L’Organisation mondiale de la santé animale (OIE) est l’institution internationale responsable de la mise en place des mesures sanitaires associées aux échanges commerciaux d’animaux vivants. Le zonage est une méthode de contrôle recommandée par l’OIE pour certaines maladies infectieuses, dont l’influenza aviaire. Les éclosions d’influenza aviaire été extrêmement coûteuses pour l’industrie avicole partout dans le monde. Afin d’évaluer la possibilité d’user de cette approche en Ontario, les données sur les sites de production avicole ont été fournies par les fédérations d’éleveurs de volailles ce cette province. L’information portant sur les industries associées à la production avicole, soit les meuneries, les abattoirs, les couvoirs, et les usines de classification d’œufs, a été obtenue par l’entremise de plusieurs sources, dont des représentants de l’industrie avicole. Des diagrammes de flux a été crée afin de comprendre les interactions entre les sites de production et les industries associées à ceux-ci. Ces industries constituaient les éléments de bas nécessaires au zonage. Cette analyse a permis de créer une base de données portant sur intrants et extrants de production pour chaque site d’élevage avicole, ainsi que pour les sites de production des industries associées à l’aviculture. À l’aide du logiciel ArcGIS, cette information a été fusionnée à des données géospatiales de Statistique Canada de l’Ontario et du Québec. La base de données résultante a permis de réaliser les essais de zonage. Soixante-douze essais ont été réalisés. Quatre ont été retenus car celles minimisaient de façon similaire les pertes de production de l’industrie. Ces essais montrent que la méthode utilisée pour l’étude du zonage peut démontrer les déficits et les surplus de production de l’industrie avicole commerciale en Ontario. Ceux-ci pourront servir de point de départ lors des discussions des intervenants de l’industrie avicole, étant donné que la coopération et la communication sont essentielles au succès du zonage. / The World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) is the international reference body for international trade standards for live animals. Zoning is a method of controlling certain infectious diseases, including avian influenza, recommended by the OIE for use when appropriate. Avian influenza outbreaks have been extremely costly to the poultry industry throughout the world. In order to assess whether this approach was possible in Ontario, data on poultry industry production sites were provided by the Ontario poultry marketing boards. Zone borders were formed based on two criteria. The first criterion was the supply of essential products and services such that within-zone commercial poultry production could be maintained. The second was the contiguity of the zone’s territory. Four associated industries were identified which provide essential products and services: feed mills, abattoirs, hatcheries, and egg grading stations. A product flow analysis was completed to understand the direction of product movements between the poultry production sites and the sites of the four associated industries. This analysis was used to create a database of input requirements and output production capacity from each type of poultry production site. Using ArcGIS, this information was merged with geospatial data from Statistics Canada on Ontario and Quebec to create the database used for zoning scenarios. Seventy-two scenarios were completed; of these, four were chosen which minimized production loss over the whole industry. These scenarios demonstrate that the method used for the zoning study can identify the production deficits and surpluses of the commercial poultry industry in Ontario. These scenarios can serve as a starting point for discussion among industry stakeholders, as cooperation and communication are essential to the success of zoning.

Water management is a challenge in the Middle East today because of increasing population, decreasing water quality, political instability and security concerns. Israel and the Palestinian Authority share the three major freshwater sources in an inequitable and unsustainable manner. This study details the hydro-geological, political, cultural and legal challenges to equitable and sustainable water resource management in the region.

