This is a Minor Fields Study (MFS) project with the aim to facilitate the handling of empty PET bottles in Uganda. The eight weeks in Uganda gave an insight in how products are produced and how the waste surplus material is managed by local producers as well as factories. During the time in Uganda a problem concerning waste management of used PET-bottles was discovered as well as a need for a concept that facilitates the handling of PET bottles in restaurants and hotels. This thesis describes the development of a product prototype, which is designed by following product design process and from the knowledge gathered in Uganda. The product is designed to be manufactured and used in Uganda. The main purpose of the product is to compress used PET-bottles, to accomplish a size reduction. This will make it easier to gather the bottles and transport them to a recycling plant. / Detta är ett Minor Field Study (MFS) projekt som har resulterat i en prototyp till en produkt som ska underlätta hanteringen av använda PET-flaskor i Uganda. Projektet påbörjades i Uganda under 8 veckors tid, där man undersökte hur restmaterial hanteras i lokala verkstäder och fabriker. Då uppmärksammades ett stort behov av ett koncept som underlättar hanteringen av PET flaskor, främst i restauranger och hotell. Denna rapport beskriver hur en prototyp har utvecklats utifrån produktdesign metodik och erfarenheter i fält. Prototypen är utvecklad på så vis att den ska kunna byggas och användas i Uganda. Produktens huvuduppgift är att trycka ihop använda PET flaskor vilket medför en storleksminskning. Detta i sin tur underlättar förvaringen av flaskorna men underlättar också transporten till en återvinningsanläggning.

The title enlightens the difficulties of democratic transition that Cambodia experiences post Khmer Rouge. Media in transitional democracies is often described as a forced compromise between what is ideal and what is actually possible. This thesis aims to understand how political agency and technological advances have affected journalistic agency in a transitional democracy. Three research questions were decided upon: How do journalists in Cambodia perceive their role in a democratic transition? What restrictions and limitations do journalistic practices face in Cambodia? And how do journalists in Cambodia perceive the impact of social media on democratic development? A field study was conducted in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. For ten weeks, eight editors and journalists currently active in Cambodia were interviewed and observed in their working environment. Normative media theory and developmental democracy theory have been used to analyze and understand the material that was generated through a combination of unstructured observations and semi-structured qualitative research interviews. Important findings were that the complicated structures of transitional democracies make journalists take on different roles, from very collaborative to extremely radical. Their different stand on journalistic practices is a mixture of their own choice and the force of historical, political and social constraints. Political power players treat them differently, which further separates them and has led to a segregated journalistic community. Even though they seem to share the same fundamental ideal of what journalism should be journalists are therefor unlikely to cooperate. Social media has been a catalyst for change in democratic development in Cambodia. By offering a place for uncensored conversations it has given the opposition access to media. Social media has brought along many new dilemmas though and is probably more beneficial to journalistic development than to democratic development. There is a lack of tolerance of diversity in Cambodia due to the fragile state of democratic transition. Therefor the immediate and unrestricted ways of expression in social media partially works against creating the social capital necessary for consolidation – fully completed democratization.

