Search results

Science and technology parks (STP) are established to facilitate innovation and the rapid development of cutting-edge technologies. The innovation performance of tenants is the primary feature of all successful STPs globally. The purpose of this study is to investigate firms’ innovation and economic performance at the National Science and Technology Park (NSTP), Islamabad, Pakistan.

The CDM (the acronym of the three authors’ names, Crépon, Duguet and Mairesse) model following a two-stage approach was used to analyze the survey data of 105 tenants. The innovation performance of tenants was estimated through probit regression at Stage 1, and the economic performance of tenants given their innovation performance was examined at Stage II using Tobit regression and the Heckman model.

The findings suggest that compatibility of innovation with the existing competitive advantage of a firm increases the innovation performance of firms, whereas collaboration of firms with NUST for research and development has only a marginal effect on innovation performance. However, the tenant’s business and social networking were weak, possibly due to the short time spent on NSTP.

These STPs are expected to be hubs of technology development and transfer by fostering open innovation through internal and external collaborations. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to estimate the innovation performance of tenants at NSTP, the first fully integrated STP in Pakistan. Despite shortcomings, the innovation and economic performance of NSTP tenants warrant further public policy support to inculcate open innovation culture.

Technology parks (TPs) are used as a tool to improve economic outlook of the region through innovation generation. This study aims to evaluate the perception of tenants of TPs to determine the gap in the expectation and identify types of firms preferring to locate in a TP.

This is the first study in Pakistan to collect data about perceived benefits of TPs in Pakistan from the decision-makers of 110 tenant firms. The cluster analysis and lift ratios are used to draw statistical inferences.

The firms can be classified into three clusters – commercial-orientation firms, science and technology-oriented firms and young tech firms – with distinct needs for survival and growth in a TP. Moreover, TPs should not just be treated as property projects for providing support services, also knowledge sharing, training and development opportunities and proximity to hubs of knowledge and markets is vital to attract a variety of industry.

Academia and policymakers have been equally interested in the potential impacts of these innovation hubs. However, there have been lack of empirical evidence on how and what to offer the incumbents of these TPs. The government of Pakistan is trying to build more TPs for promoting business activities under CPEC. Therefore, it is extremely important to determine the needs of tenants of TPs for successful utilization of huge amount of public money to be invested in TPs.

Innovative health-promoting approaches of the era have verified phytoceutics as one of the prime therapeutic tools to alleviate numerous health-related ailments. The purpose of this paper is to probe the nutraceutic potential of ginger flowers and leaves against hyperglycemia.

The aqueous extracts of ginger flowers and leaves were observed on Sprague Dawley rats for 8 weeks. Two parallel studies were carried out based on dietary regimes: control and hyperglycemic diets. At the end of the experimental modus, the overnight fed rats were killed to determine the concentration of glucose and insulin in serum. The insulin resistance and insulin secretions were also calculated by formulae by considering fasting glucose and fasting insulin concentrations. Furthermore, the feed and drink intakes, body weight gain and hematological analysis were also carried out.

In streptozotocin-induced hyperglycemic rats, the ginger flowers extract depicted 5.62% reduction; however, ginger leaves extract reduced the glucose concentration up to 7.11% (p = 0.001). Similarly, ginger flowers extract uplifted the insulin concentration up to 3.07%, while, by ginger leaves extract, the insulin value increased to 4.11% (p = 0.002). For the insulin resistance, the ginger flower showed 5.32% decrease; however, the insulin resistance was reduced to 6.48% by ginger leaves (p = 0.014). Moreover, the insulin secretion increased to 18.9% by flower extract and 21.8% by ginger leave extract (p = 0.001). The feed intake and body weight gain increased momentously by the addition of ginger flowers and leaves; however, the drink intake and hematological analysis remained non-significant by the addition of ginger parts.

Conclusively, it was revealed that leaves have more hypoglycemic potential as compared to flowers.

Corona viruses have spiked structure and enveloped glycoproteins in their structure, along with specific proteins in membranes. The mode of action of COVID-19 consists of three phases, i.e. viral replication, immune hyperactivity and pulmonary destruction. However, angiotensin-converting enzyme is an essential receptor that causes COVID-19. After infecting any individual, COVID-19 develops in specific pattern with the following stages: replication stage and adaptive immunity stage. After adaptive immunity stage, the clinical symptoms of patient include cough, fever, runny nose, shortness of breath and many more. To cope with this COVID-19, food and nutrition played an important role. The purpose of this review article is to emphasize the significance of food and immunity to reduce COVID-19 attack among susceptibles.

