Assessment of Smallholder Farmers’ Adaptive Strategies on the Effects of Seasonal Rainfall Variability on Maize Yields in Nyeri County

Maize is the leading food crop produced in most parts of the world and a staple food crop in Kenya. Majority of the maize farmers are smallholders due to reduced land sizes as a result of land fragmentation. Maize farming is rain-fed making it more vulnerable to rainfall variability. Over the years, the farmers have increased their resilience and adaptive potential through indigenous knowledge so as to cope with the climate related risks. However, the increasing rainfall variability, frequency and more severe shocks likely surpass their current adaptive strategies. The study assessed existing adaptive strategies of the small-holder maize farmers in Kieni East sub-County in Nyeri Couny to the seasonal rainfall variability effects. The research adopted a mixed research design. Data was obtained from primary and secondary sources. Primary data was obtained using household structured questionnaires. Data was analyzed using descriptive methods and presented using charts and tables. SWOT analysis analyzed several underlying aspects affecting maize farmers in the sub-County. The study found that the farmers have several specific adaptive strategies to the effects of seasonal rainfall variability at their disposal which include but not limited to the use of varieties of maize seeds, seeking training, water harvesting, use of manure and fertilizers. Farmers also respond to rainfall variability by planting maize varieties that are early maturing and drought resistant as well as engaging in alternative farming activities and other economic activities.

The Role of Diversity in Company Productivity: The Case of the Bank Sector in Kosovo

Importance to identifying how diversity affects individual and group productivity in todays globalized world is increasing. The purpose of this research lies in the phenomenon of diversity and further analysis of the impact that diversity has on the work environment. To conduct this research, I interviewed 20 managers and 30 employees of the banking sector regarding the composition of their staff with emphasis on diversity. The data were processed using the statistical analysis of SPSS program. Human resources have positively influenced the increase of success, productivity and has eased problem solving, bettered performance, training, salary, and diversity of employees. This study will have practical significance in the easier approach of problems in human resource management and their motivation.

The Hypotheses Testing Method for Evaluation of Startup Projects

This paper suggests new perspective to evaluating innovation projects and understanding the nature of startup risks. Author consider five principal hypotheses that underlie every innovative project that comprise a bunch of respective assumptions to manage startup risks in a proactive manner. Suggested approach spots the light on a project’s uncertainties and risks, embedded investment and managerial options, and enables more comprehensive and accurate evaluation of innovation. The Hypotheses Testing Method enables to estimate risks and attractiveness of a startup project in a clear and fast manner. It replaces unclear traditional techniques like NPV and DCF, avoiding heavy cash flow modelling.

Cultural Health Moments: A Search Analysis During Times of Heightened Awareness to Identify Potential Interception Points with Digital Health Consumers

Year after year whenever someone who is considered “high profile” discovers that they have some sort of sickness or if they pass away due to a sickness, there seems to be a heightened interest in that person. At the same time however, there is a heightened awareness of the type of sickness that the person had. Finding the moments in which there is a heightened sense of awareness towards a specific topic can be something of high value to various agencies and organizations. The objective of this study was to explore the moments in which people start to do some initial search queries when there is a high-profile health moment. Once it is understood when this moment occurs, further research can be done to understand where the search behavior shifts to searches of awareness, signs, symptoms, and introspection over time.

Determinants of Tax Revenue in Sierra Leone: Application of the ARDL Framework

The aim of this paper is to investigate the determinants of tax revenue in Sierra Leone, over the period 1990Q1 to 2020Q1, within the context of the ARDL estimation procedure. The result from the ARDL Bound test for cointegration suggests that a long-run relationship exists among the variables. The long run analysis indicates that real GDP (Y), openness (Op) and official development assistance (ODA) are the main determinants of tax revenue (TR) in Sierra Leone, with positive coefficients. This result is in tandem with the short run findings, which establishes a positive relationship between tax revenue and its regressors- real GDP and openness. However, the short run result also suggests that inflation has a negative impact on tax revenue. The findings confirm that any short-run disequilibrium to the long-run can be corrected at the 11 percent speed of adjustment quarterly, albeit at a low speed of adjustment. The diagnostic result shows that approximately 75 percent of the variation in the dependent variable is explained by the regressors based on the value of the R-squared. It also confirms that the model is free of serial correlation and heteroscedasticity, whilst the CUSUM test indicates stability of the model coefficients. The policy implication is for government to pursue policies that will enhance economic growth, through investment in growth enhancing sectors including agriculture, health, education, energy and infrastructure development; and ensure a politically stable environment as a recipe for private sector investment.

