Study on the Socio-Psychological Background of Entrepreneur - Managers of Small Scale Industrial Units in Ernakulam District, Kerala

The understanding of the theory of entrepreneurship depends upon one set of definitions which provide the base for analytical study. The main objective of the study was to understand the distribution of entrepreneurship in the manufacturing sector among different categories of people in kerala and to differentiate the socio - psychological background of successful entrepreneur- managers from unsuccessful entrepreneur-managers. The purpose of the study, a sample of 150 entrepreneur-managers of SS1 units spread over Ernakulam district was surveyed through a specially designed questionnaire.

Marketing Management in Small Scale Industrial Units of Women Entrepreneurs in Kerala - A Study with Reference to Ernakulam District",

The women entrepreneurs, who set up business units with encouragement and institutional support, find it difficult to market their products. The marketing concept is yet to be grasped in its entirety. Women entrepreneurs especially find the marketing fiinctions difficult to carry out. Hence, this study is carried out to understand the marketing management in SSI units of women entrepreneurs

Marine yeast Candida MCCF 101 as feed supplement in aquaculture: nutritional quality, optimization of large scale production and evaluation of its protective effect on Koi carp from Aeromonas infection

Marine yeast have been regarded as safe and showing a beneficial impact on biotechnological process. It provides better nutritional and dietary values indicating their potential application as feed supplements in aquaculture. Brown et al. (1996) evaluated all the marine yeasts characterised with high protein content, carbohydrate, good amino acid composition and high levels of saturated fats. However, there is paucity of information on marine yeasts as feed supplements and no feed formulation has been found either in literature or in market supplemented with them. This statement supported by Zhenming et al. (2006) reported still a lack of feed composed of single cell protein (SCP) from marine yeasts with high content of protein and other nutrients. Recent research has shown that marine yeasts also have highly potential uses in food, feed, medical and biofuel industries as well as marine biotechnology (Chi et al., 2009; 2010). Sajeevan et al. (2006; 2009a) and Sarlin and Philip (2011) demonstrates that the marine yeasts Candida sake served as a high quality, inexpensive nutrient source and it had proven immunostimulatory properties for cultured shrimps. This strain has been made part of the culture collection of National Centre for Aquatic Animal Health, Cochin University of Science and Technology as Candida MCCF 101. Over the years marine yeasts have been gaining increased attention in animal feed industry due to their nutritional value and immune boosting property.Therefore, the present study was undertaken, and focused on the nutritional quality, optimization of large scale production and evaluation of its protective effect on Koi carp from Aeromonas infection

Horizontal nutrient fluxes and production efficiencies in urban and peri-urban crop and livestock husbandry of Niamey, Niger

Urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA) increasingly supplies food and non-food values to the rapidly growing West African cities. However, little is known about the resource use efficiencies in West African small-scale UPA crop and livestock production systems, and about the benefits that urban producers and retailers obtain from the cultivation and sale of UPA products. To contribute to filling this gap of knowledge, the studies comprising this doctoral thesis determined nutrient use efficiencies in representative urban crop and livestock production system in Niamey, Niger, and investigated potential health risks for consumers. Also assessed was the economic efficiency of urban farming activities. The field study, which was conducted during November 2005 to January 2008, quantified management-related horizontal nutrient flows in 10 vegetable gardens, 9 millet fields and 13 cattle and small ruminant production units. These farms, selected on the basis of a preceding study, represented the diversity of UPA crop and livestock production systems in Niamey. Based on the management intensity, the market orientation and especially the nutrient input to individual gardens and fields, these were categorized as high or low input systems. In the livestock study, high and low input cattle and small ruminant units were differentiated based on the amounts of total feed dry matter offered daily to the animals at the homestead. Additionally, economic returns to gardeners and market retailers cultivating and selling amaranth, lettuce, cabbage and tomato - four highly appreciated vegetables in Niamey were determined during a 6-months survey in forty gardens and five markets. For vegetable gardens and millet fields, significant differences in partial horizontal nutrient balances were determined for both management intensities. Per hectare, average annual partial balances for carbon (C), nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) amounted to 9936 kg C, 1133 kg N, 223 kg P and 312 kg K in high input vegetable gardens as opposed to 9580 kg C, 290 kg N, 125 kg P and 351 kg K in low input gardens. These surpluses were mainly explained by heavy use of mineral fertilizers and animal manure to which irrigation with nutrient rich wastewater added. In high input millet fields, annual surpluses of 259 kg C ha-1, 126 kg N ha-1, 20 kg P ha-1 and 0.4 kg K ha-1 were determined. Surpluses of 12 kg C ha-1, 17 kg N ha-1, and deficits of -3 kg P ha-1 and -3 kg K ha-1 were determined for low input millet fields. Here, carbon and nutrient inputs predominantly originated from livestock manure application through corralling of sheep, goats and cattle. In the livestock enterprises, N, P and K supplied by forages offered at the farm exceeded the animals’ requirements for maintenance and growth in high and low input sheep/goat as well as cattle units. The highest average growth rate determined in high input sheep/goat units was 104 g d-1 during the cool dry season, while a maximum average gain of 70 g d-1 was determined for low input sheep/goat units during the hot dry season. In low as well as in high input cattle units, animals lost weight during the hot dry season, and gained weight during the cool dry season. In all livestock units, conversion efficiencies for feeds offered at the homestead were rather poor, ranging from 13 to 42 kg dry matter (DM) per kg live weight gain (LWG) in cattle and from 16 to 43 kg DM kg-1 LWG in sheep/goats, pointing to a substantial waste of feeds and nutrients. The economic assessment of the production of four high value vegetables pointed to a low efficiency of N and P use in amaranth and lettuce production, causing low economic returns for these crops compared to tomato and cabbage to which inexpensive animal manure was applied. The net profit of market retailers depended on the type of vegetable marketed. In addition it depended on marketplace for amaranth and lettuce, and on season and marketplace for cabbage and tomato. Analysis of faecal pathogens in lettuce irrigated with river water and fertilized with animal manure indicated a substantial contamination by Salmonella spp. with 7.2 x 104 colony forming units (CFU) per 25 g of produce fresh matter, while counts of Escherichia coli averaged 3.9 x 104 CFU g-1. In lettuce irrigated with wastewater, Salmonella counts averaged 9.8 x 104 CFU 25 g-1 and E. coli counts were 0.6 x 104 CFU g-1; these values exceeded the tolerable contamination levels in vegetables of 10 CFU g-1 for E. coli and of 0 CFU 25 g-1 for Salmonella. Taken together, the results of this study indicate that Niamey’s UPA enterprises put environmental safety at risk since excess inputs of N, P and K to crop and livestock production units favour N volatilisation and groundwater pollution by nutrient leaching. However, more detailed studies are needed to corroborate these indications. Farmers’ revenues could be significantly increased if nutrient use efficiency in the different production (sub)systems was improved by better matching nutrient supply through fertilizers and feeds with the actual nutrient demands of plants and animals.

