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This study aimed to determine the factors influencing the use of spacing contraceptive methods in India, particularly from men's perspective. Data were obtained through a semi-structured interview schedule from 2687 married men aged between 18 and 40 years from central Mumbai City, India, during 1999. Chi-squared tests and binary logistic regression analysis was carried out to determine the relationship between various variables and the likelihood of a couple using spacing contraceptive methods. Of the 2687 couples, 1395 (51·9%) were using one or other method of spacing contraceptives and 1292 (48·1%) were not using any method at the time of survey. Male participation in contraceptive use was 23% (condom and withdrawal). The results indicate that the use of spacing contraceptive methods was significantly higher among those couples where the men desired one or two children (OR=4·3), had knowledge of five or more contraceptive methods (OR=1·9) and discussed with their wives obtaining family planning information (OR=3·2), spacing (OR=2·7) and permanent (OR=2) contraceptive methods. Age, income, desired number of children, knowledge of a greater number of contraceptive methods, inter-spouse communication regarding obtaining family planning information, spacing and permanent methods were found to be strong predictors of the use of spacing contraceptive methods. The study underlines the importance of intervention programmes aimed at promoting a small family norm, increasing the number of contraceptive choices available and encouraging inter-spouse communication. Hence, policymakers and programme managers should encourage interventions in this direction, targeting couples to enhance the use of spacing contraceptive methods.

The design of machining fixtures for aeronautical parts is strongly based in the knowledge of the fixture designer, and it comprises certain repetitive tasks. An analysis of the design process allows us to state its suitability for developing Knowledge Based Engineering (KBE) applications in order to capture the knowledge, and to systematize and automate the designs.This work justifies the importance of fixtures for High Speed Milling (HSM), and explains the development of a KBE application to automate the design and manufacturing of such elements. The application is the outcome of a project carried out in collaboration with the company EADS.In the development process, a specific methodology was used in order to represent the knowledge in a semi-structured way and to document the information needed to define the system. The developed KBE application is independent of the parts design system. This makes it necessary to use an interface to input the part geometry into the KBE application, where it is analyzed in order to extract the relevant information for the fixture design process. The results obtained from the application come in three different ways: raw material drawings, fixture 3D solid models, and text files (Bill Of Materials – BOM, and Numerical Control – NC programs). All the results are exported to other applications for use in other tasks. The designer interacts with the application through an ad hoc interface, where he is asked to select or input some data and where the results are also visualized. The prototype KBE application has been carried out in the ICAD development environment and the main interface is with the CAD/CAM system CATIA V4.

The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT) and Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks (MFWP) have completed the Flathead River Subbasin Plan in cooperation with the Northwest Power Planning Council. This plan uses existing information to establish goals for protecting and restoring fish and wildlife populations and their habitats in the Flathead River Basin. The Northwest Power Planning Council was created in 1980 by Congress to give the states of Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington a voice in how the region plans for its energy needs, while at the same time mitigating the effects of the hydropower system on fish and wildlife in the Columbia River Basin. Each year the Council reviews proposals for on-the-ground projects and research to implement the program. The Council's 2000 Columbia Basin Fish and Wildlife Program outlines a new review and selection process, one that emphasizes the development of local sub-basin plans to guide project funding. Sub-basin plans are intended to be a blueprint for recovery efforts, and to guide the review, selection and funding of projects to carry out the Council's program. The Flathead River Sub-basin Plans has been developed in an open public process that includes the participation of a wide range of state, federal and tribal governments, local managers, landowners, local governments, and other stakeholders. The Flathead River Sub-basin Plan: identifies the goals for fish, wildlife and habitat; defines the objectives that measure progress toward those goals; establishes the strategies to meet those objectives; and incorporates much of the existing information related to fish and wildlife activities in a sub-basin in a single document.

