ABSTRACT
The study assessed the effectiveness of agricultural cooperative societies in credit delivery to members in Benin metropolis of Edo State, Nigeria. The specific objectives were to describe the socio-economic characteristic of small-scale farmers, determine the effectiveness of the cooperatives in credit delivery to members, determined to what extent the co-operatives have benefited members in financing their investments; and identified the challenges militating against the role of cooperatives in the provision of credit facilities to its members. The study used a multi-stage random sampling technique to select 120 respondents from 20 agricultural cooperative societies in the Benin metropolis. The data collected were analyzed using simple descriptive statistics and the Queue model. In terms of effectiveness of credit delivery, findings revealed that majority of the cooperatives studied were not effective in credit delivery as reflected by the queue model employed. With respect to cooperatives financing of members’ investments, computed mean average indicates that majority were of the view that cooperatives have benefited members in financing their investments. However, there is room for improvement because the approval rate was 4.23, the overall idle time was 0.13 and the traffic intensity was 1.132 instead of 1. The major constraints militating against cooperative societies’ effectiveness were low loan repayment and embezzlement of funds (poor management of funds) with respective means of 2.66 and 2.64. Based on the findings, it was recommended that any policy that will improve proper management of funds and higher loan repayment will improve the managerial ability of the cooperative management and increase the approval rate to 100 percent and the idle time to zero.
Keywords: Effectiveness, credit delivery and agricultural enterprise
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ABSTRACT
The bacteriological and physicochemical quality of stored ground water supplied to four (4) female hostels at the main campus of a private university located at the outskirts of Benin City was evaluated. Routine methods which include pour plate, multiple tube dilution, spread plate and usage of relevant calibrated meters such as pH meter and total dissolved solid (TDS) meter were utilized. The mean heterotrophic bacterial counts
ranged from 0.4 ×102 cfu to 3.6 ×102 cfu and the observed differences in the mean bacterial and fungal counts obtained from the water samples was significant (P<0.05). Nil total coliform counts were recorded for all the analyzed water samples. Three bacterial isolates; Bacillus megaterium strain YKEI, Bacillus sp., strain DDWA and Comamonas testosteroni strain T-XQC were identified. All the isolated strains of the identified bacterial cultures were resistant to augmentin, ceftazidime, cefuroxime, cloxacillin and ceftriaxone. The mean pH and turbidity values of the water samples
ranged from 5.3 ±0.07 to 5.6±0.1 and 0.7 NTU ±0.06 to 0.8 NTU ± 0.06 respectively. The isolation of multi antibiotic resistant bacterial strains invariably qualified the ground water as being unfit for direct human consumption.
Keywords: Hostel, Ground water, Multi antibiotic resistant, Physicochemical, Benin City
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ABSTRACT
The aim of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of Salmonella and Staphylococcus species in ready-to-eat food and drinking water sold within Benson Idahosa University Legacy Campus, Okha, Benin City, Edo State, Nigeria. All samples were obtained aseptically in a biohazard bag and transported in ice pack to the laboratory for immediate analysis. All samples were processed and enumeration of total heterotrophic bacterial count, total Staphylococcus aureus counts and total Salmonella counts were determined by pour plate method using nutrient agar, mannitol salt agar and Salmonella-Shigella agar respectively by standard microbiological techniques. All bacterial isolates were identified by their cultural, morphological and biochemical characteristics. Their antibiotics susceptibility profile, multidrug resistant profile and phenotypic identification of methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus were determined according to the description of Clinical and Laboratory Standard Institute (CLSI). The highest bacterial count for the drinking water samples ranged from 200 ± 45.83 ×105cfu/ml to 126.67 ±25.17 × 105cfu/ml while no Staphylococcus aureus and Salmonella was reported in all the drinking water samples collected from within the university campus. For the ready-to-eat food samples, the mean heterotrophic bacterial count obtained varied between 143.33 ± 49.09 × 105cfu/g to 174.67 ± 40.46 × 105 cfu/g. Fifty (50) bacterial isolates were presumptively identified as Salmonella and Staphylococcus aureus spp. and they were resistant to ceftazidime, cefuroxime, cefixime and augmentin. The multidrug resistant index recorded was between 50 % and 75 %. Out of the 22 isolates of Staphylococcus aureus in ready-to-eat food samples, 21 exhibited high levels of antibiotics multiple drug resistance while 13 out of 28 Salmonella isolates exhibited high levels of antibiotics multiple drug resistance. Phenotypic identification revealed 21 Staphylococcus aureus isolates to be methicillin resistant. This study demonstrated that ready to eat food sold within Benson Idahosa University Legacy campus, Okha, are not safe for human consumption. This therefore, calls for serious attention to avoid the outbreak and spread of antibiotic resistant determinants.
