This project work focused on compounding and curing of natural rubber filled with sawdust as filler. The purpose of this research work was to investigate if the incorporation of sawdust in natural rubber compounding can enhance increase in tensile strength, water absorption resistance, abrasion resistance and hardness strength and also to determine their properties with different mixing ratios. Two roll mill was used in compounding the different ratio of filler in 0g, 10g, 20g, 30 and 40g into natural rubber and compressing (curing) was done using a hydraulic hot press at a temperature of 140°C. Afterward various tests were carried out on the vulcanizate which include hardness test, tensile strength, water absorption test and abrasion resistance. The following results were obtained for average hardness test 30.14, 34.71, 53.57, 57 and 64. For percentage abrasion resistance these results were obtained 2.9, 5.17, 11.7, 8.8 and 7.1. For percentage water absorption the following result were obtained 4.76, 4.16, 5.26, 3.57 and 6.06. It was observed here that the natural rubber with incorporated sawdust powder filler is good for application where hardness and water absorption is required.

In this research work, energy audit of a processing company; a case study of food and beverages company was carried out. A walk-through energy audit of the company was undertaken to identify the major sources of energy in use, identifying the lapses in energy usage, identifying areas to improve energy usage, determining the level of consumption of the energy sources and recommending policy measures that will enhance energy savings in the industries and Nigerian industries at large. From the results analysis of the energy audit, it was observed that electric motors and ovens were the major consumer of electrical energy, accounting for 30-% and 13% of total average electric energy for a period of eight years (2002-2009). Besides, electricity accounted for 80% of energy consumed, diesel accounted for 16% while manual energy was 4%. It was also noted that the company did not sufficiently utilized the energy consumption for production

More and more issues such as climate change, corporate social responsibility, the global financial crisis, discontent with patterns of inequality, the uncovering of organizational wrongdoing and corruption cross traditionally disconnected social spheres, Prior work has predominantly used qualitative methods to identify and describe institutional complexity, with some exceptions involving experiments. The aspiration of this special issue is to contribute to understanding of institutional complexity and to offers guidance on how to move this understanding forward.

Poverty in Nigeria is wide spread and deep. Causal evidence of the growing intensity of poverty in the country can be glimpse from using incidence of mass unemployment, urban vagrancies and homelessness. The country generates new entrants into the labour market each year thereby leading to increase in unemployment and no country would allow this episode to uninterruptedly proceed without mitigation. The objective of the study is to examine government effort in tackling the problem of poverty and unemployment and to provide ways of tackling these problems through entrepreneurship practice. The methodology used was secondary data and the information gleaned from these sources were weighed using both deductive and inductive reasoning. It was recommended that there should be sustainability and synergy of all programmes and policies aimed at addressing the problem of poverty and unemployment, so as not to be disrupted for political reasons.

Tomato is one of the market gardening cultures still present in the daily dishes of populations of the planet. Varietal improvement and soil infertility forced market gardeners to develop new cultivation techniques. It is with the aim of proposing a new combination of tomato-fertilizer that this study was conducted. A factorial test (3 * 4) was installed to evaluate and determine the best treatment. During the experiment, phenological and yield parameters were observed. The result is no statistical difference between the different combinations, however, the average yield was higher than the global average of more than 25 tonnes for this study. While soil tests indicate that it is deficient in major chemical elements, hence the recommendation to always fertilize before placing crops. This study demonstrates that with strict monitoring, the crop is profitable for market gardeners and also proves that it is possible to substitute mineral fertilization with organic fertilizer.

Natural Rubber was reinforced with Cashew nut shell powder as filler at 10-50g respectively. The samples obtained were evaluated for sorption properties which included the rate at which the respective samples absorbed some solvents like Toluene, Xylene Petrol, Kerosene, Chloroform, Acetone Methanol, Ethanol, N-hexane and Water. The sorption test revealed that Xylene has the highest percentage absorption. Which implies when used with natural rubber that was not reinforced with any filler, the rubber will dissolve in it forming a solution and even when filled with cashew nut shell powder will not be suitable for use were it can come in contact with xylene. The test revealed also that the increase in filler loading increases the percentage absorption of the filler.

The CCI Method was mathematically and statistically tested and proved as an improved method to the current university selection method, ZScore. Education of Sri Lanka is entirely free and students are selected to limited capacity of the state universities by the GCE(A/L) examination. The CCI method is a simple and easily understood method which selects the top most students in each combination without distorting their earned raw marks at the examination. The raw marks contain values such as ability, efforts made by the student, parents and the society, and the raw marks uniquely determine the level of the student. Two data sets of raw marks for symmetric and more skewed were generated by means of an additive model taking the student intelligent effect and the error measurement as random, and the subject effect as fixed. The generated raw marks of three combinations in each data set were ranked according to the ZScore and CCI method. 3% of the student marks was assumed to be re-scrutinized and increased 5 – 20 marks randomly and ranked. The effect of the re-scrutiny was measured by way of the rank differences made by each selection method for original and re-scrutinized marks and studied descriptively and with Non-Parametric statistical procedures. It was concluded that CCI method is far more robust when compared to ZScore method for re-scrutinizing and it would help to speed up the University selection procedure at least by three months. By introducing CCI method for university selection, Sri Lankan GCE (A/L) examination system can be tuned to select the best set of students for human resource development.

The mechanical properties of thermoplastic elastomer polypropylene (PP)/Natural rubber [NR] blend have been investigated. It was prepared using two-roll mill at 190oC. The basic additives used were PP, NR, TMQ, MBT, processing oil, stearic acid and zinc oxide, except sulphur. The blend composition was fixed at the ratio of 0, 90/10, 80/20, 70/30, 60/40, 50/50 (PP)/(NR). By varying the filler loading mechanical properties (i.e Hardness, Abrasion, Water absorption, and impact showed that during hardness test, increase in PP Loading with less natural rubber will increase the hardness result while for 50/50 shows that the was an increase in the hardness test due to equal quantity. Impact test shows that increase in PP Loading with less natural rubber will increase the impact strength while decrease in PP Loading with high natural rubber will decrease the impact strength .Water absorption test shows that samples with Natural rubber loading absorbed water more than those with high PP loading. Abrasion test result shows that some samples increased in the graph e.g 70/30, 80/20 based on in- homogenous mixed.

The physico-mechanical properties of recycled low density polyethylene/sisal fibre composite was investigated. It was prepared using two-roll mill at 160oC. The basic materials used were Recycled Low Density Polyethylene and Sisal Fibre. The compounding composition was fixed at the ratio of 100/0, 95/5, 90/10, 85/15, 80/20, 75/25, of Recycled Low Density polyethylene and Sisal Fibre respectively. By varying the filler loading mechanical properties (i.e Hardness, Impact, Abrasion, and Water absorption,] showed that during hardness test, increase in filler Loading with LDPE will increase the hardness result. Impact test shows that there is increase as the filler loading keeps increasing. Water absorption test shows that samples without filleri. econtrol sample didn‘t absorb water. While there were increased in water absorption as the filler loading increases. Abrasion test result shows that increase in the filler loading decreases the weight of the composites, showing poor abrasion resistance as the filler loading increase from 5g-25g.