This paper explores the role and impact that the federal No Child Left Behind Act has had on public education since its legalization in 2002. It begins with a history on the evolution of federal involvement in public education. Over time, mounting pressure for theUnited Statesto compete academically on an international level has created a need for all areas of education to become "accountable" for reaching high achievement standards, arriving at the overwhelming reliance on standardized tests we see in public education today. Next, this paper presents four areas of contention surrounding the debate over No Child Left Behind. The issues concern the NCLB standardized testing requirements, the disaggregating of minority students into subgroups to separately measure test scores, the debate over whether Congress is adequately funding states to implement NCLB, and finally how actors in the debate view NCLB's effect on the balance of federalism. The opinions presented in this paper are largely bipolar and dichotomous, representing politicians and policy-makers in favor of the Act, and teachers and educators against it. In addition to exploring these dichotomies in a Literature Review, I have conducted several interviews with teachers and educators fromSyracusepublic schools to expand the scope of the controversy. This new information will support my thesis statement, which argues that No Child Left Behind and its focus on how annual standardized testing is not conducive for closing the majority/minority achievement gap. It will also elucidate how teachers, our closest connection to students, feel the Act is working. This paper will provide a unique discussion of NCLB's core provisions and who supports/opposes it and contribute new information to the study of public education.

Ireland is committed to the principles of Sustainable Forest Management (SFM). Inherent to these principles is the conservation and appropriate enhancement of biological diversity in the country?s plantation forests. Identifying how this may best be achieved is currently a priority since government policy aims to increase the forested area of Ireland from 9% to 17% by the year 2030. Little information has been published on the biodiversity of conifer and broadleaved plantation forests in Ireland, and this study represents the most extensive appraisal of their ground flora communities undertaken to date. Ground flora communities (vascular plants and bryophytes) beneath tree species important to the Irish forestry industry were examined, viz. Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis), ash (Fraxinus excelsior) and larch (Larix spp.). By adopting a chronosequence approach, these forest types were surveyed at the main stand structural stages of the forest management cycle. Fifty-nine forests distributed around Ireland were selected so that a comparative study of the ground flora in contrasting geographical regions, and on a varied range of site types, would be possible. In order to account for differences in ground flora diversity and composition among study sites, a wide range of forest management, geographical and edaphic information was collected for each site. To complement the data collected in the field, a greenhouse experiment was undertaken to assess the different effects of Sitka spruce, ash and larch leaf litter on woodland specialist species. ; TARA (Trinity?s Access to Research Archive) has a robust takedown policy. Please contact us if you have any concerns: rssadmin@tcd.ie

Quantitative cross-sectional and qualitative studies were conducted from August 2004 to may 2005 based on J. Bruce analytical framework to assess the status of quality of family planning service in B/Dar special zone, Amhara Regional state. In this study, 412 female contraceptive users for exit interview and 209 female clients for observation were participated from eight family planning service delivery points. Eight service providers, one Regional maternal and child health team leader, and one Zonal department head were interviewed. Contraceptive supplies and logistics were generally inadequate. Injectable (51.7%) and oral contraceptive pills (47%) were the most frequently used. Most of the clients were not told relevant information on other contraceptive methods and were not popular. Three hundred eight (74.8%) clients received sufficient information on the method provided and 309(75%) of clients responded that contact time with providers was about the right. Among 133 clients who prefer this clinic from their closest site, 82(61.7%) were due to preference of that provider. Clients' mean waiting time was 48 SD + 51 minutes. Limitations in Supervisory system and staff training were identified as constraints to the quality of family planning service. There was significant difference in clients' satisfaction by Governmental and Non-Governmental health service delivery points, OR= 0.480, 95% CI (0.255,0.904). Several short falls were revealed by this study in quality of care in family planning service at B/Dar Special zone. Therefore quality should be considered as integral part of all family planning service delivery points in this Zone. Key words: - Quality, Family planning, satisfaction, Bahar-Dar

