Efficiency and productivity analysis of vegetable farming within root and tuber-based systems in the humid tropics of Cameroon

The study analyzes the technical efficiency of vegetable farmers in root and tuber-based farming systems within selected sites of the humid tropics of Cameroon. Multistage sampling was used to collect primary data from a cross-section of vegetable farmers drawn from eight selected sites in Santa sub division, Northwest region of Cameroon. Stochastic frontier analysis was used to estimate the technical efficiency of vegetable farmer and to examine its determinants. The results showed that farmyard manure was the most productive factor input, followed by farm equipment and labor. The mean technical efficiency level was 67%, revealing production shortfalls and indicating possibilities of significantly increasing production with the current input Jevels. Female, as well as more educated farmers were found to be significantly more efficient than their counterparts. The results also showed that farmers become less technical efficient as farm sizes become larger. Our study findings suggest that smallholder farmers＇ access to manure, farm implements, and increased women participation in vegetable farming, will produce huge payoffs in vegetable production efficiency in Cameroon.

Analyzing Al Qaedaism

Three major events are responsible for the rampancy today of Al Qaedaism,the doctrine of Al Qaeda,an Islam extremist organization. They are:the Anti-Soviet Afghanistan War for the birth of the group;the September 11 terrorist attacks for the spread of its extremist demagogy and the war on terror for its branches networking into alliances worldwide. Al Qaedaism aims at driving away Western forces on the Moslem lands,overthrowing local Pro-West regimes,destroying Israel and setting up a Caliphate empire.Its rampancy has resulted from a combination of diverse factors at work under specific historical conditions rather an inevitable outcome of the growth of the Islam religion. As an ideological weapon for launching Jihad to oust Western influence and topple local regimes,Al Qaedaism reflects an extremist portrayal of modern Islam society,politics,economy and culture.

Intelligent Microservice Based on Blockchain for Healthcare Applications

Nowadays,the blockchain,Internet of Things,and artificial intelligence technology revolutionize the traditional way of data mining with the enhanced data preprocessing,and analytics approaches,including improved service platforms.Nevertheless,one of the main challenges is designing a combined approach that provides the analytics functionality for diverse data and sustains IoT applications with robust and modular blockchain-enabled services in a diverse environment.Improved data analytics model not only provides support insights in IoT data but also fosters process productivity.Designing a robust IoT-based secure analytic model is challenging for several purposes,such as data from diverse sources,increasing data size,and monolithic service designing techniques.This article proposed an intelligent blockchain-enabled microservice to support predictive analytics for personalized fitness data in an IoT environment.The designed system support microservice-based analytic functionalities to provide secure and reliable services for IoT.To demonstrate the proposed model effectiveness,we have used the IoT fitness application as a case study.Based on the designed predictive analytic model,a recommendation model is developed to recommend daily and weekly diet and workout plans for improved body fitness.Moreover,the recommendation model objective is to help trainers make future health decisions of trainees in terms of workout and diet plan.Finally,the proposed model is evaluated using Hyperledger Caliper in terms of latency,throughput,and resource utilization with varying peers and orderer nodes.The experimental result shows that the proposed model is applicable for diverse resourceconstrained blockchain-enabled IoT applications and extensible for several IoT scenarios.

Extract and Simple Explanation on the Principles of Taiji Studies

Taiji studies are a field of study that has its roots in the philosophical thought of the Yi Jing or Book of changes.It integrates the self‑cultivation traditions of Confucianism,Buddhism,and Daoism,and centers its academic system mostly on the perspective of the“states view”(jing jie guan).From the standpoint of its philosophical theory,Taiji studies divide the understanding of Dao into three theoretical states:the state of existence(you jie),the state of existence‑nonexistence(you wu jie),and the state of nonexistence(wu jie).It also establishes a theoretical structure that mainly includes“three states and nine axioms,”“One Dao and Nine theory sections,”and“Three practice levels and Nine secrets.”Based on traditional Chinese culture and philosophy,Taiji studies are continuously integrating the essence of them for better understanding and raising,and finally set up a rational school of Taiji Da Dao。

All-China Federation of Trade Unions Donated Epidemic Prevention Materials to the Cambodian Trade Union Confederation Committee

Since the outbreak of COVID-19,Cambodia has been committed to epidemic prevention and control.On November 28th,the first case of cluster infection was found in Cambodia.

