [viii] enjoying activities; [ix] adventure; and [x] good weather. Classification of push- based and pull- based motives suggested that getting experience in foreign land was the most important push motive for international tourists to travel, while Thai food portrayed its highest significance as pull motive. Discussion and suggestions were also made for tourism industry of Thailand.

Keywords: Decision Making, Destination Choice, International Tourist, Pull Factor, Push Factor, Thailand, Travel Motivation.

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Authors: W. Suksombat, P. Suksombat, R. Mirattanaphrai

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The effects of commercial or bovine yeasts on the performance and blood variables of broiler chickens intoxicated with aflatoxin were investigated in broilers. Four hundred eighty broilers (Arbor Acres; 3-wk-old) were randomly assigned to 4 groups. Each group (120 broiler chickens) was further randomly divided into 6 replicates of 20 chickens. The treatments were control diet without additives (treatment 1), 250 ppb AFB1 (treatment 2), commercial yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, (CY 2.5 x 107 CFU/g) + 250 ppb AFB1 (treatment 3) and bovine yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, (BY 2.5 x 107 CFU/g + 250 ppb AFB1 (treatment 4). Complete randomized design (CRD) was used in the experiment. Feed consumption and body weight were recorded at every five-day period. On day 42, carcass compositions were determined from 30 birds per treatment. While chicks were sacrificed, 3-4 ml blood sample was taken and stored frozen at (-20°C) for serum chemical analysis to determine effects of consumption of diets on blood chemistry (total protein, albumin, glucose, urea, cholesterol and triglycerides). There were no significant differences in ADFI among the treatments(P>0.05). However, BWG, FCR and mortality were highly significantly different (P<0.01) between treatments. ADG was significantly reduced (P<0.05) by aflatoxin but was unaffected by aflatoxin supplemented with either commercial or bovine yeasts (P>0.05). In terms of carcass portions, percentage of carcass was unaffected by the treatments, however, percentages of drumstick were reduced by aflatoxin and aflatoxin supplemented commercial yeast. Abdominal fat was significantly reduced (P<0.01) when commercial or bovine yeasts were added to the aflatoxin contaminated diets. Percentage of liver were significantly increased by aflatoxin contamination but were unaffected when yeasts were added to the diets. Blood chemical parameters, i.e. albumin, blood urea nitrogen and glucose were unaffected the treatments, while total protein, cholesterol and triglycerides were significantly decreased by aflatoxin. When yeasts were supplemented, such effect was not differed from the control. It is clearly indicated in the present study that supplementation of either commercial or bovine yeasts had beneficial effects on performance of broiler chickens intoxicated with aflatoxins.

Keywords: Aflatoxin, Commercial yeast, Bovine yeast, Growth performance, Blood chemical parameters, Broilers

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Authors: D. Karnawati, T.F. Fathani , B. Andayani, Suharto

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This paper highlights the importance of integrating social and technical approach (which is so called a “hybrid socio-technical approach") as one innovative and strategic program to support the social development in geodisaster prone area in Indonesia. Such program mainly based on public education and community participation as a partnership program by the University, local government and may also with the private company and/ or local NGO. The indigenous, simple and low cost technology has also been introduced and developed as a part of the hybrid sociotechnical system, in order to ensure the life and environmental protection, with respect to the sustainable human and social development.

Keywords: Hybrid socio-technical system, indigenoustechnology, life and environmental protection, public education.

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Authors: Zina Ghiloufi, Tahar Khir

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A transient three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model is developed to determine the velocity and temperature distribution in different positions cold room during pre-cooling of dates. The turbulence model used is the k-ω Shear Stress Transport (SST) with the standard wall function, the air. The numerical results obtained show that cooling rate is not uniform inside the room; the product at the medium of room has a slower cooling rate. This cooling heterogeneity has a large effect on the energy consumption during cold storage.

Keywords: Numerical simulation, CFD, k-ω (SST), cold room, dates, cooling rate.

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Authors: Keonwoo Kim, Dowon Hong, Kyoil Chung, Jae-Cheol Ryou

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Cell phone forensics to acquire and analyze data in the cellular phone is nowadays being used in a national investigation organization and a private company. In order to collect cellular phone flash memory data, we have two methods. Firstly, it is a logical method which acquires files and directories from the file system of the cell phone flash memory. Secondly, we can get all data from bit-by-bit copy of entire physical memory using a low level access method. In this paper, we describe a forensic tool to acquire cell phone flash memory data using a logical level approach. By our tool, we can get EFS file system and peek memory data with an arbitrary region from Korea CDMA cell phone.

