Designing and implementing biodiversity-based value chains can be a complex undertaking, especially in places where outcomes are uncertain and risks of project failure and cost overruns are high. We used the Stochastic Impact Evaluation (SIE) approach to guide the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) on viable investment options in honey value chains, which the agency considered implementing as an economic incentive for communities along the Kenya-Somalia border to conserve biodiversity. The SIE approach allows for holistic analysis of project cost, benefit, and risk variables, including those with uncertain and missing information. It also identifies areas that pose critical uncertainties in the project. We started by conducting a baseline survey in Witu and Awer in Lamu County, Kenya. The aim of the survey was to establish the current farm income from beekeeping as a baseline, against which the prospective impacts of intervention options could be measured. We then developed an intervention decision model that was populated with all cost, benefit and risk variables relevant to beekeeping. After receiving training in making quantitative estimates, four subject-matter experts expressed their uncertainty about the proposed variables in the model by specifying probability distributions for them. We then used Monte Carlo simulation to project decision outcomes. We also identified variables that projected decision outcomes were most sensitive to, and we determined the value of information for each variable. The variable with the highest information value to the decision-maker in Witu was the honey price. In Awer, no additional information on any of the variables would change the recommendation to invest in honey value chains in the region. The analysis demonstrates a novel and comprehensive approach to decision-making for different stakeholders in a project where decision outcomes are uncertain.

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The culture of corruption has grown deep roots in the Kenyan society and become endemic. Institutions, which were designed for the regulation of the relationships between citizens and the State, are being used instead for the personal enrichment of public officials.  Corruption persists in Kenya primarily because there are people in power who benefit from it and the existing governance institutions lack both the will and capacity to stop them from doing so. This paper looked at the role of accounting on how to control corruption in the Kenyan Public Sector and the rate of existing internal control and accounting standards are helping to reduce the level of corruption. The main objective of the study is to establish whether internal control and accounting standards have significant relationship with corruption control in the public sector in Kenya. The study got primary data using a structured questionnaire while secondary data were obtained from reports. To test for reliability of result from data used, the Cronbach alpha coefficient was applied. Questionnaires were administered to staff in Kenyan ministries. Respondents were selected using stratified random sampling method. Multiple regression analysis result showed that both internal control and accounting standards do not have significant relationship and effect on corruption control in the Kenyan Public Sector. The recommendations of the study showed that management personnel should at least have basic knowledge of accounting while staff in the accounts and finance department needs to proceed regularly on capacity building to upgrade emerging accounting trends.

The main purpose of this paper was to review the literature on the how public debt components influence economic growth in the public sector. The specific objectives of the review were to identify trends in published literature on public debt components and economic growth in the public sector; identify major conflicts and or inconsistencies in theory, concepts, methodology, findings and conclusions; identify the gaps and flaws in research within the context of public debt components and economic growth; and build propositions based on identified thematic areas. Literature on public debt components adopted to influence economic growth in the public sector was collected and analyzedfrom secondary sources. These sources included books, research publications, academic publications and journals. The general trend focused on public debt components that are important in influencing economic growth in the public sector.  Major conflicts in theory, concepts and methodology were identified and documented.  The gaps revealed that majority of publications reviewed were not grounded in theory for their studies. The literature too revealed a lack of agreement on the overall impact of public debt components on economic growth. A conceptual gap was noted in which all the research publications ignored the impact of intervening variables on the relationship between the predictor variables and the output variables. Also most publications considered public debt components as first order constructs, leaving a gap on what type public debt components to guide and help prioritization of the components during adoption and none of the reviewed studies has investigated the influence of a moderating variable on the relationship between the public debt components and economic growth. From the reviewed literature, the study findings led to the following prepositions: To examine the effect internal and external debts on economic growth in the public sector; To assess the impact of Productive and unproductive Debt on economic growth in the public sector; To evaluate the effect of Compulsory and Voluntary Debt on economic growth in the public sector; To assess the impact of Redeemable and Irredeemable Debt on economic growth in the public sector. This study recommends further research to compare and ascertain the strength of the relationship between the thematic areas and economic growth in the public sector; further research is also required to establish the influence of public debt on economic growth in the public sector.  Another area that requires further research according to the reviewed literature is on assigning weights to public debt components to assist the country.

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