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Background and Objective: Concentration prediction with Gaussian dispersion models is highly sensitive to meteorological data. The lack of sounding data station in developing countries may lead to large error and uncertainty in air pollution modeling results. In this paper, the effects of estimated upper air data on the model output concentration values were investigated. Materials and Methods: AERMOD model was executed once with real upper air data and also with estimated upper air data separately. T-Student and LEVENE tests were used to evaluate the significant differences between concentrations in two modes of using actual and estimated upper air data. Results: The results showed that large differences in concentration between the two methods. In long term modeling, there was up to 33% differences between real and estimated upper meteorological data and up to 63% differences for short term modeling. A large difference was also observed between boundary layer parameterization values in each case. The statistical analysis showed a meaningful difference (p=0.00) between the cases. The differences between ZICNV, DT/DZ, W* were 7.1%, 48%, and 19%, respectively. Conclusion: The use of estimated upper meteorological data in comparison with measured data may lead to a large error. The AERMOD modeling results with estimated meteorological data must be expressed with appropriate uncertainties and confidence interval. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim and Introduction In recent decades, governments have taken an important step towards an information society, better service delivery, and improving the welfare of their society by developing e-government. The development of communication technology and e-government is considered an effective factor in economic growth and development and high labor productivity. The aim of this research is to investigate the role of e-government development on labor productivity in developing countries including Iran using the vector autoregression approach with panel data (P-VAR) over the period 2003-2020. Methodology Sims(1986) first used a vector autoregressive (VAR) model to analyze the dynamic relationships among multiple variables The model assumes that all variables are endogenous. This model uses the lags of all endogenous variables to test the dynamic relationships among all variables. Holtz-Eakin et al.(1998) extended the vector autoregressive model to make a perfect combination of panel data and time series models, making it a powerful analytical tool for macro-dynamics research. To examine renewable energy consumption, population aging, and agricultural green total factor productivity in the same framework, this paper constructs a PVAR model based on the traditional vector autoregressive model. A Panel vector autoregressive model(PVAR) includes the analysis of the Forecast Error Variance Decomposition– FEVD and the analysis of the Orthogonal Impulse Response Function – OIRF. Parameter estimation in the PVAR model is performed using the Generalized Method of Moments. For the stability of the regression equations, a polynomial matrix is used and a partial unit root test is performed for all variables based on the augmented Dickey-Fuller test. Findings The results of the study show that due to a positive shock in the development of e-government, labor productivity reacts strongly and positively, which indicates that the development of e-government, in the long run, can lead to increased labor productivity in developing countries. The results also show that in developing countries, the impact of health shock is greater than the impact of other variables such as physical capital formation shock and education variables. Discussion and Conclusion Today, the importance and impact of the development of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, the internet of things, and big data in different sectors are so great that this period is referred to as the age of communication. Entering this era and the development of electronic tools has changed the needs of people and societies. The aim of this research was to investigate the role of e-government development on labor productivity in developing countries. The results of the modeling show that the variables of health, physical capital, education, and e-government development are the main factors affecting labor productivity, respectively. Also, the results of the research show that the response of labor productivity to the shocks of labor productivity itself was positive in the long term. This effect gradually decreases. Specifically, when a positive shock occurs in labor productivity, this situation is considered a signal for the labor force to continuously seek to improve its productivity. According to findings, the reaction of labor productivity to the positive shocks caused by the development of e-government has also been positive, which indicates that the development of e-government has a long-term effect on labor productivity and can lead to an increase in labor productivity in the long run. According to findings, in developing countries at the end of the 10th period, about ten percent of labor productivity changes are explained by e-government development shocksLabor productivity. As expected, the impact of the health shock on labor productivity is positive. Quantitatively, the effect of this shock is greater than the shock caused by education and physical capital, which shows the significant impact of health on labor productivity in developing countries. The reaction of labor productivity to the shocks of education is consistent with theoretical expectations. Also, according to expectations, physical capital has a significant effect on labor productivity in developing countries. In general, it can be seen that in developing countries, any positive change in the development of e-government has an impact on labor productivity (based on the decomposition of impulse-response functions and the analysis of the variance of the forecast error). Also, the response of labor productivity to the changes in the field of health has been greater. Therefore, the authorities of developing countries should improve the productivity of the workforce, pay attention to the development of human capital and physical capital indicators, and implement and develop the e-government as best as possible.

