Livestock-based agriculture plays an important role in the development of sub-saharan Africa, especially those countries whose livestock industry contributes significantly to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In Kenya, agriculture alone accounts for 21% of the GDP and provides employment directly or indirectly to over 75% of the total labour force. The livestock industry, mainly arid rangelands, contributes 50% of the agricultural productivity. However, these Arid and Semi-Arid Lands (ASALs) are exposed to a myriad of risks affecting the environment which is the pastoral core asset. These risks arise from climatic change and variability, growth in human population and expanding settlements, changes in the land use systems, poor infrastructure, diseases, wildlife predation, and inter-ethnic conflicts. The consequences of these pastoral risks include: (1) declining per capita asset value, (2) increased health problems, (3) increased poverty, and (4) declining GDP generated from pastoralism. While a lot of resources have been invested in responding to the pastoral crisis associated with droughts, there is still inadequate understanding of the policy measures to put in place as mitigation strategies. The aims of this research are (1) identify the main pastoral risks and community response strategies, (2) assess the impact the identified risks on the wellbeing of pastoralists based on financial, human, physical, natural and social capital measurements (5 C‘s), and (3) develop a System Dynamics (SD) model to assess the holistic impact of community and government response strategies on pastoral wellbeing. Samburu district, in northern Kenya, was chosen as a study area because it is classified as 100% ASAL and experiences frequent droughts and changing land use systems. The research process involved literature synthesis, analysis of both cross-sectional and a 5-year panel data, and the development of a System Dynamics model. Cross-section data was primarily collected for the purposes of identifying the extent to which risks affect households, while the 5-year panel data was sourced from the Arid Lands Resource Management Project (ALRMP). Descriptive and empirical analysis showed that droughts, land use system and human population were considered as the main cause of shrinking rangeland productivity and as a result declining per capita livestock. This was further confirmed from the panel data analysis indicating climate variability as the main driver of pastoral wellbeing. Droughts affect rangeland pasture productivity, market prices, livestock assets, and households‘ nutritional status and poverty levels. These results imply a multifaceted nature of pastoral system with compound affects. The SD simulation result, which was run over the period January 2006 to December 2030, provided insights on policy evaluation and the state of pastoral wellbeing. Baseline scenario indicated reducing livestock ownership, causing high malnutrition and poverty rates. Strategies which incorporated rangeland rehabilitation, planned settlements, livestock disease control, insurance against droughts, reducing inter-ethnic conflicts, and timely destocking offered better policy options. These strategies resulted in reduced malnutrition, increased pasture productivity, reduced livestock losses and ultimately reducing poverty rates among the pastoral communities.

Mega projects have become an important new development strategy in globalizing cities, and a new or emerging form of development in economic, technological, social and political life, influenced by global flows of capital. Despite being acknowledged as an important factor in globalizing economies, the role of mega projects has failed to receive appropriate research attention in terms of analysis of the various advantages and disadvantages that they carry. This research seeks to achieve a better understanding of the nature of urban development, and its implications for Dubai. The research involves an assessment of whether urban mega projects actually develop as a result of globalisation processes and draws conclusions on conflicting discussions about economic growth and social change. The research aims to establish Dubai’s attitudes towards urban mega projects and globalisation, focusing on the ways the phenomenon is conceptualized, and on understanding the impacts of the new urban paradigm, with particular reference to the Jumeirah Palm Island mega project. The research sets out to examine three key issues; firstly what are the effects of global economic factors and foreign direct investment, and how have economic factors have become a catalyst for development? Secondly, the thesis considers the technological and architectural features of large-scale development. Thirdly, it focuses on new social trends and the extent of public participation, and analyses the political dimensions of globalisation. The research reveals that whilst there are some similarities with other mega projects around the world, the Jumeirah Palm Island mega project is the product of a unique development policy. There are many global elements in the Palm Island development but there is also a significant regional dimension, as in many of the underpinning capital flows. It is argued that the adoption of a mega projects policy may have had negative consequences on the indigenous population of Dubai, which has become a minority 12% of the total population.

