Corporate Social Responsibility and Shipping Views of Baltic Sea Shipping Companies on the Benefits of Responsibility

The safety of shipping operations in the Baltic Sea is an extensively studied issue due to the density of traffic and the ecological sensitivity of the area. The focus has, however, mainly been on ship technology or on traffic control measures and the operative safety aspect of shipping is in a minor position in maritime safety studies and is lacking in terms of solutions. Self-regulatory and voluntary measures could be effective ways to improve the operational safety of shipping. Corporate social responsibility, or CSR, is one example of a voluntary measure that the shipping companies can take. CSR can enhance maritime safety and improve the shipping companies’ competitiveness. The aim of this study is to increase the knowledge of CSR in the maritime sector and study its applicability and benefits to the shipping companies. The research comprises of a theory part and a questionnaire study, which examine the significance of corporate social responsibility in shipping companies’ maritime safety and competitiveness. The aim of the questionnaire study is to find out how corporate social responsibility is implemented in the shipping companies. According to the literature review, responsible actions can produce financial and time costs, but due to these actions cost savings in the form of learning and increased efficiency can be achieved. Responsible actions can also produce concrete improvements and a reputation of responsibility that can lead to both cost savings and increase in the company’s income. CSR is recognised as having real business benefits in terms of attracting customers and high-quality employees. In shipping, CSR usually focuses on environmental issues. Environmental social responsibility in shipping is mainly motivated by the need to comply with existing and forthcoming regulation. Shipping companies engage in CSR to gain competitive advantage and to increase maritime safety. The social aspects of CSR take into account the well-being and skills of the employees, corporation and other stakeholders of the company. The questionnaire study revealed that the most common CSR measures in shipping companies are environmental measures, and that environmental concerns are considered to be the most important reason to engage in CSR. From the preliminary question about the concept of CSR it can also be seen that safety issues are commonly considered to be a part of CSR and safety gains are the second most important reason to engage in CSR. From the questionnaire, it can also be extrapolated that gaining a better reputation is one of the most important reasons to engage in CSR in the first place. For example, the main economic benefit was seen to be the increase of customer numbers as a result of a better reputation. Based on the study, it would seem that companies are starting to realise that they might gain competitive advantage and be favoured as shippers if they engage in sustainable, responsible operations and present themselves as “green”.

Improving the competitiveness of electrolytic Zinc process by chemical reaction engineering approach

This doctoral thesis describes the development work performed on the leachand purification sections in the electrolytic zinc plant in Kokkola to increase the efficiency in these two stages, and thus the competitiveness of the plant. Since metallic zinc is a typical bulk product, the improvement of the competitiveness of a plant was mostly an issue of decreasing unit costs. The problems in the leaching were low recovery of valuable metals from raw materials, and that the available technology offered complicated and expensive processes to overcome this problem. In the purification, the main problem was consumption of zinc powder - up to four to six times the stoichiometric demand. This reduced the capacity of the plant as this zinc is re-circulated through the electrolysis, which is the absolute bottleneck in a zinc plant. Low selectivity gave low-grade and low-value precipitates for further processing to metallic copper, cadmium, cobalt and nickel. Knowledge of the underlying chemistry was poor and process interruptions causing losses of zinc production were frequent. Studies on leaching comprised the kinetics of ferrite leaching and jarosite precipitation, as well as the stability of jarosite in acidic plant solutions. A breakthrough came with the finding that jarosite could precipitate under conditions where ferrite would leach satisfactorily. Based on this discovery, a one-step process for the treatment of ferrite was developed. In the plant, the new process almost doubled the recovery of zinc from ferrite in the same equipment as the two-step jarosite process was operated in at that time. In a later expansion of the plant, investment savings were substantial compared to other technologies available. In the solution purification, the key finding was that Co, Ni, and Cu formed specific arsenides in the “hot arsenic zinc dust” step. This was utilized for the development of a three-step purification stage based on fluidized bed technology in all three steps, i.e. removal of Cu, Co and Cd. Both precipitation rates and selectivity increased, which strongly decreased the zinc powder consumption through a substantially suppressed hydrogen gas evolution. Better selectivity improved the value of the precipitates: cadmium, which caused environmental problems in the copper smelter, was reduced from 1-3% reported normally down to 0.05 %, and a cobalt cake with 15 % Co was easily produced in laboratory experiments in the cobalt removal. The zinc powder consumption in the plant for a solution containing Cu, Co, Ni and Cd (1000, 25, 30 and 350 mg/l, respectively), was around 1.8 g/l; i.e. only 1.4 times the stoichiometric demand – or, about 60% saving in powder consumption. Two processes for direct leaching of the concentrate under atmospheric conditions were developed, one of which was implemented in the Kokkola zinc plant. Compared to the existing pressure leach technology, savings were obtained mostly in investment. The scientific basis for the most important processes and process improvements is given in the doctoral thesis. This includes mathematical modeling and thermodynamic evaluation of experimental results and hypotheses developed. Five of the processes developed in this research and development program were implemented in the plant and are still operated. Even though these processes were developed with the focus on the plant in Kokkola, they can also be implemented at low cost in most of the zinc plants globally, and have thus a great significance in the development of the electrolytic zinc process in general.

