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Debates about public expenditure in the agricultural sector have reopened in many developing and emerging economies because of high budget deficits and changes in public opinion. As a result, agricultural policy in many of these countries is beginning to take a more market-oriented approach to agrarian problems, most notably through the introduction of contract farming. This book explores the policy issues around contract farming and its transformative potential and addresses the lack of empirical research on this topic by focusing on South Asia: principally India, Bangladesh and Nepal.The book first addresses the effects of contract farming (vertical coordination) on productivity, food security indicators (yield, consumption expenditures, prices), employment and input usage. Then it draws lessons from the South Asian case studies on the impact of institutional changes, like contract farming, on income and food security of smallholder households. The core of the book includes case study chapters on several commodities that are produced under contract farming, including vegetables and fisheries in Bangladesh, low-value crops in Nepal and coffee in India. Other chapters also explore contracts, storage, input usage and technical efficiency in these cases. This book serves as an essential guide to academics, researchers, students, legislative liaisons and think tank groups interested in agrarian issues, agricultural economics and agricultural policy in emerging economies and particularly in South Asia.

This book presents Proceedings of the International Conference on Intelligent Systems and Networks (ICISN 2021), held at Hanoi in Vietnam. It includes peer-reviewed high-quality articles on intelligent system and networks. It brings together professionals and researchers in the area and presents a platform for exchange of ideas and to foster future collaboration. The topics covered in this book include—foundations of computer science; computational intelligence language and speech processing; software engineering software development methods; wireless communications signal processing for communications; electronics track IoT and sensor systems embedded systems; etc.

This edited book provides a platform to bring together researchers, academia and industry collaborators to exchange their knowledge and work to develop better understanding about the scope of blockchain technology in business management applications of different sectors such as retail sector, supply chain and logistics, healthcare sector, manufacturing sector, judiciary, finance and government sector in terms of data quality and timeliness. The book presents original unpublished research papers on blockchain technology and business management on novel architectures, prototypes and case studies.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Computational Data and Social Networks, CSoNet 2020, held in Dallas, TX, USA, in December 2020. The 20 full papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 83 submissions. Additionally the book includes 22 special track papers and 3 extended abstracts. The selected papers are devoted to topics such as Combinatorial Optimization and Learning; Computational Methods for Social Good Applications; NLP and Affective Computing; Privacy and Security; Blockchain; Fact-Checking, Fake News and Malware Detection in Online Social Networks; and Information Spread in Social and Data Networks.

Comment se transforment les marchés? Qui les gouverne? Les transitions écologique et sociale se feront-elles avec ou contre eux? Cet ouvrage aborde leurs composantes centrales : les technologies. Au travers d'exemples portant sur les publicités subliminales, les algorithmes, les fablabs, les tiers-lieux ou les logiciels, il met en évidence que les controverses autour des technologies révèlent les valeurs et les collectifs qui les portent. Derrière les choix techniques, ce sont les propriétés des nouveaux produits et les possibilités offertes d'orienter la société qui se jouent. Les technologies n'organisent pas seulement les marchés, elles dessinent des trajectoires et des avenirs communs. Deux voies sont explorées : le mouvement open source et le « tournant biotechnologique ».

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 33rd Canadian Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Canadian AI 2020, which was planned to take place in Ottawa, ON, Canada. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, however, it was held virtually during May 13–15, 2020.The 31 regular papers and 24 short papers presented together with 4 Graduate Student Symposium papers were carefully reviewed and selected from a total of 175 submissions. The selected papers cover a wide range of topics, including machine learning, pattern recognition, natural language processing, knowledge representation, cognitive aspects of AI, ethics of AI, and other important aspects of AI research.