Estimating the real exchange rate misalignment from the equilibrium value and exploring the factors affecting its changes is crucial for both economic policymakers and economic agents. Among the various factors affecting exchange rate misalignment, the exchange rate regime, has received less attention in experimental studies. Accordingly, the present paper seeks to find out the answer to the question of how real exchange rate misalignment is affected by different exchange rate regimes. In other words, in which of the exchange rate regimes is the exchange rate misalignment less and in which one it is higher? To answer the question, the propensity score matching approach has been used. For this purpose, we have used data from 116 developing countries with different exchange rate regimes in 2019. Other factors such as real exchange rate misalignment in the previous period, inflation, the quality of institutions and financial development have been considered as match variables to net the effect of the exchange rate regime on real exchange rate misalignment and to separate the effects of other variables. The results showed that the real exchange rate misalignment from its equilibrium level has responded significantly to the type of exchange rate regime adopted by the countries, so that the floating exchange rate regime increases the real exchange rate misalignment in the selected developing countries wherever implemented. It can be argued that factors such as high exchange rate fluctuations, a more drastic adjustment in the price level, and speculative bubbles or contagion effects in the floating exchange rate regime have led to an increase in these misalignments.

Globalization of economy is posing unprecedented opportunities and challenges for firms especially in developing countries. How does a firm best structure itself to thrive in current dynamic environment with high degree of uncertainty and go about entering global markets is one of the most risk issues in this era. Technology development strategy in alignment with business strategy is of increasing importance to achieve sustaining development. In this paper, we introduce global balance approach as a potent driver for crafting technology development strategy. This paper provides an overview to technology development framework and methodology in SAIRAN, composed of technology selection, acquisition strategy, and timing, at the core of which lies capability assessment, attractiveness, and road mapping. A case study on technology development in the field of medical equipment's and entering global market verifies the introduced methodology and how it can support global balance approach in order to deliver successful products in fast response to market, with higher quality, service levels, scalability, flexibility, and lower price.

Income inequality and efforts to its reduction it is one of the most important concerns of societies in today's world. On the one hand, countries are looking for revenue sources and, on the other hand, are trying to reduce income inequalities. In addition, due to the unequal distribution of income and the impact of migration contrary to the policies of societies, migration makes it difficult to achieve the desired economic growth. Therefore, considering the importance of the consequences of migration, the main purpose of this paper is to investigate the nonlinear effects of income inequality on brain drain in developing countries. Based on the findings of the study, the inequality in income distribution has a threshold effect on brain drain in developing countries. As long as inequality is at levels below 0.46, this variable has a negative and significant effect on brain drain, but after exceeding the threshold of 0.46 and being in a high inequality regime, the intensification of inequality increases the brain drain sharply. In other words, society tolerates a degree of inequality, but the intensification of inequality beyond the tolerable level of society causes the elites to migrate to developed countries, which are more equal, in search of a better life and proportionate to their capabilities.

Globalization of economy is posing unprecedented opportunities and challenges for firms especially in developing countries. How does a firm best structure itself to thrive in current dynamic environment with high degree of uncertainty and go about entering global markets is one of the most risk")' issues in this era. Technology development strategy in alignment with business strategy is of increasing importance to achieve sustaining development. In this paper we introduce global balance approach as a potent driver for crafting technology development strategy. This paper provides an overview to technology development framework and methodology in SAIRAN, composed of technology selection, acquisition strategy, and timing, at the core of which lies capability assessment, attractiveness and roadmapping. A case study on technology development in the field of medical equipments and entering global market verifies the introduced methodology and how it can support global balance approach in order to deliver successful products in fast response to market, with higher quality, service levels, scalablity, flexibility and lower price

Globalization of economy is posing unprecedented opportunities and challenges for firms especially in developing countries. How does a firm best structure itself to thrive in current dynamic environment with high degree of uncertainty and go about entering global markets is one of the most risky issues in this era. Technology development strategy in alignment with business strategy is of increasing importance to achieve sustaining development. In this paper we introduce global balance approach as a potent driver for crafting technology development strategy. This paper provides an overview to technology development framework and methodology in SA/RAN, composed of technology selection, acquisition strategy, and timing, at the core of which lies capability assessment, attractiveness and roadmapping, A case study on technology development in the field of medical equipments and entering global market verifies the introduced methodology and how it can support global balance approach in • order to deliver successful products in fast response to market, with higher quality, service levels, scalablity, flexibility and lower price.

Achieving a happy society is one of the goals of today's human societies, and how to achieve it has attracted the attention of many researchers and politicians. In this research, one of the dimensions of this important issue has been studied. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between the degree of trade openness and happiness in selected developing countries in the period of 2002-2007 by the GMM panel method. The results of model estimation have shown that the degree of trade openness has a nonlinear and threshold effect like Inverse-U shape on happiness. The reasons for this result can be attributed to the diversity of consumer products and thus increasing consumer utility and satisfaction in the early stages of economic opening and then by expanding the degree of trade openness and crossing the threshold level, the negative impact of the degree of openness on happiness can be attributed to issues such as increasing income inequality, differences in expected and realized happiness, and the effects of globalization on informal institutions.