L’Organisation mondiale de la santé animale (OIE) est l’institution internationale responsable de la mise en place des mesures sanitaires associées aux échanges commerciaux d’animaux vivants. Le zonage est une méthode de contrôle recommandée par l’OIE pour certaines maladies infectieuses, dont l’influenza aviaire. Les éclosions d’influenza aviaire été extrêmement coûteuses pour l’industrie avicole partout dans le monde. Afin d’évaluer la possibilité d’user de cette approche en Ontario, les données sur les sites de production avicole ont été fournies par les fédérations d’éleveurs de volailles ce cette province. L’information portant sur les industries associées à la production avicole, soit les meuneries, les abattoirs, les couvoirs, et les usines de classification d’œufs, a été obtenue par l’entremise de plusieurs sources, dont des représentants de l’industrie avicole. Des diagrammes de flux a été crée afin de comprendre les interactions entre les sites de production et les industries associées à ceux-ci. Ces industries constituaient les éléments de bas nécessaires au zonage. Cette analyse a permis de créer une base de données portant sur intrants et extrants de production pour chaque site d’élevage avicole, ainsi que pour les sites de production des industries associées à l’aviculture. À l’aide du logiciel ArcGIS, cette information a été fusionnée à des données géospatiales de Statistique Canada de l’Ontario et du Québec. La base de données résultante a permis de réaliser les essais de zonage. Soixante-douze essais ont été réalisés. Quatre ont été retenus car celles minimisaient de façon similaire les pertes de production de l’industrie. Ces essais montrent que la méthode utilisée pour l’étude du zonage peut démontrer les déficits et les surplus de production de l’industrie avicole commerciale en Ontario. Ceux-ci pourront servir de point de départ lors des discussions des intervenants de l’industrie avicole, étant donné que la coopération et la communication sont essentielles au succès du zonage. / The World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) is the international reference body for international trade standards for live animals. Zoning is a method of controlling certain infectious diseases, including avian influenza, recommended by the OIE for use when appropriate. Avian influenza outbreaks have been extremely costly to the poultry industry throughout the world. In order to assess whether this approach was possible in Ontario, data on poultry industry production sites were provided by the Ontario poultry marketing boards. Zone borders were formed based on two criteria. The first criterion was the supply of essential products and services such that within-zone commercial poultry production could be maintained. The second was the contiguity of the zone’s territory. Four associated industries were identified which provide essential products and services: feed mills, abattoirs, hatcheries, and egg grading stations. A product flow analysis was completed to understand the direction of product movements between the poultry production sites and the sites of the four associated industries. This analysis was used to create a database of input requirements and output production capacity from each type of poultry production site. Using ArcGIS, this information was merged with geospatial data from Statistics Canada on Ontario and Quebec to create the database used for zoning scenarios. Seventy-two scenarios were completed; of these, four were chosen which minimized production loss over the whole industry. These scenarios demonstrate that the method used for the zoning study can identify the production deficits and surpluses of the commercial poultry industry in Ontario. These scenarios can serve as a starting point for discussion among industry stakeholders, as cooperation and communication are essential to the success of zoning.

South Africa is a semi arid country in which the average rainfall of 450mm/year is well below the world average of about 860mm/year. As a result, South Africa’s water resources are scarce in global terms and limited in extent. Current predictions are that demand will outstrip water availability in the next 15 years. A coordinated approach to improve both water quality and quantity is needed and in order to achieve that, it is crucial to strengthen capacities of local community involvement in identifying the problems that affect them and strategies to solve them. This research was undertaken to develop a deeper understanding of community learning processes in integrated water resources management (IWRM) practices. The study drew on situated and social learning theory which explains that knowledge and skills are learned and embedded in the contexts in which knowledge is obtained and applied in everyday situations. Multiple data collection techniques were used within a case study design and included document analysis, interviews, focus group discussions and field observations. Data analysis was done in three phases and involved uncovering patterns and trends in the data sets. In this context I discovered, through careful observation and interviews with members of the different communities of practice, that people are learning through social learning interactions with other community members as they engage in their daily water management and food production practices. Learning interactions take place through both informal and formal processes such as meetings, training workshops, conversations and interactions with outsiders. I also discovered that people learn from ‘external groups’ or training programmes which bring new knowledge and expertise, but this needs to be contextualised in the local communities of practice. The research has also shown that there are a number of challenges that appear to exist in these learning contexts. For instance it was found that participation and social learning processes and interactions are influenced by a range of causal mechanisms that are contextual. These insights into how communities learn, as well as the tensions and difficulties that are experienced in the learning processes are important for furthering learning and participation in community-based IWRM practices, projects and programmes.