Behavior of RR soybeans subjected to different formulations and rates of glyphosate in the reproductive period

Recent studies indicate that glyphosate applied in post-emergence in RR soybean can eventually cause phytotoxic effects. However, there are many questions that need to be clarified in the scientific and technical contexts, involving the issue of RR soybeans regarding the use of glyphosate. This study has assessed the impact of the application of different doses and formulations of glyphosate in the reproductive period of RR soybean (R1 stage). For that purpose, an experiment in the field was conducted in two harvests (2011/12 and 2012/13), in which a 2 x 5 factorial design was used (formulations versus doses) totaling 10 treatments. In these two experiments the variables related to agronomic performance were: phytotoxicity (7, 14, 21 and 28 days after application), plant height, number of pods per plant, yield and weight of 100 grains (end of soy cycle). The results obtained allowed characterizing phytotoxicity and damages to the height and yield in RR soybean, with increasing rates of glyphosate applied in the reproductive period.

Becoming Locals in a Borderland of Exiles. Sense of Place in the Stories of Lithuania Minor Dwellers

This thesis deals with sense of place, the relation that we construct with our dwelling and the surrounding environment. The topic belongs to the field of human geography. Sense of place is deeply intertwined with the ideas of feeling at home and having a place where to return. I argue that narratives of life experience help us relate to the places we inhabit, go through, leave. My analysis concerns Lithuania Minor, the Lithuanian region lying by the border with Kaliningrad, and focuses in particular on Vilkyškiai, a village in the municipality of Pagėgiai. Most of the area’s original population disappeared in the war. After 1945, people from all over the country and the USSR settled here. This raised the prickly question of who belongs to the borderland. Refugees, migrants and settlers allow us to observe closely the development of sense of place and its main constituents. Through this analysis, I challenge the idea of people’s natural rights to places and shows how time, engagement in local-based cultural activities and recollection help foreigners become locals. To grasp the locals’ sense of place, I collected open, light-structured interviews and applied some elements of semantic analysis to interpret the materials. From my research, it emerges that the cultivation of the region’s cultural heritage and the practice of storytelling were crucial in making the respondents feel at home. Leaving aside all legalistic claims concerning the issue, I suggest that people belong to the land they dwell. I believe that their sense of place deserves consideration from the State and the other actors seeing them as migrants.