Keywords: Forensics, logical method, acquisition, cell phone, flash memory.

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Authors: W. K. Yap, V. Karri

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This paper presents a hybrid electric scooter model developed and simulated using Matlab/Simulink. This hybrid scooter modeled has a parallel hybrid structure. The main propulsion units consist of a two stroke internal combustion engine and a hub motor attached to the front wheel of the scooter. The methodology used to optimize the energy and fuel consumption of the hybrid electric scooter is the multi-mode approach. Various case studies were presented to check the model and were compared to the literatures. Results shown that the model developed was feasible and valuable.

Keywords: Hybrid electric scooters, modeling and simulation, hybrid scooter energy management.

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Authors: O. Onal, O. Turan

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In this paper, some performance parameters of a selected turbofan engine (JT9D) are analyzed. The engine is a high bypass turbofan engine which powers a wide-body aircraft and it produces 206 kN thrust force (thrust/weight ratio is 5.4). The objective parameters for the engine include calculation of power, specific fuel consumption, specific thrust, engine propulsive, thermal and overall efficiencies according to the various definitions given in the literature. Furthermore, in the case study, wasted energy from the exhaust is calculated at the maximum power setting (i.e. take off phase) for the engine.

Keywords: Turbofan, power, efficiency, trust.

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Authors: Bita Mashayekhi, Seyed Meisam Tabatabaie Nasab

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Intellectual capital is one of the most valuable and important parts of the intangible assets of enterprises especially in knowledge-based enterprises. With respect to increasing gap between the market value and the book value of the companies, intellectual capital is one of the components that can be placed in this gap. This paper uses the value added efficiency of the three components, capital employed, human capital and structural capital, to measure the intellectual capital efficiency of Iranian industries groups, listed in the Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE), using a 8 years period data set from 2005 to 2012. In order to analyze the effect of intellectual capital on the market-to-book value ratio of the companies, the data set was divided into 10 industries, Banking, Pharmaceutical, Metals & Mineral Nonmetallic, Food, Computer, Building, Investments, Chemical, Cement and Automotive, and the panel data method was applied to estimating pooled OLS. The results exhibited that value added of capital employed has a positive significant relation with increasing market value in the industries, Banking, Metals & Mineral Nonmetallic, Food, Computer, Chemical and Cement, and also, showed that value added efficiency of structural capital has a positive significant relation with increasing market value in the Banking, Pharmaceutical and Computer industries groups. The results of the value added showed a negative relation with the Banking and Pharmaceutical industries groups and a positive relation with computer and Automotive industries groups. Among the studied industries, computer industry has placed the widest gap between the market value and book value in its intellectual capital.

Keywords: Capital Employed, Human Capital, Intellectual Capital, Market-to-Book Value, Structural Capital, Value Added Efficiency.

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Authors: B. Nazari, M. A. Mohammadifar, S. Shojaee-Aliabadi, L. Mirmoghtadaie

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Millets as a new source of plant protein were not used in food applications due to its poor functional properties. In this study, the effect of high intensity ultrasound (frequency: 20 kHz, with contentious flow) (US) in 100% amplitude for varying times (5, 12.5, and 20 min) on solubility, emulsifying activity index (EAI), emulsion stability (ES), foaming capacity (FC), and foaming stability (FS) of millet protein concentrate (MPC) were evaluated. In addition, the structural properties of best treatments such as molecular weight and surface charge were compared with the control sample to prove the US effect. The US treatments significantly (P<0.05) increased the solubility of the native MPC (65.8±0.6%) at all sonicated times with the maximum solubility that is recorded at 12.5 min treatment (96.9±0.82 %). The FC of MPC was also significantly affected by the US treatment. Increase in sonicated time up to 12.5 min significantly increased the FC of native MPC (271.03±4.51 ml), but higher increase reduced it significantly. Minimal improvements were observed in the FS of all sonicated MPC compared to the native MPC. Sonicated time for 12.5 min affected the EAI and ES of the native MPC more markedly than 5 and 20 min that may be attributed to higher increase in proteins tendency to adsorption at the oil and water interfaces after the US treatment at this time. SDS-PAGE analysis showed changes in the molecular weight of MPC that attributed to shearing forces created by cavitation phenomenon. Also, this phenomenon caused an increase in the exposure of more amino acids with negative charge in the surface of US treated MPC, that was demonstrated by Zetasizer data. High intensity ultrasound, as a green technology, can significantly increase the functional properties of MPC and can make this usable for food applications.

