Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Consumption Based Human Development Index and the Global Environmental Kuznets Curve

We extend the analysis of Jha and Murthy (2003) to relate consumption to environmental degradation (conceived of as a composite) within a cross-country framework. We use the method of Principal Components Analysis (PCA) to construct an Environmental Degradation Index (EDI) for each country and global environmental degradation (GED) as the sum of the EDI’s. We then identify outliers and influential observations among both the environmental and consumption related variables. Canonical Discriminant analysis is then used to classify development classes along environmental lines. We then estimate a simultaneous equation model to analyze the pattern of causation between per capita income, consumption and environmental degradation. We estimate a Global Environmental Kuznets curve (GEKC) as a relation between EDI ranks and ranks of the consumption-based EDI. A cubic representation is most appropriate with high-consumption countries contributing excessively to GED and middleconsumption countries slightly less. Low-consumption countries are contributing insignificantly to GED. Finally we present an alternative consumption-based Human Development Index to UNDP’s income-based Human Development Index. We then compare the ranking of countries according to the consumption-based HDI ranks with their ranking according to their EDI. Two sets of data drawn from the Human Development Report (HDR) UNDP(2000)) are used in the analysis. One relates to the environment and the other to developmental variables. For the formation of a composite index that would enable the estimation of a GEKC for 174 countries, we used cross-sectional data used in the HDR. The two main contributions of this paper are to build a consumption based HDI and to estimate a Global EKC based on consumption. A simultaneous equations model explains the causal structure that is responsible for Global Environmental Degradation. Further, with Canonical Discriminant Analysis it has been shown that GED does not have geo-physical basis but an anthropogenic basis. As a part of the system of equations a Global Consumption Function has been estimated that displays interesting results. In net, the paper attempts to establish that a certain ‘type of development’ that characterizes high consumption countries is primarily responsible for Global Environmental Degradation.
Multiple Intelligence and EFL Learners' Reading Comprehension

The second half of the twentieth century can be called the age of individualization when individual values and differences are recognized and respected. Intelligence is among the various aspects of individual differences which affect education and language learning. As such, the present study aimed at investigating the relationship between Multiple Intelligence and Reading Comprehension Abilities of Iranian EFL learners. For the purpose of study, 117 senior English students were randomly selected. After administering two types of instruments including MIDAS Adults (Shearer, 1996) and Reading Comprehension Section of TOEFL (2005, Longman), the data were collected and analyzed. The results indicated that all types of the learners’ MI profile have significant relationship with the reading comprehension scores and the Verbal-Linguistic Intelligence is the most significant predictor of the learners’ reading comprehension abilities, while Visual-Spatial and Interpersonal Intelligences are the second and third predictors of the learners’ reading comprehension respectively. Furthermore, Intrapersonal and Kinesthetic Intelligences could not predict the reading comprehension of the learners.
Therapeutic Efficacy of Minerals Supplement in Macro-minerals Deficient Buffaloes and its Effect on Haematobiochemical Profile and Production

ABSTRACT : To record the prevalence of macro-minerals deficiency in buffaloes, a survey was conducted in certain parts of Northern India. The prevalence of soil Ca, P, Mg, Na, P and K deficiency was 21.35%, 23.30%, 28.64%, 3.61% and 6.84%, respectively while that of fodder Ca, P, Mg, Na and K deficiency was 13.88%, 16.55%, 19.72%, 3.54% and 4.86%, respectively. The overall prevalence of serum (buffalo) Ca, P, Mg, Na and K deficiency in certain parts of northern India was 25.48%, 24.66%, 24.36%, 4.42% and 3.28%, respectively. The correlation coefficient of Ca, P, Mg, Na and K in soil, fodder and serum was significant and in most of the cases the values were above 0.6. The highest deficiency of macro-minerals i.e. Ca, P, Mg, Na and K was found in plain regions, followed by Tarai (foot hill of Himalayas) region and finally the hilly region. For therapeutic studies, three types of mineral mixture were prepared according to deficiency obtained and fed to three groups of deficient animals. Observations were recorded on 0, 30, 60 and 75 day. In group A animals normal mineral mixture was provided, where as in group C and D 10% and 25% more of Ca, P, Mg were provided, respectively. There was an increase in body weight, milk yield, haemoglobin concentration, and total erythrocyte count. Alanine aminotransferase, aspartate amino transferase in group D animals. There was a decrease in heart rate, respiratory rate and alkaline phosphatase in group D animal after mineral supplement. Thus showing the efficacy when supplements 3 provided to group D animals.
Disclosure of Small Profits by BM&FBOVESPA Stock Exchange Listed Companies