The yellow fever 17D vaccine virus: molecular basis of viral attenuation and its use as an expression vector

The yellow fever (YF) virus is the prototype flavivirus. The use of molecular techniques has unraveled the basic mechanisms of viral genome structure and expression. Recent trends in flavivirus research include the use of infectious clone technology with which it is possible to recover virus from cloned cDNA. Using this technique, mutations can be introduced at any point of the viral genome and their resulting effect on virus phenotype can be assessed. This approach has opened new possibilities to study several biological viral features with special emphasis on the issue of virulence/attenuation of the YF virus. The feasibility of using YF virus 17D vaccine strain, for which infectious cDNA is available, as a vector for the expression of heterologous antigens is reviewed

Strain-dependent effects of diazepam and the 5-HT2B/2C receptor antagonist SB 206553 in spontaneously hypertensive and Lewis rats tested in the elevated plus-maze

The 5-HT2B/2C receptor antagonist SB 206553 exerts anxiolytic effects in rat models of anxiety. However, these effects have been reported for standard rat strains, thus raising the issue of SB 206553 effects in rat strains displaying different levels of anxiety. Herein, the effects of SB 206553 in a 5-min elevated plus-maze test of anxiety were compared to those of the reference anxiolytic, diazepam, in two rat strains respectively displaying high (Lewis rats) and low (spontaneously hypertensive rats, SHR) anxiety. Diazepam (0.37, 0.75, or 1.5 mg/kg; 30 min before testing) increased in a dose-dependent manner the behavioral measures in SHR, but not in Lewis rats. On the other hand, SB 206553 (1.25, 2.5, or 5 mg/kg; 30 min before testing) failed to alter the anxiety parameters in both strains, whereas it increased closed arm entries in Lewis rats, suggesting that it elicited hyperactivity in the latter strain. Accordingly, the hypolocomotor effect of the nonselective 5-HT2B/2C receptor agonist m-chlorophenylpiperazine (1.5 mg/kg ip 20 min before a 15-min exposure to an activity cage) was prevented by the 1.25 and 2.5 mg/kg doses of SB 206553 in Lewis rats and SHR, respectively. Compared with SHR, Lewis rats may display a lower response to benzodiazepine-mediated effects and a more efficient control of locomotor activity by 5-HT2B/2C receptors.

The collective dimension of freedom of religion or belief in international law : the application of findings to the case of Turkey

Pertinent domestic and international developments involving issues related to tensions affecting religious or belief communities have been increasingly occupying the international law agenda. Those who generate and, thus, shape international law jurisprudence are in the process of seeking some of the answers to these questions. Thus the need for reconceptualization of the right to freedom of religion or belief continues as demands to the right to freedom of religion or belief challenge the boundaries of religious freedom in national and international law. This thesis aims to contribute to the process of “re-conceptualization” by exploring the notion of the collective dimension of freedom of religion or belief with a view to advance the protection of the right to freedom of religion or belief. The case of Turkey provides a useful test case where both the domestic legislation can be assessed against international standards, while at the same time lessons can be drawn for the improvement of the standard of international review of the protection of the collective dimension of freedom of religion or belief. The right to freedom of religion or belief, as enshrined in international human rights documents, is unique in its formulation in that it provides protection for the enjoyment of the rights “in community with others”.1 It cannot be realized in isolation; it crosses categories of human rights with aspects that are individual, aspects that can be effectively realized only in an organized community of individuals and aspects that belong to the field of economic, social and cultural rights such as those related to religious or moral education. This study centers on two primary questions; first, what is the scope and nature of protection afforded to the collective dimension of freedom of religion or belief in international law, and, secondly, how does the protection of the collective dimension of freedom of religion or belief in Turkey compare and contrast to international standards? Section I explores and examines the notion of the collective dimension of freedom of religion or belief, and the scope of its protection in international law with particular reference to the right to acquire legal personality and autonomy religious/belief communities. In Section II, the case study on Turkey constitutes the applied part of the thesis; here, the protection of the collective dimension is assessed with a view to evaluate the compliance of Turkish legislation and practice with international norms as well as seeking to identify how the standard of international review of the collective dimension of freedom of religion or belief can be improved.

