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The purpose of this paper is to attempt an empirical examination of government budgeting and expenditure processes in Nigeria, a developing country. It examines the current state of budgeting and public funds management (PFM) in Nigeria. It also examines the extent to which the government has used the budgetary mechanism to effectively manage the nation’s economy.

The paper employed simple regression estimation technique for data analysis. Time series data set of budgetary information was constructed from different archival sources over a 16-years period (2000-2015), majorly the national Appropriation Acts, press releases, regulatory and governmental reports, reports of Transparency International, World Bank and Central Intelligence Agency.

The findings confirm that the nation’s annual budgeting approach is defective and lags in achieving its fiscal objectives. The budget indicates a state of poor accountability and transparency in PFM. Findings also suggest that the level of economic development in Nigeria is not commensurate with the size of government expenditure.

The paper draws the attention of the government to the need to restructure its approach to budgeting and adopt a more resilient approach that suits its environment and economic peculiarities in effort to ensure efficient management and accountability of public funds. The paper also offers value to other developing countries. It provides empirical evidence that explains an aspect why the African continent remains underdeveloped hitherto.

This paper lends a voice to the call for a restructuring of the Nigerian budgetary system and its implementation strategy. It advocates for the adoption of an alternative budgeting approach that matches Nigeria economic realities. The paper demonstrated that the traditional budgetary approach being used by many developing countries is limited in certain ways and could hinder sustainable development.

Human resource is the asset for a nation’s development and growth. The skilful human resource will enhance the nation’s productivity and directly contribute to the economy growth. At the country level, a nation’s human resource development (HRD) policy and human resource trainings schemes will catalyst for the growth of the workforce’s productivity, especially in the Industrial Revolution 4.0 which requires advanced technological knowledge and specialists in particular fields such as digitalisation, artificial intelligence and quantum computing. This chapter discusses the HRD in developed, developing and less-developed countries and raise awareness and attention of organisations as well as nations to develop and train up human resource for the future growth of the countries.

Purpose. This chapter discusses the challenges and different strategies to increase skill development for the future workforce.

Methodology. Multiple sources on the topic were studied and reviewed in this chapter. The idea of skill and its development is discussed in the literature review.

Findings. Different nations’ governments have promoted human capital development by providing up-skilling and retraining programs to balance supply and demand. Skills gaps need to be brought to the attention of stakeholders, such as governments, businesses, and the educational system. Teachers, employers, and other stakeholders need to develop strategies and action plans to ensure that the skills gaps are appropriately identified and adequately addressed. These initiatives must be developed with input from various stakeholders.

Practical Implications. The research results would inform the curriculum, incorporating skill development processes tailored to various scenarios. These findings would aid business organisations in crafting skill development programs that address identified skill gaps. Challenges in skill development would be taken into account during course development, and relevant teaching–learning materials would be created. Key stakeholders, such as accrediting organisations, employers, and students, should exert more influence on academic institutions to prioritise societal demands for economic development.

Originality/Value. The uniqueness and significance of this chapter lie in its concise summary of the strategies to tackle the hurdles in skill development.

The US fertility transition in the nineteenth century is unusual. Not only did it start from a very high fertility level and very early in the nation’s development, but it also took place long before the nation’s mortality transition, industrialization, and urbanization. This paper assembles new county-level, household-level, and individual-level data, including new complete-count IPUMS microdata databases of the 1830–1880 censuses, to evaluate different theories for the nineteenth-century American fertility transition. We construct cross-sectional models of net fertility for currently-married white couples in census years 1830–1880 and test the results with a subset of couples linked between the 1850–1860, 1860–1870, and 1870–1880 censuses. We find evidence of marital fertility control consistent with hypotheses as early as 1830. The results indicate support for several different but complementary theories of the early US fertility decline, including the land availability, conventional structuralist, ideational, child demand/quality-quantity tradeoff, and life cycle savings theories.

This study investigates the evolutionary pattern of China's electronics industry and China's industrial integration into the Northeast Asian region from a historical perspective. The purpose is to shed some light on the catch‐up path of China's technological capabilities using some empirical evidence covering the period of 1974‐2000.

Market share and the Finger‐Kreinin similarity index (FKSI) are used as measures to trace the path of catch‐up from both quantitative and structural perspectives and evidence is provided at the sectoral level. The Standard International Trade Classification (SITC) classification systems is adopted and FKSI values are derived from international trade data at both four‐digit SITC and sectoral levels.

First, the take‐off points toward rapid progress of China's technological capability in different sectors happened not concurrently but in a sequentially manner. Second, as to structural evolution, the process of China's integration into the world market and the Northeast Asian region started in 1978 and the extent of integration has become higher and higher ever since. Until late 1990s, gaps between China and Japan and between China and Korea have been successfully narrowed in terms of comprehensiveness of export structure in electronics.

