Development strategies for the information and communications technology sector in the Caribbean: A global perspective

This occasional paper examines the experiences of three leading global centres of the ICT industry – India, Silicon Valley, and Estonia – to reflect on how the lessons of these models can be applied to the context of countries in the Caribbean region.Several sectors of the technology industry are considered in relation to the suitability for their establishment in the Caribbean. Animation is an area that is showing encouraging signs of development in several countries, and which offers some promise to provide a significant source of employment in the region. However, the global market for animation production is likely to become increasingly competitive, as improved technology has reduced barriers to entry into the industry not only in the Caribbean, but around the world. The region’s animation industry will need to move swiftly up the value chain if it is to avoid the downsides of being caught in an increasingly commoditized market. Mobile applications development has also been widely a heralded industry for the Caribbean. However, the market for consumer-oriented smartphone applications has matured very quickly, and is now a very difficult sector in which to compete. Caribbean mobile developers would be better served to focus on creating applications to suit the needs of regional industries and governments, rather than attempting to gain notice in over-saturated consumer marketplaces such as the iTunes App Store and Google Play. Another sector considered for the Caribbean is “big data” analysis. This area holds significant potential for growth in coming years, but the Caribbean, which is generally considered to be a datapoor region, currently lacks a sufficient base of local customers to form a competitive foundation for such an industry. While a Caribbean big data industry could plausibly be oriented toward outsourcing, that orientation would limit positive externalities from the sector, and benefits from its establishment would largely accrue only to a relatively small number of direct participants in the industry. Instead, development in the big data sector should be twinned with the development of products to build a regional customer base for the industry. The region has pressing needs in areas such as disaster risk reduction, water resource management, and support for agricultural production. Development of big data solutions – and other technology products – to address areas such as these could help to establish niche industries that both support the needs of local populations, and provide viable opportunities for the export of higher-value products and services to regions of the world with similar needs.

An assessment of the economic impact of climate change on the Agriculture, Health and Tourism sectors in Saint Lucia

