Ecological Impact Asessment and Ecological Monitoring of a Strategic Landfill-A case study in Hong Kong

This paper discusses ecological and monitoring studies covering vegetation, stream fauna, birds, mammals and other vertebrates at the West New Territories (WENT)Landfill, Hong Kong. Recommendations for the protection of vegetation on and around the site, including control of the erosion and run off from the construction site were proposed and implemented, resulting in effective protection of the local vegetation cover. Stream macrobenthos were low in species diversity and abundance and did not show a changing trend during the construction and the operation of the land fill. Birds attracted to the active dumping site were dominated by Crested Mynah Acridotheres cristatellus and the Tree Sparrow Passer montanus. After an increase in the population during the warmer months, the number of birds seen on the land fill site decreased to 10 in December 1994. Mammal monitoring by live trapping revealed that the rat population did not increase after the land fill operation started. This project was the first comprehensive’ ecological study and monitoring of an urban land fill in Hong Kong and it demonstrated that careful environmental planning and implementation of mitigation measures can successfully limit environmental impacts of landfills to acceptable levels.

The Effect of Consultations on the Cost of Pre-Anesthetic Assessment

Background: In our study, researching the distribution of the consultations other than anaesthesia in compliance with the disciplines and ages of the patients and its effect on the assessment cost has been aimed. Methods: Our study has been conducted during 8 months by the retrospective assessment of the records of 3844 cases on which an elective surgical procedure was planned in the anesthesiology polyclinic of Firat University Hospital. The records of patients have been obtained through examining their files from the hospital record system. Results: The total number of patients whose consultations have been demanded was 367 (9.5%) and the number of male/female was 192/175. The number of cases about which more than one consultation has been demanded was determined as 87 (2.2%). The number of cases on which a method change for the anaesthesia was applied was 21 (5.7%), and the number of cases whose surgery was cancelled was 3 (0.81%). Requested consultation for each patient, the consultations of cardiology, chest diseases and internal medicine bring an additional cost on the total sum respectively as 37.2 TL (28.61 $), 29.8 TL (22.92 $) and 19.9 TL (15.30 $). Conclusions: We suggest that the cost analysis should be absolutely taken into consideration during the pre-anaesthetic assessment for the requirement of routine examinations.

Importance of functional classification in the use of carabids for the environmental risk assessment of the GE crops and other agricultural practices

Carabids(Coleoptera:Carabidae)seem to be suitable bioindicalors of the environmental impacts of novel agrotechnologies,including deployment of the genetically engineered(GE)crops.In this article,we describe our effort to employ carabids in the environmental risk assessment(ERA).GE maize MON88017,its near-isogenic hybrid nontreated or treated with the soil insccticide chlorpyrifos,and two reference hybrids were used to compare three different ways how to utilize carabids in ERA.The analysis of abundance of all captured carabids or of the most abundant carabid specics did not disclose any differences between the treatments.The analysis based on the categories of functional traits revealed distinct fecatures of some treatments and proved suitable for ERA because it permitted field data transportability in spite of different species compositions.Our results indicate that GE maize has no detrimental environmental effecl,On the other hand,we found significant trends toward lower abundance and lower species number(including analysis of all carabid species together)in plots treated with the insecticide,and some tendencies to higher abundance and higher species number in plots sown with the reference hybrid PR38N86.Using functional group indicators alows identification of unintended changes in ecological functions of agroecosystem and comparability across geographics.We recommend data evaluation at the level of the categories of functional traits in ERA of GE crops and other agricultural practices.

Risk identification and prioritization in banking projects of payment service provider companies:An empirical study

ldentifying risks and prioritizing is important for payment service provider(PSP)companies to get banking projects and gain more market share.However,studies regarding the identification of risks and causal relationships are insufficient in the lranian PSP industry and the industry is unique because of its characteristics.In this study,30 experts involved with PSP companies are employed as the research sample.Eleven key risks and 46 sub-risks are also ientified.Subsequently,the fuzzy decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory technique is applied to determine the effective and affected risks and the severity of their effects on each other.Finally,all risks are ranked.Due to the interal interrelationships of the main risks,the weight of each risk is calculated via the fuzy analytic network process.As the second-level risks have no significant interrelationships,they are ranked via the fuzzy analytical hierarchy process.Moreover,the best-worst method is used to ensure that the obtained rankings are reliable.This study identifies the risks affecting the loss of banking projects and determines the impacts of these risks on each.A sensitivity analysis is then conducted on the weights of the criteria,and the results are compared.