Background: Market fires have been a recurring disaster in East Africa. The governments of developing countries face the challenge of absorbing labour for all their citizens, and this brings in the factor of informal sectors. In sub-Saharan Africa, informal sectors account for 70% of total household earnings; this helps to reduce high poverty levels as the government generates income from the sectors. Objectives: The broad objective of the study was to explore fire safety control measures and Emergency preparedness among Toi market Traders in Nairobi City County, Kenya. Specific objectives were to: assess fire safety control measures, determine the level of compliance with statutory fire safety measures as envisioned by the Fire Risk Reduction Rules of 2007, and assess the level of knowledge of fire emergency preparedness by the Toi Market Traders. Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive study design was employed. The study location was Toi Market, Nairobi County. The sample size was 391, which was determined by Slovin’s et al., formula 2007. A purposive sampling technique was used, with stratified random sampling in selecting each category, which was based on probability proportional to size. Data were obtained by the use of questionnaires, interviews, and observation checklists. Chi-square was used to determine associations between study variables. Results: A good number of respondents, 385 (98.5%), successfully participated. Results found that 80.9% of the respondents had either witnessed or experienced a fire outbreak in the market; 89% of people living with disabilities also witnessed or experienced a fire in the market. Further, it was found that there was no firefighting equipment in the market, as 97.7% stated. Only 20.8% of respondents were trained in fire safety and able to use a fire extinguisher; 90.3% stated that no fire safety drills were ever performed in the market. Most 83% said that there was a high need for basic fire safety training. The results also revealed that electrical faults 36.2% and arson attacks due to land disputes 25.9% were the major causes of market fires. Conclusions: The study found that there were no fire safety guidelines governing the market; thus, recurrent fire episodes occurred. Similarly, the level of adherence to the Fire Risk Reduction Rules of 2007 was very low. The knowledge level of fire preparedness was also found to be low.
Geo-targeted advertising has emerged as an important digital marketing strategy for reaching culturally diverse consumers with locally relevant content. This conceptual research paper examines how geo-targeted advertising,when combined with cultural localisation and personalisation, influences consumer engagement and purchase intent in multicultural digital markets.Drawing on secondary literature from digital marketing, cross-cultural consumer behaviour, customer engagement, brand trust, personalisation, and data privacy, the paper analyses how geographical data can be used to adapt advertising language, imagery, storytelling, offers, and communication styles to local cultural expectations. The review indicates that geographical targeting alone does not necessarily produce favourable consumer responses. Its effectiveness depends on whether the advertisement meaningfully reflects consumers cultural values, language, preferences, and lived experiences. Culturally aligned and personalised communication can increase relevance, relatability, emotional connection, and trust, thereby encouraging engagement and strengthening purchase intent. However, excessive personalisation,cultural stereotyping, inauthentic representation, and non-transparent data collection may produce privacy concerns, consumer vulnerability, and negative brand perceptions.
Bioclimatic comfort assessment of passengers in informal urban minibuses (tokpa-tokpa) in Cotonou (Benin). Informal collective transport systems represent a major component of daily mobility in West African cities, yet their physical characteristics expose users to severe thermal conditions. In Cotonou, urban minibuses known as tokpa-tokpa are highly vulnerable to climatic constraints because of their metallic body structure, limited thermal insulation, natural ventilation dependence and high passenger density. This study assesses the bioclimatic burden experienced by passengers and transport workers by analysing the combined influence of solar radiation, high humidity and traffic congestion periods. An instrumented observation campaign was conducted on 90 trips distributed across three major transport corridors in the Cotonou metropolitan area: Vedoko-Dantokpa, Etoile Rouge-Godomey and Akpakpa-Dantokpa. GPS-synchronised onboard thermo-hygrometers were used to characterize indoor environmental variations, while 540 passengers and 45 drivers/apprentices participated in thermal perception surveys based on TSV and ASHRAE scales.
