An Analysis of Philippine Trade Reforms in 1995-2000 Using the 1994 APEX Model

There are three major developments in the area of foreign trade in 1990s: (a) the WTO-Uruguay Round agreement in 1995; (b) the AFTA agreement; and (c) the series of unilateral trade reform programs of the government. The paper attempts to make an impact assessment of these reforms during the period 1995 and 2000 using the updated APEX model, a computable general equilibrium of the Philippine economy. Part of the trade reform process is the shift to transaction valuation of imports. The paper also attempts to analyze the possible effects of this shift

Estimates of Total Factor Productivity in the Philippines

The paper presents an updated TFP estimates in the Philippines. The present estimates were derived using a modified set of methodologies, thus may not be comparable with those derived in the previous estimates (Cororaton and Caparas 1999). Modifications were introduced in the method for computing sectoral employment, sectoral investment and sectoral capital stock. Based on the revised TFP estimates, one can observe favorable as well as unfavorable trends. Sectoral estimates showed improving TFP in the 1990s, although a number of the sectoral TFP levels are still negative. However, for the economy as a whole, 1990 saw a slight decline in TFP. This could indicate that there may seem to be some unfavorable resource allocation effects. Looking at the factor intensity results, the growth during the period could generally be described as capital accumulation type of growth. This is particularly true for nontradable sectors, specially the service-related sectors. The labor-capital ratios and the sources of growth analysis indicate a movement of capital towards these sectors, relative to the rest of the sectors. One factor which may have contributed to this type of resource movement is the prolonged real appreciation of the currency in face of an aggressive trade reform programs in the first half of the 1990s. This kind of an economic environment may not be conducive to production activities, both for domestic consumption and exports. In a period when capital inflow is massive, which actually transpired during the first half of the 1990s, nontradable, service sectors could become an attractive destination of capital

Mobilizing LGU Support for Basic Education: Focus on the Special Education Fund

Basic public education is still largely the responsibility of the central government, delivered through the Department of Education (DepEd), notwithstanding the devolution of many basic services to local government units (LGUs). However, LGUs do provide supplementary funding support to public basic education because they have access to a sustainable source of financial resources that are earmarked for the basic education subsector, the Special Education Fund (SEF). The SEF comes from an additional one percent tax on real property that LGUs are mandated to impose and collect by virtue of Republic Act 7160 otherwise known as the Local Government Code of 1991.The resources that LGUs provide to the basic education sector from their general fund are quite significant at 7 percent of total general government spending on basic education in 2001-2008. Thus, the LGUs are considered major partners of the national government in the delivery of basic education services. In this light, the study examines the management of the SEF in terms of collection, allocation, and utilization in order to maximize LGUs' support for the Education for All (EFA) initiative and to promote a more equitable allocation of resources for basic education.However, there are significant disparities in per pupil SEF spending across LGUs of different income classes and in different regions. LGUs in urban areas (i.e., cities and the large municipalities) where property values are high tend to have larger tax bases. These disparities have significant implications on the ability of the LGUs to provide additional support to the basic education sector.In terms of spending priorities, some of the major findings of the study include: (i) maintenance and other operating expenditures captured the biggest chunk of the total SEF spending of all LGUs in the aggregate (40%) while capital outlays and personal services garnered an average of 32 percent and 29 percent of LGUs total SEF spending in 2001-2008; (ii) repair/maintenance and construction of school buildings tops the list of SEF spending priorities in the sample Provincial School Boards (PSBs) and the sample City School Boards (CSBs); and (iii) relatively large portions (20%-50%) of the SEF are set aside for sports and other co-curricular activities and programs of the DepEd.The findings of the study highlight the need to improve the governance of Local School Boards (LSBs). Related to this, the measures proposed include: (i) clearer guidelines on preparation of the LSB budget, (ii) the establishment of needs-based criteria in allocating SEF across schools to ensure its efficient and effective use, and (iii) institutionalization of greater transparency between DepEd and LGUs in terms of reporting of resources that schools receive from the DepEd budget, on the one hand, and actual SEF collections and its utilization during the budget year, on the other hand, in order to foster better working relationship in the LSB