Emerging Technologies in Environmental Bioremediation introduces emerging bioremediation technologies for the treatment and management of industrial wastes and other environmental pollutants for the sake of environmental sustainability. Emerging bioremediation approaches such as nano-bioremediation technology, electro-bioremediation technology, microbial fuel cell technology, Modified Ludzack-Ettinger Process, Modified Activated Sludge Process, and phytotechnologies for the remediation of industrial wastes/pollutants are discussed in a comprehensive manner not found in other books. Furthermore, the book includes updated information as well as future directions for research in the field of bioremediation of industrial wastes. This book will be extremely useful to students, researchers, scientists and professionals in the field of microbiology and biotechnology, Bio (chemical) engineers, environmental researchers, eco-toxicology, and many more. - Includes the recovery of resources from wastewater - Describes the importance of microorganisms in environmental bioremediation technologies - Points out the reuse of treated wastewater through emerging technologies - Pays attention to the occurrence of novel micro-pollutants - Emphasizes the role of nanotechnology in pollutant bioremediation

This book constitutes revised selected papers from the 14th International Conference on Web Information Systems and Technologies, WEBIST 2018, held in Seville, Spain, in September 2018. The purpose of the WEBIST series of conferences is to bring together researches, engineers and practitioners interested in technological advances and business applications of web-based information systems. The 12 full papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from originally 68 paper submissions. They cover different aspects of Web information systems, namely internet technology, mobile and NLP information systems, service-based information systems, platforms and eco-systems, Web intelligence and Web interfaces.

A new edition of the #1 text in the human computer Interaction field! Hugely popular with students and professionals alike, the Fifth Edition of Interaction Design is an ideal resource for learning the interdisciplinary skills needed for interaction design, human-computer interaction, information design, web design, and ubiquitous computing. New to the fifth edition: a chapter on data at scale, which covers developments in the emerging fields of'human data interaction'and data analytics. The chapter demonstrates the many ways organizations manipulate, analyze, and act upon the masses of data being collected with regards to human digital and physical behaviors, the environment, and society at large. Revised and updated throughout, this edition offers a cross-disciplinary, practical, and process-oriented, state-of-the-art introduction to the field, showing not just what principles ought to apply to interaction design, but crucially how they can be applied. Explains how to use design and evaluation techniques for developing successful interactive technologies Demonstrates, through many examples, the cognitive, social and affective issues that underpin the design of these technologies Provides thought-provoking design dilemmas and interviews with expert designers and researchers Uses a strong pedagogical format to foster understanding and enjoyment An accompanying website contains extensive additional teaching and learning material including slides for each chapter, comments on chapter activities, and a number of in-depth case studies written by researchers and designers.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Information in Contemporary Society, iConference 2019, held in Washington, DC, USA, in March/April 2019. The 44 full papers and 33 short papers presented in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 133 submitted full papers and 88 submitted short papers. The papers are organized in the following topical sections: Scientific work and data practices; methodological concerns in (big) data research; concerns about “smart” interactions and privacy; identity questions in online communities; measuring and tracking scientific literature; limits and affordances of automation; collecting data about vulnerable populations; supporting communities through public libraries and infrastructure; information behaviors in academic environments; data-driven storytelling and modeling; online activism; digital libraries, curation and preservation; social-media text mining and sentiment analysis; data and information in the public sphere; engaging with multi-media content; understanding online behaviors and experiences; algorithms at work; innovation and professionalization in technology communities; information behaviors on Twitter; data mining and NLP; informing technology design through offline experiences; digital tools for health management; environmental and visual literacy; and addressing social problems in iSchool research.

White biotechnology, or industrial biotechnology as it is also known, refers to the use of living cells and/or their enzymes to create industrial products that are more easily degradable, require less energy, create less waste during production and sometimes perform better than products created using traditional chemical processes.Over the last decade considerable progress has been made in white biotechnology research, and further major scientific and technological breakthroughs are expected in the future. Fungi are ubiquitous in nature and have been sorted out from different habitats, including extreme environments (high temperature, low temperature, salinity and pH), and may be associated with plants (epiphytic, endophytic and rhizospheric).The fungal strains are beneficial as well as harmful for human beings. The beneficial fungal strains may play important roles in the agricultural, industrial, and medical sectors. The fungalstrains and their products (enzymes, bioactive compounds, and secondary metabolites) are very useful for industry (e.g., the discovery of penicillin from Penicillium chrysogenum). This discovery was a milestone in the development of white biotechnology as the industrial production of penicillin and antibiotics using fungi moved industrial biotechnology into the modern era, transforming it into a global industrial technology. Since then, white biotechnology has steadily developed and now plays a key role in several industrial sectors, providing both high value nutraceutical and pharmaceutical products. The fungal strains and bioactive compounds also play an important role in environmental cleaning. This volume covers the latest developments and research in white biotechnology with a focus on diversity and enzymes.