Toward including the effect of manufacturing processes in the pre-estimated losses of the switched reluctance motor

The estimation of losses plays a key role in the process of building any electrical machine. How to estimate those losses while designing any machine; by obtaining the characteristic of the electrical steel from the catalogue and calculate the losses. However, this way is inaccurate since the electrical steel performs several manufacturing processes during the process of building any machine, which affects directly the magnetic property of the electrical steel and accordingly the characteristic of the electrical steel will be affected. That means the B–H curve of the steel that was obtained from the catalogue will be changed. Moreover, during loading and rotating the machine, some important changes occur to the B–H characteristic of the electrical steel such as the stress on the laminated iron. Accordingly, the pre-estimated losses are completely far from the actual losses because they were estimated based on the data of the electrical steel obtained from the catalogue. So in order to estimate the losses precisely significant factors of the manufacturing processes must be included. The paper introduces the systematic estimation of the losses including the effect of one of the manufacturing factors. Similarly, any other manufacturing factor can be included in the pre-designed losses estimations.

Explaining the Shifts of International Trade in Pulp and Paper Industry

The pulp and paper industry is currently facing broad structural changes due to global shifts in demand and supply. These changes have significant impacts on national economies worldwide. In this paper, we describe the recent trends in the pulp and recovered paper (RP) production, and estimate augmented gravity models of bilateral trade for chemical pulp and RP exports with panel data. According to our results, there is some variation in the effects of the traditional gravity-model variables between pulp grades and RP. The results imply also that, in comparison to export supply, import demand plays a larger role in determining the volume of exports. Finally, it is evident that Asia, particularly China, is the most important driver of chemical pulp and RP trade: China is hungry for fiber, and must import to satisfy its growing needs. Moreover, the speed of China’s growth in chemical pulp and RP imports has been driving the increased significance of planted forests in the exports of hardwood pulp (BHKP) as well.

Sleep habits and complaints of adults in the city of São Paulo, Brazil, in 1987 and 1995

This study compares the prevalence of complaints of insomnia, excessive diurnal sleepiness, parasomnias, and sleep habits of the adult population in the city of São Paulo, Brazil, estimated in surveys carried out in 1987 and 1995. Representative samples of 1000 adult residents per survey were interviewed using a validated structured sleep questionnaire, the "UNIFESP Sleep Questionnaire". Difficulty maintaining sleep, difficulty initiating sleep and early morning awakening, occurring at least three times a week, were reported in 1987 and 1995, by 15.8/27.6, 13.9/19.1, and 10.6/14.2% of the interviewees, respectively, significantly increasing throughout time. These sleep problems were more often found among women. Frequencies of excessive diurnal sleepiness and sleep attacks were unchanged comparing 1987 with 1995 (4.5 vs 3.8 and 3.1 vs 3.0%, respectively). Parasomnia complaints remained unchanged, with the exception of leg cramps, which doubled in prevalence from 1987 to 1995 (2.6 to 5.8%). Snoring was the most common parasomnia (21.5% in 1995), reported more often by men than by women, and somnambulism was the least common (approximately 1%). Besides sleeping slightly less, interviewees went to bed and woke up later in 1995. Approximately 12% of the subjects in both surveys had consulted a physician due to sleep problems and 3.0% reported habitual use of sleep-promoting substances in 1995. Overall, there was a significant increase in insomnia complaints from 1987 to 1995 in the general population of the city of São Paulo. This major change over a little under a decade should be considered as an important public health issue.

Ghrelin attenuates the growth of HO-8910 ovarian cancer cells through the ERK pathway

Ovarian cancer is one of the most common causes of death from gynecologic tumors and is an important public health issue. Ghrelin is a recently discovered bioactive peptide that acts as a natural endogenous ligand of the growth hormone secretagogue receptor (GHSR). Several studies have identified the protective effects of ghrelin on the mammalian reproductive system. However, little research has been done on the effects of ghrelin on ovarian cancer cells, and the underlying mechanisms of these effects. We sought to understand the potential involvement of mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) in ghrelin-mediated inhibition of growth of the ovarian line HO-8910. We applied different concentrations of ghrelin and an inhibitor of the ghrelin receptor (D-Lys3-GHRP-6) to HO-8910 cells and observed the growth rate of cells and changes in phosphorylation of the MAPKs ERK1/2, JNK and p38. We discovered that ghrelin-induced apoptosis of HO-8910 cells was though phosphorylated ERK1/2, and that this phosphorylation (as well as p90rsk phosphorylation) was mediated by the GHSR. The ERK1/2 pathway is known to play an essential part in the ghrelin-mediated apoptosis of HO-8910 cells. Hence, our study suggests that ghrelin inhibits the growth of HO-8910 cells primarily through the GHSR/ERK pathway.