In the present era, corona virus, a member of crown-shaped type, created a pandemic situation around the globe owing to its capability to move from human to animals and vice versa. This virus can transfer its 35% infection to the individuals. Contemporarily, this outbreak was observed in Wuhan, China in December 2019 and affected a huge number of communities by spreading like common flu. However, after investigation, it was revealed that COVID-19 is different from common flu regarding respiratory illness created by this novel coronavirus along with its taxonomy.

Over and above to all the aforementioned food safety concerns, it is suggested to use sufficient supply of green leafy vegetables along with fiber-rich foods such as legumes, beans, whole grains and vegetables. It is further good for health to get all these varieties whole and organic. The individuals should use probiotics (lactobacillus) on daily basis as a source of diary probiotic that can further bind to the virus directly and then can inhibit the viral attachment with body cells; also the probiotics are claimed to enhance the immune system of the body.

In the case of fruits and vegetables purchased, it must be thoroughly washed with water and then disinfected; after pat drying, these fruits and vegetables can be moved to the refrigerator and stored along with other foods. During the outbreak of COVID-19, the partially cooked or ready-to-eat foods should be avoided, especially eggs, meat, meat products, milk and milk-related products. On the other side, nuts should not be consumed; if required, then it must be properly roasted at home before consumption.

The baked product right after coming out of oven is completely safe; however, these are contaminated during handling such as crumb in case of bread and with knives; so in the breakout of any viral attack, the individuals should avoid slicing of the bread. Moreover, it is recommended to place the baked products in personal bags instead of bulk quantity. Before the consumption, the baked products should be toasted, microwaved or heated with the help of pan (traditional) to reduce the amount of viral load.

Dietary supplements are taken by most of the people on daily basis or sporadically especially when they are suffering from inflammation or cold. They have options while selecting these types of supplements such as probiotics, Echinacea, omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins D and E, calcium glucosamine, garlic and iron. These supplements are beneficial for the group of population who do not eat diversity of food as sufficient amount of essential nutrients is provided through this pathway.

This work is original in its novelty.

The purpose of this paper is an attempt to cover available literature on natural resource management, which reflects the involvement of Pakistan communities living in different regions for sustainable management in agriculture, forestry and livestock sectors differentiated by women. In addition, it was also highlighted about the lack of access to productive resources for rural women farmers. The conclusion was drawn and key recommendation were suggested.

It is authors real-life experiences or observations in a given field to support colleagues in a variety of ways including advising, establishing best practices and noting trends.

It was concluded that there are no opportunities such as training of most advanced launched technologies for the sake of better crop production, dairy and fisheries sector sustainable development, as well as the availability of microfinance to support the women farmers in Pakistan rural areas to make them self-dependent.

The opinions and key recommendations are genuine and useful, which should be adopted for the more bright future of women farmers, especially in Pakistan’s rural area.

This study aims to investigate the complex relationship between green intellectual capital (GIC), green human resource management (GHRM) and green innovation (GI) for improvement in the environmental performance (EP) of an organization.

The data collected from 456 food manufacturing firms in Pakistan was used for structural equation modeling through SmartPLS. Hypotheses were tested through path analysis, predictive relevance and effect size of variables.

The findings show that GIC and GHRM have no direct impact on EP; instead, GI plays a mediating role to make GIC and GHRM helpful in improving an organization’s EP. Also, the environmental strategies play a significant role in the EP and act as a moderator in the relationship between GI and EP.

The Global Climate Risk Index has ranked Pakistan as the fifth most vulnerable to climate change. Industrial activities are contributing significantly to carbon emissions, and therefore, it is vital to mitigate and adapt to climate change to improve the organization’s EP. The findings of this study show that GIC, GHRM and GI can significantly enhance the EP of food manufacturing firms in Pakistan.

The continuous increase in the negative gap between biocapacity and ecological footprint has remained globally persistent since early 1970. The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of foreign capital, domestic capital formation, institutional quality and democracy on ecological footprint within a global panel of 101 countries from 1995 to 2017.

The empirical procedure is based on data mix. To this end, this study uses a battery of testing and estimation approaches both conventional (no cross-sectional dependence [CD]) and novel approaches (accounting for CD). Among the battery of estimation techniques used, there are the dynamic ordinary least square, the mean group, the common correlation effect mean group technique, the augmented mean group technique, the Pooled mean group and the dynamic common correlation effect technique with the desire to obtain outcomes robust to heteroskedasticity, endogeneity, cross-correlation and CD among others.

The estimated outcomes indicate that using different estimators’ domestic capital formation consistently degrades the environment through an increase in ecological footprint, while institutional quality consistently enhances the quality of the environment. Further, the outcome reveals that, though foreign capital inflow degrades the environment, the time period is essential, as it shows a short-run environmental improvement and a long-run environmental degradation. Democratic activities show a mixed outcome with short-run degrading effect and a long-run enhancement effect on environmental quality.