This report analyses the agriculture, health and tourism sectors in Saint Lucia to assess the potential economic impacts of climate change on the sectors. The fundamental aim of this report is to assist with the development of strategies to deal with the potential impact of climate change in Saint Lucia. It also has the potential to provide essential input for identifying and preparing policies and strategies to help advance the Caribbean subregion closer to solving problems associated with climate change and attaining individual and regional sustainable development goals. Some of the key anticipated impacts of climate change for the Caribbean include elevated air and sea-surface temperatures, sea-level rise, possible changes in extreme events and a reduction in freshwater resources. The economic impact of climate change on the three sectors was estimated for the A2 and B2 IPCC scenarios until 2050. An evaluation of various adaptation strategies for each sector was also undertaken using standard evaluation techniques. The key subsectors in agriculture are expected to have mixed impacts under the A2 and B2 scenarios. Banana, fisheries and root crop outputs are expected to fall with climate change, but tree crop and vegetable production are expected to rise. In aggregate, in every decade up to 2050, these sub-sectors combined are expected to experience a gain under climate change with the highest gains under A2. By 2050, the cumulative gain under A2 is calculated as approximately US$389.35 million and approximately US$310.58 million under B2, which represents 17.93% and 14.30% of the 2008 GDP respectively. This result was unexpected and may well be attributed to the unavailability of annual data that would have informed a more robust assessment. Additionally, costs to the agriculture sector due to tropical cyclones were estimated to be $6.9 million and $6.2 million under the A2 and B2 scenarios, respectively. There are a number of possible adaptation strategies that can be employed by the agriculture sector. The most attractive adaptation options, based on the benefit-cost ratio are: (1) Designing and implementation of holistic water management plans (2) Establishment of systems of food storage and (3) Establishment of early warning systems. Government policy should focus on the development of these adaption options where they are not currently being pursued and strengthen those that have already been initiated, such as the mainstreaming of climate change issues in agricultural policy. The analysis of the health sector placed focus on gastroenteritis, schistosomiasis, ciguatera poisoning, meningococal meningitis, cardiovascular diseases, respiratory diseases and malnutrition. The results obtained for the A2 and B2 scenarios demonstrate the potential for climate change to add a substantial burden to the health system in the future, a factor that will further compound the country’s vulnerability to other anticipated impacts of climate change. Specifically, it was determined that the overall Value of Statistical Lives impacts were higher under the A2 scenario than the B2 scenario. A number of adaptation cost assumptions were employed to determine the damage cost estimates using benefit-cost analysis. The benefit-cost analysis suggests that expenditure on monitoring and information provision would be a highly efficient step in managing climate change and subsequent increases in disease incidence. Various locations in the world have developed forecasting systems for dengue fever and other vector-borne diseases that could be mirrored and implemented. Combining such macro-level policies with inexpensive micro-level behavioural changes may have the potential for pre-empting the re-establishment of dengue fever and other vector-borne epidemic cycles in Saint Lucia. Although temperature has the probability of generating significant excess mortality for cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, the power of temperature to increase mortality largely depends on the education of the population about the harmful effects of increasing temperatures and on the existing incidence of these two diseases. For these diseases it is also suggested that a mix of macro-level efforts and micro-level behavioural changes can be employed to relieve at least part of the threat that climate change poses to human health. The same principle applies for water and food-borne diseases, with the improvement of sanitation infrastructure complementing the strengthening of individual hygiene habits. The results regarding the tourism sector imply that the tourism climatic index was likely to experience a significant downward shift in Saint Lucia under the A2 as well as the B2 scenario, indicative of deterioration in the suitability of the island for tourism. It is estimated that this shift in tourism features could cost Saint Lucia about 5 times the 2009 GDP over a 40-year horizon. In addition to changes in climatic suitability for tourism, climate change is also likely to have important supply-side effects on species, ecosystems and landscapes. Two broad areas are: (1) coral reefs, due to their intimate link to tourism, and, (2) land loss, as most hotels tend to lie along the coastline. The damage related to coral reefs was estimated at US$3.4 billion (3.6 times GDP in 2009) under the A2 scenario and US$1.7 billion (1.6 times GDP in 2009) under the B2 scenario. The damage due to land loss arising from sea level rise was estimated at US$3.5 billion (3.7 times GDP) under the A2 scenario and US$3.2 billion (3.4 times GDP) under the B2 scenario. Given the potential for significant damage to the industry a large number of potential adaptation measures were considered. Out of these a short-list of 9 potential options were selected by applying 10 evaluation criteria. Using benefit-cost analyses 3 options with positive ratios were put forward: (1) increased recommended design speeds for new tourism-related structures; (2) enhanced reef monitoring systems to provide early warning alerts of bleaching events, and, (3) deployment of artificial reefs or other fish-aggregating devices. While these options had positive benefit-cost ratios, other options were also recommended based on their non-tangible benefits. These include the employment of an irrigation network that allows for the recycling of waste water, development of national evacuation and rescue plans, providing retraining for displaced tourism workers and the revision of policies related to financing national tourism offices to accommodate the new climate realities.

The new digital revolution: From the consumer Internet to the industrial Internet

The new digital technologies have led to widespread use of cloud computing, recognition of the potential of big data analytics, and significant progress in aspects of the Internet of Things, such as home automation, smart cities and grids and digital manufacturing. In addition to closing gaps in respect of the basic necessities of access and usage, now the conditions must be established for using the new platforms and finding ways to participate actively in the creation of content and even new applications and platforms. This message runs through the three chapters of this book. Chapter I presents the main features of the digital revolution, emphasizing that today’s world economy is a digital economy. Chapter II examines the region’s strengths and weaknesses with respect to digital access and consumption. Chapter III reviews the main policy debates and urges countries to take a more proactive approach towards, for example, regulation, network neutrality and combating cybercrime. The conclusion highlights two crucial elements: first, the need to take steps towards a single regional digital market that can compete in a world of global platforms by tapping the benefits of economies of scale and developing network economies; and second, the significance of the next stage of the digital agenda for Latin America and the Caribbean (eLAC2018), which will embody the latest updates to a cooperation strategy that has been in place for over a decade.