The present study sought to verify the normal curve distribution modality for returns on equities from companies listed on the BM&FBOVESPA Stock Exchange in order to search for evidence of earnings management in financial statements from 1995 to 2012. Although small profits or losses have a slightly different in rational logic, the difference between declared profit and loss can be significant psychologically. In this way, companies would avoid reporting small losses, thus transforming them into profits. The method used was based on the work of Burgstahler and Dichev (1997), in which profit s histograms were analyzed for the frequency of small negative and positive relations in equity variations. The results emphasized the practice of results management more consistently between 1995 and 2012, nevertheless this undesirable practice has been declining in Brazil.
Land surface parameter optimisation through data assimilation: the adJULES system

Land-surface models (LSMs) are crucial components of the Earth System Models (ESMs) which are used to make coupled climate-carbon cycle projections for the 21st century. The Joint UK Land Environment Simulator (JULES) is the land- surface model used in the climate and weather forecast models of the UK Met Office. In this study, JULES is automatically differentiated using commercial software from FastOpt, resulting in an analytical gradient, or adjoint, of the model. Using this adjoint, the adJULES parameter estimation system has been developed, to search for locally optimum parameter sets by 5 calibrating against observations. This paper describes adJULES and demonstrates its ability to improve the model-data fit using eddy covariance measurements of gross primary production (GPP) and latent heat (LE) fluxes. adJULES also has the ability to calibrate over multiple sites simultaneously. This feature is used to define new optimised parameter values for the 5 Plant Functional Types (PFTS) in JULES. The optimised PFT-specific parameters improve the performance of JULES over 90% of the sites used in the study, a third of which give similar reduction in errors as site specific optimisations. The new improved 10 parameter set for JULES is presented along with the associated uncertainties for each parameter.
History Dependence in the Housing Market

Using data on the universe of housing transactions in England and Wales over a 20-year period, we document that sale prices and selling propensities are affected by house prices prevailing in the period in which properties were previously bought. Using administrative data on mortgages, we show that cognitive frictions explain most of the history dependence in sale prices, whereas credit frictions are more relevant for selling propensities. We corroborate our analysis with data on online house listings, and we estimate the impact of history dependence on the collapse and slow recovery of housing market activity in the postcrisis period. (JEL E32, R21, R31)
Modeling river flows and sediment dynamics for the Laguna de Santa Rosa watershed in Northern California

The nonpoint source pollution model Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) was applied to understand management options that may improve water quality in the Laguna de Santa Rosa watershed in Sonoma County, California. Surface water quality in the Laguna watershed has been significantly impaired over recent years, as natural land cover has been urbanized or converted to agricultural uses. We first generated new maps of land cover and major land uses from satellite and airborne imagery for the watershed. The SWAT model output was checked against six streamflow gauges in the watershed. At the monthly time step, we found that the precalibrated model performed well at all gauges, with the coefficient of determination (r2) values ranging from 0.81 to 0.92. Calibration by modifications of groundwater extraction in the watershed resulted in notable increases to correlation values at all gauges, except at upstream locations on Santa Rosa Creek and Mark West Creek. Measured seasonal trends in sediment concentrations were tracked closely by the SWAT model predictions. Highest sediment loading rates were associated in the model results with pasture, rangeland, and vineyard cover areas. Model scenarios were tested for vegetation filter strips and improved ground cover conditions applied in subbasins, where soil erosion was shown to be elevated in previous simulations.
Profitability of Indigenous Chicken: The Case of Producers in Makueni County, Kenya