PurposeDespite the critical role of the industrial buying situation in shaping buyer behavior and seller response, little research has been conducted to augment extant knowledge on the subject. To fill this gap, this article focuses on influence strategies that industrial buyers exert on their suppliers in different buying situations.Design/methodology/approachThe study received information from 122 Greek producers of industrial goods through a mail survey based on a semi‐structured questionnaire. This incorporated 24 influence strategies equally divided into six groups (legalistic, coercive, reward, expert, referent, and informational), and respondents were asked to specify their degree of agreement or disagreement, whether these are used by their customers in three buying situations (straight re‐buy, modified re‐buy, and new task).FindingsThe study revealed that: industrial customers use a wide array of influence strategies, with those based on referent, expert, or legalistic sources being more widely employed; influence strategies vary in degree of application according to buying situation, and are least used by new‐task buyers; and straight re‐buyers tend to make greater use of expert, referent, and, to some extent, legalistic influence strategies, while modified re‐buyers employ more coercive and, to a lesser extent, information‐based influence strategies. Overall, influence strategies play an important role in industrial buying behavior, requiring sellers to treat customers differently in each buying situation.Originality/valueSeveral suggestions for future research are provided, such as replicating the study in different geographic contexts, monitoring changes of influence strategies as a buyer moves from one buying situation to another, and investigating the countervailing actions taken by suppliers.

Political communication is strictly distinguished from social and individual activities that are interest-laden and thus lack the autonomy to be political. The latter belongs solely to political societies that are democratic. Indeed, there must be a strict restriction of the use of political to a public domain in which every member of society participates in public debates and decisions. This participation is the continuous origination and maintenance of the political domain as a guarantee of human autonomy and equality.This equality suggests that the publicly appointed officials are bound by the democratic ethos to maintain such a public domain and thus are called on to communicate the public issues; any communication that is designed for effect, for rhetorical obfuscation, is interest-laden and hence designed to advance the motives of an individual or a group and not the concerns of the public. In various ways, such a communication, and those who in their expertise help in its design, adds to the legitimation crisis that leads finally to public cynicism.Political journalism, as part and parcel of the originating and maintaining of the political society, is designed to serve the public by providing information that is of public concern. This is not to say that gossip columns of social interest are to be excluded from mass media. Rather, the primary task is information – despite the tendency of the public officials and their experts to obfuscate and mislead. One could in fact argue that political journalism and communication is, by now, the primary instrument of continuing the origination and maintenance of political (i.e., democratic) society (Mickunas, Pilotta 1999).

Globalisation is enabled by new information and communication technologies (ICTs) that have made it easy to move vast quantities of market information and intelligence, as well as capital, around the world. Conscious of the importance of ICTs in the globalisation process, the World Trade Organization (WTO) has developed a vision for structuring the ICT sector in developing countries. However, although embedded in international efforts to address the digital divide, itself occasioned by uneven access to ICTs at a range of geographic scales, WTO strategy for configuring the ICT sectors of developing countries appears to work in the interest of multinational corporations. Furthermore, WTO policy initiatives, especially those which come under the ambit of the Agreement on Telecommunications, GATs and TRIPs, have tended to exacerbate the digital divide. The result is the resurgence of imperialism, this time represented by knowledge dependence. While locating the marginality of Africa in cyberspace within its colonial past, this paper argues that current international attempts at bridging the digital divide are part of wider efforts to not only secure the virgin markets of developing countries, but also to configure the world in the interest of the new imperial powers. Within this context, therefore, Africa faces the challenge of imperialism anew. The paper discusses the substance of this challenge, and argues that while isolationism cannot be promoted as a counter-force to globalisation, Africa must re-establish the basis of its integration into a globalising world by developing a framework that challenges the dominant assumptions of processes of globalisation promoted by the WTO.