This study examines the problem of the alleged forgery of pre-Islamic poetry from a critical linguistic perspective. Rather than limiting the discussion to the authenticity of individual poems and their attribution to their poets, the study investigates the image of the Arabic language that emerged within this controversy and the methodological assumptions that contributed to constructing that image.The study argues that some modern approaches to the problem of forged pre-Islamic poetry went beyond questioning the authenticity of particular texts and associated the systematic nature of Classical Arabic with the assumption of later linguistic fabrication. Prescriptivism, grammatical inflection, dialectal diversity, diglossia, and the relatively late documentation of Arabic were consequently treated, in varying degrees, as evidence of a historical discontinuity between the language of pre-Islamic Arabs and the standardized language transmitted in later sources.The study therefore examines the tension between prescriptive and descriptive approaches and questions whether the distinction between standardized language and everyday linguistic usage can legitimately serve as evidence for textual forgery. It also discusses grammatical inflection and grammatical reasoning, the relationship between Classical Arabic and the ancient dialects, and the concept of diglossia.
The EPA S.W.M.M. model is a dynamic rainfall-runoff simulation model used to simulate the quantity and quality of runoff for a single event or over the long term (continuously), primarily in urban areas. The runoff component of S.W.M.M. operates on a collection of subcatchment areas that receive precipitation and generate the corresponding runoff. The routing component of S.W.M.M. conveys this runoff through a system of pipes, channels, storage facilities, pumps and gates. S.W.M.M. determines the quantity and quality of runoff generated within each catchment area, as well as the flow rate and flow depth in each pipe and channel during a simulation period composed of multiple time steps. This model enables a more accurate determination of the time of concentration and, consequently, the peak discharge, thereby supporting improved design of the relevant structures. The hydrodynamic modelling of the new Vlora Airport is presented as an example.
The article provides a theoretical foundation for a multi-objective optimisation framework for glass-fibre-reinforced composites used in mechanical engineering structures. The interrelationships among the material,structural, manufacturing,operational,economic,and environmental parameters governing the performance of composite components are examined. A sequence of optimisation procedures is established, encompassing the specification of structural requirements, selection of design variables, formulation of objectives and constraints, numerical modelling, and identification of a set of Pareto-optimal solutions.The necessity of simultaneously considering strength, stiffness,weight, durability, cost, and manufacturability is substantiated. The use of an aggregate performance measure for ranking compromise solutions according to predefined priorities is justified. Particular attention is given to the effects of material-property variability, manufacturing deviations, and operational loads on the robustness of design solutions. The proposed framework combines multi-objective search methods with finite element modelling, sensitivity analysis, and experimental validation. Its implementation enables an informed selection of the composition and reinforcement architecture of glass fibre reinforced composites,taking into account the intended application, manufacturing conditions, and the life cycle of the mechanical engineering structure.
This study provides a theoretical framework for the application of digital technologies to predicting the in-service reliability of glass-fibre-reinforced polymer (GFRP) engineering structures. The principal degradation mechanisms of GFRP composites are examined, including polymer matrix cracking,fibre matrix interfacial debonding, interlaminar delamination,local fibre failure, and progressive stiffness degradation.The effects of cyclic loading, temperature, moisture, vibration, and manufacturing defects on the evolution of structural condition are identified. A digital prognostic system is proposed as a closed-loop information and computational framework integrating a digital product passport, sensor-based monitoring, non-destructive testing, finite element modelling, a digital twin, and a prognostic module. The need for regular updating of the digital twin using in-service measurements and for accounting for the asset - specific loading history is substantiated. The integrated application of fibre-optic, piezoelectric, acoustic-emission, and strain sensors in conjunction with ultrasonic and thermographic inspection is shown to be appropriate. The potential of machine-learning techniques for sensor-data processing, diagnostic-feature extraction, and acceleration of prognostic calculations is examined. It is emphasised that such techniques should be applied in combination with physics-based models of composite deformation and failure.