The project of this thesis is to illuminate the teacher perspective on study visits by examining how six religion teachers relate to the study visit method in high school religious education. The research object of the thesis is to investigate whether teachers believe there are viable didactic possibilities and challenges associated with the study visit concept in education, and to define them if present. The results show that the main didactic advantage, as perceived by the teachers participating in this study, lies in the meeting the study visit enables. A meeting may lead to increased insight and understanding of other people’s way of thinking, conceiving and believing. It may result in improved understanding of religiosity in general and religious identity in particular. The teachers also acknowledged that impressions and activities of a study visit may be remembered longer, as such learning methods incorporate our senses more integrally, allowing us to remember them better. The study visit is an experience the students may find useful long after graduation. One didactic challenge teachers identified is that of time and commitment investment for the individual teacher. All participants agreed that a clearly defined aim is imperative to a successful study visit, emphasizing the importance of conducting preparatory work before and after the event. The teachers also identified a didactic challenge regarding representativity. One side of the problem regarded the selection, what religions would be included in the study visits program? It was also a matter of deciding who would be representing an entire religion. The didactic challenge presented by representativity has been prioritized and is linked to theories on sociocultural perspectives on learning and intercultural pedagogy. Viewing teaching methods in a sociocultural perspective, one can conclude that students are absorbing knowledge by making study visits. The difficulty for the teacher lies in identifying what they are learning. Adopting intercultural pedagogy could circumvent this. Students are then equipped with an intercultural awareness. They will have the tools to interpret this meeting in a meaningful way, recognizing the qualities and benefits of a multicultural society. / Syftet med denna uppsats är att belysa ett lärarperspektiv på studiebesök genom att undersöka hur sex religionslärare förhåller sig till metoden studiebesök i religionskunskap på gymnasiet. Uppsatsens forskningsfrågor är huruvida lärarna anser att det finns några religionsdidaktiska möjligheter och utmaningar med att använda sig av studiebesök och i sådana fall vilka. Resultatet visar att de didaktiska möjligheterna lärarna ser är framför allt mötet som ett studiebesök kan generera. Mötet kan ge eleverna insikter och förståelse för andra människors sätt att tänka, tycka och tro samt ge förståelse för människors religiösa identitet och religiositet överlag. Lärarna ser också en möjlighet i att ett studiebesök kan leva kvar längre eftersom de aktiverar fler sinnen och på så sätt enklare fastnar i minnet. Studiebesöket blir då en erfarenhet som eleverna kommer att bära med sig ut i samhället efter examen. En didaktisk utmaning som lärarna beskriver är att det krävs både tid och engagemang för läraren. För att ett studiebesök ska bli lyckat anser alla att det är viktigt att ha ett tydligt syfte med studiebesöket och betonar vikten av både för- och efterarbete. Lärarna såg också en didaktisk utmaning vad gällde representativitet. Problemet handlade dels om urval, alltså vilka religioner och livsåskådningar som skulle få utrymme i studiebesök och vilka som uteblev. Det handlade också om vem som skulle få representera en hel religion. Den didaktiska utmaningen som representativitet innebär har i uppsatsen fått ett särskilt utrymme och kopplats till teorin om sociokulturellt perspektiv på lärande och interkulturell pedagogik. Genom ett sociokulturellt perspektiv på lärande kan man konstatera att eleverna lär sig något genom ett studiebesök, svårigheterna för lärarna är att veta vad eleverna lär sig. Att använda interkulturell pedagogik skulle kunna vara ett sätt att hantera denna problematik. Eleverna utrustas då med en interkulturell medvetenhet och får på så sätt redskap för att kunna tolka detta möte på ett mer meningsfullt sätt och därmed se kvalitéerna i ett mångkulturellt samhälle.

Aim - The aim of this thesis is to understand the challenges of the Ugandan coffee industry by having a business ecosystem perspective. By using a broader perspective like the BE, one can see relations and connections that may not have been visible before. Furthermore, when using a BE perspective more actors are included in the systemic work, and important platforms and tools are included in the work of moving the BE forward as one entity. Methodology - A qualitative study was conducted to examine and understand the Ugandan coffee industry from a business ecosystem perspective. 18 semi-structured interviews were performed with coffee farmers and coffee organizations in Uganda. The data was divided into five different themes; Knowledge Sharing in the Business Ecosystem, Platforms and Interactions in the Business Ecosystem, Roles in the Business Ecosystem, Challenges in the Business Ecosystem and Youth in the Business Ecosystem. Conclusions - The findings of the thesis are that some parts of the business ecosystem are missing or lacking. Effective platforms for knowledge sharing are an issue, due to lack of access to a technological platform, monetary resources and low level of education. It was difficult to place some of the actors in different roles that exist in the business ecosystem, because sometimes an actor could fit the description of multiple roles. The interactions and the knowledge sharing also need improvement. Research limitations - Due to the sheer size of any business ecosystem, it is a daunting task to map one out. To make it more manageable, a particular part of the business ecosystem was examined. This might have resulted in the exclusion of important actors. Many of the interviews required an interpreter which meant that some interpretations may have been lost in translation. Furthermore, all the interviews with coffee farmers were arranged by a third party. Which could affect the results. Research contribution – In this thesis a business ecosystem perspective was applied on the Ugandan coffee industry, which has never been done before. Furthermore, it discusses what an unhealthy or lacking business ecosystem is or looks like, since there is little or no previous literature discussing this.

In Sweden the National Bureau of Statistics has reported an increase in stress-related disorders and sleep problems since the mid-1990’s. They also report that the number of hours of overtime worked has increased. Previous research on work-related stress and overtime work has demonstrated associations with altered physiological arousal, increased risk for stress related diseases, shorter sleep, greater fatigue and impaired performance. However, there is a lack of knowledge on the effects within individuals. The general aim of the thesis was to investigate the effect of overtime work and increased work stress on sleep, the diurnal pattern of cortisol, sleepiness and subjective stress in a within-subject design. In addition, it examined individual differences in the diurnal cortisol response to stress. We used a combination of methods – questionnaires, sleep and wake diaries, objective measures of sleep, stress hormones (salivary cortisol) and ambulatory measures of heart rate and blood pressure. Studies followed office workers during two different conditions of (I) high/low work stress and (II) overtime work respectively. The individual differences in the cortisol response to stress from study I prompted study III. In this study we examined two groups that showed different cortisol responses to stress. In conclusion, the results (I) demonstrated that a week with higher workload and stress affects physiological stress markers such as cortisol, and is associated with increased sleepiness and problems of unwinding at bedtime, shorter sleep duration and longer work hours. Furthermore (II) overtime work, under conditions of relatively low workload, was shown to be associated with modest effects on physiological markers of arousal. More pronounced effects were found on sleep and fatigue, with greater problems during overtime work. Study III indicated that individual differences in cortisol response to stress maybe related to fatigue and exhaustion.

