Exploitation Activities Research Articles

Mediating Role of Dynamic Capabilities on the Relationship Between Organizational Ambidexterity and Firm Performance of Supermarkets in Kenya

Several businesses have established successful strategies in order to move their operations toward the desired future position. However, problems with performance have made it difficult to achieve the suggested future position. The possibility to grow and expand has been found in some supermarkets that embrace organizational ambidexterity. Existing research suggests that supermarkets poor performance can be attributed to informal retail competition, a lack of resource exploitation and exploration, ongoing employee training and development, and consumer preference for convenience because most informal retail locations are more easily accessible. Dynamic capabilities are a firm's ability to adapt and respond to changing environments effectively. They involve processes, routines, and skills that enable an organization to identify, assess, and seize opportunities or respond to threats. Examples of dynamic capabilities in the supermarket industry might include the ability to quickly adjust product offerings in response to changing customer preferences or rapidly reconfigure supply chain operations in response to disruptions. Dynamic capabilities can mediate the relationship between organizational ambidexterity and supermarket performance by enhancing exploration and exploitation. Organizational ambidexterity involves both exploration and exploitation activities. Dynamic capabilities play a crucial role in facilitating these activities. Supermarkets operate in a dynamic and competitive environment. Dynamic capabilities help them adapt to changing market conditions. For example, if a supermarket identifies a shift in customer preferences towards organic products, dynamic capabilities can help in quickly sourcing and stocking these products, thereby improving performance.

Riscos potenciais de erosão do solo no centro-norte do Vietnã usando sensoriamento remoto e GIS

ABSTRACT Unsustainable exploitation activities (UEAs), combined with the increasing impacts of global climate change are the key causes that lead to soil erosion in the North-Central Vietnam. Mountainous areas in the North-Central Vietnam commonly have steep slopes and sandy clay in the surface soil layer, which contribute to enhancing the soil erosion, resulting in a serious loss of life and property. This study investigates the land cover change (LCC) across the Thanh Chuong district by combining Remote Sensing Technique (RST) data with Geographic Information System (GIS) and further, establishing erosion risk hazard maps based on the RUSLE model simulation. To achieve these objectives, Sentinel and Landsat satellite images from the period 2010_2021 were acquired. It was verified that the forest area gradually decreased from 2010_2021, and the average annual soil loss was approximately 25 t per year. The amount of erosion that led to a soil loss of up to 18% of the total land area is related to weather conditions, terrain features, and the soil texture. The decline in the vegetation cover is expected to be the main cause of increasing trends in erosion and soil loss.

Complete mitochondrial genome of the abyssal coral Abyssoprimnoa gemina Cairns, 2015 (Octocorallia, Primnoidae) from the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, Pacific Ocean

The Clarion-Clipperton Zone (CCZ) in the tropical East Pacific is a region of interest for deep-sea mining due to its underwater deposits of polymetallic nodules containing economically important metals such as nickel, copper, and cobalt. It is also a region of extensive baseline studies aiming to describe the state of the environment, including the biodiversity of the benthic fauna. An abundant component of the abyssal plain ecosystem consists of sessile fauna which encrusts polymetallic nodules and are vulnerable to potential impacts arising from exploitation activities, particularly removal of substrate. Therefore, this fauna is often considered to have key species whose genetic connectivity should be studied to assess their ecological resilience. One such species is Abyssoprimnoa gemina Cairns, 2015, a deep-sea coral from the CCZ whose presence in the Interoceanmetal Joint Organization (IOM) claim area has been confirmed during samplings. In this study, we used next-generation sequencing (NGS) to obtain the 18S nuclear rRNA gene and the complete mitochondrial genome of A. gemina from IOM exploration area. The mitogenome is 18,825 bp long and encodes for 14 protein coding genes, 2 rRNAs, and a single tRNA. The two phylogeny reconstructions derived from these data confirm previous studies and display A. gemina within a highly supported cluster of seven species whose mitogenomes are all colinear and of comparable size. This study also demonstrates the suitability of NGS for DNA barcoding of the benthic megafauna of the CCZ, which could become part of the IOM protocol for the assessment of population diversity and genetic connectivity in its claim area.