Ayurveda, an ancient science, presents concepts in various Samhitas that remain relevant to health phenomena today. The human body undergoes variations in strength and physiological, psychological, and pathological changes influenced by Vata, Pitta, and Kapha. They are the result of Swabhava of Swabhava of Dosas, i.e. Prakriti. Ancient classics have stated that individual diet and regimen should have opposite properties to those of the constitutional Dosa and be prescribed for the maintenance of health. The Jangala Desha of western Rajasthan is characterised by an arid and semi-arid climate with extreme temperatures, low rainfall, strong winds, and scarce vegetation. These geo-climatic factors play an important role in shaping the health, lifestyle, and Prakriti of individuals residing in the region. The relationship between Prakriti, Ahara, and Desha underscores the interconnectedness of the mind, body, and environment, captured in the Vedic phrase Yat Pinde Tatha Brahmande; changes in the environment are reflected within the body. Here, an attempt has been made to assess Prakriti of an individual concerning the Jangal Desha, and to correlate Desha Prakriti, Ahara Dravyas, and Jangal Desha to identify suitable dietary and lifestyle practices for maintaining health and preventing disease and to document region-specific dietetics according to Prakriti.
The significance of the study is mainly to emphasis on the issue of domestic women workers, part of informal sector employment and the rights of these workers in the Indian economy. With the emergence of new LPG policies (Liberalization, Privatisation and Globalisation), we find a change in the structure of the Indian economy. The women to achieve economic independence is opting or expanding the avenue for securing or gaining employment opportunities according to the quality of education, training and skill they possess. Wherefore women workers are employed both in the formal and informal sector of the Indian economy and are eventually participating more in numbers in the informal sector rather than the informal sector economy. Among the informal sector employment, women workers are more engaged in the domestic work sector, a sector that is mostly unregulated and lacks legal protection. India, being a country with rich historical past and tradition has witnessed domestic workers characterized by decades under unfair and exploitative conditions and has been labelled as one of the most neglected sectors of the country\'s informal labour force. The employment of domestic workers and the migration of domestic workers outside the country is historically embedded in the growth and development of the nation. The urban households in metro cities with the aid of paid domestic workers can accommodate themselves in the organized or formal labour force The employment opportunity for the middle and upper-class women workers and their participation in the economic activities contributes to the revenue of the State. Women workers in the informal sector are denied and deprived of the labour rights that are available to the workers in the formal industry. This study is mainly concerned with the protection of the rights of domestic workers in India concerning the severe violations of their labour rights.
B. R. Ambedkar spent more than a decade arguing for separate electorates for the Depressed Classes. He won them in the Communal Award of 1932, lost them within weeks to Gandhi\'s fast and the Poona Pact, and attacked the reserved-seat system that replaced them for years afterward. Yet in the Constituent Assembly in 1949 he accepted joint electorates and the abolition of separate electorates for the Scheduled Castes. This shift is usually read as a defeat, a pragmatic compromise, or a genuine change of mind. This article argues that all three readings mistake a device for a principle. A close reading of Ambedkar\'s electoral writings, and in particular of his analysis of the 1937 election returns in What Congress and Gandhi Have Done to the Untouchables, shows that his objection was never to joint electorates as such, but to any arrangement in which the representatives of the Scheduled Castes were chosen by the caste-Hindu majority rather than by the Scheduled Castes themselves. Separate electorates were the device he judged best able to secure that principle. When the device became unavailable and the franchise was transformed, he accepted a weaker arrangement without giving up the principle behind it. The reinterpretation is modest, but it resolves a puzzle that has long attended the study of Ambedkar\'s constitutional politics.
One of the best ways for the enriching development of women is them joining the workforce as it gives them financial as well as social independence. However difficult it may be for a woman to join the workforce; it is even more tough for them to join back the workforce after taking a break due to various reasons. This paper showcases and analyses the problems faced by women mainly in the workforce and more so, the problems they face while joining back the workforce after a long break. It provides solutions to these problems based on a survey conducted. This paper addresses an issue which is not only bad for the society, but also for our economy.