Made available in DSpace on 2010-04-20T20:51:22Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 3 57659.pdf.jpg: 19638 bytes, checksum: 9e5bd0c5201b6d99e3da4e91f332f1b9 (MD5) 57659.pdf: 509197 bytes, checksum: 7a7b5b23d42ea64ff6d345d627a0cf19 (MD5) 57659.pdf.txt: 218404 bytes, checksum: 81a61ea0397036f8654e17538664d034 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2006-07-04T00:00:00Z / Studies and researches on the reasons of the increase in healthcare costs tends to focus on a set of factors, such as the increase of materials and medicines prices, the new technologies, the aging of the population, among others. However, there are few studies that analyses the interactions between the healthcare system participants which may result in inefficiencies, or reveal the logic behind the exchange of values between healthcare market players and its rationality, in order to identify some issues which may contribute to the raising costs in the healthcare system, not followed by an increase of benefits to the end users. It is known that great part of healthcare expenses occurs within the hospital settings. Therefore this research analyzes some aspects of the hospital purchasing, in order to describe major aspects in the relationship between some parts involved in its dynamics, identify specificities of hospital purchasing, and verify some inefficiencies in the health care value chain. Four private hospitals of the city of São Paulo have been chosen and from each of these hospitals, an executive of the high administration, the purchasing/supply manager and a physician were interviewed. From the perception of the interviewees some inefficiencies were identified, as the dependence of some hospitals on the materials and medicine commercialization margins, which reveals the existence of a cost in the system not directly related to the real value added by the hospitals; the difficulty in standardizing the surgical materials that represent one the major purchase expenses in these institutions; the existence of supplier’s marketing practices that try to annul the rationality of the purchase; the difficulty to align the objectives between hospitals, health plans, physicians and suppliers, among others. / Os estudos e pesquisas sobre as razões do crescimento dos custos na Saúde apontam um conjunto de fatores, como o aumento dos preços dos materiais e medicamentos, os avanços tecnológicos, o envelhecimento da população, entre outros. Porém, poucos são os estudos que procuram analisar como a interação entre as partes que constituem o sistema de saúde pode resultar em ineficiências, ou que procuram desvendar a lógica de como se dão as trocas de valores entre os players desse mercado e sua racionalidade, a fim de identificar fatores que elevem os custos no sistema sem um aumento de benefícios aos usuários finais. Sabe-se que grande parte dos gastos na saúde ocorre dentro dos hospitais. Sendo assim, este trabalho buscou analisar a gestão de compras dos hospitais, para descrever aspectos relevantes no relacionamento entre algumas partes envolvidas na dinâmica da compra hospitalar, conhecer especificidades da gestão de compras destas organizações, e verificar algumas ineficiências na cadeia de valor da saúde. Foram escolhidos quatro hospitais privados do município de São Paulo, onde foram entrevistados um executivo da alta administração, um gestor de compras e um médico. A partir da percepção destes entrevistados foram identificadas algumas ineficiências, como a dependência de alguns hospitais nas margens de comercialização de materiais e medicamentos, que mostra a existência de um custo no sistema, desvinculado do real valor agregado pelos hospitais; a dificuldade em se padronizar os materiais cirúrgicos que representam um dos maiores gastos em compras nestas instituições; a existência práticas de marketing dos fornecedores que tentam anular a racionalidade da compra, a dificuldade de alinhamento de objetivos entre hospitais, operadoras de planos de saúde, médico e fornecedores, entre outros.