Business and Information Technology Alignment Measurement -- a recent Literature Review

Since technology has been involved in the business context, Business and Information Technology Alignment (BITA) has been one of the main concerns of IT and Business executives and directors due to its importance to overall company performance, especially today in the age of digital transformation. Several models and frameworks have been developed for BITA implementation and for measuring their level of success, each one with a different approach to this desired state. The BITA measurement is one of the main decision-making tools in the strategic domain of companies. In general, the classical-internal alignment is the most measured domain and the external environment evolution alignment is the least measured. This literature review aims to characterize and analyze current research on BITA measurement with a comprehensive view of the works published over the last 15 years to identify potential gaps and future areas of research in the field.Comment: 12 pages, Preprint version, BIS 2018 International Workshops, Berlin, Germany, July 18 to 20, 2018, Revised Paper

Molecular and antigenic characterization of Piscine orthoreovirus (PRV) from rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss)

Piscine orthoreovirus (PRV-1) causes heart and skeletal muscle inflammation (HSMI) in farmed Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar). Recently, a novel PRV (formerly PRV-Om, here called PRV-3), was found in rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) with HSMI-like disease. PRV is considered to be an emerging pathogen in farmed salmonids. In this study, molecular and antigenic characterization of PRV-3 was performed. Erythrocytes are the main target cells for PRV, and blood samples that were collected from experimentally challenged fish were used as source of virus. Virus particles were purified by gradient ultracentrifugation and the complete coding sequences of PRV-3 were obtained by Illumina sequencing. When compared to PRV-1, the nucleotide identity of the coding regions was 80.1%, and the amino acid identities of the predicted PRV-3 proteins varied from 96.7% (λ1) to 79.1% (σ3). Phylogenetic analysis showed that PRV-3 belongs to a separate cluster. The region encoding σ3 were sequenced from PRV-3 isolates collected from rainbow trout in Europe. These sequences clustered together, but were distant from PRV-3 that was isolated from rainbow trout in Norway. Bioinformatic analyses of PRV-3 proteins revealed that predicted secondary structures and functional domains were conserved between PRV-3 and PRV-1. Rabbit antisera raised against purified virus or various recombinant virus proteins from PRV-1 all cross-reacted with PRV-3. Our findings indicate that despite different species preferences of the PRV subtypes, several genetic, antigenic, and structural properties are conserved between PRV-1 and-3

Search for standard model Higgs boson production in association with a W boson using a neural network discriminant at CDF

15 páginas, 4 figuras, 7 tablas.-- CDF Collaboration: et al.We present a search for standard model Higgs boson production in association with a W boson in proton-antiproton collisions (pp ->(WH)-H-+/--> l nu bb) at a center of mass energy of 1.96 TeV. The search employs data collected with the CDF II detector that correspond to an integrated luminosity of approximately 1.9 fb(-1). We select events consistent with a signature of a single charged lepton (e(+/-)/mu(+/-)), missing transverse energy, and two jets. Jets corresponding to bottom quarks are identified with a secondary vertex tagging method, a jet probability tagging method, and a neural network filter. We use kinematic information in an artificial neural network to improve discrimination between signal and background compared to previous analyses. The observed number of events and the neural network output distributions are consistent with the standard model background expectations, and we set 95% confidence level upper limits on the production cross section times branching fraction ranging from 1.2 to 1.1 pb or 7.5 to 102 times the standard model expectation for Higgs boson masses from 110 to 150 GeV/c(2), respectively.We thank the Fermilab staff and the technical staffs of the participating institutions for their vital contributions. This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy and National Science Foundation; the Italian Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare; the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan; the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada; the National Science Council of the Republic of China; the Swiss National Science Foundation; the A.P. Sloan Foundation; the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, Germany; the Korean Science and Engineering Foundation and the Korean Research Foundation; the Science and Technology Facilities Council and the Royal Society, UK; the Institut National de Physique Nucleaire et Physique des Particules/CNRS; the Russian Foundation for Basic Research; the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, and Programa Consolider- Ingenio 2010, Spain; the Slovak R&D Agency; and the Academy of Finland.Peer reviewe