Agricultural Internet of Things (AG-IoT) intrusion detection requires models that limit representation complexity without weakening the credibility of their evaluation. This study investigates whether a learned intrusion-detection representation can be reduced to a sparse latent subset while retaining a useful clean-detection profile. A compact one-dimensional CNN encoder, referred to as CNN-Lite, learns a 128-dimensional latent representation; IWHO-Lite performs binary, sparsity-aware dimension selection; and a Random Forest provides the terminal classification score. Data-dependent preprocessing is confined to the training scope, while model-development decisions remain isolated from score calibration, operating-threshold selection, and final testing. Exact-vector overlaps are additionally audited before evaluation. Across Farm-Flow, CICIoT2023, and UNSW-NB15 using three independent model seeds, IWHO-Lite retained 63.00, 37.67, and 41.67 latent dimensions, corresponding to compression rates of 50.78%, 70.57%, and 67.45%, respectively. Mean clean-test F1-scores were 0.4724, 0.9953, and 0.7480. Mean batch-inference latency ranged from 0.0973 to 0.1344 ms per sample in the recorded experimental environment. Farm-Flow combined high recall with a substantial false-positive burden, highlighting strong dataset dependence. The results support a leakage-aware performance-parsimony characterization of latent-dimension selection rather than universal predictive superiority or hardware-validated efficiency.
India has placed a lot of hopes in the interoperable three-pronged support of digital identity, real-time payments and consent-based data exchange-popularly known as the India Stack-which can be considered as Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI). This paper questions whether Indias administrative capability is sufficient to make this technological achievement good for inclusive growth as envisioned in Viksit Bharat 2047 with a USD 30 trillion economy and per capita income of USD 18,000. The paper is based on secondary data from the National Payments Corporation of India, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, the DBT Mission and the recent scholarship in public administration and development economics, and proposes a four-dimensional framework of administrative capacity, which comprises infrastructural reach, bureaucratic competence, regulatory capacity and accountability embeddedness. While the analysis reveals Indias DPI has reached scale and measurable fiscal impact, inclusiveness remains limited due to a persistent rural, gender and digital-literacy divide; documented instances of exclusion in authentication at the frontline and in the state; and uneven capacity at the frontline and within States. The paper brings three priorities to the forefront: capacity building in the last mile, enforcement of data protection regimes and cooperative federalism, all of which are seen as the key constraints on the path to 2047, having been supplanted by technology.
Au Niger, la promotion de l entrepreneuriat agricole est l une des solutions pour lutter contre la pauvrete et l insecurite alimentaire recurrente. L objectif de l etude est d analyser l entreprenariat agricole et sa contribution dans le revenu et le bien-etre des menages. La methodologie s est basee sur une enquete aupres de 154 entrepreneurs agricoles (39 en agriculture, 82 en elevage et 33 en agroalimentaire) echantillonnes de maniere aleatoire. L analyse des donnees a consiste en des statistiques descriptives et des tests statistiques de comparaison de groupes (ANOVA et Khi2) au seuil de 5%. Les resultats de l etude montrent que la majorite des entrepreneurs evoluent dans l informel (65%) et de maniere individuelle (82%). Malgre que l ecrasante majorite des entrepreneurs (96%) sont formes en entreprenariat, seulement 43% possedent un plan d affaire. Les entreprises sont essentiellement financees par des subventions (76%) et des fonds propres (20%). Dans l ensemble, l entrepreneuriat agricole contribue a 58% du revenu des menages et a57% des depenses mensuelles des menages.
The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into project management is reshaping organisational practices by enhancing decision-making, efficiency, and project outcomes. This study examines the relationship between human-AI collaboration and project management performance in Nigeria, with organisational readiness as a moderating variable. A quantitative, cross-sectional survey design was adopted, and data were collected from 120 project managers and team members across construction,information technology, banking, and telecommunications sectors. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics, correlation, regression, and moderation analysis. The findings reveal that human - AI collaboration has a significant positive effect on project management performance, particularly in improving cost efficiency, schedule adherence, and quality delivery. Additionally, organisational readiness significantly moderates this relationship, indicating that organisations with strong digital infrastructure, skilled personnel, and supportive leadership derive greater benefits from AI integration. These results reinforce the relevance of Socio-Technical Systems Theory and the Technology Acceptance Model in explaining AI-enabled project environments.
