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Forests are the renewable resources, which are under continuous threat due to various anthropogenic interferences. The present paper discusses the risk caused due to the residual forest patches of eastern ghats of Andhra Pradesh, India, and the actions to be taken to protect them before they go into the phase of extinction. The paper focuses mainly on the significance of Kondapalli reserved forest of eastern ghats and on the role of anthropogenic factors in modifying the structure of these forests and on the possible causative and underlying factors that drive such changes. Though Kondapalli forest was declared as reserve forest, it is subjected to human disturbances, threatening the biodiversity and its population. The establishment of industries near to this forest and easy movement of people into the forest have caused a lot of damage to the vegetation. Encroachment, indiscriminate cutting of trees and haphazard grazing in forest areas have resulted in vast stretches of useless degraded scrub, eroded soils and bare hills. In this context, there is a need to analyze the current status of these forests and suggest measures to retain the remnant forests and recover wherever possible, thus providing various types of resources and for becoming a repository for biodiversity of the area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main objective of the paper is to investigate which factors influenced the output growth—fixed capital or workers? The paper analyzes the data by calculating Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) for different years and different variables like workers, fixed capital and output collected for 62 manufacturing industries from the Annual Survey of Industries (ASI) in Andhra Pradesh. In general, Cobb-Douglas production function has been used in two variables framework and value added has been considered as output and labor and capital as inputs. The Cobb-Douglas production function analysis through panel data analysis was done. The study followed the 1998-99, National Industrial Classification (NIC). The main findings of the study are, firstly, not all industries influenced the output growth. Secondly, most of the industries (20 industries) did not provide employment opportunities. Thirdly, a few (18) manufacturing industries' fixed capital CAGR has negatively declined. Fourthly, a few (12) manufacturing industries' output CAGR has negatively declined. And, finally only manufacture of machinery and equipment industry's workers per factory employed average declined, and rest of the industries' average number of workers per factory employed increased. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic development of any country largely depends on the transport activity. Among the various modes of transport available, road based transport is widely accepted because of its advantages. In India, the public transport undertakings are facing heavy competition from private ownership and are operating in an environment of privatization. One among the various reasons for increased voice of privatization of public transport undertakings is the poor quality of services offered to the traveling public. This paper presents a study on the quality of services offered by the Andhra Pradesh State Road Transport Corporation (APSRTC). As the corporation incurred continuous losses in the past, this study highlights whether the losses affected the quality of services offered to the traveling public. Quality of services is measured in terms of number of trips operated, regularity, breakdowns, rate of accidents, and the number of vehicles off the road. In addition, this paper also examines the quality of services offered in relation to inventory maintenance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the technical efficiency of four sugar factories in West Godavari District over the period 1985-86 to 2005-06. High efficiency is very important for the survival of a factory. Technical efficiency of a sugar factory depends upon its capacity to extract maximum sugar from the sugarcane. It is determined by several factors, such as reduced mill extraction, reduced boiling house extraction, reduced overall extraction, and sugar loss. The paper reveals that out of the four sugar factories, Andhra Sugars-I at Tanuku maintained minimum sugar loss level and extracted maximum sugar from cane throughout the study period. Thus, the study concludes that this factory was better than the other sugar factories in terms of technical efficiency during the study period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study explores the factors influencing job satisfaction among doctors working in various government hospitals. The paper examines the components that bring in job satisfaction in a much detailed form. The data was collected from about 106 doctors working in cities, district head quarters and rural villages of the state of Andhra Pradesh in India. The findings of the study present the factors underlying job satisfaction among doctors working in government hospitals, which may help the policy makers to formulate policies needed for sustainable and higher health provision for the civilians of the nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper seeks to analyze the pattern and determinants of public expenditure on health in Andhra Pradesh, India, considering a dataset for the period 1985-2005. Simple ratios, percentage methods and multiple regression technique are adopted in the study. It is found that the health expenditure in absolute terms increased remarkably during the study period in Andhra Pradesh, but as a ratio of total government expenditure and social service expenditure in the state, it showed a decreasing trend. The share of capital expenditure is found to be low. The determinant analysis suggests that the increase in health expenditure has been determined by factors like per capita income, literacy rate and population rather than fiscal deficit and infant mortality rate. The percentage GDP spending on health in the state is around 1, which is low and can be increased by following a suitable mechanism in increasing resource efficiency. This would also help to increase capital investments in health sector in terms of opening up additional hospitals in the backlog areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cotton production in India needs to be reorganized in order to increase productivity, reduce cost of production, and secure stable returns to the farmers. Cotton is produced in India under varied conditions and entails certain heterogeneity in terms of yield, cost and return. The common cause of concern is how to reduce the ever rising costs of production and increase value addition to the farmer. Industry needs extra long staple and clean cotton for value-added production. In the presence of anonymous agents working through spot markets, production decisions suffer from inefficiencies owing to information asymmetry and bounded rationality. There is a need for an informed coordinating agent between