Keywords: Millet protein concentrate, Functional properties, Structural properties, High intensity ultrasound.

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Authors: Yiorgos Hadjichristou

Abstract:

The paper will focus on the hybrid living typologies which are brought about due to the Global Crisis. Mixing of the generations and the groups of people, mingling the functions of living with working and socializing, merging the act of living in synergy with the urban realm and its constituent elements will be the springboard of proposing an essential sustainable housing approach and the respective urban development. The thematic will be based on methodologies developed both on the academic, educational environment including participation of students’ research and on the practical aspect of architecture including case studies executed by the author in the island of Cyprus. Both paths of the research will deal with the explorative understanding of the hybrid ways of living, testing the limits of its autonomy. The evolution of the living typologies into substantial hybrid entities, will deal with the understanding of new ways of living which include among others: re-introduction of natural phenomena, accommodation of the activity of work and services in the living realm, interchange of public and private, injections of communal events into the individual living territories. The issues and the binary questions raised by what is natural and artificial, what is private and what public, what is ephemeral and what permanent and all the in-between conditions are eloquently traced in the everyday life in the island. Additionally, given the situation of Cyprus with the eminent scar of the dividing ‘Green line’ and the waiting of the ‘ghost city’ of Famagusta to be resurrected, the conventional way of understanding the limits and the definitions of the properties is irreversibly shaken. The situation is further aggravated by the unprecedented phenomenon of the crisis on the island. All these observations set the premises of reexamining the urban development and the respective sustainable housing in a synergy where their characteristics start exchanging positions, merge into each other, contemporarily emerge and vanish, changing from permanent to ephemeral. This fluidity of conditions will attempt to render a future of the built- and unbuilt realm where the main focusing point will be redirected to the human and the social. Weather and social ritual scenographies together with ‘spontaneous urban landscapes’ of ‘momentary relationships’ will suggest a recipe for emerging urban environments and sustainable living. Thus, the paper will aim at opening a discourse on the future of the sustainable living merged in a sustainable urban development in relation to the imminent solution of the division of island, where the issue of property became the main obstacle to be overcome. At the same time, it will attempt to link this approach to the global need for a sustainable evolution of the urban and living realms.

Keywords: Social ritual scenographies, spontaneous urban landscapes, substantial hybrid entities, re-introduction of natural phenomena.

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Authors: Christina Babatsou, Efthimios Zervas

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Since 2008 a new economic crisis is present is the entire planet. This crisis affects several domains of the economic but also of the social life. Consumption decreases due to the lack of necessary resources of households to increase their expenditures. The car manufacturing is one of the main industrial activities in European Union (EU) and the present crisis particularly affects it. The present study examines the correlations between several socio-economic indicators and car market in European Union. The target is to find out the impact of the present economic crisis on the car market in EU.

Keywords: European Union, Passenger cars, Social indicators, Correlations

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Authors: Ali Jafari, Hatam Godini, Saed Hamed Mirhousaini

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This paper presents an overview of current municipal solid waste management in Khoram Abad city. According to data collected by the local authorities, the waste generation rate is estimated to be 800 g/cap.d with density of 243 kg/m3. Solid waste is stored in different types of containers at the source of generation in different areas of the city. Local Authority is responsible for waste collection, transportation. Municipality is responsible for waste collection, using private sector contracts. At present, both mechanical and manual methods are used to collect residential waste. Manual methods of collection are the most commonly used for waste collection in most parts of the city. Land filling is the main disposal method in this city. But it has some obvious problem and deficiencies The current state of solid waste management has been improved slightly in the last decade. By more actions can reduce the human and environmental risks.

Keywords: Disposal, Landfill, management, solid waste.