Les agriculteurs produisent deux categories de produits : perissables et non perissables. Ces deux types de produits sont demandes tout au long de lannee. Cette etude utilise une revue systematique de la litterature comme methode danalyse. Lobjectif de tout espace de stockage est de garantir la securite des produits agricoles afin deviter les pertes dues aux intemperies, a lhumidite, aux rongeurs, aux oiseaux, aux insectes et aux micro-organismes tels que les champignons, les bacteries et les moisissures. Les regions en developpement doivent disposer dinfrastructures appropriees pour la transformation et le stockage des produits perissables.
In a context of crop diversification and land scarcity, intercropping remains a viable solution for producers to satisfy their food and income needs. Crop association of sesame with cowpea is not practised in Senegalese farming systems. However, this system could improve land-use efficiency under rain-fed conditions, in the same way as associations of cereals and legumes. The aim of this experimentation is to investigate the effect of intercropping sesame with this traditional crop of Senegals groundnut-growing region, The study was carried out during the 2021 and 2022 rainy seasons in Bambey, in the north-central part of Senegals groundnut-growing region. It focuses on a single factor : intercropping, with three (3) treatments : sesame as a single crop (T1), cowpea as a single crop (T2) and a sesame-cowpea intercrop (T3). A randomised complete block design (Fischer blocks) with three (3) replicates is used. The variables measured mainly concerned growth parameters, yields and their components, which were used to calculate biological indicators such as LER, LEC and the percentages of land area saved (%LS). For each variable, the effects of the factor were analysed using analysis of variance (ANOVA) and means were compared using the LSD test at the 5% significance level with R Studio IDE software version 2026.07.1.
The limited availability of high-quality fry is a major obstacle to the development of fish farming in Cote dIvoire. This study aimed to assess the reproductive performance of Oreochromis niloticus reared in hapas installed in earthen ponds. Two hapas, each measuring 7,5 m2 and stocked with 42 broodstock (sex ratio of one male to two females), were monitored for six weeks. The broodstock were fed the commercial floating feedcontaining 32 per cent crude protein. The physico-chemical parameters of the water, the zootechnical performance of the broodstock and their reproductive performance were assessed.
The global toy manufacturing sector is undergoing a historic disruption as multinational corporations are more frequently pursuing supply chain diversification via the China Plus One framework. Concurrently, India has transitioned from a net importer into a structurally stable, export-oriented toy economy. This study presents a comprehensive meta-analysis and economic evaluation of the Indian toy industry, exploring its core macroeconomic metrics, regulatory shifts,technological transitions, and infrastructural challenges. Drawing upon trade data from FY 2017-18 to FY 2025-26, the paper tracks the 151.9% expansion of aggregate toy exports alongside a 66% reduction in traditional imports. However, persistent systemic bottlenecks, such as elevated input costs, raw material import dependencies, regulatory friction within MSMEs, and land acquisition issues in critical industrial corridors, disturb the realization of these gains. By benchmarking Indian manufacturing frameworks against leading industrial models in China like Shantou Chenghaiand Vietnam, this paper outlines an integrated, multi-stakeholder strategic blueprint to establish India as a dominant global toy export leader.
Underwater Sensor Networks (UWSNs) are a core enabler of the Internet of Underwater Things, supporting environmental monitoring, marine exploration, offshore industry, and defense applications. However, the resource-constrained, energy-limited, and unattended nature of underwater deployment makes UWSNs highly vulnerable to node impersonation and data-injection attacks, while conventional authentication schemes based on key exchange impose additional communication rounds and cryptographic computation that drain the limited battery of sensor nodes. This paper proposes a lightweight Provenance-Based Authentication framework (PBAU) for UWSNs that authenticates sensor nodes from their historical behavior rather than cryptographic key exchange. The paper specifies the provenance record structure with hash-chained, sink-side storage requiring no material on sensor nodes; a complete per-packet authentication algorithm with O(1) time complexity and zero node-side cryptographic cost; and an energy analysis under a realistic underwater acoustic model incorporating Thorp absorption, spreading loss, transmission/reception energy, signal-to-noise ratio, and propagation delay, showing that eliminating the authentication round trip removes both a full acoustic propagation delay and the associated transmit/receive energy from every exchange.
