Women Farmers and Commercial Ventures: Increasing Food Security in Developing Countries.

Women Farmers and Commercial Ventures: Increasing Food Security in Developing Countries. Anita Spring. ed. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2000. 419 pp.     

Genetically Modified Crops and Food Security

The role of genetically modified (GM) crops for food security is the subject of public controversy. GM crops could contribute to food production increases and higher food availability. There may also be impacts on food quality and nutrient composition. Finally, growing GM crops may influence farmers’ income and thus their economic access to food. Smallholder farmers make up a large proportion of the undernourished people worldwide. Our study focuses on this latter aspect and provides the first ex post analysis of food security impacts of GM crops at the micro level. We use comprehensive panel data collected over several years from farm households in India, where insect-resistant GM cotton has been widely adopted. Controlling for other factors, the adoption of GM cotton has significantly improved calorie consumption and dietary quality, resulting from increased family incomes. This technology has reduced food insecurity by 15–20% among cotton-producing households. GM crops alone will not solve the hunger problem, but they can be an important component in a broader food security strategy.     

Biotechnological Approaches for Developing Salt Tolerant Field Crops

Plant cell cultures have been widely used to screen against salt, salt mixtures, sea water and proline analogues, to develop salt tolerant genotypes in crop species. In some cases, selected trait expressed in regenerated plants has also been shown to be inherited through the sexual cycle. Besides, salt-tolerance character available in the wild germ plasm could be introgressed into the economic target species through improved wide hybridization techniques (e.g. embryo rescue, protoplast fusion, etc.). The third approach makes use of the recombinant DNA technology for identification, cloning, transfer and expression of the salt-tolerance genes in the target species. Basic research on salt-tolerance mechanisms at molecular level, stress related proteins and DNA sequences, plant morphogenesis, somatic cell hybridization, developmental regulation and selection strategies, however, need to be intensified to accelerate breeding for this complex characteristic.     

Potential Use of School Absenteeism Record for Disease Surveillance in Developing Countries,Case Study in Rural Cambodia

Background

Disease surveillance allows prospective monitoring of patterns in disease incidence in the general community, specific institutions (e.g. hospitals, elderly care homes), and other important population subgroups. Surveillance activities are now routinely conducted in many developed countries and in certain easy-to-reach areas of the developing ones. However due to limited health resources, population in rural area that consisted of the most the vulnerable groups are not under surveillance. Cheaper alternative ways for disease surveillance were needed in resource-limited settings.

Methods and Findings

In this study, a syndromic surveillance system using disease specific absenteeism rates was established in 47 pre-schools with 1,417 students 3–6 y of age in a rural area of Kampot province, Cambodia. School absenteeism data were collected via short message service. Data collected between 1st January and 31st December 2012 was used for system evaluation for future potential use in larger scale. The system appeared to be feasible and acceptable in the rural study setting. Moderate correlation was found between rates of school absenteeism due to illness and the reference data on rates of attendance at health centers in persons <16 y (maximum cross-correlation coefficient = 0.231 at lag = −1 week).

Conclusions

School absenteeism data is pre-existing, easily accessible and requires minimum time and resources after initial development, and our results suggest that this system may be able to provide complementary data for disease surveillance, especially in resource limited settings where there is very little information on illnesses in the community and traditional surveillance systems are difficult to implement. An important next step is to validate the syndromic data with other forms of surveillance including laboratory data.     

Poverty and Health Ethics in Developing Countries

Developing countries face difficulties of exploitation, dehumanisation and lack of ethical professionalism, to an extent that developed countries do not encounter. Poverty-related difficulties include lack of infrastructure, unreasonable dominance of defence-related expenses in the budget, lack of a sufficient number of health care providers, absence of accountability for serious medical malpractice, as well as exploitation of patients in pharmaceutical trials. This country report presents the case of Bangladesh, one of the poorest countries in the world and therefore a good example for the deplorable condition of the health sector in developing countries.     

发达国家医院信息系统发展研究及启示

目的 结合我国当前实际,参考国外发达国家的经验,建立先进的医院信息系统,为改善病人就诊环境,赢得最优的服务效率和质量,为各级医院信息化的进一步发展提升提供参考。方法 在广泛收集国内外研究成果的基础上,将理论与实证分析相结合,分析国外发达地区医院信息系统发展与我国的不同及差距,重点分析美国医院信息系统的发展。结果 通过分析可以看出以下方面的差距：（1）政府的作用,（2）医院信息化的投资规模,（3）标准化的推广和保险体制的完善,（4）信息技术应用的深度和广度。结论 通过对比分析,总结经验与教训以及我国须注意和改进的具体问题,得出了对我国有益的启示。     

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Program on Radiation and Tissue Banking: a Successful Program for Developing Countries

Since its inception the IAEA program in radiation and tissue banking supported the establishment of twenty five tissue banks in different countries. Now more than 103 tissue banks are now operating in these countries. The production of sterilized tissues has grown in an exponential mode within the IAEA program. From 1988 until the end of 2000 the production of sterilized tissues was 224,706 grafts, with an estimated value of at least $51,768,553 million dollars at the mean current charge rate in non-commercial banks in Europe and USA. During the period 1997–2002 several countries from Asia and the Pacific region produced more than 155,000 grafts, with an estimated value of about $36.7 million dollars. Training was considered to be one of the most important tasks to be supported. A total of 192 students were registered in the training program and 146 students graduated with a University Diploma. For many developing countries an additional benefit is not having to import expensive sterilized tissues from developed countries, but the exposure of orthopedic and plastic surgeons working, to new methods of using allografts in specific surgical treatments.