The thesis examines the functions of universities in transforming a developing economy into a Knowledge Based Economy (KBE). Universities play a vital role in strengthening the KBE by providing the resource, ‘knowledge’. This study explores the challenges encountered by academic leadership in Pakistan, while striving to achieve a KBE. Although, the Higher Education Commission (HEC), has introduced a large number of reforms in universities of Pakistan since 2003 but these reforms are only a beginning of a process of engagement of universities in socioeconomic development. The newly established Commission was charged with the task to align higher education with the needs of the country, provide greater access to quality higher education, and develop the skills of faculty. Other steps towards reformation of the higher education sector of Pakistan included the introduction of quality assurance systems in universities, investment in their physical as well as knowledge infrastructure and developing a ranking system for universities in order to create a competitive environment among them. These measures taken by the HEC were fundamental for the development of a globally recognised higher education system. The current emphasis on the promotion of entrepreneurship is now leading to the establishment of technology parks and technology transfer offices on campuses so that universities can contribute directly to the process of socioeconomic development. The thesis elaborates the conditions, which facilitate or hamper the functions of universities in Pakistan. University–industry linkages in the United States (Silicon Valley) and United Kingdom (Oxford and Cambridge) have inspired many developing countries. In order to follow the same trends, universities in Pakistan are adopting the entrepreneurial role too. However, there is a gap in the literature regarding how the roles and functions of universities in developing economies differ from those of universities in a KBE. Therefore, the researcher aims to fill this gap in the literature by investigating the perceptions of academic leaders in Pakistan. This research employs a qualitative design and grounded theory research strategy. The sample size consists of fifty semi structured interviews with various stakeholders of higher education such as the leaders of the higher education regulatory body (Higher Education Commission), five high ranking universities of Pakistan and the Intellectual Property Organisation (IPO) in Pakistan. Data are analysed inductively, resulting in a new substantive theory, the Model of Symbiosis. The study reveals, there are external and internal factors which facilitate the formation of a KBE. The external factor which include, good governance, political stability, an effective policy framework and strengthening of the institutions (government, judicial institutions, educational and financial institutions) while internal factors include the development of physical infrastructure of universities and knowledge creation as well as dissemination activities taking place in universities. These factors help in the creation of positive mind-set towards ‘knowledge’. Moreover, a KBE is based on surplus knowledge and innovation capability of a country. The production and use of surplus knowledge require collaboration among different institutional actors. The State, the National Eco-system of Education and the corporate sector, have to work in a symbiotic relationship so that synergy for a welfare society is generated. This welfare society will thrive economically and also it will become a part of the global international community. The researcher advocates that universities can put the economy on a stable condition if they are ‘tasked’ and deployed on a mission to solve issues of the society such as enhancing agricultural productivity, resolving the issue of electricity shortage, provision of clean drinking water, infrastructure development, and the growth of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to create employment opportunities. Hence, universities in developing countries can act as agents of change provided that their basic infrastructure (both knowledge infrastructure and physical infrastructure) is developed and it supports those universities in their roles. Secondly, along with the basic infrastructure, a regulatory framework and intellectual property regimes should also be in place to strengthen the economy in developing countries.