<div>International development projects are a massive business, with billions invested annually in the Global South. However, such projects have an unacceptably long record of high failure rates. The problem perpetuates, in part, due to the success factors by which international development projects are judged. Often, projects are assessed on the basis of donor-identified priorities that are not aligned with local impacts. One such international development project involves the construction of small-scale water harvesting structures known as sand dams. Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) continue to raise sufficient funds to build thousands of sand dams across sub-Saharan Africa, and yet 50% of sand dams are estimated to be non-functioning.</div><div><br></div><div>Sand dams are small, reinforced concrete dams built across an impermeable stream-bed. Over time, sand settles behind the dam, creating an upstream sand reservoir that fills with rainwater and surface runoff. The sand helps filter the water, protects it from evapotranspiration, and can provide water to the local community for domestic and agricultural use during the dry season. Sand dams often fail due to poor construction, inadequate siting, and siltation.</div><div><br></div><div>This dissertation explores methodologies for studying the regional and local impacts of sand dams and investigates the feasibility of developing model-based site selection guidelines for sand dams. Three objectives of this study are: (1) to develop a methodology to assess the ability of sand dams in improving the overall water availability in the region; (2) to examine claims made by non-scientific bodies about sand dam impacts by investigating how diverse sand dams influence macroinvertebrate habitat, vegetation, erosion, and local water availability; and (3) to create guidelines for siting new sand dams based on a fully integrated surface and groundwater flow model.</div><div><br></div><div>For the first objective, two multiple regression models are developed to compare (1) water storage and (2) vegetation in an area with a high density of sand dams, termed the sand dam counties (SDC), to those in a control area. The models analyze remotely sensed datasets to assess whether evidence exists of significantly increased storage in the SDC relative to the control area. The results show that the remotely sensed water storage data is unable to consistently detect higher levels of water storage in the SDC. This is likely due to the low resolution of the dataset combined with the small magnitude of sand dams' impact on regional water storage. The results of the vegetation model show that the sand dams have a consistent, positive impact on vegetation within the SDC relative to the control area. Because vegetation health and cover is often correlated with groundwater levels, these results likely indicate that the sand dams are also increasing local groundwater levels. Overall, this study shows that remotely sensed dataset can provide a useful basis to assess the impact of international development projects, particularly those that involve the natural environment. </div><div><br></div><div>For the second objective, data relating to macroinvertebrates, vegetation, erosion, and water table elevations at three sand dams were collected and analyzed during a year-long field study in Tanzania. These study subjects were specifically selected to test an NGO claim that sand dams revitalize the entire ecosystem. The results of this study show that sand dams are not a suitable habitat for macroinvertebrates due to their homogeneity. The impact of sand dams on vegetation cover can be significant, but may be limited by the slope of the surrounding land. Functioning sand dams likely have little impact on streambank erosion, but non-functioning sand dams may contribute to the erosion of streambanks in unstable reaches. Lastly, the water table is locally raised by recharge from sand dams, however, the spatial and temporal extent of the impact is more limited than conveyed by NGOs and previous studies. This study adds to the limited body of knowledge on the environmental responses to sand dams and demonstrates the importance of examining the local impacts of individual international development projects. </div><div><br></div><div>For the third objective, results from four different simulations of a watershed-based model with three cascading sand dams are analyzed to identify overland features that improve vadose zone storage and groundwater recharge and reduce evapotranspiration. Results from this study show that sand dams constructed in a low-lying area that collects surface runoff from adjacent steep slopes, such as in a U-shaped valley, will likely collect and store sufficient water for use by a local community. Watersheds with relatively more area cultivated with low-water-need crops will similarly be beneficial to sand dam performance. In addition, the analysis revealed that the volume of water a sand dam receives during a rainy season is less important for water storage than the duration of dry seasons. Lastly, the simulations showed that sand dams constructed in an area with sandier soils will perform better than those in an area with loamy soils. This study produced a set of guidelines that can be used to identify locations where sand dams are likely to capture and store sufficient water for community use during the dry season.</div>

No description available.