The implementation of water policy and the integrated management of water face multiple challenges in South Africa (SA), despite the successes of post-apartheid government programmes in which some significant equity, sustainability and efficiency milestones have been met. This study uses a series of intervention processes into municipal water service delivery to explore the context, constraints, and real-world messiness in which local water authorities operate. The equitable provision of drinking water by local government and the collaborative management of untreated water by ‘water user associations’ are two sites of institutional conflict that have been subjected to broad ‘turnaround’ and ‘transformation’ attempts at the national level. This thesis seeks to explore and understand the use of transdisciplinary research in engaging local water authorities in a process of institutional change that increases the likelihood of equitable water supply in the Lower Sundays River Valley (LSRV). Fieldwork was conducted as part of a broader action research process involving the attempted ‘turnaround’ of the Sundays River Valley Municipality (SRVM) between 2011 and 2014. A multi-method research approach was employed, which drew on institutional, ethnographic, and systems analyses within an evolving, transdisciplinary methodology. In the single case study research design, qualitative and quantitative data were collected via participant observation, interviews and documentary sources. Analytical methods included system dynamics modelling and an adapted form of the ethnographic tool of ‘thick description’, which were linked in a governance analysis. Government interventions into the SRVM failed to take account of the systemic complexity of the municipal operating environment, the interactions of which are described in this study as the ‘modes of failure’ of local government. These modes included the perpetual ‘firefighting’ responses of municipal officials to crises, and the simultaneous underinvestment in, and over-extension of, water supply infrastructure, which is a rational approach to addressing current water shortages when funds are unavailable for maintenance, refurbishment, or the construction of new infrastructure. The over-burdening of municipalities with technocratic requirements, the presence of gaps in the institutional arrangements governing water supply in the LSRV, and the lack of coordination in government interventions are analysed in this study, with policy recommendations resulting. The primary contribution of this study is in providing a substantively-contextualised case study that illustrates the value of systemic, engaged, extended, and embedded transdisciplinary research.

In most of the urban cities of developing countries piped water supply is intermittent and they receive water on alternate days for about few hours. The Unaccounted For Water (UFW) in these cities is very high due to aged infrastructure, poor management and operation of the system. In the cities of developing countries, supplied water is not able to meet the demand and there is huge gap between supply and demand of water. To meet the water demand people are depending on other sources of water like groundwater, rain water harvesting, waste water treatment, desalination etc. Huge quantity of groundwater is extracted without any account for the quantity of water used. The main challenge for water authorities is to meet the consumer demands at varying loading conditions. However, the present execution of decisions in the operational management of WDS is through manual control. The manual control of valve throttling and control of pump speed, reduces the efficiency and operation of WDS. In such cases, system modeling coupled with automated control can play a significant role in the appropriate execution and operation of the system. In the past few decades, there has been a major development in the field of modeling and analysing water distribution systems. Most of the people in Indian mega cities are facing water problems as they are not able to receive safe reliable drinking water. In rapidly growing cities, the water resources management has been a major concern for the Government. There is always a need to optimize the available water resources when the rate of demand constantly beats the rate of replenishments. Mathematical modeling of WDS has become an indispensible tool since the ages to model any type of WDS. Development of mathematical models of WDS is necessary to analyse the system behavior for a wide range of operating conditions. Using models, problems can be anticipated in proposed or existing systems, and solutions can be evaluated before time, money, and materials are invested in a real-world project. In the present study, we have developed a model of WDS of a typical city like Bangalore, India and analysed them for several scenarios and operating conditions. Bangalore WDS is modeled using EPANET. Before a network model is used for analysis purpose, it must be ensured that the model is predicting the behavior of the system with reasonable accuracy. The process of matching the parameters of the developed model and the field observed data is known as calibration. All WDS require calibration for effective modeling and simulation of the system. Demand and roughness are the most uncertain parameters and they are adjusted repeatedly to get the required head at nodes and flow in the pipes. The calibration parameters usually include pipe roughness, valve settings, pipe diameter and demand. Pipe roughness, valve settings and pipe diameter are associated with the flow conditions and the demands relate to the boundary conditions. For Bangalore WDS, the values of roughness coefficient and demand are available; and the values of valve settings are not available. Hence, this value is estimated during calibration process. Dynamic Inversion (DI) nonlinear controller with Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) features (DI-PID) is used for calibrating