farmer and other input providers on the one side, and to supply managerial technology and link up final buyer, on the other. Such vertical integration strategies are capable of avoiding the intermediate channels of middlemen, raising direct benefits by enhancing yield and quality and producing internal economies. This paper sets out to analyze the e-safal experiment in six villages of Andhra Pradesh in the light of such context of vertical integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is an enormous amount of public policy debate in India and the rest of the world on status of women because women constitute almost half of India's population. The kind of indifference shown by the society towards women in socio-economic field evidently discloses the perpetual and persisting disparity among men and women. Women education should be seen as a factor for economic development and not as a mere waste of resources. The myth that women are not "comparably competent" to men is exploded with their meaningful participation in all the fields. It is established that given an opportunity they are equally intellectual and can definitely compete with men in any field. The theory of justice and cooperative conflict are also examined in this article from the perspective of gender discrimination in education. This paper analyses the status of women in relation to literacy and gender disparity in India in general and the State of Andhra Pradesh (AP) in particular. Further, taking statistics of female literacy for the past four decades, the paper critically examines status of female literacy in AP as against the national average. The research paper concludes with some observations and provides suggestions which can be instrumental in improving female literacy of India in general and AP in particular. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Punganur in Andhra Pradesh was a prominent zamindari during the British rule. Lack of permanent irrigational facilities and inadequate transport coupled with poor soils left the zamindari a backward region. Whenever there was a famine in any part of the ceded district, it had its echo in Punganur. The entire 19th century was dotted with numerous famines in the zamindari. The famines which occurred in the zamindari before the first Famine Commission of 1880 form the frame of reference for this paper. They present certain unique features both in their severity and also in the manner the relief was provided. During the first phase of the famines (1800-1870), a large number of ryots were forced to abandon their lands and leave the villages in search of living. The Great Famine of 1876-78 was the severest of all famines. The starving people ate even the leaves and roots to keep the body and soul together. There were also famines during the last decade of the century, but they are beyond the scope of the present paper. This paper also analyzes the nature of the famine relief measures adopted during the famines. There was relief provided by the zamindar. The government directly took certain measures to mitigate the sufferings of the people and there were also certain concessions shown by the government to the zamindar with the hope that those concessions would ultimately percolate to the ryots. Thus, there was a three-pronged approach in the relief that came to the people. While the relief works undertaken by the zamindar were mostly related to the improvement of irrigational works, the government's relief revolved around the provision of transport facilities like road works, etc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh are two large rice producing states in India. Although both the states have undergone rigorous changes in agriculture, the forms of reform have been very different in these two states. While institutional reforms dominated in West Bengal, in Andhra Pradesh agricultural growth was solely driven by technological reforms. Given this background this paper analyzes the cost efficiency of rice production in these two states. It has examined the trend of cost efficiency and technical efficiency of rice production in the two states for the period 1971-2005 by using stochastic frontier analysis. It is observed that cost efficiency in case of West Bengal was higher during the 1970s and early 1980s but after that from the 1990s Andhra Pradesh is having better cost efficiencies. The technical efficiencies are also similar in both the states. Thus the states, which have followed different paths of agricultural development, show similarities as far as technical efficiency is concerned. But Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal show that both cost and technical efficiency are below the optimum level which is the real cause of worry. From the above analysis, it seems that there is inefficiency of input in each factor used in both the states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper seeks to analyze the political economy of determining own tax revenue and selective state taxes of Andhra Pradesh (AP), India. The study suggests that the own tax revenue and revenue from selective state taxes of AP are mainly determined by a set of economic and need-based factors, rather than political factors. The political dummies like Congress government dummy and election year dummy are insignificant in influencing the own tax revenue, and other state taxes except tax on vehicles. But in many cases the coefficients of these political dummies are found to be negative, possibly signaling that the growth in tax revenues is undermined by political power shift and compromises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Education is an essential cog in the wheel of human progress. Management education has been growing due to the spurt in demand for management graduates. In Andhra Pradesh (AP), there has been an unusual and revolutionary growth of B-Schools since 1996. However, the performance of B-Schools, in terms of placements and average salary, has been lagging dismally, leading to significant unemployment among MBAs produced by the universities and their affiliates. This paper discusses the need of region-specific resource-focused education as a differentiating dimension, which would potentially reverse the aforesaid trend and primarily improve the effectiveness of management education in AP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper examines the depth and space of gender bias against female children in schooling in Andhra Pradesh. It is observed that though the performance of Andhra Pradesh with respect to child schooling in general and girl children in particular, during the last 15 years is better than many other states in India, the phenomenon of educational deprivation of children still persists. Moreover, the gender inequalities in educational deprivation are unaltered although such gender inequality in Andhra Pradesh has been relatively lower than that of the all-India average. Household characteristics such as caste, occupation, head of the household, parental literacy status, household size, and presence of sibling