New Evidence on Export Price Elasticity from China and Six OECD Countries

这份报纸由在时期 1990-2012 上分析中国，法国，德国，意大利，日本，英国和 USA 的盒子在出口价格弹性上提供新证据。估计为非静止的数据用面板数据技术被做了。在证明长期间关系对任何结构的裂缝稳定以后，出口被外国需求显著地决定，这被发现，与比为中国，日本，德国， UK 和 USA 的统一显著地高的长期间收入弹性。相反地，出口是为大多数在样品的国家无弹性的价格，在长跑和短跑。例外是法国，其出口定价弹性，更低(更高) 比统一在短期内(长跑) 。

Search of Novel Model for Integrative Medicine

This article provides global and Indian scenario with strengths and limitations of present health care system. Affordability, accessibility and availability of health care coupled with disproportionate growth and double burden of diseases have become major concerns in India. This article emphasizes need for mindset change from illness-disease-drug centric curative to person-health-wellness centric preventive and promotive approaches. It highlights innovation deficit faced pharmaceutical industry and drugs being withdrawn from market for safety reasons. Medical pluralism is a growing trend and people are exploring various options including modern, traditional, complementary and alternative medicine. In such a situation, knowledge from Ayurveda, yoga, Chinese medicine and acupuncture may play an important role. We can evolve a suitable model by integrating modern and traditional systems of medicine for affordable health care. In the larger interest of global community, Indianand Chinese systems should share knowledge and experiences for mutual intellectual enrichments and work together to evolve a novel model of integrative medicine.

Delayed resistance to Cucumber mosaic virus mediated by 3′ UTR-derived hairpin RNA

RNA silencing has been shown to function in the plant antivirus defense response,leading to viral RNA degradation induced by vsiRNA-containing RISC cleavage activity.Cucumber mosaic virus(CMV) 3′UTR sequences share a high conservation of nucleotide sequence and secondary structures that are important for CMV replication.Here,in an attempt to simultaneously target the multiple genomic and subgenomic RNAs of CMV for degradation,CMV 3′UTR were used to design hairpin RNA(hpRNA) to transform tobacco(Xanthi.nc) so as to constitutively produce viral siRNAs.Most of the transgenic plants expressing CMV Q strain(Q-CMV,subgroup Ⅱ strain) RNA3 3′UTR-derived hpRNA showed de-layed resistance to Q-CMV infection and exhibited recovery phenotypes.Compared with Q-CMV-in-oculated leaves,the upper leaves showed weak or no disease symptoms and a reduced accumulation level of viral RNAs.Together with transient assays,our results indicate that the 3′UTR-derived siRNAs were biologically active in targeting viral RNA for degradation.Recovery resistance in transgenic plants was also observed against subgroup IB strain SD-CMV infection,indicating a broad-spectrum anti-CMV effect of the 3′UTR-based antiviral silencing.Northern blot assays indicated that there was no strong correlation between the degree of resistance and the accumulation level of 3′UTR-derived siRNAs,suggesting that to target a highly structured RNA,such as the CMV 3′UTR,the quantity of siRNAs may not be the only determinant of silencing efficiency.Target RNA secondary structures may also affect target accessibility,siRNA-containing RISC-target recognition and the consequent antiviral effect.

A Lotus in Its Prime--Celebrating the 20th Annivereary of Macao’s Return lo the Motherland

On December 20,1999,the Chinese government resumed its exercise of sovereignty over Macao,established the Macao Special Administrative Region(SAR),and implemented“one country,two systems”and the policies of Macao being ruled by its own citizens and enjoying a high degree of autonomy,ushering in a new chapter in the historical development of Macao.The year 2019 marks the 20th anniversary of Macao s return to China.