WDS for valve settings on the basis of observed flow and roughness coefficient. From the obtained results it is observed that, controllers are capable of achieving the target flow to all the GLRs with acceptable difference between the flow meter readings and the simulated flow. After calibrating any real WDS to the field observed data, it will be useful for water authorities if the consumer demands are met up to certain extent. This can be achieved by using the concept of equitable distribution of water to different consumers. In the urban cities of developing countries, often large quantities of water are supplied to only a few consumers, leading to inequitable water supply. It is a well known fact that quantity of water supplied from the source is not distributed equitably among the consumers. Aged pipelines pump failures, improper management of water resources are some of the main reasons for it. Equitable water to different consumers can be provided by operating the system in an efficient manner. Most of the urban cities receive water from the source to intermediate reservoirs and from these reservoirs water is supplied to consumers. Therefore, to achieve equitable water supply, these two supply levels have to be controlled using different concepts/ techniques. The water requirement of each of the reservoirs has to be calculated, which may depend on the number of consumers and consumer category. Each reservoir should receive its share of water to satisfy its consumer demand and also there must be provision to accommodate shortages, if any. The calibrated model of Bangalore WDS is used to achieve equitable water supply quantity to different zones of Bangalore city. The city has large undulating terrain among different zones which leads to unequal distribution of water. Dynamic Inversion (DI) nonlinear controller with Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) features (DI-PID) is used for valve throttling to achieve the target flows to different zones/reservoirs of the city at different levels. Equitable water distribution to different reservoirs, when a part of the source fails to supply water is also discussed in this thesis. From the obtained results it is observed that, controllers were responding in all the cases in different levels of targets for such a huge network. When there is change in supply pattern to achieve the equitable supply of water to different zones, the hydraulics of the WDS will change. Therefore, it is necessary to understand whether the system is able to handle these changes. The concept of reliability can be used to analyse the performance of WDS for wide range of operating conditions. Reliability analysis of a WDS for both normal and likely to occur situations will give a better quality of service to its consumers. Calculating both hydraulic and mechanical reliability is important as the chances of occurrence of both the failure scenarios are equal in a WDS. In the present study, a methodology is presented to model the nodal, system and total reliability for water supply networks by considering the hydraulic and mechanical failure scenarios. These two reliability measures together give the total reliability of the system. Analysing a real and complex WDS for the probable chances of occurrence of the failure scenarios; and then to anlyse the total reliability of the system is not reported in the literature and this analysis is carried out in the present study for Bangalore city WDS. The hydraulics of the system for all the operating conditions is analysed using EPANET. Hydraulic reliability is calculated by varying the uncertain independent parameters (demand, roughness and source water) and mechanical reliability is calculated by assuming system component failures. The system is analysed for both the reliability scenarios by considering different chances of failure that may occur in a real WDS; and hence the total reliability is calculated by making different combinations of hydraulic and mechanical failure scenarios. Sensitivity analysis for all the zones is also carried out to understand the behavior of different demand points for large fluctuation in hydraulics of the system. From the study, it is observed that, Hydraulic reliability decreases as the demand variation increases. But, as the roughness variation increases, there is no much change in the nodal or system reliability. Consumer demand or reliability of the WDS can be increased by saving the water lost in the system. This can be achieved by tracking the water parcel from the source till the consumer end, which will give an idea about the performance of different stages and zones in achieving the target flows. Huge quantity of water is lost in WDS and hence it is necessary to account for the water lost at different levels, hence the system can be managed in a better way. In most of the intermittent water supply systems demand is controlled by supply side; there is also a need to understand the demand variation at the consumer end which in turn affects the supply. Matching this varied supply-demand gap at various levels is challenging task. To get a better control of such problem, water balance (WB) equations need to be derived at various levels. When we derive these WB equations it should be emphasized that UFW is one of the major component of this equation. Given this back ground of the complex problem, for a typical city like Bangalore, an attempt is made to derive WB equations at various levels. In the present study, stage-wise and zone-wise WB is analysed for different months based on the flow meter readings. The conceptual model developed is calibrated, validated and also the performance of the model is analysed by giving a chance of error in the flow measurement. Based on all the above observations, stage-wise and zone-wise water supply weights are also calculated. From the study it is found that, there is no much loss of water in all the four stages of supply. Water loss is minimal of about 3 % till water reaches from source to