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Authors: Nadia M. G. AL-Saidi

Abstract:

Since 1984 many schemes have been proposed for digital signature protocol, among them those that based on discrete log and factorizations. However a new identification scheme based on iterated function (IFS) systems are proposed and proved to be more efficient. In this study the proposed identification scheme is transformed into a digital signature scheme by using a one way hash function. It is a generalization of the GQ signature schemes. The attractor of the IFS is used to obtain public key from a private one, and in the encryption and decryption of a hash function. Our aim is to provide techniques and tools which may be useful towards developing cryptographic protocols. Comparisons between the proposed scheme and fractal digital signature scheme based on RSA setting, as well as, with the conventional Guillou-Quisquater signature, and RSA signature schemes is performed to prove that, the proposed scheme is efficient and with high performance.

Keywords: Digital signature, Fractal, Iterated function systems(IFS), Guillou-Quisquater (GQ) protocol, Zero-knowledge (ZK)

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Authors: F. Amin, A. H. Jahangir, H. Rasifard

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With the widespread growth of applications of Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), the need for reliable security mechanisms these networks has increased manifold. Many security solutions have been proposed in the domain of WSN so far. These solutions are usually based on well-known cryptographic algorithms. In this paper, we have made an effort to survey well known security issues in WSNs and study the behavior of WSN nodes that perform public key cryptographic operations. We evaluate time and power consumption of public key cryptography algorithm for signature and key management by simulation.

Keywords: Wireless Sensor Networks, Security, Public Key Cryptography, Key Management.

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Authors: N. Paparisteidi, D. Rodamitou

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This article focuses on the skills development and path planning of students studying computer science at EPITECH: French private institute of higher education. We examine students’ points of view and experience in a blended learning model based on a skills development curriculum. The study is based on the collection of four main categories of data: semi-participant observation, distribution of questionnaires, interviews, and analysis of internal school databases. The findings seem to indicate that a skills-based program on active learning enables students to develop their learning strategies as well as their personal skills and to actively engage in the creation of their career path and contribute to providing additional information to curricula planners and decision-makers about learning design in higher education.

Keywords: Active learning, blended learning, higher education, skills development.

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Authors: Nazrul M. Ahmad, Asrul H. Yaacob, Ridza Fauzi, Alireza Khorram

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Elliptic curve-based certificateless signature is slowly gaining attention due to its ability to retain the efficiency of identity-based signature to eliminate the need of certificate management while it does not suffer from inherent private key escrow problem. Generally, cryptosystem based on elliptic curve offers equivalent security strength at smaller key sizes compared to conventional cryptosystem such as RSA which results in faster computations and efficient use of computing power, bandwidth, and storage. This paper proposes to implement certificateless signature based on bilinear pairing to structure the framework of IKE authentication. In this paper, we perform a comparative analysis of certificateless signature scheme with a well-known RSA scheme and also present the experimental results in the context of signing and verification execution times. By generalizing our observations, we discuss the different trade-offs involved in implementing IKE authentication by using certificateless signature.

Keywords: Certificateless signature, IPSec, RSA signature, IKE authentication.

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Authors: Areej Azhar, Peter Duncan, David Edgar

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Due to a high unemployment rate among local people and a high reliance on expatriate workers, the governments in the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) countries have been implementing programmes of localisation (replacing foreign workers with GCC nationals). These programmes have been successful in the public sector but much less so in the private sector. However, there are now insufficient jobs for locals in the public sector and the onus to provide employment has fallen on the private sector. This paper is concerned with a study, which is a work in progress (certain elements are complete but not the whole study), investigating the effective implementation of localisation policies in four- and five-star hotels in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The purpose of the paper is to identify the research gap, and to present the need for the research. Further, it will explain how this research was conducted. Studies of localisation in the GCC countries are under-represented in scholarly literature. Currently, the hotel sectors in KSA and UAE play an important part in the countries’ economies. However, the total proportion of Saudis working in the hotel sector in KSA is slightly under 8%, and in the UAE, the hotel sector remains highly reliant on expatriates. There is therefore a need for research on strategies to enhance the implementation of the localisation policies in general and in the hotel sector in particular. Further, despite the importance of the hotel sector to their economies, there remains a dearth of research into the implementation of localisation policies in this sector. Indeed, as far as the researchers are aware, there is no study examining localisation in the hotel sector in KSA, and few in the UAE. This represents a considerable research gap. Regarding how the research was carried out, a multiple case study strategy was used. The four- and five-star hotel sector in KSA is one of the cases, while the four- and five-star hotel sector in the UAE is the other case. Four- and five-star hotels in KSA and the UAE were chosen as these countries have the longest established localisation policies of all the GCC states and there are more hotels of these classifications in these countries than in any of the other Gulf countries. A literature review was carried out to underpin the research. The empirical data were gathered in three phases. In order to gain a pre-understanding of the issues pertaining to the research context, Phase I involved eight unstructured interviews with officials from the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities (three interviewees); the Saudi Human Resources Development Fund (one); the Abu Dhabi Tourism and Culture Authority (three); and the Abu Dhabi Development Fund (one).

