Maximizing Stimulation Efficiencies in Offshore Multistage Completions, Black Sea, Romania

This paper presents an analysis of the stimulation treatment design and operational efficiencies in the Black Sea. In greater detail, the paper focuses on how the stimulation design and each operational step has been optimized to save time, money and ensure an HSE driven completion methodology. An analysis was performed on the stimulation design and implementation approach looking at its evolution through a knowledge building and lesson learning process. The principal goal was to determine the most economical way to stimulate an offshore well without making any concessions to the reservoirs’ production or ultimate recovery. From the basics of well and frac design to completion optimization, effort was applied in analyzing ball launching procedures, frac spacing, logistical arrangements on the stimulation vessel and all other areas where there was potential to make improvements. Ultimately, an analysis of fluid displacements during flush was performed and deductions inferred. Past stimulation treatments were analyzed in an effort of better understanding the advantages and disadvantages in terms of production output of the wells. Similarly, an analysis of the completion approach and operational efficiencies showed the ability of pumping three stimulation stages a day. Considering that horizontal wells in the area are usually completed in six stages, a stimulation campaign would effectively be completed in 2 pumping days, 4 days total if no weather or operational delays are faced. Further improvements of this approach have been implemented in 2021 when six stimulation stages have been pumped in a single vessel ride. Applying the ball drop procedure offshore showed optimal results, as it is efficient in reducing downtime in between fracturing stages and in achieving proper isolation between stimulation zones. Likewise, with over flush being a concern throughout most of the stimulation population, certain cases in the Black Sea showed that over flushing did not adversely affect production of the wells with the production exhibiting ~15% above expected production rates post stimulation. In conclusion, the authors believe that the operational efficiencies achieved in the Black Sea are transposable in other offshore environments and successful cost cutting can be achieved by sound engineering and logistical decisions. The approach and results are beneficial in understanding where the economics are positively impacted in multistage stimulation treatments in the offshore environments, hence ultimately improving the rate of return.

Changing Food Consumption Patterns and Land Requirements for Food in the Six Geopolitical Zones in Nigeria

Research on food consumption in Nigeria has mainly focused on food intake, household diversity, and purchasing power. We investigated a knowledge gap for food consumed by households and the land requirements for food resulting from household consumption patterns. The food consumed and the household size determine the land requirement for food. Therefore, a quantity-based analysis and a land demand methodology were applied to derive household food quantity and land requirements for food respectively. The results show that a greater percentage of household income is spent on cereals and starchy roots as the main source of calories and that cowpea is a secondary food option for households. In addition, households are changing their dietary intake from rice to maize and rice to cassava and yams as a cheaper alternative and experts’ measurements of food security at the household level indicates that households in our study are moderately food insecure. Other findings showthat the country’s specific and per capita land requirements for food have gradually increased between 2000 and 2018. Across the six geopolitical zones, Northern regions with higher populations have high land requirements for food, especially for rice and maize (cereals), while Southern regions have high land requirements for cassava and yams (starchy roots) due to their respective consumption and household sizes. In addition, from our study, the land requirements for food show the actual cropland area of South South fed 5000 households. Consequently, a scenario analysis shows that the land requirements for food in our study exceeds the entire geographical area of Nigeria. Therefore, continued population growth without improved living standards and adequate food production output per hectare will further exacerbate food insecurity and land shortage in Nigeria.

PENDAMPINGAN MANAJEMEN PEMASARAN DENGAN MEMANFAATKAN IPTEKS PADA USAHA MIKRO, KECIL DAN MENENGAH (UKM) TERDAMPAK COVID-19