Most of the thesis is devoted to studying the collapse of the Mexican peso in December 1994 using empirical methods that allow shifts in regimes, as well as a small theoretical model based on the escape clause approach. Also, we present a study of the consumption boom observed in Mexico in the period 1989-1994 to highlight the importance of taking into account structural breaks in co-integration modelling. We use a series of realignment expectations, as well as linear and non-linear methods, to look for evidence that helps to characterise the Mexican crisis. Contrary to the predictions of first-generation models of currency crises, we find that the credibility of the peso did not experience any steady deterioration before its devaluation, and there was no stable relationship between realignment expectations and economic fundamentals. By using a Markov-switching regression model, we show that realignment expectations shifted over time between regimes of relatively high and low credibility, and that these shifts were more frequent during the troubled 1994. This evidence makes it problematic to endorse explanations of the collapse of the peso based on models of speculative attacks, and suggests using the approach of second-generation models of currency crises to study the Mexican experience. The theoretical model is designed to illustrate some specific features of the Mexican experience. We argue that the substitution of peso denominated assets for dollar denominated and indexed assets in investors’ portfolios helped policymakers to resist recurrent periods of confidence crisis during 1994, but it also made it more difficult to eliminate a potential self-fulfilling devaluation. In particular, the sterilisation of reserve losses during 1994 seems to be more important in the onset of the devaluation of the peso than the increase in the stock of dollar indexed bonds. We use an index of pressure in the foreign exchange market and mean-variance Markov- switching models to study the timing and causes of the shifts of the Mexican economy between states of calm and crisis. Models with time-varying transition probabilities do not yield conclusive results. Hence, we adopt a two step approach to obtain the probability of the state of crisis at each date in the sample, and then model this series as a function of economic fundamentals and political events. We find that the reduction of the debt-output ratio and positive political events maintained the economy in the state of calm up to 1994, despite a continuous real appreciation of the peso. However, the end of the declining path of the debt-output ratio and negative political shocks produced a shift towards the state of crisis for most of 1994 that finally led to the collapse of the peso. The study of the consumption boom observed in Mexico in the period 1989-1994 illustrates that structural breaks in long run relationships can be dated and evaluated if we allow regime shifts in co-integration modelling. The available data rejects a stable co-integration relationship between consumption and income. Meanwhile, using Markov- switching models, we find that there was a marked shift in the co-integration vector after the implementation of the program for stabilisation and economic reform in December 1987. The program caused the former unitary income elasticity of consumption to increase by almost 30 per cent, but later the shift was reversed when the currency and financial crisis erupted at the end of 1994.

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Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T20:20:35Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 TeseSSR.pdf: 4068903 bytes, checksum: 04896bfbefd0027002928519a22c3786 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2003-12-19 / Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais / Hemoglobin structural and functional aspects, as well as the presence of intraerythrocitic organic phosphates of 167 individuals of 10 species of bats, belonging to Phyllostomidae (Artibeus planirostris, Phyllostomus discolor, Artibeus lituratus, Carollia perspicillata, Desmodus rotundus, Glossophaga soricina), and Molossidae family (Molossus ater, Molossus molossus, Nyctinomops laticaudatus e Eumops perotis) were studied. These individuals were collected in different areas of São Paulo State. Hemoglobin of these individuals were submitted to starch gel electrophoresis and showed all the same pattern: one slow major, migrating close to A2 human hemoglobin and one minor fast component, migrating close to human hemoglobin A. No intra and inter specific variation were detected. Variations on functional properties in blood were detected. Most of the species (7) presented normal Bohr effect, while C. perspicillata, D. rotundus e M. molossus null Bohr effect. Artibeus planirostris presented reverse Bohr effect. All the hemoglobin samples showed normal Bohr effect in the stripped form as well as in the presence of 2,3-biphospho glicerate and inositol hexaphosphate. The addition of this organic phosphate has altered both Bohr effect and P50 values. The oxygen affinities were high in all hemoglobins. In vivo, the oxygen affinity of bat hemoglobins is lower due to modulator effect,probably ,3.biphospho glicerate. In the erythrocytes of all individuals studied 2,3-biphospho glycerate were found in varying concentrations and a little higher than most of Mammals. No inositol polyphosphates were found in any sample tested. / Foram estudados aspectos estruturais e funcionais da hemoglobina, bem como, a presença dos fosfatos orgânicos em 163 indivíduos de 10 espécies de morcegos pertencentes à família Phyllostomidae (Artibeus planirostris, Phyllostomus discolor, Artibeus lituratus, Carollia perspicillata, Desmodus rotundus, Glossophaga soricina), e Molossidae (Molossus ater, Molossus molossus, Nyctinomops laticaudatus e Eumops perotis). Essas espécies foram coletadas em regiões diferentes do estado de São Paulo. Através de eletroforese em gel de amido, foram detectado nas 10 espécies estudadas, dois componentes hemoglobínicos, um componente maior, de mobilidade próxima à hemoglobina A2., e outro menor, de mobilidade próxima a da Hb A humana. Não foi detectada qualquer variação intra ou interespecífica. Foram detectadas, variações nas propriedades funcionais do sangue. A maioria (7) das espécies apresentou efeito Bohr normal, enquanto que C. perspicillata, D. rotundus e M. molossus apresentou efeito Bohr nulo. Artibeus planirostris apresentou efeito Bohr reverso. Todas as espécies apresentaram hemoglobina com efeito Bohr normal na forma stripped, bem como na presença dos moduladores 2,3-bifosfoglicerato e inositol hexafosfato . A adição desses fosfatos orgânicos alterou tanto amplitude do efeito Bohr quanto os valores de P50. A afinidade ao oxigênio das hemoglobinas stripped das espécies estudadas é alta, sendo diminuída, in vivo, por ação de moduladores, provavelmente o 2,3,bifosfoglicerato. Nos eritrócitos de todas as espécies estudadas mostraram 2,3.bifosfoglicerato em concentrações que variaram dependendo da espécie, mas levemente superiores à da maioria dos mamíferos. Não foi detectado qualquer tipo de inositol polifosfatado nos eritrócitos das espécies estudadas.