In Phase II, a questionnaire was administered to 24 managers and 24 employees in four- and five-star hotels in each country to obtain their beliefs, attitudes, opinions, preferences and practices concerning localisation. Unstructured interviews were carried out in Phase III with six managers in each country in order to allow them to express opinions that may not have been explored in sufficient depth in the questionnaire. The interviews in Phases I and III were analysed using thematic analysis and SPSS will be used to analyse the questionnaire data. It is recommended that future research be undertaken on a larger scale, with a larger sample taken from all over KSA and the UAE rather than from only four cities (i.e., Riyadh and Jeddah in KSA and Abu Dhabi and Sharjah in the UAE), as was the case in this research.

Keywords: KSA, UAE, localisation, hotels, Human Resource Management.

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Authors: Rabia Göçmen, Gülşah Kanbur, Sinan Sefa Parlat

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Aim of this study is to determine the effects of cellular insulin receptor stimulators on performance, plasma glucose, high density lipoprotein (HDL), low density lipoprotein (LDL), total cholesterol, triglyceride, triiodothyronine (T3) and thyroxine (T4) hormone levels, and incubation features in the breeding Japanese quails (Coturnix japonica). In the study, a total of 84 breeding quails was used, 6 weeks’ age, 24 are male and 60, female. Rations used in experiment are 2900 kcal/kg metabolic energy and 20% crude protein. Water pH is calibrated to 7.45. Ration and water were administered ad-libitum to the animals. As metformin source, metformin-HCl was used and as chrome resource, chromium picolinate was used. Trial groups were formed as control group (basal ration), metformin group (basal ration, added metformin at the level of feed of 20 mg/kg), and chromium picolinate (basal ration, added feed of 1500 ppb Cr) group. When regarded to the results of performance at the end of experiment, it is seen that live weight gain, feed consumption, egg weight, feed conversion ratio (Feed consumption/ egg weight), and egg production were affected at the significant level (p < 0.05). When the results are evaluated in terms of incubation features, hatchability and hatchability of fertile egg ratio were not affected from the treatments. Fertility ratio was significantly affected by metformin and chromium picolinate treatments and fertility rose at the significant level compared to control group (p < 0.05). According to results of experiment, plasma glucose level was not affected by metformin and chromium picolinate treatments. Plasma, total cholesterol, HDL, LDL, and triglyceride levels were significantly affected from insulin receptor stimulators added to ration (p < 0.05). Hormone level of Plasma T3 and T4 were also affected at the significant level from insulin receptor stimulators added to ration (p < 0.05).

Keywords: Chromium picolinate, cholesterol, hormone, metformin, quail.

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Authors: Siyathorn Khunon, Thanawit Buafai

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This paper aims to investigate management of beach safety with a focus on tourist drownings in Samui. The data collected in this investigation will then lead to the proposal of a practical management model suitable for use in Samui. Qualitative research was conducted in the following manner: nine stakeholders from local government organizations and tourism businesses were interviewed in-depth. Additionally, a best practice case study from Phuket was applied to analyze beach safety. Twelve foreign tourists were also interviewed. Then, a focus group comprised of 32 people was used to determine practical solutions for enhancing tourists’ safety on the beach in Samui. A steering committee to coordinate between public and private organizations was proposed to manage and enhance tourists’ safety. A practical model is proposed to increase the safety level of tourists in Samui

Keywords: Beach safety, drowning, tourists, Samui.

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Authors: Margareta Ilkova, Petr Teply

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The article deals with dividends and their distribution from investors from a theoretical point of view. Some studies try to analyzed the reaction of the market on the dividend announcement and found out the change of dividend policy is associated with abnormal returns around the dividend announcement date. Another researches directly questioned the investors about their dividend preference and beliefs. Investors want the dividend from many reasons (e.g. some of them explain the dividend preference by the existence of transaction cost; investors prefer the dividend today, because there is less risky; the managers have private information about the firm). The most controversial theory of dividend policy was developed by Modigliani and Miller (1961) who demonstrated that in the perfect and complete capital markets the dividend policy is irrelevant and the value of the company is independent of its payout policy. Nevertheless, in the real world the capital markets are imperfect, because of asymmetric information, transaction costs, incomplete contracting possibilities and taxes.

