Supply chain management concept has found its way into the construction sector of the economy as a result of the inherent opportunity to improve performance. The concept has continued to attract increasing support among major stakeholders in the execution of construction projects. However, it was observed that the strategy is still at low level of adoption among professionals in the industry. Moreover, the low level of knowledge of the strategy and the inability to effectively put the principles of supply chain management to practice hinders the application. This study therefore advances the knowledge of supply chain management by undertaking an examination of few key areas on the concept with a view to improving the awareness and understanding among professionals and assist in designing a supply chain management strategy suitable for building development process. Relevant studies were identified for review by literature search using key words and concepts related to the topic of the current study. Thematic areas of discussion include the construction industry outlook, building development process, the principles and essentials of construction supply chain management. The understanding of basic principles and essentials of supply chain management is important to adopting, adapting, designing and deployment of the strategy in the construction industry and this constituted the purpose and focus of the study.

This paper examines the relevance of the Internet of Things to the Real Estate profession. Questionnaires were distributed, and the interview was also conducted on the Estate Surveyors and Valuers in Akure metropolis. The paper adopts a quantitative method of data analysis. Descriptive techniques were adopted; it includes the tabular analysis of data using percentages and frequencies. A bar chart and Pie chart were also used. From table 4 and figure one (1) (bar chart), it was discovered that most of the respondents are aware of the existence of the Internet of Things as the majority of them indicated their awareness. Table 5 and figure 2 (Pie chart) also show that a high percentage of the respondents agreed that the Internet of Things is relevant to the Real Estate profession.

Apprenticeships provide young people with training and improve the supply of workers to the construction sector. In Nigeria, there is a large influx of craftspeople from neighbouring countries. This situation has led to an increase in the rate of youth employment. The current study seeks to address the following questions: (i) what are the factors responsible for the noncompletion of construction crafts apprenticeship? And (ii) what are the determinants of successful completion of construction crafts apprenticeship? Forty-six (46) semi-structured interviews were conducted with relevant stakeholders involved in apprenticeship in Lagos State, Nigeria. The study reveals that "lack of information on the content of training programme," "financial difficulties," "bullying," "lack of interest," and "work-life balance" as factors responsible for non-completion. In contrast, it was found that "personal interest and motivation," "parental and family support," "personality of the trainer," and "potential to earn income" are determinants of successful completion of construction crafts apprenticeship. This finding can be used to develop strategies for improving outcomes of construction craftspeople apprenticeships. The study contributes to the knowledge on apprenticeships in the field of construction and vocational education.

Real estate practice is a strategic and multi-faceted vocation that connects the clients/owners of real estate projects or products with end users in the building industry. Different aspects of real estate practices require collaboration of real estate practitioners who are professional estate surveyors and valuers, with the built environment professionals and other stakeholders at different levels in order to achieve the transaction objectives. This study, therefore, examined the practice with a view to uncovering the preparedness of the estate surveyors and valuers with respect to the knowledge and application of supply chain management in real estate practices. Empirical data were collected with the aide of questionnaires administered to respondents from the 373 estate firms in Lagos State, Nigeria of which 291 were duly completed and returned constituting 78% rate of response. The Readiness Assessment Model was adapted to determine the operational preparedness of the estate surveying and valuation firms to implement supply chain management with regards to management readiness, employee readiness, services/processes readiness and logistic/ICT readiness on a 5-point Likert scale and the corresponding mean score and relative importance was determined. The Kolmogorov Smirnov Test of Normality was performed and showed that the data was normally distributed. Hence, the Pearson Product Moment Correlation analysis was used to determine the relationship between knowledge and application of supply chain management in real estate businesses. It was observed, among others, that the knowledge of supply chain management is generally low among estate valuers and does not necessarily translate to application in the property market transactions of real estate firms. The study further observed that management and employees of estate surveying and valuation firms do not have adequate knowledge of the principles and practices of supply chain management for productive engagement in property market transactions. This was further identified alongside others such as confidentiality, stiff rivalry and economic instability as critical factors resisting the adoption of supply chain management in the property market. The study therefore suggested capacity building programmes on supply chain management for the estate surveyors and valuers to improve the knowledge of the strategy and harness the benefits.

This paper applies the novel Successive Approximation Method (SAM) for the solution of the quadratic Logistic Differential Model (LDM). To confirm the reliability of the method, illustrative examples are considered, and it is remarked that the approximate-analytical solutions of the considered cases are computed with ease. The proposed technique is used directly, without transformation, discretization, linearization, or any restrictive assumptions.