GLRs. Water is transferred between the stages during some days of the month, may be due to shortage of water or due to unexpected demand. Huge quantity of water is lost in the distribution main which is of about 40 to 45% for all the moths which is analysed. This type of model will be extremely useful for water supply managers to manage their resources more efficiently and this study is discussed in detail as a part of this thesis. As mentioned above, huge quantity of groundwater is used in urban cities and the quantity of water extracted is not accounted. In the present study, zone wise and sub zone-wise piped water and ground water used in different parts of the cities is analysed with the help of available data. From the study it is observed that, the quantity of piped water supply and UFW is consistent for the time period analysed and the quantity of water withdrawn from the borewells are varying considerably depending on the yield of the borewlls in different zones. The main components of urban water supply are piped water, ground water, rainfall and runoff generated, UFW, waste water produced and other water quantities which may be minute. In future, to manage the water resources properly, integrated water management is necessary in city scale which will give an idea about the total water produced and the water utilized at the consumer end. Therefore, integrated water management concept is carried out in Hebbal region, (a small part of Bangalore) using the available data. From the analysis we noticed that, domestic water supplied to North sub zones are better when comparing to East sub zones. This type of total water balance can be studied in other parts of Bangalore, to understand the behavior of different water components and to make better decisions. The developed model, analysis and operating conditions of this study can be applied to other similar cities like Bangalore. This type of study may be useful to water authorities for better control of the resources, or in making better decisions and these types of models will act as decision support systems.

The subject of this diploma thesis is construction project for implementation of bus terminal in Benešov. This thesis contains technical report, construction study of main technological stages, supply management for selected technological processes, technical report of site facilities including drawings, construction machinery and equipment for selected technological processes, technological specification for execution of earthworks SO01 & SO02, technological specification for execution of foundations SO01 & SO02, control and test plan for execution of earthworks, control and test plan for execution of foundations, safety and health protection plan for selected technological processes, construction site noise study and a construction study of reconstruction of roads in the terminal area.

The purpose of this study was to develop a framework for provision of essential medicines for the district health services. A qualitative descriptive, exploratory and contextual action research design was followed. The data collection was conducted through site visits and semi structured interviews targeting the responsible pharmacists who were purposively selected on the basis of their expert knowledge and experiences from the eight of the nine provinces of the Republic of South Africa which is a developing country with limited resources for provision of healthcare services. The study found that there was no standardised framework for provision of essential medicines for the District Health Services. Based on the site visits and action research findings a proposed framework covering the selection, procurement, warehousing, distribution and management support components for provision of essential medicines for district health services was developed and subjected to national pharmaceutical experts and district health services managers review and critique which is finally presented, after taking into consideration the experts inputs as a proposed framework emanating from the study. The proposed framework will contribute towards improving the provisioning and availability of essential medicines within the district health services. / Health Studies / D.Litt. et Phil. (Health Studies)

Water security is influenced by the complex interplay between ecological, socio-political, governance and water management systems. Achieving water security is essential for ensuring sustainable development, and challenges with water security are closely linked to the overall experience of poverty that many countries throughout the world, including South Africa, confront. These problems can broadly be understood through three main factors: water availability, access and usage; water governance and management underpin these factors. Water insecurity can often be seen in townships within South Africa, where water service delivery and water access is precarious. This study provides a lens into the water security experiences of two poor township communities in the Sundays River Valley Municipality (SRVM) namely Nomathamsanqa in Addo and Aquapark in Kirkwood. The research assessed water security patterns amongst RDP, township and informal settlement households serviced by the SRVM and found that communities face severe water security problems. Specifically, it was found that all township households encounter frequent water shortages, cuts in municipal water supply and water quality concerns. Issues around the payment for water and dissatisfaction with water service delivery also emerged. The purpose of this research was to allow for community experiences and perspectives to be expressed in an academic space that has previously been dominated by water management and policy makers. The study concludes that these communities within the SRVM experience significant challenges in securing safe water and these are largely due to social water scarcity issues and the difficulties the municipality faces concerning water service delivery.