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The purpose of this article is to provide an overview of the sources for grants funding available to libraries

The author provides a narrative article.

A number of funding sources – both government and private – exist for academic, special, and public libraries.

Practical suggestions on where to look for possible grants funding. Additional reading on grants preparation is also provided.

When disasters occur, the Chinese national or local government and their relevant departments (hereinafter referred to as the government) probably need to acquire emergency supplies from suppliers. Before concluding a transaction, the public officials usually negotiate the quality and price of the emergency supplies with the suppliers. They expect to achieve the best relief effect while the suppliers want to maximize their own interests. Therefore, in order to help the government acquire inexpensive emergency supplies with high quality in a short time, the purpose of this paper is to examine the negotiation process and proposes a negotiation principle for the staff.

This paper first elaborates the characteristics and impact factors of emergency supplies requisition negotiation. Then it establishes a model describing the negotiation on price and quality of emergency supplies between the public officials and suppliers. Afterwards, it proposes an algorithm which can estimate the success rate of the negotiation. Finally, the paper employs the conclusion of the model and algorithm to analyze the emergency supplies requisition negotiation process during the China Lushan earthquake.

This paper proposes a “WRAD” principle of emergency supplies requisition negotiation of public officials in disasters. First, they should ensure the requisition price is not too low. Second, they would widen the difference between the high price and low price. Third, it is best for them to follow the principle of “ascending negotiation and descending choice” while selecting multiple suppliers to negotiate.

This paper establishes a model to study the emergency supplies requisition negotiation process between the public officials and suppliers based on evolutionary game theory. The model assumes that both the public officials and suppliers are not fully rational individuals, and they need time to consult with each other to find out the optimal solution. This paper proposes an innovative action principle of the public officials during the negotiation process which can help it to acquire inexpensive, high-quality, emergency supplies within a short period from the suppliers.

This study aims to examine the effect of liquidity risk on deposit money banks’ (DMBs) performance in Sub-Saharan Africa. This study also tests the interaction effect of liquidity risk and nonperforming loans on the performance of DMBs’ in Sub-Saharan Africa.

This study uses a two-step system generalized method of moment to test the influence of liquidity risk on DMBs’ performance in Sub-Saharan Africa. A sample of 50 listed banks across six Sub-Saharan African countries, including Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa, Zambia, Kenya and Tanzania, were used. The bank performance proxy used are return on asset and return on equity, while net interest margin is used for robustness check.

The study’s findings reveal a significant and negative association between liquidity risk and bank performance. Moreover, the relationship between the nonperforming loan and bank performance is negative and significant. Furthermore, the interaction effect of liquidity risk and nonperforming loans on bank performance is found to be significantly negative for the two proxies of bank performance. The result is robust for the alternative bank performance measurements and econometric model, which adequately addresses endogeneity tendency.

To the best of the researchers’ knowledge, this is one of the earliest empirical studies that examine the effect of liquidity risk on DMBs’ performance across Sub-Saharan African countries. This study further differs from previous studies with the interaction term of liquidity risk and nonperforming loan included in the model.

Breakfast skipping by children, with its varying global prevalence and associated factors, is well documented to adversely affect their health, cognitive ability, academic performance and anthropometric status. Libya, a country with a young population base, has limited information on breakfast skipping prevalence among its young citizens as well as its compounding factors unique to the country. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the breakfast skipping pattern among Benghazi primary school children.

The paper's approach is to use a cross sectional study among 386 primary school children (196 males and 190 females) using an interviewer‐administered structured questionnaire. The enrolment exclusion criteria were a pre‐existing chronic disease or a food allergy or food intolerance or any acute illness.

Breakfast skipping during weekdays (38.6 per cent, n=149), reduced drastically on weekends (1.0 per cent, n=4); 10.7 per cent subjects skipped breakfast daily (mean 2.5 + 1.3 days). Absence of hunger and lack of time to eat or prepare breakfast were cited as main barriers in its regular consumption. Bread and milk were the most commonly consumed breakfast foods. Certain groups of regular breakfast eating subjects consumed higher (p < 0.05) dietary thiamine and iron than their breakfast skipping counterparts and also better fulfilled their daily requirements for these nutrients. Parental breakfast eating habits influenced their children's breakfast eating pattern.

Efforts, including better time management, are required to inculcate a positive breakfast eating attitude among Benghazi primary school children. Their parents need to act as better role models by adopting healthy breakfast eating practices themselves.

The paper shows that breakfast skipping among Benghazi primary school children is a nutritional problem of grave concern, warranting a public health intervention.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a mathematical model of a make-to-order manufacturing company simultaneously negotiating multiple contingent orders that possess conflicting issues in order to achieve order acceptance decisions (OADs).

The paper developed a mathematical model by incorporating probabilistic theory and some theories of negotiation in the OAD problem. The model helps to harness the relationship between the manufacturer and customers of contingent orders on conflicting issues. A numerical example is enumerated to illustrate the working mechanism and sensitivity of the model developed.

In the negotiation-based OAD system, if more than one customer is willing to negotiate on the offer of manufacturer, rather than engaging in one-to-one negotiation, the manufacturer has to negotiate with all the customers simultaneously to maximize the expected contribution and acceptance probability from all the orders. Also, the numerical example illustrates that, sometimes, rejecting an order/orders from the order set gives better results in terms of the expected contribution than continuing negotiations on them.