Combined Tevatron upper limit on gg -> H -> W+W- and constraints on the Higgs boson mass in fourth-generation fermion models

12 páginas, 4 figuras, 2 tablas.-- CDF Collaboration: et al.We combine results from searches by the CDF and D0 collaborations for a standard model Higgs boson (H) in the process gg -> H -> W+W- in p (p) over bar collisions at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider at root s = 1.96 TeV. With 4.8 fb(-1) of integrated luminosity analyzed at CDF and 5.4 fb(-1) at D0, the 95% confidence level upper limit on sigma(gg -> H) x B(H -> W+W-) is 1.75 pb at m(H) = 120 GeV, 0.38 pb at m(H) = 165 GeV, and 0.83 pb at m(H) = 200 GeV. Assuming the presence of a fourth sequential generation of fermions with large masses, we exclude at the 95% confidence level a standard-model-like Higgs boson with a mass between 131 and 204 GeV.We thank the Fermilab staff and the technical staffs of the participating institutions for their vital contributions. This work was supported by DOE and NSF (USA), CONICET and UBACyT (Argentina), CNPq, FAPERJ, FAPESP and FUNDUNESP (Brazil), CRC Program, CFI, NSERC and WestGrid Project (Canada), CAS and CNSF (China), Colciencias (Colombia), MSMT and GACR (Czech Republic), Academy of Finland (Finland), CEA and CNRS/IN2P3 (France), BMBF and DFG (Germany), Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (Japan), World Class University Program, National Research Foundation (Korea), KRF and KOSEF (Korea), DAE and DST (India), SFI (Ireland), INFN (Italy), CONACyT (Mexico), NSC(Republic of China), FASI, Rosatom and RFBR (Russia), Slovak R&D Agency (Slovakia), Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, and Programa Consolider-Ingenio 2010 (Spain), The Swedish Research Council (Sweden), Swiss National Science Foundation (Switzerland), FOM (The Netherlands), STFC and the Royal Society (UK), and the A.P. Sloan Foundation (USA).Peer reviewe

Copper-containing mesoporous bioactive glass promotes angiogenesis in an in vivo zebrafish model

The osteogenic and angiogenic responses of organisms to the ionic products of degradation of bioactive glasses (BGs) are being intensively investigated. The promotion of angiogenesis by copper (Cu) has been known for more than three decades. This element can be incorporated to delivery carriers, such as BGs, and the materials used in biological assays. In this work, Cu-containing mesoporous bioactive glass (MBG) in the SiO2-CaO-P2O5 compositional system was prepared incorporating 5% mol Cu (MBG-5Cu) by replacement of the corresponding amount of Ca. The biological effects of the ionic products of MBG biodegradation were evaluated on a well-known endothelial cell line, the bovine aorta endothelial cells (BAEC), as well as in an in vivo zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryo assay. The results suggest that ionic products of both MBG (Cu free) and MBG-5Cu materials promote angiogenesis. In vitro cell cultures show that the ionic dissolution products of these materials are not toxic and promote BAEC viability and migration. In addition, the in vivo assay indicates that both exposition and microinjection of zebrafish embryos with Cu free MBG material increase vessel number and thickness of the subintestinal venous plexus (SIVP), whereas assays using MBG-5Cu enhance this effect.The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided by the Andalusian Ministry of Economy, Science and Innovation (Proyectos Excelencia Grants no. P10-CTS-6681 and no. P12-CTS-1507) and Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitivity (BIO2014-56092-R). LBRS acknowledges the CONACYT-Mexico Fellowship PhD Program