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In this thesis, we are interested in the asymptotic analysis of extremes and risks. The heavy-tailed distribution function is used to model the extreme risks, which is widely applied in insurance and is gradually penetrating in finance as well. We also use various tools such as copula, to model dependence structures, and extreme value theorem, to model rare events. We focus on modelling and analysing of extreme risks as well as demonstrate how the derived results that can be used in practice. We start from a discrete-time risk model. More concretely, consider a discrete-time annuity-immediate risk model in which the insurer is allowed to invest its wealth into a risk-free or a risky portfolio under a certain regulation. Then the insurer is said to be exposed to a stochastic economic environment that contains two kinds of risk, the insurance risk and financial risk. The former is traditional liability risk caused by insurance loss while the latter is the asset risk resulting from investment. Within each period, the insurance risk is denoted by a real-valued random variable X, and the financial risk Y as a positive random variable fulfils some constraints. We are interested in the ruin probability and the tail behaviour of maximum of the stochastic present values of aggregate net loss with Sarmanov or Farlie-Gumbel-Morgenstern (FGM) dependent insurance and financial risks. We derive asymptotic formulas for the finite-ruin probability with lighted-tailed or moderately heavy-tailed insurance risk for both risk-free investment and risky investment. As an extension, we improve the result for extreme risks arising from a rare event, combining simulation with asymptotics, to compute the ruin probability more efficiently. Next, we consider a similar risk model but a special case that insurance and financial risks following the least risky FGM dependence structure with heavy-tailed distribution. We follow the study of Chen (2011) that the finite-time ruin probability in a discrete-time risk model in which insurance and financial risks form a sequence of independent and identically distributed random pairs following a common bivariate FGM distribution function with parameter -1 ≤ θ ≤ 1 governing the strength of dependence. For the subexponential case, when -1 < θ ≤ 1, a general asymptotic formula for the finite-time ruin probability was derived. However, the derivation there is not valid for θ = -1. In this thesis, we complete the study by extending Chen's work to θ = -1 that the insurance risk and financial risk are negatively dependent. We refer this situation as the least risky FGM dependent insurance risk and financial risk. The new formulas for θ = −1 look very different from, but are intrinsically consistent with, the existing one for -1 < θ ≤ 1, and they offer a quantitative understanding on how significantly the asymptotic ruin probability decreases when θ switches from its normal range to its negative extremum. Finally, we study a continuous-time risk model. Specifically, we consider a renewal risk model with a constant premium and a constant force of interest rate, where the claim sizes and inter-arrival times follow certain dependence structures via some restriction on their copula function. The infinite-time absolute ruin probabilities are studied instead of the traditional infinite-time ruin probability with light-tailed or moderately heavy-tailed claim-size. Under the assumption that the distribution of the claim-size belongs to the intersection of the convolution-equivalent class and the rapid-varying tailed class, or a larger intersection class of O-subexponential distribution, the generalized exponential class and the rapid-varying tailed class, the infinite-time absolute ruin probabilities are derived.

