Who are those people we call farmers? Rural Kenyan aspirations and realities

Rural Kenyan households have different aspirations and income portfolio strategies, including agricultural intensification and income diversification. This article reports on a study that interviewed 624 households to explore rural aspirations and derive lessons for agricultural technology development and transfer. Though few households specialised in farming, many households self-identified as farmers and aspired to increase their agricultural income. Despite the prevalence of agricultural aspirations, few aspired for their children to have a future in farming. Combining aspirations with potential to invest, the article provides suggestions for targeting agricultural interventions. We need to start listening better to those people we call “farmers” to develop and offer innovations that meet their realities.     

The detection of HIV antibodies in blood stains

Blood samples were collected on cotton wool and stored at +20 degrees C. These samples were tested in an enzyme linked immunosorbent assay and the immunoblotting test. HIV-antibodies could be detected in samples stored up to four month.     

Overcoming barriers to communication between police and socially disadvantaged neighbourhoods: a critical theory of community policing

This research paper explores barriers to communication between police and residents of socially disadvantaged neighbourhoods (SDNs). Using a participant observation approach, research in a poor, high-crime, muiti-ethnic neighbourhood in Vancouver, Canada examined communication between police and neighbourhood residents. Communication problems that were apparent included one-way dialogue between police and neighbourhood residents, the inability of police to effectively communicate with minority and special needs groups, and the promulgation of community policing as a purposive rational model which obfuscates an empathetic dialogue between police and SDN residents. These communicative problems limited the success of community policing and crime prevention in this neighbourhood and perpetuated the asymmetrical relations between many residents and the police. Indeed, traditional community policing models have generally failed SDNs because they do not recognize how police communication with residents can continually reproduce an asymmetrical power relationship between the two. The infusion of Habermasian critical theory into community policing represents one means to overcome the communicative obstacles that perpetuate the asymmetrical power relations between police and SDN residents. lt does so by emphasizing a communicative action that attempts to expose and deconstruct asymmetrical social and personal power relationships and replace them with modes of communication that result in a more empathetic relationship. The communicative emphasis in a critical theory of community policing is a commitment to forward policing in SDNs as a democratic and empowering process. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

A variable geometry of enforcement?

This paper locates the control of fraud against the Community budget within the wider context of the tensions engendered by fiscal crises and successive enlargements of the European Union. Funds allocated to the Member States for agriculture, whether in the form of subventions or structural grants, take up more than half of total budget expenditure, so the Common Agricultural Policy has been at the heart of the discussion on budgetary control. Since the 1980s the Common Agricultural Policy has been blamed for the repeated fiscal crises affecting the Community budget, and for frauds and irregularities. In this historical context, the control of fraud has not been static, but has gone through distinct phases, beginning with benign neglect in the 1960s and 70s, followed by transitional and active phases up to and including today's media focus on the Community budget, and the fraud affecting it. The paper analyses the prospects for future enforcement.     

Development of immersion skin in fresh and salt water at different water temperatures

The development of skin wrinkling was analysed using 48 hands from 24 adult corpses in systematic experiments involving submersion in fresh and salt water at varying water temperatures (10 degrees, 20 degrees, and 30 degrees C); the results were documented by photography. Skin wrinkling was observed after between 15 min and 72 h of submersion. These are the essential results of the study: skin wrinkling is highly dependent on temperature and begins after only 15 min of submersion. The development of wrinkling in salt water, especially after long periods (greater than 24 h), is different from that in fresh water. Washerwomen's hands are classified into four categories that allow practical, usable conclusions to be drawn about the duration of submersion. Previous opinions concerning the development and timing of washer-women's hands were verified by means of test photographs shown to 16 domestic and foreign experts on legal medicine. It became obvious that expertise in this area varies considerably. Concerning the forensic approach, these surveys again show that, even when many influencing factors are known (water temperature, osmolarity, etc.) and comprehensive documentation has been made, the length of submersion can only be very roughly assessed from macroscopical aspects.     

The battle for patent rights in plant biotechnology: evidence from opposition fillings

This paper describes and analyzes the occurrence and extent of oppositions initiated against plant biotechnology patents granted by the European Patent Office (EPO). The opposition mechanism is a legal procedure that allows any third party to challenge the validity of patents awarded by the EPO. Results indicate that the opposition rate is far greater in plant biotechnology than in other emerging industries. Consistent with theoretical predictions, the empirical findings suggest that opposed patents are disproportionately those that score high on features that proxy for their “value” or “quality”. In contrast to previous findings, however, the results show that large-volume applicants are more likely to be opposed. Because the boundaries of plant biotech patents are ill-defined, large patent portfolios do not promote cooperative behavior such as licensing or settlements. The analysis rejects the hypothesis that awardees are subject to “nuisance” or “frivolous” oppositions. Instead, the opposition procedure serves as an error correction mechanism.     

Morphometric assessment of testicular changes in drug-related fatalities

Testicular sections of 50 deceased drug addicts were examined by light microscopy using morphometric methods and determining the extent of spermatogenesis by application of the Johnsen score count. Twenty cases of violent death served as reference sample. The study was aimed at obtaining data about the degree of germinal gland damage following the duration of the individual drug career, which was correlated to the histologic findings. Progressively reduced maturation of germinal cells, decrease of tubular diameter and height of sperm-producing epithelium were found the longer the individual case history has been. The results clearly indicated a substantial impairment of male fertility in the course of a drug career, but etiology seems to be multifactorial, since most of the deceased were polytoxicomanic and more than 40% were under the influence of alcohol at the time of death. Testicular damage is obviously a sequel of long-lasting abuse and a very complex process, presumably progressing with the duration of the adverse habit.     

Criminal DNA databases: the European situation

In the last 5 years, a number of European countries have successfully introduced national databases holding the DNA profiles from suspected and convicted criminal offenders as well as from biological stain materials from unsolved crime cases. At present, DNA databases are fully or partially in operation in the UK, The Netherlands, Austria, Germany, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland and Sweden. Furthermore, in the other European countries, specific legislation will be enacted soon, or the introduction of such databases is being discussed to initiate a legislative process. Numerous differences exist regarding the criteria for a criminal offender to be included in the database, the storage periods and the possibility to remove database records, the possibility to keep reference samples from the offenders as long as their respective records are being held, and the role of judges in the process of entering a database record or to perform a database search. Nevertheless, harmonization has been achieved regarding the DNA information stored in national databases, and a European standard set of genetic systems has been recommended which is included either in part or completely in the DNA profiles of offenders and crime stains for all European databases. This facilitates the exchange of information from database records to allow the investigation of crime cases across national borders.