Investigação e implementação de ferramentas computacionais para otimização de websites com ênfase na descrição de conteúdo

Pós-graduação em Ciência da Computação - IBILCE

O estabelecimento virtual na sociedade técnica: a necessária busca de segurança jurídica nas transações comerciais

Pós-graduação em Direito - FCHS

Tecnologias aplicadas ao uso e desenvolvimento do jogo de xadrez

Pós-graduação em Desenvolvimento Humano e Tecnologias - IBRC

O ensino da capoeira na educação física escolar: blog como apoio pedagógico

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Seleção de fornecedores e gestão logística nas importações da China: uma abordagem de processos e custos para pequenas e médias empresas

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Google e infoespoliação: internet, informação e acumulação de capital

Pós-graduação em Ciências Sociais - FFC

Metodologia para inovação tecnológica através de sistema colaborativo de inclusão digital e certificação na agricultura familiar

Pós-graduação em Agronomia (Energia na Agricultura) - FCA

Comunidades mediadas pela internet: fatores de sucesso e modelo de ciclo de vida

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Uso do Google mapas como recurso didático para mapeamento do espaço local por crianças do ensino fundamental I da cidade de Ouro Fino/MG

Pós-graduação em Geografia - IGCE

Relacionamentos humanos mediados pelo computador: as experiências de intermautas cadastros no site de comunidades UOL K

Os sites de comunidades têm atraído grande número de pessoas. Elas passam a se relacionar à distância, utilizando para isso recursos como envio de recados e mensagens e trocam informações sobre si através da auto-descrição (perfil) e do uso de imagens, ambos abertos ao público. A experiência de possuir uma página pessoal neste tipo de ambiente e se relacionar com pessoas através dela se constitui o objeto desta pesquisa a qual foi realizada com base na metodologia qualitativa. Foram entrevistados 16 usuários da rede de relacionamentos UOL K, pertencente ao UOL (Universo OnLine), considerado o principal portal de conteúdo e provedor pago de acesso à Internet do Brasil. A análise dos resultados destacou os seguintes aspectos: o site possibilita tanto fazer novos contatos quanto manter contatos feitos anteriormente, há uma tendência a fazer novos contatos, a língua escrita é utilizada tanto para se comunicar como para refletir acerca de si mesmo, o anonimato é favorecido pela comunicação à distância e causa receio de se decepcionar com o outro, as experiências são vistas como reais mesmo ocorrendo num ambiente virtual, “estar online” pode ser prazeroso e não significa desprender-se do mundo offline, a afiliação às comunidades é freqüente e tem como base objetivos comuns, o uso da foto é, graças aos recursos do site, um elo entre a comunicação sincrônica (bate-papo) e a comunicação assincrônica (UOL K), há uma ênfase na sexualidade e, por fim, os usuários se vêem na necessidade constante de rever e relativizar conceitos como próximo e distante, público e privado, estar ou não online. Conclui-se que, mesmo não tendo o hábito de marcar encontros face a face, os usuários são capazes de se relacionar virtualmente de forma genuína, trocar afetos, formar vínculos e manter uma vida online na qual o comunicar-se encontra seu sentido em si mesmo, podendo não haver outro objetivo a não ser o de estar em contato.

The genetics of New World monkey visual pigments

To have color vision, having at least two cone photopigment types with different spectral sensitivities present in distinct photoreceptors is necessary together with the neural circuitry necessary to extract color information. Visual pigments are highly conserved molecules, but differences can be found among vertebrate groups. Primates have a variety of cone photopigments (i.e., opsins) that are expressed by polymorphic genes. This article examines the diversity of cone photopigments in New World monkeys and their behavioral relevance.