Bio-Technology Essays - Biotechnology, Genetically Modified Crops

Bio-Technology The short-term future of biotechnology in production agriculture looks bleak. The unattractive truth is that economics, not science can play a larger role in the future of biotechnology. Currently, some of the largest biotech companies are losing money buying up smaller companies. This reduction in competition is good and bad for the biotech companies. They can and must raise their prices to the producers to cover the costs of buying the other companies, research and development. International demand is low for genetically engineered crops and livestock because of trade restrictions, resulting in low prices for US farmers and ranchers. They cannot afford to pay so much for their inputs, so they settle for cheaper inputs. If we, the future of agriculture can increase the demand for biotech products by educating the world on the advantages of biotech products and reduce trade restrictions; decrease the costs of inputs and increase prices to consumers, then the scientists can do the rest. As soon as we can get past the economic glass ceiling, then the sky is the limit for biotechnology in production agriculture. Science Essays

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buy custom Health Care essay I conducted an interview on health care system with one of the educators in a healthy facility in Texas. My interest was to get information about the current local care delivery system and the relationship between the community clinical system and the public health system, and at the same time explore the interviewees expectations for future health care delivery. Below are some of the questions that I asked her, and the responses that she gave back. I asked her to comment on the current situation in local health care delivery system and she said that the situation is deteriorating day by day as compared to previous years. She said that today people are exposed to risks of being infected by various diseases like HIV/AIDS and cancer but our health facilities are lacking enough facilities to treat these patients. She also added that medicine is costly nowadays as compared to previous times due to high cost of living (Tucker Mahan, 2003). Next I asked her about the relationship between the community clinical system and the public health system, and she commented that both are out to provide health services to the sick and both are non-profit making health care organizations. The difference is that, community health systems are non-governmental organizations while the public health systems are overnmental organizations (Tucker Mahan, 2003). The next question I asked was how health care delivery has changed over the last five years and how she thinks it will change in the next five years, she answered that there has been tremendous changes in health care delivery over the last five years and that over the past five years, more diseases have come up that did not use to be common and a good example is cancer. HIV/AIDS prevalence has also gone up as compared to the past. This has put a lot of strain in the few available facilities and it is possible nowadays to find two patients sharing a bed in public hospitals. She further said that, the trend is likely to worsen in the next five years if our leaders will not come together and look for adequate health facilities and educate people on how to prevent infections like HIV/AIDS (Wagner, Moore Aryel, 2006). I asked her about the ways in which the hospital and its providers interact with the public health system and she said that the interaction between these two parties is positive, nowadays health workers go to the field to educate people on how to prevent infectious diseases like cholera, diarrhea and even HIV/AIDS which is very encouraging. I also wanted to know whether there is adequate coordination between the public health systeem and the health care delivery system in general and she answered that the coordination was very poor. A lot of public medicine like ARVs that are supposed to be supplied freely are sold, sometimes public hospitals lack basic medical services like pain killers which is so discouraging. She said that this is the reason why most people prefer going to private hospitals, though they are expensive, they offer quality services. The last question I posed to her was whether there is a health care delivery preparedness plan for a public health event such as an infectious epidemic or bioterrorist attack and she answered that in most cases, the health facilities do not prepare for these emergencies, the epidemic may break out and kill several people before the government put up measures to control the situation (Wagner, Espino, et al. 2004). The educator concluded that there is a lot to be done in our health care systems so as to serve the patients and more especially those people with limited means to pay for quality health services. She also added that we should strive to meet the goals of the world health organization which is; all health systems should provide good health, responsiveness to the expectations of the population, and fair financial contribution (Wagner, Espino, et al. 2004). Buy custom Health Care essay

Transparency in public procurement Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Transparency in public procurement - Essay Example It is because of these lack of transparency in public procurement that corruption has acquired its definition in that it is defined as the use of public office for public gain, where this lack of transparency does not only contribute to the definition as there have been corruption cases in the private sector, as well. As such, the definition of corruption in public procurement has been perceived and surveyed by different agencies to look into the impacts. Transparency International states that bribery is the most common form of corruption emanating from multinational companies that then provide bribe money from the world’s richest nations in an attempt to clinch contracts meant for public procurement. ... This way, Tabish says that the bribe money that rich corporations pay to receive contracts are usually then factored in the total cost of the contract, which she perceives to mean that the contract or the entire project will cost more than the earlier mentioned price of service and product procurement. She continues to state that the consequence of the lack of transparency is usually more than the bribe received by corrupt individuals seeking to benefit themselves as it all trickles down to the same person that received the bribe. This way, Tabish continues to highlight the price of lack of transparency and how it comes into being discarded by mentioning that cultural norms, ethics and accountability contribute greatly towards transparency or lack of it public procurement.3 As such, it is said that corruption or beach of transparency can be achieved or carried out at any stage in a procurement process meaning that there is not a single phase or project that is safe from corruption. S tudies further indicate that lack of transparency was directly related to systems of functions that involve corruption and the ability to look into projects that have both quality and quantity at high levels.4 This was because, transparency to Tabish, is a clear and concise means to achieve a project free of irregularities at all phases, and even exempt it from manifestation. A special report on E-governance portrays a number of practices, as being the best in ensuring transparency in procurement, where turning all systems to digital and internet based is the way to go. The report quotes Korea as an example of promoting transparency in procurement, where certain conditions must be met prior to a contract award to a company in all of its qualifications or lack of them