Indigenous Chicken(IC) ( Gallus domestica ) is increasingly becoming an essential component of diets in urban centers. This increase in demand is accompanied by an increase in production by smallholder farmers. These farmers rely on the indigenous chicken for food security, household income, employment and quick funds in emergencies. The profit associated with the production of indigenous chicken, constitutes part of the contribution of the Agriculture sector to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Kenya. However, in Makueni County there is little information on the amount of profit from production of IC or its relationship with socioeconomic factors. The objectives of this study was to calculate the profit of IC in Makueni and to determine the relationship between socio economic factors and profit from IC.A total of 130 households were sampled using multi stage sampling after which data was collected using a pre tested questionnaire in a house hold survey. These data was then analysed using budgetary analysis and multiple regression in STATA 11. The results showed that the profit from IC production in Makueni was Ksh. 5347/100 birds (1US$= Ksh86.70). Age, education, access to credit, flock size, price and years in farmer group had a significant relationship with the profit. Therefore it is recommended to form marketing groups that will engage in contractual agreements with final buyers of indigenous chicken. Key words: Indigenous chicken, food security, profitability, flock size, credit
The search terms employed were " interactive whiteboard " OR " interactive whiteboards " OR " Promethean board " OR " electronic whiteboard " OR " smart board " OR " Mimio "

Interactive whiteboards are increasing in popularity and prevalence in education. A scoping survey was performed to ascertain the types of documents available from academic databases on the use of interactive whiteboards with school-aged children. More than half of all the identified documents were grey literature: that is, comprised of non-refereed research, descriptive articles, product descriptions, and general opinion. The remaining research-based documents were predominantly descriptive and qualitative. A small number of documents contained quantitative data, and these were mainly survey-based. There were few experimental studies available. The limited number of research studies contrasts with the sizeable volume of grey literature available on these technological tools. There appears to be a need for more experimental research on the purported positive outcomes of interactive whiteboard use in schools such as higher academic achievement and engagement levels.
Accuracy Assessment of Digital Terrain Models of Lowland Pedunculate Oak Forests Derived from Airborne Laser Scanning and Photogrammetry

Digital terrain models (DTMs) present important data source for different applications in environmental disciplines including forestry. At regional level, DTMs are commonly created using airborne digital photogrammetry or airborne laser scanning (ALS) technology. This study aims to evaluate the vertical accuracy of DTMs of different spatial resolutions derived from high-density ALS data and existing photogrammetric (PHM) data in the dense lowland even-aged pedunculate oak forests located in the Pokupsko basin in Central Croatia. As expected, the assessment of DTMs’ vertical accuracy using 22 ground checkpoints shows higher accuracy for ALS-derived than for PHM- derived DTMs. Concerning the different resolutions of ALS-derived (0.5 m, 1 m, 2 m, 5 m) and PHM-derived DTMs (0.5 m, 1 m, 2 m, 5 m, 8 m) compared in this research, the ALS-derived DTM with the finest resolution of 0.5 m shows the highest accuracy. The root mean square error (RMSE) and mean error (ME) values for ALS-derived DTMs range from 0.14 m to 0.15 m and from 0.09 to 0.12 m, respectively, and the values decrease with decreasing spatial resolution. For the PHM-derived DTMs, the RMSE and ME values are almost identical regardless of resolution and they are 0.35 m and 0.17 m, respectively. The findings suggest that the 8 m spatial resolution is optimal for a given photogrammetric data, and no finer than 8 m spatial resolution is required. This research also reveals that the national digital photogrammetric data in the study area contain certain errors (outliers) specific to the terrain type, which could considerably affect the DTM accuracy. Thus, preliminary evaluation of photogrammetric data should be done to eliminate possible outliers prior to the DTM generation in lowland forests with flat terrain. In the absence of ALS data, the finding in this research could be of interests to countries, which still rely on similar photogrammetric data for DTM generation.
Investigating antecedent factors to job performance: Contemporary evidence from government supply management professionals