found to be the important factors for child schooling. Though the probability of a child attending increases with the betterment of the household, the probability is lower for female children than their male counterparts. In addition, supply factors of schooling have their own impact in general and in particular for girl child schooling. Therefore, the gender as a characteristic is itself a constraint for child schooling even after neutralising the impact of all the other factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The value of a nation depends on the quality of its citizens, which in turn depends on the excellence of their education system, and this eventually is an output of the quality of the teacher. The teacher is the signpost that determines the accomplishments and ambitions of a nation. Hence, it is essential to empower teachers to make the future of a nation secure. The demands and expectations with regard to the position of a teacher can be addressed by both induction as well as in-service training. The present study, which is an integral part of the doctoral dissertation "A Study of Management Practices of Secondary Schools", attempts to understand the perceptions of the heads of the schools regarding the impact of in-service training programs on teacher performance at secondary level. The sample comprises 188 secondary schools-around 34% of the population-in Krishna district of the state of Andhra Pradesh, India, selected through stratified sampling technique. The primary data was secured through self-designed questionnaire and interview schedules. The statistical technique of Chi-square test and simple percentages were utilized to establish the consistency and understand the pattern of responses with the help of SPSS, version 19. The findings revealed that the in-service training for teachers has been a neglected activity in the educational administration. Many school heads perceived that the programs were of not much use in enhancing the teachers' performance [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emerging economies are building up their education systems by overcoming the major challenges of finance, infrastructure and planning and control of resources and internal processes through 'school-based management' reforms. To achieve relative competitiveness, school management must deal with these challenges. Governments consider decentralization as an indispensable step in efforts to provide quality education. Many successful schools set up committees and undertake improvements in planning. The Indian school education sector is not an exception. This study sought to explore the nature of planning function being practiced at the school level as a source of competitive advantage. A sample of 188, among the population of 557 secondary schools in Krishna district of Andhra Pradesh in India, was selected through stratified sampling. The primary responses were collected through a structured questionnaire administered to the respective school heads and analyzed with chi-square and simple descriptives. Decentralization is a management strategy which demands flexible implementation with a balance between the autonomy and the characteristics of its beneficiaries. Improvement of the quality of education needs the functioning and management of schools to improve. The findings indicate that the planning framework is either nonexistent or inactive in a majority of public sector schools. The inclusion of community members in school management is comparatively better in the public sector schools run by the State government of Andhra Pradesh than those run by private managements. The academic, infrastructure and financial planning activities are highly centralized, giving no scope for innovation and autonomy at the school level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study shows that female work participation rate has declined and season-wise irrigation facility is the main factor that determines the employment and wages of the agricultural women labor. In Andhra Pradesh, male participation is more in categories of cultivators and other workers but their participation is less in the category of workers in household industry and agricultural laborers. In contrast, female participation rate is more for the category of agricultural laborers and household industry, but the rate is less in the case of cultivators and other workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In today's highly competitive environment, business entities are forced to enhance efficiency by cutting down wasteful expenditure. This involves manpower and process optimization and cost reduction by realigning business processes to take advantage of technology. A lot of effort has been put in by the industry and government entities to automate/e-enable their processes pertaining to line and staff functions. Procurement is one such area which has seen rapid computerization. Against the backdrop of the prevailing corruption and inordinate delay in public procurements in India, e-procurement implementation becomes important. Shift from manual procurement to e-procurement has inherent benefits such as efficiency, effectiveness and transparency which have been validated in numerous studies. Studies on e-procurement implementation best practices are limited in scope and therefore lack specificity to the Indian context and public procurement policies. Difference in the enabling environment like IT infrastructure, internet penetration and IT literacy are hurdles to implementation of these practices in the Indian context. Therefore, specific e-procurement implementation of best practices specific to the Indian context needs to be evolved. On the basis of India: e-Readiness Report 2008, the e-procurement implementation by the Governments of Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh were selected as candidates for the qualitative case study. Qualitative and comparative analyses of the selected case studies were carried out using template analysis. The study brings out the impediments to successful implementation of e-procurement solutions specific to the Indian context, and thereafter covers the best practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The colonial land tax system, designed to stimulate the extension of commercial agriculture and commoditification of agricultural production, has severe impacts on the adivasis of India. Particularly, the notion of colonial rule of property evicted millions of adivasis out of their land by force and for mollified debts. This process has been witnessed more widely in the post-colonial India. Using their own method of struggle, the educated adivasi youths began to reassert their lands that their forefathers lost to non-adivasis. The interventions of civil society (NGO) diverted the adivasis toward a so called legal fight which did not take the issue to a logical end. The legal process helped the non-adivasis to legalize their illegal holdings in the Agency tracts of Andhra region of Andhra Pradesh. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]