Ähnlich wie in den anderen MOEL hatte auch in der Slowakei der Systemwechsel Anfang der 90er Jahre drastische Folgen für den Agrar- undb Ernährungssektor. Die Konsumenten reagierten auf die Abschaffung der Verbrauchersubventionen bei Milch und Milchprodukten mit deutlicher Einschränkung ihrer Nachfrage. Gleichzeitig schrumpfte die Milchproduktion seit Transformationsbeginn auf gegenwärtig etwa die Hälfte des Niveaus von 1989. Molke-reien wurden geschlossen bzw. mit stetig wachsenden Überkapazitäten betrieben. In den letzten Jahren vor dem EU-Beitritt waren die Aktivitäten in diesem Sektor in erster Linie auf die Anpassung an EU-Standards gerichtet. Mittlerweile ist die slowakische Milchverarbeitung überwiegend in ausländischer Hand. Der Pro-Kopf-Konsum von Milch und Milchprodukten hat sich auf einem sehr niedrigen, von Ernährungsexperten als gesundheitlich bedenklich beurteilten, Niveau eingependelt. Dieser Diskussionsbeitrag hat eine Zusammenschau von Informationen über den slowakischen Milchsektor zum Inhalt, die die ganze Kette von der Primärproduktion über Verarbeitung und Handel bis hin zum Verbrauch umfasst. Eingebettet sind diese Ausführungen in eine Darstellung der demographischen, wirtschaftlichen und marktpolitischen Rahmenbedingungen der Slowakei. ; Like in other CEEC, transition in the beginning of the 1990s had significant consequences for the agricultural and food sectors in Slovakia. For example, Slovakian consumers reacted to the abolition of consumer subsidies by drastically reducing their consumption of milk and milk products. Concurrently, milk production declined and now stands at fifty percent of its 1989 level. Dairies were closed down while those remaining carried on producing under constantly increasing overcapacities. In the years prior to EU accession, activities in the milk sector were primarily aimed at the adoption of EU standards. Meanwhile, the Slovakian milk processing industry is predominantly in the possession of foreign investors. Present per capita consumption of milk and milk production is still at a very low level, which nutrition experts assess as an alarming health risk. This paper contains an overview of the Slovakian dairy sector, which comprises the complete milk chain - from primary production to processing and retailing up to consumption. The description is complemented by background information on demographic, economic and political parameters in Slovakia.

This is a conference paper. ; Groundwater plays a significant role in rural water supply but its development has been made with very little information on the hydrogeological conditions and groundwater potential of various areas of the country. This has not only resulted in unsuccessful water sources but also in resources being spent on very expensive water supply technologies when cheaper and more sustainable ones are possible. This in turn has affected government's efforts to increase rural water supply coverage, which currently stands at 58 percent. In order to significantly improve water supply coverage in the country using low-cost, simple water-supply technologies, Uganda has initiated a Groundwater Mapping Programme to prepare maps representing groundwater resources in terms of their quantity and quality and summarizing this information spatially. Six different types of maps have been prepared all of which are important in guiding proper planning of groundwater development activities. Groundwater maps are guiding district political and technical officials on the most feasible water supply technology options to consider in various areas and are also providing them with indications of areas with low water supply coverage, which require more attention. The districts are now exclusively constructing shallow wells in areas where they are indicated as feasible as opposed to the past practice of construction deep boreholes everywhere. The people with the lowest water supply coverage are also using the maps to bargain for their equitable share of government resources. It is expected that with the availability of groundwater maps there will be a reduction in failure of wells and cost of water supply systems resulting in increase in water supply coverage and hence more benefit to the people.

Mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs) are infrastructure-free networks of mobile nodes that communicate with each other wirelessly. There are several routing schemes that have been proposed and several of these have been already extensively simulated or implemented as well. The primary applications of such networks have been in disaster relief operations, military use, conferencing and environment sensing. There are several ad hoc routing algorithms at present that utilize position information (usually in two dimensional terms) to make routing decisions at each node. Our goal is to utilize three-dimensional (3D) position information to provide more reliable as well as efficient routing for certain applications. We thus describe extensions to various location aware routing algorithms to work in 3D. We propose a new hierarchical, zone-based 3D routing algorithm, based on GRID by Liao, Tseng and Sheu. Our new algorithm called "Hyper-GRID" is a hybrid algorithm that uses multipath routing (alternate path caching) in 3D. We propose replacing LAR with Multipath LAR (MLAR) in GRID. We have implemented MLAR and are validating MLAR through simulation using ns-2 and studying its efficiency, scalability and other properties. We use a random waypoint mobility model and compare our MLAR approach versus LAR, AODV and AOMDV in both 2D and 3D for a range of traffic and mobility scenarios. Our simulation results demonstrate the performance benefits of MLAR over LAR and AODV in most mobility situations. AOMDV delivers more packets than MLAR consistently, but does so at the cost of more frequent flooding of control packets and thus higher bandwidth usage than MLAR.

Deregulation of electric power industry in the USA is an effort by the Federal and State governments to exercise power through the control of mission-critical infrastructure. This research asserts that information and communication technology (ICT) was necessary for this deregulatory effort, but ICT by itself is not sufficient to assure the success of deregulation. Using metaphors adopted from Kling and Scacchi's "web of computing", the paper shows how regulators attempted to change the social fabric in the electric power industry by using ICT to alter a complicated set of interdependencies and complementarities. Given the social and infrastructural nature of the research, web models are an effective mechanism to understand these complex relationships. In the paper, the basic web model is extended with architectural aspects to draw out the original connections with "urban infrastructure" and architecture. Ethnographic methods were used to gain a deep understanding of the ecology of the electric power industry. Data were collected over a nine-month period at a large utility's grid dispatch control center because these centers were the primary focal point of deregulatory efforts. Essentially, the paper is another data point indicating rational models are of little value outside tightly controlled circumstances. The paper's primary contribution, however, is intended for policy-makers changing ICT designs at an architectural level using regulatory mechanisms, and for ICT analysts who must map the resulting complex of ecological interrelationships into an integrated design. The resulting integrated ICT infrastructure is used to run the electric power infrastructure that information societies depend on in the most intimate way on a daily basis.

Crisis pregnancy is a complex challenge for individuals and societies alike. Its prevention and management need to be informed by up-to-date and locally applicable information on knowledge, attitudes and behaviours concerning sexual practices and contraception. Studies of aspects of sexual health in Ireland offer the prospect of vastly increasing our understanding of the pattern of health behaviours in the area of sexuality and their relationship to both the attitudes/beliefs and socio-demographic characteristics of individuals. Such surveys can also provide guidelines on where and how to intervene to improve sexual health outcomes. They offer a benchmark against which to gauge success and to plan for future work in the area of sexual health promotion in Ireland. A number of recent Government initiatives have highlighted the need for national data on sexual health issues. In October 2001, the Government established the Crisis Pregnancy Agency (CPA). Its primary focus is the development of a strategy to deal with crisis pregnancy, and more specifically to provide for: • a reduction in the number of crisis pregnancies by the provision of education, advice and contraceptive services • a reduction in the number of women with crisis pregnancies who opt for abortion by offering services and supports which make other options more attractive • the provision of counselling and medical services after crisis pregnancy. (Statutory Instrument No. 446, 2001) Information on contraceptive and crisis pregnancy service availability and utilisation, and on antecedents of crisis pregnancy, is needed for the optimal planning and evaluation of services. Research findings can provide evidence-based recommendations for planning and development of appropriate initiatives.