The Impact of Foreign Direct Investment on Income Convergence in China - A Spatial Panel Data Analysis

After taking into account the spatial dependence effects in the panel data consisting of all 31 provinces, direct-controlled municipalities, and autonomous regions in China between the years 1998 and 2017, it found significant spatial autocorrelation effects in both traditional absolute and conditional β income convergence models. At the national level, using the spatial econometric models (Spatial Error Model for absolute convergence and Spatial Durbin Model for conditional convergence), the analysis shows that in the past 19 years from 1999 to 2017, there is no absolute β income convergence. However, there is conditional β income convergence after controlling for all growth factors, while the positive effect of fixed asset investment on regional economic growth is significant, and the effect of population growth is significantly negative. The other growth factors such as FDI inflow, export, and higher education enrollment were surprisingly found no statistically significant effects on regional economic growth. From regional level (Spatial Durbin Model and Spatial Lag Model), there is no conditional β income convergence within each four economic regions. Nonetheless, the northeast region showed an income divergence trend, where only the fixed asset investment is positively significant. This study results imply that China should continue to improve fixed asset investment and control population growth to stimulate regional economic growth and income convergence.

Situational Approach of Leadership - Case Study at "Kujtesa" Company

In the contemporary time in which we live, the approach of leaders plays an important role in implementing the strategy of the “Kujtesa” company. The purpose of this research is to show the application of leadership style to their subordinates. The methodology used in the study is a combination of quantitative and qualitative data. The results of the research were processed with the data of 100 employees and managers of the “Kujtesa” company. The data were processed using the statistical analysis of SPSS program. This research includes the analysis of key factors of leaders' style with their subordinates such as: human resource management, work structure, management readiness to face new challenges and new situations. This study shows a clear picture of the functioning of leaders' approaches to subordinates.

The Determinants of Audit Quality: A Study Using the Approach of Earnings Surprise Benchmark

This study aims to find empirical evidence regarding the influence of audit tenure, audit firm rotation, audit firm industry specialization, and time budget pressure on audit quality. This research is a quantitative research using secondary data in the form of financial statements. This study uses a population of manufacturing companies in the consumer goods sector listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange in 2015-2017. The sampling was done by using a non-probability method with a purposive sampling technique. The number of samples used in this study is 34 companies. The data analysis method used is a logistic regression analysis method using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21. The results of this study indicate that audit tenure and audit firm rotation have no effect on audit quality, PAF industry specialization has a positive effect on audit quality, time budget pressure has a negative effect on audit quality.

The Development of Sino Indian Trade from the Perspective of “The Belt and Road Initiative”

Since ancient times, the two ancient civilizations of China and India have had a long history of trade exchanges, and such trade exchanges have left an important mark in the history of Sino-India relations. Chronologically，this article takes the Sino-Indian trade exchanges as a research perspective to outline two thousand years of trade history between two countries. From the Sino-Indian Business Road that began in the Qin Dynasty and Han Dynasty to the origin of the Silk Road on which Zhang Qian went to the Western Regions as an envoy, explored the Sino-India-Tibet Road and Maritime Silk Road trade; analyzed the opium trade between China, Britain and India in modern times. At the same time, it uses the founding of People’s Republic of China, the Sino-Indian War, the Belt and Road Initiative and the important events of the global epidemic as nodes to describe the development of Sino-Indian trade. In the long history, this kind of rich trade history also shows that China and India are more likely and should establish a better and more extensive trade cooperation relationship, and learn to effectively deal with the turmoil. This will provide reference for operating the trade activities between the two countries.

International Evidence on Purchasing Power Parity: A Study of High and Low Inflation Countries

The purpose of this article is to select a sample of low inflation countries and high inflation countries and examine the long run validity of the relative Purchasing Power Parity doctrine. We explore the notion that countries with historically low inflation experience strong and stable currency and those with a continuous high inflation face weak and depreciating currencies. After a review of the literature, a theoretical model is developed for the relationship between inflation and exchange rate changes. This is followed by some graphical annual time series and empirical results for selected countries. We find our hypothesis is supported for high inflation countries. We then explore productivity differences and their impact on real exchange rates.