Public Order, Public Protest and Public Monuments

Much public protest in recent years has been directed towards monuments to controversial figures who have profited from the slave trade or other exploitative activities. The most striking example in the United Kingdom has been the fate of the four individuals accused of damaging the statue to Edward Colston in Bristol as part of a Black Lives Matter demonstration. This article examines the arguments relied on by the defence at trial and in the Attorney-General's Reference which followed their acquittal. The article begins by setting protest relating to public monuments in its international and historical context.

The need for an environmental strategy in the oil, gas and petrochemical industries

The different stages of oil exploration, extraction, and processing, as well as its down-stream industries and the activities of refineries and petrochemical exploitation, leave multiple effects on the environment. For certain, as a result, soil, air, water (including surface and underground), organisms, plants, trees and even humans are affected by these effects. Hence, the fundamental importance of sustainable development and attention to the needs of the future generation, as well as the relevance of preventing the re-duction of environmental quality, encourages and requires oil industry and environmental experts to think of solutions and provide operational-strategic solutions to control and reduce the adverse environmental effects caused by these industries. Indeed, it is necessary to diversify control strategies and include environmental considerations in the planning of the oil, gas, and petrochemical industries, but the current situation is far from ideal. This article first briefly presents some environmental challenges and problems of the oil, gas and petrochemical industries and then describes the need for an environmental strategy to overcome these issues.

Urgent call for protection and use of transboundary watercourses. Some legal reflections

AbstractThe use of transboundary water resources has received special international attention in recent years. Although riparian countries recognize the benefits of cross‐border rivers and enter into agreements with countries sharing the transboundary rivers by means of legal rules, treaties, and principles, they have done excessive riverine exploitation activities to maximize their socio‐economic benefits, causing the imbalance in the ecosystems and peace. This study aims to conduct a secondary analysis of primary qualitative data to research the common legal frameworks on international water law such as Helsinki Rules, UN Watercourses Conventions, and UNECE Water Convention, together with a case study on the Mekong River Agreement. Bilateral, multilateral, international treaties and principles are currently not enforceable enough to compel riparian countries strictly to comply with these legal rules and principles on equitable and sustainable water coordination and development. Besides, there are still internal conflicts among the upper and lower riparian countries over the equitable and reasonable use of transboundary river watercourses due to lack of punitive sanctions. There is an urgent need to establish a specialized international water management commission designated by all nations with the utmost power to regulate human‐related activities concerning transboundary watercourses to govern equitable and sustainable management and development of the transboundary water use. Besides, current international law principles have to be revised to fill the gap of disagreement and potential conflicts between upstream, middle stream and downstream countries.

A hybrid association analysis framework of accident reports for offshore drilling platforms

As the key work unit of offshore oil and gas exploration and exploitation activities, an offshore drilling platform (ODP) integrates high-density equipment and facilities in a relatively narrow area, making it prone to frequent serious accidents under the influence of environmental factors. The mining association rules of the hidden dangers from the accumulated historical accident reports can help find the potential causes of the risks and proactively reduce the risk of accidents and damages. However, due to the professionalism of the corpus linguistics of the offshore oil and gas industry and the complex correlations between multiple named entities, mining valuable information from massive transaction datasets has increasingly become a challenge for academia and industry. To this end, a hybrid association analysis framework for ODPs is proposed in this paper, which is divided into four stages: data preprocessing, information extraction, association rule mining and making a rectification plan. In the key information extraction stage, we propose a three-layer deep learning network based on the BERT-IDCNN-BiLSTM-CRF (BIBC) model, which makes effective use of the semantic information of the context to extract the trituples of the hidden dangers (i.e., equipment, location and phenomenon). Based on the extracted entities, an effective multientity association rule mining algorithm based on hash technology and an inverted itemset (HTApriori) as a variant of Apriori for ODP databases is developed to understand the many-to-one, one-to-many and many-to-many risky causes between the entities. A series of real-world experimental results show that the proposed framework offers more reliable and effective performances of information extraction and association rule mining than the comparison methods. By analyzing the association results, the hidden dangers and their association rules, which occur with some small probability but are critical in ODPs, can be found. This work is helpful in significantly improving the rationality of the rectification plans. In addition, the application results on the CoNLL2003 dataset further prove the generalization performance of the proposed method.