Für die Kinder- und Jugendhilfe als einem bedeutenden Segment des Bildungs-, Erziehungs- und Sozialwesens zeichnet sich spätestens seit den 1990er-Jahren eine zunehmende Relevanz von Management-, Organisations- und Personalentwicklungskonzepten ab. Allerdings sind diese Entwicklungen bislang nur selten Gegenstand von wissenschaftlich-reflektierten Beobachtungen. Es fehlen gerade auch im Rahmen der Jugendhilfeforschung als Teil einer sozialpädagogischen Forschung Erkenntnisse über die entsprechenden Veränderungen im Struktur- und Leistungsspektrum sowie bezogen auf einen Habitus professionellen Handelns. Ein Beispiel hierfür ist die Feststellung einer vermehrten Anwendung des Kennzahleninstrumentes auf einer praxeologischen und einer politischen Ebene der Jugendhilfe aufgrund einer national wie international zu konstatierenden Implementation von markt- und wettbewerbsorientierten Steuerungsmodellen sowie angesichts einer zu beobachtenden Durchdringung des sozialpädagogischen Alltagsdenkens mit ökonomischen, zumeist betriebswirtschaftlichen Kategorien. Damit ist der Ausgangspunkt für die vorliegende Forschungsarbeit zur Bedeutung und Verwendung von Kennzahlen in der Jugendhilfe benannt. Die Untersuchung fokussiert die forschungsleitende Fragestellung, welche Bedeutung das Kennzahleninstrument für die Kinder- und Jugendhilfe hat und wie es in diesem Teilsegment der Sozialen Arbeit verwendet wird. Die Formulierung einer Antwort ist mit dem Forschungsziel verbunden, Auswirkungen der Implementation von Kennzahlen � verstanden als Messziffern mit einer Informations- und Steuerungsfunktion, die quantitativ erfassbare Sachverhalte von Jugendhilfewirklichkeit komprimiert und standardisiert abbilden � bei Sozialen Diensten für junge Menschen und deren Familien zu eruieren. Damit wird ein Beitrag zu einer im Rahmen der Jugendhilfeforschung notwendigen reflexiven Beobachtung eines Transfers von Instrumenten aus der Ökonomie in die Kinder- und Jugendhilfe geleistet.Die Untersuchung gliedert sich in drei Teile. In einem ersten Teil wird anknüpfend an die gesellschaftstheoretischen Überlegungen von Jürgen Habermas sowie an empirisch gestützte Beobachtungen aus dem Gesundheitswesen, der öffentlichen Verwaltung sowie dem Feld der Sozialen Arbeit herausgearbeitet, dass die in Praxis und Politik zu beobachtende zunehmende Relevanz von Kennzahlen auf Tendenzen einer Ökonomisierung zurückzuführen ist. Ein zweiter Teil fokussiert � begrenzt auf die Jugendhilfe � die Anwendung von Kennzahlen und Kennzahlensystemen. Dabei beschränkt sich die Arbeit nicht darauf, Verwendungskontexte zu benennen, sondern darüber hinaus werden sowohl Voraussetzungen als auch Eingrenzungen für den Einsatz dieses Messinstrumentes vorgenommen. Ein dritter Teil schließlich beinhaltet eine rekonstruktive Fallstudie zur Anwendung des Kennzahleninstrumentes im Rahmen interkommunaler Vergleichsarbeit von Jugendämtern speziell für das Feld der Hilfen zur Erziehung.Ein zentrales Ergebnis der Untersuchung ist, dass auf der einen Seite die Grenzen einer Verwendung von Kennzahlen in der Jugendhilfe und damit verbundene potenzielle Pathologien in diesem Teilsegment der Sozialen Arbeit offensichtlich sind. Auf der anderen Seite jedoch eröffnen sich über den Einsatz dieses Informations- und Steuerungsinstrumentes gleichermaßen Potenziale für eine Weiterentwicklung der Sozialen Dienste für junge Menschen und deren Familien. Diese beschränken sich nicht nur auf die Möglichkeiten einer Erhöhung des empirischen Eigenwissens der Kinder- und Jugendhilfe, sondern gelten auch für eine rationalere Gestaltung und Steuerung. Gleichwohl können diese positiven Effekte nur dann wirken, wenn bei den Jugendhilfeakteuren Sensibilität und Kompetenzprofil für den Umgang mit Messziffern geschärft werden.