Through continuing research efforts in this domain, certain models and strategies have been developed for negotiation on a one-to-one basis (i.e. negotiation by the manufacture with only one customer at a time). One-to-one negotiation will neither help companies to streamline their production systems nor will it maximize the expected contribution. To the best of the author’s knowledge, so far, this is the first instance of research work in the domain of a joint OAD and negotiation framework that attempts to develop a simultaneous negotiation method for arriving at OADs.

Multinational companies are considered “driving forces” of globalization and “prime movers” of global sociation. Yet the problems, conflicts, and contradictions in the implementation of global strategies at the micro level – as well as the real possibility that such implementation will fail – are virtually ignored in macro‐sociological studies. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to address this neglect by focusing on a micro level examination of the contribution of expatriates in their interactive role as facilitators and managers, and, their informal social networks.

The interpretation of how global structures are concretely organized and sustained is based on case studies and interviews with German expatriates in Russia. The article examines two particular aspects: the contribution of expatriates in their interactive roles, on the one hand, and their informal social circles, on the other. The analytical framework draws on the concept of “global microstructures”.

Expatriates must maneuver between the conflicts and contradictions that surface from the three‐way relationship between head office, branch office, and the market, and their respective local institutionalized pressures. It is argued that such conflicts and contradictions cannot be resolved within the formal structure of organizations and that, as a result, they are shifted to the level of interpersonal interaction or to informal networks. Global reach as well as microsocial foundations therefore characterize the expatriate's action system.

Since the study is restricted to German expatriates in Russia, further comparative research is needed to sustain the findings for other institutional and cultural settings.

The findings raise awareness both of the contradictory demands expatriates are confronted with in their everyday work as well as their unique resources. They could contribute to better management training and preparation for expatriates prior to their move abroad.

The paper presents a micro‐sociological view on how systemic integration is actually achieved through a globally stretched as well as locally specified network of interaction. It could be valuable for international strategy definition as well as for personnel managers, and future expatriates themselves.

Innovation has become the engine of economic growth, especially with the Fourth Industrial Revolution. This paper aims at studying the association between innovation – measured by gross expenditure on research and development (GERD) – and economic performance – represented by real gross domestic product (GDP) – in MENA region over the period 1996-2016.

The paper uses the panel corrected standard error method to account for heteroskedacity and possible contemporaneous correlation across panels, and the first order autocorrelation within panel for unbalanced datasets.

The study concludes that R&D expenditure is positive and statistically significant in explaining GDP, but their relationship is weak. Specifically, a 10 per cent increase in R&D expenditure raises GDP by 4 per cent. In addition, human capital, labor force and fixed capital accumulation are found positive and statistically significant. These findings highlight on the importance of innovation and education on fostering economic growth, urging MENA governments to further invest in R&D and innovation sector.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this paper is the first to investigate the relationship between GERD and GDP in MENA region within the endogenous-growth model framework.

This study examined the effects of event sponsorship, in the context of the two most recent FIFA World Cup (FWC) events hosted in Europe (France 1998 and Germany 2006). More than 4,000 teenagers were incorporated into the sample in order to measure recall and image values for official FWC sponsors. The comparative findings suggest that it is nearly impossible to generalise about whether sponsoring the FWC is effective or not as a communication tool. For some companies it definitely is effective; for others the effects are limited. Ambush marketing, however, seems to be an effective alternative.

The purpose of this paper is to undertake an analysis of the attempts of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) countries to catch up in their national development to build an innovation-driven economy on which to base future growth and wealth. We conducted an analysis of GCC and BRIC countries to show the different strategies leaders have taken to try and achieve this aspiration. This paper analyses the various aspects of national innovation systems of BRIC and GCC countries, highlights similar and different approaches and attempts to quantify their success. For example, GCC countries spend extensively on research and development (R&D), but have so far achieved less than meaningful results. Brazil, China and India are catching up to the acknowledged world leaders in innovation, but Russia is lagging.

Our comparison was based mostly on secondary data from sources and institutions that use statistical data to build country rankings, such as the Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) produced by the World Economic Forum. BRIC and GCC countries were analyzed over 1996-2011 because most of the indicators data are only available from 1996. Data related to intellectual property rights have been collected since 1999 or 2000. The data available for the number of researchers proved problematic for both BRIC and GCC countries. For instance, some data for the GCC countries was missing. To not leave a gap, we extrapolated in line with the overall trend; using the least squares method to approximate a straight line for the missing data based on what had already been reported.

Counter-intuitively, we will argue that the push toward an innovation-based economy is actually not dependent on total expenditure on R&D, but rather relies on the efficient allocation of investments and the rigorous implementation of innovation strategy. And, we will demonstrate this by showing our ideas in relation to both BRIC and GCC countries. This analysis raises fascinating points of discussion for those looking to build an innovation economy in other countries and has practical implications for policy-makers and policy implementers in all countries.

First analysis of the correlation of gross expenditure on R&D (GERD) with gross domestic product (GDP) growth and Straits Times Index (STI) policy measures.