The overall purpose of this study is to examine the privatization experiences of developing and developed countries in agricultural research and modeling in the Iranian agricultural sector. In the first stage, the influential factors in privatization were identified using the cross-linked research method. For this purpose, 42 selected papers in internationally accredited journals in the period 2000-2018 were selected with a thematic focus on privatization and agricultural research. In five separate stages, the objectives, samples, research method, findings and results were selected. The results of this phase resulted in the separation of five key factors in privatization. The factors were 1) Causes of privatization tendency: to increase efficiency, improve government finances, expand capital markets, reduce costs, create employment, and reduce administrative bureaucracy 2) Privatization Barriers: Component Political and legal uncertainties, strong stakeholder opposition, government financial weakness, high unemployment, increased competition in world markets, inflation control, and reduced government tenure. 3) Privatization Disadvantages: Component the reluctance to provide services in disadvantaged areas, ignoring environmental issues, reducing government control over the type and quality of service provision, and the existence of insecure employment contracts 4) Solutions Privatization: Including equity, direct selling of assets, contracting, and restructuring of the consumer market. 5) Consequences of privatization: Increasing efficiency, improving government finances, reducing costs, creating employment and reducing bureaucracy. In the second phase of the research, using the qualitative research method by grounded theory, the five main factors identified were coded in three stages and the proposed model of agricultural privatization in Iran was put together to bring together the contexts, causes, solutions and consequences.

Fertility is one of the basic processes of the population that has an important effect on the dynamics and change of population structure. The declining burden is a global phenomenon; in the past decades, developed countries and today many developing countries are experiencing it, and in Iran, the overall fertility rate has reached less than the replacement level. Estimation of fertility rate in rural areas is mainly affected by population size and space unit size. Therefore, estimating fertility rates and mapping them in small and sparsely populated geographical areas is challenging. This study aims to accurately estimate and identify spatial patterns of fertility in rural areas using spatial smoothing methods for 2016 and 2011. Experimental Bayes and spatial Bayes smoothing methods were used to analyze the data. While the average GFR of 2011 and 2016 are 51.1 and 71.6 (children per 1000 women), respectively, the findings show that spatial smoothing methods, especially the experimental spatial Bayesian method, have good efficiency in estimating fertility in small areas. Adjusting the fertility rate in densely populated areas is less and in sparsely populated areas it makes a significant adjustment. The results also show the occurrence of high rural fertility in less developed border areas (southeast, east and south) and the spread of low rural fertility from north to south and then the central and western villages. The persistence of low fertility in most of the rural areas is causing serious challenges in the economic, social and political spheres. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural development is one of the main concerns of developing countries. The consequences of lack of development in rural areas such as widespread poverty, unemployment and migration have led to more attention to rural development. According to the latest report of the Statistics Center of Afghanistan (2020), out of the total population of this country, about 23.4 million people (71%), live in rural areas. At the same time, rural areas face various economic, social, cultural, managerial and environmental challenges. Therefore, identifying Afghanistan's rural development challenges is a prerequisite to developing policies, plans, and providing a flexible model for achieving sustainable rural development. In this regard, the main purpose of this study was to identify and analyze the major challenges of rural development in Afghanistan. The statistical population included 60 experts on agricultural and rural development. The data collection tool was a questionnaire and its method was face-to-face interview. For data analysis, coefficient of variation and confirmatory factor analysis were used. The results of this study showed that several challenges including economic (such as lack of credits and investments in rural areas), social (such as women's low participation in rural activities), environmental (such as improper exploitation of groundwater), physical (such as the weakness or lack of rural-urban network), and managerial (especially the dominance of unskilled laborers in rural economic activities) challenges, have influenced rural development in Afghanistan, respectively. Undoubtedly, any effort to eliminate them will play a significant role in achieving sustainable rural and consequently national development of this country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Intellectual property system (IPS) can be defined as the set of institutions and rules involved in the design, implementation, and enforcement of intellectual property in a national economy. Intellectual property system as a main subsystem of the national innovation system potentially is a powerful tool for innovation policies in every country with different developmental level. However, due to differences in the nature and function of the national innovation system in developing countries vs. developed countries, intellectual property system must be proportionate to the developmental level and innovation capacities in these countries. In this paper, after reviewing the history of the evolution of intellectual property system in Iran and describing its main components, SWOT method has been used to analyze strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the current intellectual property system. Finally, policy suggestions for further conformity between the intellectual property system and the national innovation system in Iran are presented and discussed in detail.

