Magister Philosophiae - MPhil / Sub-Saharan African countries in general with particular reference to Ghana, Cameroon and Burkina Faso depend mostly on agriculture which is seen as the main source of income. Agriculture provides income for a large percentage of the rural population, and employs about 70 per cent of its labour force with a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of about 30 per cent. Ghana, Cameroon and Burkina Faso as well as a large majority of African countries depend on subsistence farming and the cultivation of subsistence crops helps provide food and ensures food security for the people. Although they mostly depend on subsistence crops, they also produce primary export crops such as cocoa for Ghana, coffee for Cameroon, and cotton for Burkina Faso which represent a major source of foreign exchange. Due to the significant importance of agriculture in the above countries Ghana, Cameroon and Burkina Faso, gave great importance to agriculture by part taking in international trade negotiations or agreements on agriculture. These countries were involved more vigorously in the Uruguay Round where agricultural products were fully covered by multilateral trade rules for the first time. Farmers from Ghana, Cameroon and Burkina Faso are faced with so many challenges in exporting their agricultural products to world markets despite their participation in the agricultural trade reforms. They have restricted access to rich countries agricultural markets and they also face unfair competition in their own domestic markets from subsidised imports of food staples from wealthy countries. Other challenges such as: trade barriers, inadequate trade infrastructure (logistics and transportation), and inadequate institution serving farmers and agriculture and lack of technology to transform traditional agriculture are also of great importance. With regard to the above challenges faced by Ghana, Cameroon and Burkina Faso this research is to examine or analyse the impacts that international trade reforms have on the agricultural exports focusing on primary products (cash crops), such as cocoa, coffee and cotton which are a major source of export revenue for these countries and the livelihood basis for millions of rural households who grow these crops. The research will also look at the challenges faced by Ghana, Cameroon and Burkina Faso in exporting their agricultural products to developed countries‘ markets despite their participation in the international trade agreements on agriculture. Taking a look at the international trade reforms it can be seen that while the Uruguay Round will have a significant impact on global trade and economic welfare, its effect on the above countries‘ agricultural exports is expected to be much smaller, and if anything maybe negative. Ghana, Cameroon, Burkina Faso and most African countries are likely to gain slightly from tariff cuts and the elimination of non-tariff barriers on manufactured products. These countries will find themselves slightly worse off as a result of cuts to developed countries' subsidies to their agricultural exports, which tends to increase world food prices.

This master thesis explores what were the causes of falling behind of the Swedish economy during the 70s and 80s of the 20th century. In addition, it deals with the reforms that Sweden has implemented during 90's. Theoretical input is engaged in development of economy and society and focuses on the period of the 30s, which was crucial for further development and in which laid the foundation for later growth. In the analytical part are explored the causes of the economic slowdown. This led to the gradual decline of economic level and a slump in international rankings. Analysis of the reforms carried out during the 90s of the 20th century provides guidance for all countries which want to optimize the allocation of resources in the economy and are trying to accelerate economic growth.

The first chapter describes the political and economic development in Ghana and its impact on the creation of the formal educational system since the first european invasion on the african continent and the beginnings of colonialism until the end of 1990's. The second chapter analyses current educational system, especially its newly reformed structure and functioning. The third chapter concentrates on the two main problems of the educational system in Ghana, which are child labour and low quality of education.

In my thesis I have focused on economic development of China and India. The goal is to compare success of transformation in these countries based on the analysis of macroeconomic developments. The whole work is divided in three parts. In the first part are theoretical basis of work. In the second part is described economic development of China and India included main economic reforms. Last part contains a comparison of macroeconomic indicators and overall evaluation of applied methods of transformation.

This paper is focused on economic development of the People's Republic of China during the last decade. The aim of this paper is to analyse the economic transformation and identify key factors holding back the economic growth. In the theoretical part of this paper there will be a short introduction of China. Some Chinese social and economic specifics will also be explained. The end of this chapter will be focused on historical economic reforms and current goals for the economy. Next chapter will be focused on analysis of the economy in the last decade using the official available data. In the conclusion of this paper there will be presented findings and key factors holding back the economic growth of China.

The recent LIBOR rate scandal in which Barclays received a sizeable fine for their role in the exploitation of the Interbank rate has had a negative reputational impact on Absa, as Barclays’ owns more than 50.1 per cent of Absa’s shares. This raises the question as to what the impact is of foreign bank ownership on a developing country.The purpose of this research is to ascertain whether a developing country can attain economic growth benefits in the form of increased levels of competition and efficiency in its banking sector, by implementing the foreign bank entry or more specifically the foreign bank ownership of local banks, economic liberalisation reform.Using econometric analysis the study calculated the levels of competition and efficiency from the annual firm-level financial statements for the period 1999 to 2010. This was done in two phases, where Phase One was from 1999 to 2004 and Phase Two was from 2005 to 2010 representing the periods pre- and post the Barclays’ acquisition of Absa.The findings of the two phases were then compared and indicated that there was no significant change in the level of competition or in the level of efficiency in the South African banking sector.The findings of the two phases were then compared and indicated that there was no significant change in the level of competition or in the level of efficiency in the South African banking sector. / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / unrestricted

The judicial system of Poland is at the forefront of public, constitutional, political and legal debates of the European Union. Different aspects of rule of law in Poland, such as independence of judges, their right to irremovability, the alleged intention of the government to occupy and impact Polish judicial sector are discussed among academics. The aim of this research conducted throughout the thesis is to add complete and all-inclusive analysis of the recent judgment of European Court of Justice (hereinafter: "ECJ") regarding lowering retirement age of judges to the ongoing academic literature. Furthermore, before reaching that conclusion, providing the reader with the review of Polish political debate, the responses of European Union institutions and analysis of the necessity of the reform for Polish judicial system. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Magister Philosophiae - MPhil / For generations, participation has been a mainstay of academic writing and teaching. By the 1970's, the policy statements of the major international donors and implementing agencies all emphasize the importance of participation (Dudley, 1993). It is time to stop simply reiterating the cry for community participation and prolonged argument about definitions of participation - related concepts. That was yesterday's battle. Certainly, despite all the rhetoric, participation often does not happen.