Keywords: Food safety; drinking water quality; antibiotics resistance; Salmonella; Staphylococcus aureus
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ABSTRACT
This study was carried out to investigate the effect of various levels of Vernonia amagdalina on the hematological parameters of one hundred and ninety eight (198) arbor acre broiler birds. The experiment lasted for 6 weeks and was divided into two (2) phases, 0-3 weeks and 4-6 weeks. The birds were randomly selected and sub-divided into 6 dietary treatments with 3 replicates, each replicate contained eleven (11) birds in a complete randomized design in a deep litter system. The experimental treatments include a control diet which was without any form of antibiotics, treatment1 (T1), another treatment diet contained an antibiotic named collistin, treatment 2 (T2), the remaining four diets include different levels of powdered form of bitter leaf at 0.1, 0.5, 2.5 and 12.5% augmentation of dry matter weight of feed stock, respectively. There was no significant difference between the test results obtained from various treatments (P＞0.05). There was also no significant difference between the two phases (P＞0.05). For the packed cell volume and hemoglobin 0.1% inclusion of V. amydalina had the highest figure for the first phase (0-3 weeks) but 2.5% inclusion of V. amydalina has the highest figure for the second phase (4-6 weeks). For the red and white blood cell 0.1% inclusion of V. amydalina and 2.5% inclusion of V. amydalina have the highest figure for the first phase (0-3 weeks) respectively while 2.5% inclusion of V. amydalina and T2 for the second phase (4-6 weeks). The result shows that inclusion of V. amygdalina at the rate of 0.1%, 0.5, 2.5, 12.5% in their feed had no adverse effect on the hematological parameters measured and can be used as an alternative for antibiotics in broiler production
Keywords: Vernonia amagdalina, Collistin, Hemoglobin, Antibiotics, Augmentation, ad libitum
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Abstract
The spate of political instability in the West African sub-region has triggered a lull in socio-economic activities and consequently the government in the sub-region has responded by increasing spending on defense in order to restore socio-economic stability. This study examines the relationship between defense spending and economic growth in the ECOWAS sub-region using a panel of thirteen (13) countries for the period (2000-2014). The study
adopts a panel data framework and specifies the fixed and random effect models. The Hausman test is utilized to determine the appropriateness of the fixed effect model. Using non-stationary panel data which became stationary at first difference, the panel Fully Modified Least Squares (FMOLS) was utilized to estimate the model. The study reveals that defense spending induces a negative effect on economic growth; this would not be unconnected with crowding out of private sector investment, high cost of the importation of military hardware and the huge amount spent on maintaining the military as well as the weak fiscal discipline in the economies of the sub-region. It is recommended that government institutions be strengthened to ensure realistic, transparent and appropriate channeling of defense spending towards productive economic activities.
Keywords: Defense Spending, Gross Domestic Product, Government Expenditure, Panel Fully Modified Ordinary Least Square (PFMOLS).
Abstract
The paper examines the definition of sexual violence and its different types such as rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy and enforced sterilization. This is in light of the war in Bosnia by the Serbian forces. During the war (1992 – 1995), Serbian forces set up rape camps all over Bosnia, where Bosnian Muslim women were subjected to various forms of sexual violence such as gang rapes and sexual mutilations. In response to the above atrocities the United Nations set up the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) to try war offenders. The Statute of the Tribunal criminalized war time sexual offences as war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.
Keywords: Crimes against humanity, Genocide, ICTY, Rape, Sexual violence, war crimes.
Abstract
Corruption as a phenomenon has accounted for the dearth of infrastructure as well as most of the social and economic ills that beset Nigeria today. Nearly all administrations, whether military or civilian have muted the idea of dealing with the monster and have indeed enacted laws, such as the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission Act etc. administrative policies such as the Treasury Single Account, Due Process Departments, Servicom, Whistle Blowing Policy etc. and recently deployed technology as the Integrated Personnel Payroll Scheme –IPPIS. This paper demonstrates that the incidence of corruption has not declined because offenders are not likely to be punished because they are either not properly investigated or charged; where tried, trials go on for years unending and punishment is infinitesimal relative to the crime. This work doctrinally argues that corruption thrives because of the inability of law enforcement agencies and the judicial system to maintain the historical, conceptual and theoretical link between crime and punishment, which is characterized by certainty, adequacy and swiftness of punishment. Quick prescriptions, such as deepening the whistle blowing policy of government and adherence to sentencing guidelines in the Administration of Criminal Justice Act were suggested by the paper.
Keywords: Corruption, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Punishment, perception index, poverty
Abstract
This paper reviews the power of the legislature under the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria. It discusses the scope of the legislative power and the composition of the National Assembly. It examines the specific functions of the Legislature under the Constitution as well as their limitations. The paper concludes with a recommendation that the 1999 Constitution should be amended to transfer some of the items under the exclusive legislative list to the concurrent legislative list to enable the State Houses of Assembly to legislate on those matters which affect their people directly instead of waiting for the National Assembly to do so.
Keywords: Legislature, Constitution, Democracy, Senate, Assembly, representatives
ABSTRACT
The article evaluated the legal protection of new plant and animal varieties under intellectual property law. This issue has become a subject of increasing concerns to the international community. Hence, international and regional agreements have been entered into as well as national legislation enacted to address this sensitive subject of biological interventions. It was discovered in the study that though scientific propagation of plant and animal varieties is of ancient times, yet patent laws in some countries, including Nigeria, expressly prohibits the patentability of any variety of animal or plant or any essentially biological process for the production of animals or plants, not being a microbiological process or the products of such a process. The article concludes that though indisputably, ethical and moral questions will inevitably arise in the exploitation of biological interventions, nonetheless, the more fundamental question is how they should be addressed. This is because splicing morality provision into patent laws will result in an unstable fusion.
KEYWORDS: Animal Variety, Breeder’s Right, Intellectual Property Right, Patentability, Plant Variety, TRIPS Agreement.