This paper critically examines the new institutionalism approach to defining and evaluating formal and informal institutions as well as providing policy prescriptions for developing countries with regard to two key challenges. The first challenge is the lack of theoretical consensus on the definition of institutions and, consequently, their extension from formal and ethical rules to executive mechanisms and political and economic institutions. The second challenge is the constraint on the measurement of informal institutions stemming from the characteristics of informal social levels in which institutions appear unplanned. For this reason new institutionalism scholars have largely avoided careful study of informal norms. Conceptual scattering, also, has made it almost impossible to provide a comprehensive definition of the entity. Thus the lack of adequate focus on informal institutions has led to the neglect of this theory of gradual institutional change. In addition, due to the social overlap, many institutions are strongly correlated, making it difficult to discover a causal relationship between institutions and economic development. Theses conceptual and theoretical challenges hinder the development of a comprehensive policy agenda for developing countries. For this reason, some institutionalists emphasize the importance of adaptive institutions rather than adoptive ones.

The unprecedented speed of science and technology and the relative economic need of different societies for technological entrepreneurship are undeniable and this need is specially felt in less developed countries. Nevertheless, technological entrepreneurship development in different areas has always been faced with different obstacles and problems and its most important application, that is modernization of emerging economies, is challenging. It is logical that removing these barriers requires precise and careful identification. Hence, in this study, a qualitative research method and semi-structured interviews were used to analyze technological entrepreneurship barriers in Sarbaz area of Sistan and Baluchestan province. The present study was a case study and its statistical community included experts working in organizations related to entrepreneurship and, of course, technological entrepreneurship and other economic activities in different areas of Sistan and Baluchestan province. They have been active or are still working in the area in question. After collecting the data using semi-structured interviews, the collected data were analyzed. Finally, by analyzing the interviews and the data, the barriers and problems of developing the technological entrepreneurship in Sarbaz County were identified. These barriers included economic barriers (13 components), educational barriers (12 components), psychological barriers (8 components), infrastructure barriers (7 components), cultural barriers (9 components), political barriers (6 components), managerial barriers (6 components), technological barriers (7 components), human resources, and capital constraints (7 components). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public private partnership has been used extensively in both developing and developed countries in delivering various types of projects, ranging from transportation projects, health care facility and power plants. The high speed rail projects which implemented by public private partnership in recent years has faced with difficulties. This paper aims to develop an identification and assessment method for critical risks of public private partnershiphigh speed rail project in Iran. In this research at first, risks of public private partnershiphigh speed rail projects are identified by integration of extensive literature review and Public private partnership high speed rail project experience in Iran and other countries. In the next step, the identified risks are assessed by questionnaire survey and multivariate statistical analysis. Analytical investigations show that the number of critical risks in high speed rail projects and their mean importance is higher than that of general public private partnership projects. In this study in addition of confirming pre identified risk groups consisting political and financial groups, two major groups of initialisation and contractual risks specific to high speed rail projects are identified and two groups specific to developing countries named circumstances and private risks are proposed. Because of insufficient studies and lack of experience in developing countries about transportation mega projects via Public private partnership this study can be a helpful reference for public private partnership implementation of high speed rail mega projects in developing countries.

It is generally assumed that distance learning is considered as an inescapable step forward for developing countries. Traditional education in developing countries can no longer respond and bend to the demands due to explosive population growth, economic constraints and over-demand for education. Given the pressure brought to bear on these countries to join the developed and information-rich world, it seems that distance education would provide a better education for a larger number of people at lower cost. The present paper attempts to investigate the status of distance education in Library and information science, expand on the challenges and opportunities it poses for the educational systems in the developing countries and to provide a more realistic link between education and development in such communities.

The consensus among experts is that Iranian Copyright Laws are in dire need of review and revision given the new requirements and capabilities facing our young society. In order to arrive at well-written and operationally sound regulations governing generation and dissemination of digital information within the cyberspace – while protecting the rights of their author - one needs to have a better understanding of libraries’ mission (as repositories and distribution point for rich information), global trend of information exchange economization, and social conditions. Having a business plan and taking note of intellectual property, database managers and providers must draw up economic justification for their digital libraries. Thus a written strategic plan for development and management of intellectual property could be effective over a specific time period. The research infrastructure and foundations and existing capacity for absorbing scientific and technical knowledge, is weak in developing countries. This inevitably leads to these societies maintaining a less than desired low scientific output and development. New knowledge is generated in richer countries where research and development capital expenditure is higher. The present paper deals with the political and economic strategies involved in designing the information production, distribution and consumption cycle while protecting proprietary.

The aim of this paper is twofold. It first investigates the demand for international reserves using panel data for 32 developing countries during the period 1975 – 2004. To this end, an Error Correction Model (ECM) approach is employed to estimate the empirical model and then a capital asset pricing model (CAMP) is used to determine the composition of the foreign exchange reserves. A dummy variable is included in the model to consider the effect of changing exchange rate system on the demand and the composition of international reserves. The results show that there is a negative relationship between exchange rate flexibility and the demand for international reserves.