Sustainability of Small Scale Farming in a Mountain Region: Case Study of the Khaling Rai Population of the Solukhumbu, Nepal

The Khaling Rai live in a remote area of the mountain region of Nepal. Subsistence farming is central to their livelihood strategy, the sustainability of which was examined in this study. The sustainable livelihood approach was identified as a suitable theoretical framework to analyse the assets of the Khaling Rai. A baseline study was conducted using indicators to assess the outcome of the livelihood strategies under the three pillars of sustainability – economic, social and environmental. Relationships between key factors were analysed. The outcome showed that farming fulfils their basic need of food security, with self-sufficiency in terms of seeds, organic fertilisers and tools. Agriculture is almost totally non-monitized: crops are grown mainly for household consumption. However, the crux faced by the Khaling Rai community is the need to develop high value cash crops in order to improve their livelihoods while at the same time maintaining food security. Institutional support in this regard was found to be lacking. At the same time there is declining soil fertility and an expanding population, which results in smaller land holdings. The capacity to absorb risk is inhibited by the small size of the resource base and access only to small local markets. A two-pronged approach is recommended. Firstly, the formation of agricultural cooperative associations in the area. Secondly, through them the selection of key personnel to be put forward for training in the adoption of improved low-cost technologies for staple crops and in the introduction of appropriate new cash crops.

Technical and scale efficiency of cassava production system in Delta State, Nigeria: an application of Two-Stage DEA approach

The present study examines the level of pure technical and scale efficiencies of cassava production system including its sub-processes (that is production and processing stages) of 278 cassava farmers/processors from three regions of Delta State, Nigeria by applying Two-Stage Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach. Results reveal that pure technical efficiency (PTE) is significantly lower at the production stage 0.41 vs 0.55 for the processing stage, but scale efficiency (SE) is high at both stages (0.84 and 0.87), implying that productivity can be improved substantially by reallocation of resources and adjusting operation size. The socio-economic determinants exert differential impacts on PTE and SE at each stage. Overall, education, experience and main occupation as farmer significantly improve SE while subsistence pressure reduces it. Extension contact significantly improves SE at the processing stage but reduces PTE and SE overall. Inverse size-PTE and size-SE relationships exist in cassava production system. In other words, large/medium farms are technically and scale inefficient. Gender gap exists in performance. Male farmers are technically efficient at processing stage but scale inefficient overall. Farmers in northern region are technically efficient. Investments in education, extension services and infrastructure are suggested as policy options to improve the cassava sector in Nigeria.

A Detailed Look at Scale and Translation Invariance in a Hierarchical Neural Model of Visual Object Recognition

The HMAX model has recently been proposed by Riesenhuber & Poggio as a hierarchical model of position- and size-invariant object recognition in visual cortex. It has also turned out to model successfully a number of other properties of the ventral visual stream (the visual pathway thought to be crucial for object recognition in cortex), and particularly of (view-tuned) neurons in macaque inferotemporal cortex, the brain area at the top of the ventral stream. The original modeling study only used ``paperclip'' stimuli, as in the corresponding physiology experiment, and did not explore systematically how model units' invariance properties depended on model parameters. In this study, we aimed at a deeper understanding of the inner workings of HMAX and its performance for various parameter settings and ``natural'' stimulus classes. We examined HMAX responses for different stimulus sizes and positions systematically and found a dependence of model units' responses on stimulus position for which a quantitative description is offered. Interestingly, we find that scale invariance properties of hierarchical neural models are not independent of stimulus class, as opposed to translation invariance, even though both are affine transformations within the image plane.