This book constitutes the proceedings of the 17th International Conference on Service-Oriented Computing, ICSOC 2019, held in Toulouse, France, in October 2019. The 28 full and 12 short papers presented together with 7 poster and 2 invited papers in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from 181 submissions. The papers have been organized in the following topical sections: Service Engineering; Run-time Service Operations and Management; Services and Data; Services in the Cloud; Services on the Internet of Things; Services in Organizations, Business and Society; and Services at the Edge.

The two-volume set LNBIP 353 and 354 constitutes the proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Business Information Systems, BIS 2019, held in Seville, Spain, in June 2019. The theme of the BIS 2019 was'Data Science for Business Information Systems', inspiring researchers to share theoretical and practical knowledge of the different aspects related to Data Science in enterprises. The 67 papers presented in these proceedings were carefully reviewed and selected from 223 submissions. The contributions were organized in topical sections as follows: Part I: Big Data and Data Science; Artificial Intelligence; ICT Project Management; and Smart Infrastructure. Part II: Social Media and Web-based Systems; and Applications, Evaluations and Experiences.

This book surveys the well-known results and also presents a series of original results on the mathematical modeling of social networks, focusing on models of informational influence, control and confrontation. Online social networks are intended for communication, opinion exchange and information acquisition for their members, but recently, online social networks have been intensively used as the objects and means of informational control and an arena of informational confrontation. They have become a powerful informational influence tool, particularly for the manipulation of individuals, social groups and society as a whole, as well as a battlefield of information warfare (cyberwars). This book aimed at under- and postgraduate university students as well as experts in information technology and modeling of social systems and processes.

This book highlights cutting-edge research on various aspects of human–computer interaction (HCI). It includes selected research papers presented at the Third International Conference on Computing, Communication and Signal Processing (ICCASP 2018), organized by Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University in Lonere-Raigad, India on January 26–27, 2018. It covers pioneering topics in the field of computer, electrical, and electronics engineering, e.g. signal and image processing, RF and microwave engineering, and emerging technologies such as IoT, cloud computing, HCI, and green computing. As such, the book offers a valuable guide for all scientists, engineers and research students in the areas of engineering and technology.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Metadata and Semantic Research, MTSR 2017 2017, held in Tallinn, Estonia, November 28th to December 1st, 2017. The 18 full and 13 short papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 58 submissions. They focus on the Internet of Things (IoT) and the practical implementation of ontologies and linked data. Further topics are theoretical and foundational principles of metadata; ontologies and information organization; applications of linked data, open data, big data and user-generated metadata; digital interconnectedness; metadata standardization; authority control and interoperability in digital libraries and research data repositories; emerging issues in RDF, OWL, SKOS, schema.org, BIBFRAME, metadata and ontology design; linked data applications for e-books; digital publishing and Content Management Systems (CMSs); content discovery services, search, information retrieval and data visualization applications.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 30th Canadian Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Canadian AI 2017, held in Edmonton, AB, Canada, in May 2017. The 19 regular papers and 24 short papers presented together with 6 Graduate Student Symposium papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 62 submissions. The focus of the conference was on the following subjects: Data Mining and Machine Learning; Planning and Combinatorial Optimization; AI Applications; Natural Language Processing; Uncertainty and Preference Reasoning; and Agent Systems.

This two volume set LNCS 10041 and LNCS 10042 constitutes the proceedings of the 17th International Conference on Web Information Systems Engineering, WISE 2016, held in Shanghai, China, in November 2016. The 39 full papers and 31 short papers presented in these proceedings were carefully reviewed and selected from 233 submissions. The papers cover a wide range of topics such as Social Network Data Analysis; Recommender Systems; Topic Modeling; Data Diversity; Data Similarity; Context-Aware Recommendation; Prediction; Big Data Processing; Cloud Computing; Event Detection; Data Mining; Sentiment Analysis; Ranking in Social Networks; Microblog Data Analysis; Query Processing; Spatial and Temporal Data; Graph Theory; Non-Traditional Environments; and Special Session on Data Quality and Trust in Big Data.

Understand how to control microbial pathogens and toxic agents at all stages of the food supply chain.

Advances in Microbial Physiology