Purpose: The purpose of the study was to investigate the influence of transformational leadership, organisational citizenship behaviour and quality of work life on job performance amongst supply management professionals employed by the South African government. Rationale: The depressed job performance of supply management professionals in the South African government presents an impetus to generate new empirical information on the subject in order to find solutions. Methodology: A quantitative survey approach was followed using a sample of 264 supply management professionals employed in the South African government and were based in Gauteng Province. A Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was conducted to assess psychometric properties of the measurement instrument. Hypotheses were tested using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM). Findings: Transformational leadership had positive and significant relationships with organisational citizenship behaviour and quality of work life. Quality of work life exerted a greater influence of job performance than organisational citizenship behaviour. Value of research: The study provides current evidence of the influence of transformational leadership on organisational citizenship behaviour and quality of work life, as well as the influence of organisational citizenship behaviour and quality of work life on job performance amongst supply management professionals. Conclusion: Transformational leadership has a positive influence on organisational citizenship behaviour and quality of work life amongst supply management professionals in the government. Both organisational citizenship behaviour and quality of work life exerta positive influence on the job performance of supply management professionals in the government. Future studies should be extended to other professional cohorts in both the private and the government sectors.
Genetic population structure of Hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricta) using microsatellite analysis

Information on the genetic structure of marine species is essential for stock improvement programs. In order to analyses the genetic diversity of the Hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricte) by the microsatellite genetic method, 64 samples were caught from the beaches located in Kish and Qeshm islands. Polymerase chain reactions (PCR) of genomic DNA extracted from the samples were carried out using 5 pairs of microsatellite primers. The results of this study indicated that all 5 pairs of primers were polymorphic. Average numbers of real allele and effective allele were 4.90 and 2.99, respectively. Average rate of observed heterozygosity was 0.570 and that for expected heterozygosity was 0.616. Study of the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium was shown the entire locus had not equilibrium except Cm3 and Ei8 locus in Kish area. F st (0.166) and R st (0.634) calculated by the Analysis of Molecular Variance (AMOVA) test illustrated that there are separate populations of Hawksbill turtle in this part of the Persian Gulf (Kish and Qeshm islands). It seems that Kish’s turtles live under better conditions in contrast to their Qeshm counterparts. Diminution of genetic variation within examined population decreases its adaptation to environmental alterations. We identified two different E. imbricte populations from north of the Persian Gulf.
Theoretical Perspectives of Managerial Power and CEO Compensation in

This paper survey on related literature on how top management pay is influenced by poor quality of governance structure (controlling shareholder managerialism) and derives various testable implications by examining top manager's cash compensation - salary and bonus- in Korean Chaebol. Moreover, this paper is aiming at explaining , compensation arrangements approved by boards often deviate from optimal contracting because directors are captured or subject to influence by management, sympathetic to management, or simply ineffectual in overseeing compensation.
The Effect of Swimming Abilityon the Anxiety Levels of Female College Students

This study aims to determine changes in the anxiety levels of female college students in relation to their swimming skills. The results of the study were obtained from 141 female college students enrolled at the University of Kebangsaan Malaysia. Breaststroke was used in order to evaluate their swimming skills, while Spielberger’s State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) was used to evaluate their anxiety levels. The analysis and observations confirmed a moderately strong correlation (r = -0.407, sig .000) between the level of anxiety (state anxiety) experienced in the water and swimming skills. The results showed that learning how to swim decreases the anxiety levels of female college students. We suggest that taking up this activity might have benefits for students with high levels of anxiety.
EFECTO DE L-ARGININA Y ACEITE DE PESCADO EN EL COMPORTAMIENTO REPRODUCTIVO DE OVEJAS DE PELO SINCRONIZADAS CON UN PROGESTÁGENO EFFECT OF L-ARGININE AND FISH OIL ON THE REPRODUCTIVE PERFORMANCE OF HAIR SHEEP SYNCHRONIZATION WITH A PROGESTAGEN