A Multi-scale Model for Copper Dishing in Chemical-Mechanical Polishing

The present success in the manufacture of multi-layer interconnects in ultra-large-scale integration is largely due to the acceptable planarization capabilities of the chemical-mechanical polishing (CMP) process. In the past decade, copper has emerged as the preferred interconnect material. The greatest challenge in Cu CMP at present is the control of wafer surface non-uniformity at various scales. As the size of a wafer has increased to 300 mm, the wafer-level non-uniformity has assumed critical importance. Moreover, the pattern geometry in each die has become quite complex due to a wide range of feature sizes and multi-level structures. Therefore, it is important to develop a non-uniformity model that integrates wafer-, die- and feature-level variations into a unified, multi-scale dielectric erosion and Cu dishing model. In this paper, a systematic way of characterizing and modeling dishing in the single-step Cu CMP process is presented. The possible causes of dishing at each scale are identified in terms of several geometric and process parameters. The feature-scale pressure calculation based on the step-height at each polishing stage is introduced. The dishing model is based on pad elastic deformation and the evolving pattern geometry, and is integrated with the wafer- and die-level variations. Experimental and analytical means of determining the model parameters are outlined and the model is validated by polishing experiments on patterned wafers. Finally, practical approaches for minimizing Cu dishing are suggested.

A Multi-scale Model for Copper Dishing in Chemical-Mechanical Polishing

The present success in the manufacture of multi-layer interconnects in ultra-large-scale integration is largely due to the acceptable planarization capabilities of the chemical-mechanical polishing (CMP) process. In the past decade, copper has emerged as the preferred interconnect material. The greatest challenge in Cu CMP at present is the control of wafer surface non-uniformity at various scales. As the size of a wafer has increased to 300 mm, the wafer-level non-uniformity has assumed critical importance. Moreover, the pattern geometry in each die has become quite complex due to a wide range of feature sizes and multi-level structures. Therefore, it is important to develop a non-uniformity model that integrates wafer-, die- and feature-level variations into a unified, multi-scale dielectric erosion and Cu dishing model. In this paper, a systematic way of characterizing and modeling dishing in the single-step Cu CMP process is presented. The possible causes of dishing at each scale are identified in terms of several geometric and process parameters. The feature-scale pressure calculation based on the step-height at each polishing stage is introduced. The dishing model is based on pad elastic deformation and the evolving pattern geometry, and is integrated with the wafer- and die-level variations. Experimental and analytical means of determining the model parameters are outlined and the model is validated by polishing experiments on patterned wafers. Finally, practical approaches for minimizing Cu dishing are suggested.

Behavioral Measures and their Correlation with IPM Iteration Counts on Semi-Definite Programming Problems

We study four measures of problem instance behavior that might account for the observed differences in interior-point method (IPM) iterations when these methods are used to solve semidefinite programming (SDP) problem instances: (i) an aggregate geometry measure related to the primal and dual feasible regions (aspect ratios) and norms of the optimal solutions, (ii) the (Renegar-) condition measure C(d) of the data instance, (iii) a measure of the near-absence of strict complementarity of the optimal solution, and (iv) the level of degeneracy of the optimal solution. We compute these measures for the SDPLIB suite problem instances and measure the correlation between these measures and IPM iteration counts (solved using the software SDPT3) when the measures have finite values. Our conclusions are roughly as follows: the aggregate geometry measure is highly correlated with IPM iterations (CORR = 0.896), and is a very good predictor of IPM iterations, particularly for problem instances with solutions of small norm and aspect ratio. The condition measure C(d) is also correlated with IPM iterations, but less so than the aggregate geometry measure (CORR = 0.630). The near-absence of strict complementarity is weakly correlated with IPM iterations (CORR = 0.423). The level of degeneracy of the optimal solution is essentially uncorrelated with IPM iterations.

Bayesian tools for zero counts in compositional data

The log-ratio methodology makes available powerful tools for analyzing compositional data. Nevertheless, the use of this methodology is only possible for those data sets without null values. Consequently, in those data sets where the zeros are present, a previous treatment becomes necessary. Last advances in the treatment of compositional zeros have been centered especially in the zeros of structural nature and in the rounded zeros. These tools do not contemplate the particular case of count compositional data sets with null values. In this work we deal with \count zeros" and we introduce a treatment based on a mixed Bayesian-multiplicative estimation. We use the Dirichlet probability distribution as a prior and we estimate the posterior probabilities. Then we apply a multiplicative modi¯cation for the non-zero values. We present a case study where this new methodology is applied. Key words: count data, multiplicative replacement, composition, log-ratio analysis

Composición factorial de la versión española de la Spence Children Anxiety Scale (SCAS).

Resumen tomado de la publicación