The Impact of Foreign Direct Investment Inflows on the Economic Growth of Bangladesh. The Roles of Infrastructural Facilities

Foreign direct investment (FDI) inflow has been a key concern for Bangladesh to obtain additional support for the economic development. The Government of Bangladesh continuously competing with other South Asian countries and putting more effort to increase the number of FDI inflows in the country. From the country’s perspective, the constant increasing rate of economic growth shows a positive outcome of FDI inflow. However, the country still not performing up to the mark to pull enough FDI inflows to its potential. Thus, this study discusses about the major determinants and factors affecting FDI inflows in Bangladesh. Among those determinants and factors, infrastructural facility is considered as the most important to affect FDI inflows. FDI inflow is fundamentally depending upon infrastructural facilities to achieve its desire success. Foreign investors take this issue very seriously because based on this they can measure their ease of doing business in the host country. Despite of providing a large market size, due to having weak and lack of infrastructural facilities, Bangladesh is facing trouble in drawing attention of the foreign investors. In order to make the infrastructural facilities happen, it is highly required to organize each of the systems under of it. The body of this study discussed about the weak infrastructures in Bangladesh such as transport and communication, power and energy, education system, and governance services. Improvement in one of these systems cannot provide valuable positive changes on FDI inflows. It requires improvement in all the weak systems to grasp multinational companies and attract foreign investors. On the basis of this research problem, research questions are established. Both qualitative and quantitative methods are used to answer the research questions. Furthermore, several theories have been applied to justify possible scenarios from the research problem. In addition, the history in between Bangladesh, trade liberalization, and FDI inflows is presented briefly.

Between Dugin’s Eurasianism and Mahan’s Sea Power Concept: Russia’s Geopolitical Discourse within Foucault’s ‘Discursive Tree’ before and After the Incorporation of the Crimea

The fall of 2013 could be characterized as a crossroad in the geopolitics of Eastern Europe, namely Ukraine. Two rivalry geopolitical projects have been developing throughout the post-Cold War years, and it seems that they reached a collision point in Ukraine; a country whose authorities have been for long switching sides between the European Union and the Russian Federation in their foreign policy commitments. The refusal/postponing to sign the Association Agreement with Brussels, an expected event by a large category of the Ukrainian society, by Yanukovich’s government led to the outset of the latter; and brought a pro-Western, anti-Russian government in Kyiv. It seems that Ukraine, after those events, has embarked definitively on the path of integration into the West (European Union and possibly NATO). The Russian Federation, who has been throughout Putin’s years engaged into the re-integration of post-Soviet space, reacted to these developments in an assertive manner by violating borders, agreements and the territorial integrity of Ukraine. Thus, the incorporation of the Crimea into the Russian Federation is the first in its kind in the post-Soviet space, despite the existence of various other conflicts that broke out in the region after the Soviet Union broke up. I will investigate in this thesis the nature of what will be labelled, in this work, the Crimean issue. I argue that the incorporation of the Crimean peninsula into the Russian Federation marks a new era in Russian geopolitical thinking that shapes, to a far extent, Russian foreign policy. Discourse analysis will be the methodological basis for this study, with a special focus on Michel Foucault’s Archaeology of Knowledge. The innovation that this research brings is the fact that it discusses Russian geopolitical discourse within the scope of Foucault’s ‘discursive tree’, with a reference to the Crimean issue. A wide range of primary sources will be consulted in this study such as presidential addresses to the Federal Assembly (2000-2014), Foreign Policy Concepts of the Russian Federation (2000, 2008), Russian maritime doctrines, as wells as Dugin’s Osnovy Geopolitiki (Foundations of Geopolitics), Mahan’s (The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660–1783) and other Eurasianism related literature.