Keywords: dividend distribution, taxation, payout policy, investor, Modigliani and Miller theorem

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Authors: D. Nebbali, R. Nebbali, A. Ouibrahim

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This study focuses on the cooling of a photovoltaic panel (PV). Indeed, the cooling improves the conversion capacity of this one and maintains, under extreme conditions of air temperature, the panel temperature at an appreciable level which avoids the altering. To do this, a fan provides forced circulation of air. Because the fan is supplied by the panel, it is necessary to determine the optimum operating point that unites efficiency of the PV with the consumption of the fan. For this matter, numerical simulations are performed at varying mass flow rates of air, under two extreme air temperatures (50°C, 25°C) and a fixed solar radiation (1000W.m2) in a case of no wind.

Keywords: Energy conversion, efficiency, balance energy, solar cell.

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Authors: Tosin Osasona

Abstract:

The Nigeria Police Force bears the constitutional mandate as the primary policing agency for the protection of life and property within Nigeria; however, the police have an historical ill-reputation for corruption, ineptitude and impunity. Using the institutional theory of police as the framework of analysis, the paper argues that the performance of the police in Nigeria mirrors the dominant political, social and economic institutions and the structural environment of the Nigerian state. The article puts in perspective the deliberate political decision to underfund the police, leaving officers of the force the extra task of foraging for funds to undertake the duty that the Nigeria state primarily exists for; the article further explores the nexus between corruption in the police in Nigeria and the issue of funding. The article finds that the Nigerian state, by deliberately under-funding the police, while expecting the agency to perform its duties, has indirectly sanctioned the corruption of the force and approved the cooption of the institution of police and policing for private use in Nigeria.

Keywords: Funding, policing, Nigeria Police Force, corruption.

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Authors: Agneta Sundström, Zahra Ahmadi, Akmal Hyder

Abstract:

The purpose of this paper is to develop a typology based on market orientation (MO) and innovation orientation (IO), and to illustrate to what extent housing companies in Sweden fit within this framework. A qualitative study on 11 public housing companies in the central part of Sweden has been conducted by the help of open and semi-structured questions for data collection. Four public housing company types- i.e. reactive prospector, proactive prospector, reactive defender and proactive defender have been identified by the combination of MO-IO dimensions. Future research can include other dimensions like entrepreneurship and network to observe how it particularly affects MO. An empirical study can compare public and private housing companies on the basis of MO and IO dimensions. One major contribution of the paper is the proposition of typology which can be used to describe public housing companies and deciding their future course of actions.

Keywords: Customer-led, economy, innovativeness, market orientation.

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Authors: Amal M. Alrayes

Abstract:

Data and system quality play a central role in organizational success, and the quality of any existing information system has a major influence on the effectiveness of overall system performance. Given the importance of system and data quality to an organization, it is relevant to highlight their importance on organizational performance in the Kingdom of Bahrain. This research aims to discover whether system quality and data quality are related, and to study the impact of system and data quality on organizational success. A theoretical model based on previous research is used to show the relationship between data and system quality, and organizational impact. We hypothesize, first, that system quality is positively associated with organizational impact, secondly that system quality is positively associated with data quality, and finally that data quality is positively associated with organizational impact. A questionnaire was conducted among public and private organizations in the Kingdom of Bahrain. The results show that there is a strong association between data and system quality, that affects organizational success.

Keywords: Data quality, performance, system quality.

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Authors: J. Pawłat, H. Stryczewska

Abstract:

Shortening of natural resources will impose greater limitations of electric energy consumption in various fields including water treatment technologies. Small water treatment installations supplied with electric energy from solar sources are perfect example of zero-emission technology. Possibility of solar energy application, as one of the alternative energy resources for decontamination processes is strongly dependent on geographical location. Various examples of solar driven water purification systems are given and design of solar-water treatment installation based on ozone for the geographical conditions in Poland are presented.

Keywords: solar energy, water purification, ozone water treatment

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