Ambidexterity in strategic alliances: An integrative review of the literature

AbstractStrategic alliances play a vital role in exploration and exploitation activities, otherwise known as the ambidextrous approach for value creation. This has led to an upsurge in studies on ambidexterity in strategic alliances by giving rise to various conceptualizations and theoretical challenges. However, we lack a systematic evaluation and synthesis of the theoretical and empirical insights from this growing body of research. In this paper, we use an integrative systematic literature review (SLR) approach to critically analyse 77 articles on ambidexterity in strategic alliances published in 38 leading journals across 13 disciplines. Findings from bibliometric and qualitative content analyses reveal three major research directions: (1) micro‐foundation and organizational antecedents of ambidexterity in alliances, (2) governance mechanisms of ambidexterity, and (3) relational and performance outcomes of ambidexterity. We integrate these findings into a unified framework which provides a foundation for future research on ambidexterity in strategic alliances, with implications for academics, policymakers and practitioners.

Microsoft Excel Program Training at the Dumai Petroleum Vocational School, Riau Province

Education at the Vocational High School (SMK) level is an important alternative for students to develop their skills and be ready to face competition in an increasingly competitive job market. SMK graduates have technical skills and are ready to enter work sectors related to procedures and routines. In Riau Province, the upstream oil and gas industry provides opportunities for SMK graduates to participate in this sector. SMK Migas in Duri City and Dumai City were established to prepare students for positive contributions to the oil and gas industry around the region. The development of technology, especially in the field of information technology, encourages the industry to apply the technology in every aspect of its operations. Modernization and digitalization also affect the oil and gas industry sector, which includes exploration and exploitation activities. The oil and gas industry requires reliable human resources (HR), given the density of capital and technology in this sector. However, companies tend to look for experienced workers, so SMK graduates need to have skills that can be directly used in the oil and gas industry. The transition to an increasingly advanced technological era requires SMK graduates to have the ability to adapt to technology, especially in the use of computers as a means of work and learning. Behave=adaptive Being able to operate the Microsoft Office program package is an important requirement for every individual who uses a computer, either in the form of a personal computer (PC) or laptop. Laptops are also the main device for freelance engineers in conducting engineering analysis from simple to complex.

Appraisal of geothermal potentials of some parts of the Abakaliki Anticlinorium and adjoining areas (Southeast Nigeria) using magnetic data

The Abakaliki Anticlinorium and its adjoining areas were appraised with the object of delineating high geothermal potential zones. Spectral depth analysis involving an improved centroid technique was used to analyze high-quality magnetic data. The obtained geothermal parameters were gridded to map various geothermal features within the investigated area. The obtained results varied from 4.99–9.35 km, 2.31–6.15 km, 6.11–16.28 km, 35.63°C–94.93°C/km, and 89.07–237.32 mW/m2 for centroid depth, top depth, Curie point depth, geothermal gradient, and heat flow values, respectively. The delineated semioval structure in the central zone of the investigated region characterized by a shallow Curie point depth (< 8.5 km) correlates with the location of the high-heat flow (>191.0 mW/m2) and geothermal gradient (>74.0°C/km) region. The high geothermal potential of the region is triggered by the massive post-rift tectonic event of the Santonian period related to the Abakaliki Anticlinorium. Further geophysical exploration programs should be carried out before exploitation activities at anomalous geothermal regions.