Datenherrschaft – an Ethically Justified Solution to the Problem of Ownership of Patient Information

Patient information systems are crucial components for the modern healthcare and medicine. It is obvious that without them the healthcare cannot function properly – one can try to imagine how brain surgery could be done without using information systems to gather and show information needed for an operation. Thus, it can be stated that digital information is irremovable part of modern healthcare. However, the legal ownership of patient information lacks a coherent and justified basis. The whole issue itself is actually bypassed by controlling pa- tient information with different laws and regulations how patient information can be used and by whom. Nonetheless, the issue itself – who owns the patient in- formation – is commonly missed or bypassed. This dissertation show the problems if the legislation of patient information ownership is not clear. Without clear legislation, the outcome can be unexpected like it seems to be in Finland, Sweden and United Kingdom: the lack of clear regulation has come up with unwanted consequences because of problematic Eu- ropean Union database directive implementation in those countries. The legal ownership is actually granted to the creators of databases which contains the pa- tient information, and this is not a desirable situation. In healthcare and medicine, we are dealing with issues such as life, health and information which are very sensitive and in many cases very personal. Thus, this dissertation leans on four philosophical theories form Locke, Kant, Heidegger and Rawls to have an ethically justified basis for regulating the patient infor- mation in a proper way. Because of the problems of property and ownership in the context of information, a new concept is needed and presented to replace the concept of owning, that concept being Datenherrschaft (eng. mastery over in- formation). Datenherrschaft seems to be suitable for regulating patient infor- mation because its core is the protection of one’s right over information and this aligns with the work of the philosophers whose theories are used in the work. The philosophical argumentation of this study shows that Datenherrschaft granted to the patients is ethically acceptable. It supports the view that patient should be controlling the patient information about themselves unless there are such specific circumstance that justifies the authorities to use patient information to protect other people’s basic rights. Thus, if the patients would be legally grant- ed Datenherrschaft over patient information we would endorse patients as indi- viduals who have their own and personal experience of their own life and have a strong stance against any unjustified paternalism in healthcare. Keywords: patient information, ownership, Datenherrschaft, ethics, Locke, Kant, Heidegger, Rawls

Political Legitimacy and Ethnocultural Justice. Essays on Public Reason, Democratic Citizenship, and the Rights of Cultural Minorities

In this thesis, I argue that there are public cultural reasons that can underpin public justifications of minority rights of indigenous and national minorities in a constitutionaldemocracy. I do so by tackling diverse issues facing a liberal theory of multiculturalism. In the first essay, I criticize Will Kymlicka’s comprehensive liberal theory of minority rights and propose a political liberal alternative. The main problem of Will Kymlicka’s theory is that it builds on the contestable liberal value of individual autonomy and thus fails to take diversity seriously. In the second essay, I elaborate on the Rawlsian political liberalism assumed here by criticizing Chandran Kukathas’s version of political liberalism as overly accommodating to diversity. In the third essay, I discuss questions of method that arise for a political liberal approach to the moral-political foundations of multiculturalism, and propose a certain understanding of the political liberal enterprise and its crucial standard of reasonableness. In the fourth essay, I dwell on the political liberal ethic of citizenship and propose a strongly inclusionist interpretation of the duty of civility. In the fifth and last essay, I introduce a certain understanding of ethnocultural justice and propose a view on certain cultural reasons as public cultural reasons. Cultural reasons are public when they are based on necessarily established cultural marks of a democratic polity, as specified by the cultural establishment view; and when they are crucial for the societal cultural bases of self-respect of citizens. The arguments in this thesis support, and help to spell out, moral-political rights of indigenous and national minorities as formulated in international legal documents, such as the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (United Nations 2007) or the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (United Nations 1966).