ABSTRAKPandemi Covid 19 berdampak pada perubahan tatanan bersosialisasi, berbisnis dan bermasyarakat. Kelompok masyarakat yang lebih kecil seperti pelaku UKM juga mengalami dampak perubahan tersebut; sehingga memerlukan bimbingan khusus untuk beradaptasi dengan kondisi yang baru. Beberapa kendala dan masalah yang muncul diantaranya adalah berkurangnya omset pelaku UKM yang disebabkan karena keterbatasan dalam melakukan inovasi dan manajemen produksi. Tujuan dari program pengabdian ini adalah meningkatkan daya saing UKM. Terselenggaranya program ini merupakan bagian dari tridharma perguruan tinggi yaitu pengabdian kepada masyarakat dan bentuk tindak kerjasama yang dilakukan universitas dengan Sentra UKM Barambing Kabupaten Luwu yang bertindak sebagai mitra. Beberapa kegiatan yang dilakukan dalam program ini diantaranya; pelatihan digital marketing, pelatihan Pembuatan laporan keuangan dalam bentuk modul /format praktis serta pelatihan diversifikasi dan inovasi produk (desain produk). Luaran yang dihasilkan dalam program ini, adalah terlaksananya kegiatan pelatihan yang berdampak terbukanya peluang pasar online sehingga pemasaran produk UKM meningkat; pemahaman dan kemampuan peserta pelatihan dalam menyusun laporan keuangan; pengembangan luaran produksi dengan tampilan yang lebih menarik. Penguatan pada tiga komponen ini dapat meningkatkan omset UKM Barambing Kabupaten Luwu dalam jangka Panjang. Kata Kunci : UKM; covid-19; inovasi; pengabdian. ABSTRACTThe Covid-19 pandemic has impacted changes in socializing, doing business, and socializing. Smaller community groups such as SMEs are also affected by these changes, requiring exceptional guidance to adapt to new conditions. Some of the obstacles and problems that arise include SMEs' reduced turnover due to limitations in innovation and production management. The purpose of this service program is to increase the competitiveness of SMEs. The implementation of this program is part of the tri dharma of higher education, namely community service and a form of cooperation carried out by the university with the Barambing SMEs Center, Luwu Regency, which acts as a partner. Some of the activities carried out in this program include; digital marketing training, training on making financial reports in the form of practical modules/formats, and training on product diversification and innovation (product design). The outputs produced in this program are the implementation of training activities that impact opening online market opportunities so that SME product marketing increases; understanding and ability of training participants in preparing financial reports; production output development with a more attractive appearance. Strengthening these three components can increase the turnover of Barambing SMEs in Luwu Regency in the long term. Keywords: SMEs; covid-19, innovation; devotion.

Resource competition and technological diversity

The work develops and investigates a mathematical model for evolution of the technological structure of an economic system where different technologies compete for the common essential resources. The model is represented by a system of consumer–resource rate equations. Consumers are technologies formalized as populations of weakly differentiated firms producing a similar commodity with like average output. Firms are characterized by the Leontief–Liebig production function in stock-flow representation. Firms self-replicate with a rate proportional to production output of the respective technology and dissolve with a constant rate of decay. The resources are supplied to the system from outside and consumed by concerned technologies; the unutilized resource amounts are removed elsewhere. The inverse of a per firm break-even resource availability is proposed to serve as a measure for competitiveness towards a given resource. The necessary conditions for coexistence of different technologies are derived, according to which each contender must be a superior competitor for one specific resource and an inferior competitor for the others. The model yields a version of the principle of competitive exclusion: in a steady state, the number of competing technologies cannot exceed the number of limiting resources. Competitive outcomes (either dominance or coexistence) in the general system of multiple technologies feeding on multiple essential resources are shown to be predictable from knowledge of the resource-dependent consumption and growth rates of each technological population taken alone. The proposed model of exploitative competition with explicit resource dynamics enables more profound insight into the patterns of technological change as opposed to conventional mainstream models of innovation diffusion.

Evaluating the efficiency of Mediterranean container ports using data envelopment analysis

Mediterranean container ports are constantly requested to face new market challenges after years of decline of their traffic in favour of a stronger leadership of Northern range ports, also favoured by the consolidation of the Arctic Route and the Belt and Road Initiative. To regain competitiveness, Mediterranean ports must undertake a path of operational, managerial and infrastructural strengthening. This study applies Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) to 35 Mediterranean container ports in order to identify the potential key success factors on which to intervene to improve their competitiveness potential and response to the new market needs. The application uses the port throughput as output, and three inputs: yard area, number of quay cranes and distance of the port from the Suez–Gibraltar axis. The latter has been inserted in the study to evaluate whether it can affect port efficiency. Both input- and output-oriented approaches are used in order to investigate the port competitiveness through the production function (input-oriented), and the port commercial competitiveness based on the output and feasibility of its production (output-oriented). Results can provide insights for the implementation of future policies and management strategies aimed to strengthen the Mediterranean port context.