In today's fast evolving Central and Eastern Europe, economic perspectives, especially European Union perspectives are indispensable to the success of the transformation process initiated in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Based on our research output, this thesis offers many such perspectives that can help understand the logic of the transformation and the subsequent business done by national and international enterprises. We have interwoven many information-rich threads of transformation principles with banking, dynamic cultural factors and tax policy that influence these new market-economy countries. We observe the role and the process of financial institutions and also consider the impact that information technology exerts on these economies and thus concluding that the significance of culture development and the betterment of the population are the central driving force within a wider Europe. This thesis offers fundamental notions that influence cross-cultural interactions also, providing a concrete basis for understanding the influence of Central and Eastern European countries on the European Union's political choices and vice versa. We examine the transformation and its significance, paradoxes and the interplay of economic approaches and entrepreneurship. In the specific, we look at how the European Union policy towards these countries evolved, suggesting that a trend towards a Bruxelles Consensus is the specific outcome of the European Union's attitudes towards Central and Eastern Europe. An extended evaluation of the consequences for all of us will also emerge as our approach has been that to present all these aspects in a way that inspire understanding of basic governing issues and expectations concerning the future on Central and Eastern Europe in the ever-growing European Union.

Since the Global Financial Crisis, the literature of financial networks analysis has been trying to investigate the changes in the financial networks structure, that led to the instability of the financial system. The Global Financial Crisis followed by the Great Recession costed taxpayers an unprecedented $14 trillion (Alessandri and Haldane, 2009), austerity and downturns in GDP. The dynamics of the financial networks transferred the collapse of a US housing market bubble into a large meltdown of the financial systems globally. The study of systemic risk and macro-prudential policy has come to the forefront to model and manage the negative externalities of monetary, fiscal and financial sector activities that can lead to system wide instabilities and failure. The dimensions of crisis propagation have been modelled as those that can spread cross-sectionally in domino like failures with global scope, or build up over time, as in asset bubbles. The cross sectional propagation of shocks that occur due to non-payment of debt or other financial obligations with the failure of a financial intermediary or a sovereign leading to the failure of other economic entities, is called financial contagion. Cross sectional analysis of financial contagion can be done using statistical methods or by network analysis. The latter gives a structural model of the interconnections in terms of financial obligations. This dissertation uses both approaches to model financial contagion. The applications include the study of systemic risk in Eurozone Sovereign crisis, the US CDS market and the global banking network. This is organized in three self-contained chapters Our contribution to the literature begins with the study of the dynamics of the market of the Credit Default Swap (CDS) contracts for selected Eurozone sovereigns and the UK. The EWMA correlation analysis and the Granger-causality test demonstrate that there was contagion effect since correlations and cross-county interdependencies increased after August 2007. Furthermore, the IRF analysis shows that among PIIGS, the CDS spreads of Spain and Ireland have the biggest impact on the European CDS spreads, whereas the UK is found not be a source of sovereign contagion to the Eurozone. Next we perform the empirical reconstruction of the US CDS network based on the real-world data obtained from the FDIC Call Reports, and study the propagation of contagion, assuming different network structures. The financial network shows a highly tiered core-periphery structure. We find that network topology matters for the stability of the financial system. The “too interconnected to fail” phenomenon is discussed and shown to be the result of highly tiered network with central core of so called super-spreaders. In this type of network the contagion is found to be short, without multiple waves, but with very high losses brought by the core of the network. Finally we study a global banking network (GBN) model based on the Markose (2012) eigen-pair approach and propose a systemic risk indices (SRI) which provide early warning signals for systemic instability and also the rank order of the systemic importance and vulnerability of the banking systems. The empirical model is based on BIS Consolidated Banking Statistics for the exposures of 19 national banking systems to the same number of debtor countries and the data obtained from Bankscope for the equity capital of these 19 national banking systems. The SRI is based on the ratio of the netted cross-border exposures of the national banking systems to their respective equity capital. The eigen-pair method stipulates that if the maximum eigenvalue of the network exceeds the capital threshold, there is cause for concern of a contagion. This is compared with the loss multiplier SRI proposed by Castrén and Rancan (2012). The latter is found to have no early warning capabilities and peaks well after the onset of the crisis in 2009 while the eigen-pair SRI gives ample warning by late 2006 that the cross border liabilities was unsustainable in respect of the equity capital of the national banking systems. We contribute to the literature by highlighting the efficacy of the network approach to systemic stability analysis of GBNs. In particular we develop an eigen-pair approach for GBNs and prove its usefulness in an early warning context.