L-arginine is a substrate of the enzyme nitric oxide synthase for production of nitric oxide (NO), which has an influence in reproductive physiology, while fish oil inhibits the production of NO. Therefore, an study was performed about the effects of a supplement (for 3 d) of L-arginine (A) (for 3 d) and fish oil (AC) on the onset of estrus (E), percentage of estrus (PE), ovulatory rate (TO), percentage gestation (PG) and prolificity (PR) in hair sheep ewes treated (12 d) with 40 mg of fluorogestone acetate (AFG) using an impregnated polyurethane sponge inserted into the vagina. The treatments were the following: P=progesterone oil alone (n=7); AFG+eCG=40 mg fluorogestone acetate (12 d) + 400 IU equine chorionic gonadotropin (eCG; n=8); AFG+A=AFG+300 mg kg −1
Adhesive property of bacteria and its relationship to microbial spoilage of shrimp

Abstract : Pacific shrimp (Panadalus jordani) was washed repeatedly and the eluted bacteria were enumerated and identified. Selected isolates were tested for their adhesive properties. Washing reduced the microbial load by 3.84 to 42.04%. The bacteria which most resisted wash-off were Straphylococcus and Pseudomonas spp. The easiest to wash off was Flavobacterium spp. Attachment, measured by hanging glass cover slips in broth, however, showed Pseudomonas and Staphylococcus spp. to have the greatest ability to adhere. Moraxella spp. showed the least ability to adhere to glass (.02%), followed by Lactobacillus spp. at 0.11%. Arthrobacter and Flavobacterium spp. adhered at 0.30 and 0.37% levels, respectively. Attachment of Pseudomonas spp. to glass was the least affected by media compositon, temperature, or presence of a surface-active agent (sodium hexametaphosphate). Staphylococcus spp. , on the other hand, attached most strongly under optimum growth conditions but were most affected by varying growth conditions, temperature, and presence of a metabolic inhibitor (sodium hexametoaphosphate). This indicates that the adhesive ability of Staphylococcus spp. is directly related to its metabolic activity, while Pseudomonas spp. is less sensitive to changes in metabolism and may depend on motility for adhesion. Bacteria that could adhere strongly on solid surfaces (Pseudomonas and Staphylococcus spp.) tend to be found in greater proportions and, hence, contribute more to the spoilage of shrimp.
Urea ammoniation compared to urea supplementation as a method of improving the nutritive value of wheat straw for sheep

The ammoniation of wheat straw by urea in a stack method was investigated and compared to urea supplemented and untreated straw in an intake and in vivo digestibility trial. Ammoniation and supplementation significantly (P .;; 0,01) improved the mean daily consumption of wheat straw by 46,7 and 35,6% respectively. The improvement of 8,1% in the voluntary intake of ammoniated wheat straw compared to urea supplemented wheat straw was not significant. Apparent digestibility of OM, OM, CWC, ADF and hemicellulose was significantly (P .;; 0,01) improved by 17,5; 15,1; 24,1; 14,3 and 39,2% respectively, when ammoniated straw was compared to untreated straw. Corresponding improvements of 10,0; 8,4; 17,8; 8,7 and 29,2% were obtained when ammoniated straw was compared to urea supplemented straw. All these differences were significant at least at P . ;; 0,05. Similarly, urea supplementation tended to increase the digestibility of the above-mentioned fractions marginally. Both ammoniation and urea supplementation of wheat straw significantly (P ,.;; 0,01) improved the apparent digestibility of CP as well as the N-balance. The apparent digestibility of CP of ammoniated wheat straw was significantly (P .;; 0,01) reduced by 22,1 % compared to urea supplemented wheat straw. The N-balance of ammoniated wheat straw, on the other hand, was marginally higher than that of urea supplemented wheat straw, mainly owing to a higher level of urinary N-excretion observed on the latter treatment. S. Atr, J. Anim. Sci. 1984, 14: 59-63