Urban construction sites require strict control of their environmental impact, which, for vibratory sheet pile driving, can include damage to nearby structures due to ground vibrations. However, the lack of knowledge concerning the generation of soil vibrations makes the prediction of ground vibration levels difficult. This MSc. thesis in particular, focuses on a crucial link in the vibration transfer chain: the sheet pile – soil interface, which is also one of the least documented. The aim of this thesis is first, to carry out a full-scale field test consisting in the monitoring of sheet pile and ground vibrations during sheet pile vibratory driving. And second, to analyze a selected portion of the collected data with focus on the sheet pile – soil vibration transfer. Both aspects of the thesis work aim, more generally, to contribute to the understanding of ground vibration generation under vibratory sheet pile driving. The full-scale field study was performed in Solna in May 2013. It consisted in the vibratory driving of seven sheet piles, out of which three were fitted with accelerometers. During the driving, ground vibrations were measured by accelerometers, the closest ones placed only 0.5 m from the sheet pile line. The design and installation of the soil instrumentation was innovative in as much as accelerometers were not only set on the ground surface but also at three different depths (~ 3 m, 5 m and 6 m). The analysis presented in this thesis is primarily a comparison between sheet pile vibrations and ground vibrations measured 0.5 m from the sheet pile line. The principal aspects considered in the comparison are: the influence of penetration through different soil layers, the sheet pile – soil vibration transfer efficiency, the frequency content of sheet pile and soil vibrations, and differences between toe- and shaft-generated vibrations. The main conclusions from this study are:  Most of the vibration loss occurs in the near field: 90-99% of the sheet pile vibration magnitude was dispersed within 0.5 m from the driven sheet pile. Moreover, the sheet pile – soil vibration transfer efficiency was reduced for higher sheet pile acceleration levels and higher frequencies.  The soil characteristics strongly influence the sheet pile vibration levels. A clear distinction could be made between "smooth" and "hard" driving, the latter being associated with an impact situation at the sheet pile toe.  The focus of ground vibration studies should not only be the vertical vibrations. Indeed, the ground vibrations’ horizontal component was found to be of the same or even higher magnitude than the vertical component.

The author Mike Davis has labelled our entire globe as a planet of slums. This hesis aims to provide some insights to the research field of slum rehabilitation, and thus contribution to efforts to make our globe slum free. The United Nations states that security of tenure is one of the essential preconditions for improvements in slums. The statement comes with support from academic research, which highlights the relation between secure tenure and a slums physical quality. Out of these messages two hypotheses are formulated and tested throughout the thesis; one theoretical, the other empirical. The theoretical section holds that tenure should be studied according to property rights and tenure status, that interventions for slum rehabilitation should support the dwellers efforts of incremental development, that tenure is granted in both the informal and formal land market, and that there are several causalities between secure tenure and the quality of housing and infrastructure. The case study examines 208 informal settlements in terms of their living conditions in the city of Pune, India. The thesis draws on empirical data in the form of a citywide slum survey that has been made available by the non-governmental organisations, Maharashtra Action League and CHF International, both of which operate in Pune. The empirical section reveals that secure tenure does not influence housing quality at all, that secure tenure just slightly influences available infrastructure in a settlement, and that urban planners are able to support a sustainable and incremental rehabilitation of slums by focusing on tenure security.

Ziel der Dissertation war die Überprüfung der klinischen Wirksamkeit von Natriumsalicylat bei respiratorischen Erkrankungen von Mastputen unter Feldbedingungen. Bisher existieren keine konkreten Richtlinien bzw. Modelle zum Versuchsaufbau beim Geflügel, und explizit bei der Pute, zur Durchführung einer derartigen Studie. Daher stellten sowohl die Konzeption als auch die Implementierung eines Studiendesigns zur Untersuchung der Wirksamkeit eines Antiphlogistikums bei der Mastpute unter Feldbedingungen eine zusätzliche elementare Zielsetzung dieser Promotion dar. Die in dieser Dissertationsschrift entwickelten Feldstudien orientieren sich an den Leitlinien der good clinical practice sowie der guideline for the conduct of efficacy studies for non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs und entsprechen der Wertigkeitsklasse Ia der evidenzbasierten Veterinärmedizin. Jede der drei Feldstudien wurde als kontrollierte, randomisierte und verblindete Parallelgruppenstudie in verschiedenen Regionen Deutschlands durchgeführt und gliederte sich in eine viertägige experimentelle Phase (EP) und eine siebentägige postexperimentelle Phase (PoP). Die zunächst definierten Arbeitshypothesen bekamen entsprechende Beurteilungskriterien zugewiesen. Unter deren Nutzung erfolgte die spätere Evaluierung, inwieweit die entzündungshemmende Wirkung von Natriumsalicylat imstande war, den Heilungsprozess der respiratorischen Grunderkrankung zu beschleunigen und eine verbesserte restitutio ad integrum hervorzurufen.