Green investment should be the policy target of all economies, and these policies should be adopted to target both domestic capital and foreign capital alike. Second, the adoption of democratic practices will produce good leaders that will not just design short-term policies to blindfold the populace temporary but those that will produce long-term-oriented practices that will better and enhance the quality of the environment through the reduction of the global footprint. Equally, enhancing the institutional framework like respect for the rule of law in matters of abatement should be encouraged.

Although much research on the role of macroeconomic indicators on environmental quality has been done this far, democratic practices, intuitional quality and domestic capital have been given little attention. This research fills this gap by considering robust empirical techniques.

This paper provides an analysis of the energy-carbon Kuznets curve hypothesis (CKC) using a second-generation panel methodology.

Specifically, the authors investigate whether energy consumption, natural resources and governance explain the CKC proposition. The study’s empirical strategy is based on the Westerlund panel cointegration test, augmented mean group (AMG) and vector autoregressive (VAR) panel Granger-causality tests.

The results suggest that the CKC hypothesis is incomplete without these mechanisms, as they play a critical role in reducing carbon emissions in Africa. The authors recommend improving the environmental standards and proper regulatory and monitoring systems to reduce carbon emissions and promote sustainable development in the continent.

The study revisits the CKC hypothesis with particular emphasis on governance and more robust empirical estimation techniques.

Entrepreneurial leadership has been developed from the existing leadership and entrepreneurship literature as a new leadership theory to meet the dynamic changes in the 21st century. Accordingly, the main purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of entrepreneurial leadership on employee creativity and the mediating influence of psychological empowerment and psychological safety, with the lens of social learning theory.

Data were collected from the manufacturing sector of Pakistan with a sample size of 280 dyads of managers and employees. A two-step analytical strategy was adopted through which the measurement model was validated by using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling to estimate the structural model to fit the data. The bootstrapping method was applied for testing the mediation analysis.

The current study found that entrepreneurial leadership positively related to employee creativity. Moreover, it was found that psychological empowerment and psychological safety mediated the relationships between entrepreneurial leadership and employee creativity.

The findings of the current study provide guidance to managers and businessmen on how to develop the creative skills of employees by adopting entrepreneurial leadership behaviors. Besides, this study enriches the literature by exploring the performance mechanism of entrepreneurial leadership to develop employee creativity.

The current study is considered the first to examine the role of entrepreneurial leaders in stimulating employee creativity through psychological safety and psychological empowerment. As such, it enriches the creativity literature by exploring the employee creativity mechanism through entrepreneurial leadership and validating the importance of psychological factors in the development of creativity compared to previous studies, which have focused primarily on the concept or scale development of entrepreneurial leadership. Furthermore, it provides several theoretical and managerial implications along with future opportunities.

This study aims to compare the antioxidant and antimicrobial activity of different parts (tip, mid and base portion) of lemongrass leaves for application as a natural ingredient in the functional drink.

Lemongrass leaf powder was prepared from different parts of leaves and evaluated for nutritional composition. Additionally, the extracts of different portions of lemongrass leaves were analyzed for total phenolics, free radical scavenging activities, ferric reducing antioxidant potential (FRAP) and antimicrobial activities for their application in food products.

Tip portion of lemongrass leaf anticipated significantly (p < 0.05) higher contents of ash, protein, calcium, potassium and iron i.e. 6.2 mg/100 g, 18 mg/100 g, 340 ppm, 819 ppm and 32 ppm, respectively. Maximum (p < 0.05) phenolics (14.7 mg GAE/100 g), 2,2-diphenyl-1-picryl-hydroxyl (86.3%) and FRAP (200 mmol/100 g) were observed in lemongrass leaf tip methanolic extracts. Moreover, lemongrass leaf tip hydro-methanolic extracts portrayed maximum zone of inhibition against E. coli and Staphylococcus aureus i.e. 16.7 and 18.2 mm, respectively.

This study demonstrated higher antimicrobial and antioxidant activities of the tip of lemongrass leaves as compared with mid and base portions, hence suggesting its role in the improvement of physicochemical, antimicrobial and antioxidant properties of food products. Consequently, the application of lemongrass methanolic extract up to 10% remarkably enhanced the nutritional value and sensorial acceptance of the beverages.

The present research draws evidence from laboratory analysis of fresh lemongrass grown in Pakistan. The findings suggest that lemongrass methanolic extracts could be used as a nutritionally rich source of antioxidant activity in functional drinks.