NILAI TAMBAH DAN STRATEGI PENGEMBANGAN PRODUK PADA AGRONDUSTRI KOPI BUBUK CAP GUNUNG DI KABUPATEN WAY KANAN

This study aims to analyze and calculate the added value of Cap Gunung coffee powder agro-industry, and arrange the development strategy of Cap Gunung coffee powder agro-industry products. The method that used in this research is a case study. Therefore, the analytical method that used is the Hayami Method and Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Threats (SWOT) Analysis. Based on the calculation of the value added is Rp13,386/kg with a value added ratio is 32.81 percent. Furthermore, results of the SWOT analysis show that the values of internal and external factors are 78.8 and 64.9. This value indicate that the Cap Gunung coffee powder agro-industry in quadrant I, or in the Strength-Opportunity (SO) strategy. The priority strategy that can be implemented is to expand the marketing area, increase production output, and develop businesses by utilizing their strengths.Keywords: added value, development strategy, hayami method, SWOT analysis

ADVANTAGES, DISADVANTAGES AND PROSPECTS OF IMPLEMENTING A PIECE-RATE FORM OF PAY AT THE INDUSTRIAL ENTERPRISE ENVIRONMENT

The paper considers the conditions of expediency of using the piece-rate form of pay in the modern industrial environment. The necessity to ensure implementation of the motivational and stimulating role of the pay system is noted, as both business efficiency and employee motivation depend on this choice. The extensive use of piece-rate form of pay at industrial enterprises is related to its proven advantages, the main of which is the obvious relationship between production output and wages. This stimulates to increase individual employee productivity rate and efficiency the production system as a whole. The reason for the piece-rate form of pay to be promising to consist in its flexibility and ability to transform depending on the specifics of production environment and conditions of labour organization. Emphasized that despite mentioned advantages, implementation of piece-rate form of pay has its own certain limitations and risks. Specifically, it does not natively support accounting for a quality parameters of production, may lead to violation of production process synchronicity requirement and omit compliance to the norms of material consumption. Is determined that while choosing forms and systems of pay, it should be clearly understood that the development of an effective such system for successful monetary motivation of employees at the enterprise environment is an extremely complex task and depends on multiple factors, even if we take into consideration industrial enterprises only.

SMED Simulation in Optimising the Operating Output of Tandem Press Line in the Automotive Industry using WITNESS Software

The automotive industry is one of the most advanced industries in the world. The demand for vehicles keeps increasing over time, mainly influenced by technology’s sophistication and impressive designs. This research is focusing on the production performance of the stamping process in Malaysia’s automotive industry. The main issue observed and evidenced in data collected from industry players is that an unacceptably long time is taken in the die/tooling change process, which grossly affects the planned production output. The most significant direct impact on this situation is the increase in operating costs due to additional time taken to meet the planned production output. Therefore, this research aims to establish a new framework that can optimise the efficiency of the dies changeover process, which could lower the overall production cost, which could partially transfer the saving to the consumers. The study was conducted in two stages; the first is on data collection correlates with the automotive stamping premise to create a simulation procedure, and the second is to analyse the current production output using WITNESS simulation. These simulated output data have later been compared to the actual industrial data. Using a systematic dies changeover process, a new alternative framework was proposed. The framework combined single minute exchange of die (SMED), lean tools and simulation to become an integrated single minute exchange of die (ISMED). It shows that the proposed method decreased the changeovers processes from the initial of 1509.5 seconds to 750.75 seconds, then further reduced to 569.75 seconds, with the nett time reduction of 62.2%. The result shows that the daily production output has increased gradually from 1100 pieces to 1500 pieces, further increasing to 2145 pieces. As evidenced in analytical data, it is believed that this new framework can strengthen the total output in the manufacturing process, especially in the manufacturing of automotive stamping parts.

Efektivitas Penggunaan Input Dalam Usaha Tani Bawang Merah Di Kecamatan Baraka Kabupaten Enrekang

The working pattern of shallot farmers in Enrekang Regency still adheres to the old model of production principles, were to increase production is accompanied by adding the inputs. In fact, in the dimension of the Cobb-Douglas production theory, the addition of inputs is not always necessary in line with the increase of production output. Therefore, this study aims to see the effectiveness of inputs in shallots farming in Enrekang Regency. The input variables used in this study include the area of land, capital, labor, and technology that are optimized and correlated with the production of shallots. The analytical method used is multiple linear regression by adopting the Cobb-Douglas production theory. The results of the analysis found that the use of inputs is reaching the condition of decreasing return to scale in shallots farming.