The period of 1974‐2000 saw the tremendous transition in China from a centralized and planned system into a market‐driven economy. It also saw several noteworthy shifts of China's industrial policy in order to build up its innovative capacity and to catch‐up with Japan and Korea. Unlike many other studies that deeply root in macroeconomic approach, this study traces the evolution of China's performance at the sectoral level by focusing on electronics industry. The findings of this paper are explained in terms of national industrial policy, location effects, and low‐cost sourcing.

The purpose of this paper is to identify, dissect and unravel real-life contextual human capital issues related to George Town’s built heritage from the perspectives of key stakeholders in the heritage arena.

The paper opted for an exploratory study using qualitative techniques like in-depth interviews and focus group discussions to gather insights and to listen to the voices from key stakeholders pertaining to issues related to human capital in built heritage. The data were supplemented and complemented by secondary resources such as technical reports, conservation guidelines, by-laws and case studies from other countries.

The paper provides empirical insights about real-life issues, barriers and challenges pertaining to human capital in George Town’s built heritage. The key findings from this study revealed that the quantity of professionals and builders is still insufficient and their quality of work has room for improvement.

Due to the selected research approach, the research results may lack generalisability. Thus, researchers are encouraged to further test the proposed propositions by enlarging the number of respondents or administering this similar study in another locality/historic city (i.e. Malacca ‒ George Town’s twin historic city).

The paper provides practical implications for the development of the right quantity and quality of human capital for George Town’s built heritage. The findings from this study are also useful for urban managers, policymakers and conservation practitioners.

This paper fulfils an identified need to examine the real-life issues of human capital in built heritage for George Town.

The unseen benefit of the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria is that it presented an insight into the contributions of the manufacturing industry to the socio-economic development of the nation. During the pandemic, the unavailability of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) have demonstrated the low production capability of the Nigerian manufacturing industry to provide essential materials and equipment required by the health sector. This availability of these facilities is vital for the sustenance of public health and lives of frontline health workers. Consequently, this challenge resulted in an increase in infection and deaths of frontline health workers which could have minimized if there were adequate provision of PPE local production. Hence, this study postulates that the COVID-19 pandemic is an entrepreneurial opportunity in Nigeria, especially for the mass production of PPE to service the health sector of Nigeria and sub-Saharan Africa. The study therefore investigated the challenges of entrepreneurship in Nigeria's manufacturing industry and examined how the strategic partnership between educational institutions, corporate bodies and the government can be optimized. Utilizing a qualitative research methodology based on scholarly journals and interview sessions, the study revealed that Nigeria's manufacturing capability is low due to Nigeria's age-long protectionist tendency, lack of integration of entrepreneurship skill in the industry, inadequate knowledge of financial knowledge, lack of synergy in the industry, among others. The study recommended a strategic framework for Nigeria's manufacturing industry for the production of PPE in form of a helix model after an overhauling of the production process of the industry.

Privatization is one of the ways governments consider to dispense with the consequences of governmental economy in the economic reforms. One of the complex matters that governments face is decision-making in privatization and choosing policies and methods that move the country’s economy toward more efficiency. Considering the importance and complexity of this issue, taking a comprehensive strategic perspective by the policy makers seems necessary for establishing successful privatization.

Article 44 of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s constitution is the foundation of its privatization program and this study specifies the strategic requirements in implementation of privatization based on the mentioned article and other legal documents. Iran Privatization Organization (IPO) is the single executor of the program and we surveyed all members of the statistical population of this study, including all experts, supervisors, managers, deputies, and senior advisers of IPO to collect the required information by a questionnaire with some questions including strategic thinking, requirements, and results.

To analyze the data, at first, validity and reliability of the collected data, then the correlation between strategic thinking and requirements were tested and all strategic requirements of privatization were prioritized. We used tests such as Cronbach’s Alpha, Pearson Correlation Coefficient, Linear Regression, and Friedman to perform the study.

This study aims to report on how programme directors address sustainability within engineering education at Swedish universities and engineering colleges.

The study was performed as a survey with follow-up interviews around the following core questions: to what extent do programme directors possess a deep understanding of the subject of sustainable development? Which are the core competencies in sustainable development that programme directors identify as important for their engineering students to acquire during their basic training? To what extent are those competencies integrated into engineering education today and what kind of support do programme directors receive from their department to integrate these competencies into the curriculum?

Programme directors believe that learning for sustainable development is important mainly based on their personal convictions. However, out of 10 potential learning objectives extracted from the literature, only four-six are implemented in degree programmes. Learning objectives and activities are not always aligned, as students are required to learn about interdisciplinary collaboration without working with students from other faculties. The programme directors receive some support from the department, but they express a need for additional support. Examples of support that they suggest are faculty training, efficient teaching material and incorporation of sustainability in the quality assessment instruments for degree programmes.

This study is the first comprehensive, national survey of what programme directors think about sustainability in higher education. Their views are important in the attempt to accelerate the integration of sustainability in higher education curricula.