This paper assesses the potential economic impacts of Integrated Agricultural Research for Development (IAR4D) conceived to address observed low productivity, prevailing poverty level, slow growth and general underperformance of the agricultural sector associated with the traditional agricultural and rural development (ARD) approach. The economic surplus analysis suggested that IAR4D research and extension, with respect to maize production, could achieve returns ranging from 30 to 38 per cent and a maximum adoption of 25 to 50 per cent for the conservative and baseline scenario, respectively. Similarly, with the same range of maximum adoption, the approach could yield returns ranging from 22 to 29 per cent for the conservative and baseline scenario, respectively in millet production. However, the same range of adoption could result in 29 to 37 per cent for the conservative and baseline scenario, respectively in sorghum production. The estimated benefits are sensitive to expected adoption rates but much less so to changes in research and extension costs. However, the estimates indicate that the production of all the crops was socially profitable under the IAR4D option. Our results were consistent with earlier economic analyses which showed that IAR4D was more productive, profitable and acceptable to farmers than the conventional Research for Development (R&D) approach.

Engineers' main concern is the stability of nominal frequency and voltage levels in an electric power system. If these two characteristics deteriorate, the performance and life expectancy of the power system's related equipment would suffer. Because of this, control devices must be set up and installed specifically for a given working environment in order to maintain the frequency and terminal voltage magnitude within acceptable ranges. An effort has been made to develop a fractional-order PID (FOPID) controller for combined frequency and voltage control issues, since the system performance may be enhanced by choosing an appropriate controller. Utilizing moth flame optimization method, this study examines the plan and execution of the FOPID controller for simultaneous load frequency and voltage management of the power system. An AVR-based excitation voltage control system is used in the first portion of the study to illustrate the suggested method for frequency stabilization of isolated power systems. Comparison of dynamic responsiveness of the system with PID controllers improved by other intelligent methods reveals the superiority and efficacy of the suggested methodology. Also included in this project are multi-unit two-area power systems. The algorithm's capacity to be tuned is examined in great detail and compared to other algorithms.

No abstract

No abstract