Les réformes pénales en matière d’alternatives à l’emprisonnement ont connu un essor fulgurant un peu partout dans le monde (à l’exception de certains pays comme le Mali, qui ne connaît qu’une seule peine alternative à l’emprisonnement stricto sensu « la peine de travail d’intérêt général »), en particulier en France et au Québec entre les années soixante-dix et deux mille. Ces réformes ont notamment mené à la création de diverses peines ou mesures qualifiées d’alternatives à l’emprisonnement ou d’alternatives à l’incarcération ou de peines de substitution à l’emprisonnement, etc. À titre d’exemple, en France et au Québec, nous pouvons mentionner la création de diverses peines de substitution à l’emprisonnement telles que les peines affectant le permis de conduire, le jour-amende, la confiscation, la peine de probation, etc. Cela dit, les différentes réformes pénales en matière d’alternatives à l’emprisonnement menées par les autorités des pays susmentionnés ont-elles permis de lutter contre la surpopulation carcérale et la récidive ? La recherche est scindée en deux parties : la première est consacrée à la relative efficacité des réformes pénales en matière d’alternatives à l’emprisonnement, due principalement à l’ambivalence des politiques pénales des autorités françaises, maliennes et québécoises, mais aussi à une surpopulation carcérale explosive et à l’augmentation du taux de récidive des condamnés à des alternatives à l’emprisonnement ; la seconde partie est axée sur l’exigence d’autonomisation des alternatives à l’emprisonnement pour lutter efficacement contre la récidive et la surpopulation carcérale / Criminal reforms in alternatives to imprisonment have boomed around the world (with the exception of some countries like Mali, which has only one alternative sentence to imprisonment in the strict sense of the term "The sentence of community service"), particularly in France and Quebec between the 1970s and 2000s. These reforms have led to the creation of various punishments or measures classified as alternatives to imprisonment or alternatives to incarceration, etc. For example, in France and Quebec, we can mention the creation of various alternatives to imprisonment such as the penalties affecting the driving license, the day-fine, the confiscation, the sentence of probation, etc. That said, have the various penal reforms in the field of alternatives to imprisonment carried out by the authorities of the above-mentioned countries helped to combat prison overcrowding and recidivism? The research is divided into two parts: the first is devoted to the relative effectiveness of penal reforms in terms of alternatives to imprisonment, mainly due to the ambivalence of the penal policies of the French, Malian and Quebec authorities, but also to a explosive prison overcrowding and the increase in the recidivism rate of those sentenced to alternatives to imprisonment; the second part focuses on the need to empower alternatives to imprisonment to effectively combat recidivism and prison overcrowding

The Electricity Industry Reforms (EIR) is a worldwidephenomenon that is inducing an intensive business orientedcontext in the organization, processes and functions of theElectricity Industry (EI). The electric power grid is nowtreated as the electricity market, the consumer as thecustomer, the power system activities are related to marketactors (i.e. generators, distributors and retailers) and theElectricity Industry Control Centers (EICC) provide theessential coordination and economic trade functions andtransactions. The EICC are looking for solutions to introduce, amongstothers, emerging information processes in the business orientedcontext with all the Electricity Industry actors without losingthe technical reliability of the EI. The EIR is delineated as amajor change on the traditional EI relying heavily oninformation exchange amongst the market actors. In the Central American countries, these EIR started around1996. The EICC in this region are facing the demanded changeswith information legacy systems, in operation long time beforethe EIR and considered already obsolete. This thesis exploresand summarizes, as a researchcontribution, the main problems at the EICCs in CentralAmerica, in managing the incorporation of emerging informationproc-esses. An Information System Migration Framework (ISMF) for theEICC is proposed as a re-search contribution and solution tothe problems identified. The ISMF here presented provides a setof steps and guidelines to follow for managing any emerginginformation processes in a systematic, feasible and reliableway. The ISMF is a continuous description of emerginginformation processes, risk assessments, requirementelicitation and specifica-tions with traceable and incrementalimplementations without completely replacing the system. TheISMF has as fundamental characteristic that provides a feasibleview of the current operation of the EICC, a continuous anditerative process of controlled changes and a systematicprocess to update the EICC operation model with a set of stepsthat are implementation independent, technology independent,process ori-ented and user centered. The ISMF’s feasibility, replicability and useracceptance has partially tested at the EICC in El Salvador andNicaragua. <b>Key words:</b>Electricity Industry, Electricity IndustryReforms, Electricity Industry Control Centers, InformationSystem Migration, Information Systems Modeling andRequirements, Case Studies in the Electricity Industry inCentral America. / NR 20140805