ANALISIS KEKUATAN HELIDECK SANTOS SANGU PT. McDERMOTT INDONESIA

Offshore building structures are buildings commonly used for oil and gas exploitation activities. The distance is quite far from the coastal area, it is necessary to support transportation facilities for the mobility of offshore structures such as ships and helicopters. To support this mobilization activity, a helicopter landing medium is needed, namely the helideck. This study aims to identify the shock loads that occur on the helideck and calculate the strength of the helideck santos sangu PT.McDermott Indonesia. This study used data from PT.McDermott Indonesia on one of the projects located in Block 16, Bangladesh. The helicopter data used in this study was a jet-A1 type helicopter with a maximum weight of 5307 Kg. The results showed that the value of the helicopter dynamic load on a normal landing was 10348.65 Kg with a working stress of 62163.41 N/mm2 and had an interaction ratio (IR) = 0.35, while for an emergency landing the dynamic load was 1724.75 Kg, the working stress was 103606.45 N/mm2, interaction ratio (IR)= 0.59.

OPTIMALISASI SIFAT MEKANIK SERAT ALAM DARI SERBUK KAYU ULIN MELALUI TEKNIK PENGERINGAN SEBAGAI PENGUAT MATERIAL BIOKOMPOSIT ANJUNGAN KAPAL

Ironwood (eusideroxylon zwageri) is a type of wood that has great potential for industrial development. Currently, forest exploitation activities and the wood industry produce 30%-60% solid wood waste and have not been utilized optimally. One way to use it is to make composite materials. The purpose of this study was to determine the most optimal drying technique of ironwood powder, to provide information on the morphology, content and functional groups as well as the mechanical strength of the biocomposite with a volume fraction ratio. The ironwood powder samples in this study were characterized using the SEM-EDX, FTIR, and Vickers hardness tests. The results of the SEM test obtained information that the morphology of all samples had similarities, namely the surface was rough and the measured diameter of the sample ranged from 50-100 µm. While the EDX test obtained information that all samples had high carbon and oxygen content. The FTIR test results showed that ironwood powder had a cellulose content as evidenced by the absorption peaks and chemical bonds that were the same as pure cellulose. The results of the mechanical test on the biocomposite showed that sample C had the highest average HV value of 13.3 N/m2, while sample E had an average HV value of 12.26 N/m2 below the HV value of sample E. Meanwhile, sample A obtained the lowest hardness value with an average HV 5.93 N/m2.

Tinjauan Yuridis Eksploitasi Manusia Dalam Fenomena Mandi Lumpur

Very massive technological development does not always bring positive effects but also brings negative effects. The development of creativity does not lead to a new social phenomenon, namely online begging. This phenomenon was later exacerbated by the alleged human exploitation of the process. So it elicits responses from various circles. Even the Ministry of Social Affairs issued Circular No. 2 of 2023 on the Control of Exploitation Activities and/or Begging Activities that Utilize the Elderly, Children, Disabled People, and/or Other Vulnerable Groups so that such actions do not proliferate. However, in fact, the circular was not effective enough to answer the problem. This study was conducted using a normative juridical method through a legislative approach and a case approach

Geological and energy potential analysis of Küplüce-Gökçesu basin rich in coal and other potential energy resources

The Küplüce-Gökçesu Basin, located in northwestern Anatolia, is an Eocene-aged shallow marine basin known for its rich carbonaceous sediments. The basin is underlined by Paleozoic metamorphic rocks, granites from the Sakarya Massif, and Jurassic-Upper Cretaceous turbiditic and carbonate rocks. The sedimentary deposits in the basin consist of two main lithological units, namely, the Tokmaklar and Sazlar Formations. The Tokmaklar Formation comprises marl, bituminous marl, clayey bituminous limestone, Nummulite limestone, and marl-clay-sandstone successions. Economic coal formations are found at the base of the Tokmaklar Formation, along with bituminous limestone and marl. The Sazlar Formation is composed of thick layered sandy limestones and marls, deposited in reefal conditions. Previous studies conducted in the 1980 s estimated the coal reserves in the Küplüce-Gökçesu Basin to be around 40 million tons. However, this study reveals the discovery of a new coal seam that was not previously identified, with a potential thickness of approximately 11 m. This discovery suggests that the coal reserves in the region could be significantly larger than previously known, potentially 5-6 times greater. The quality of the Küplüce-Gökçesu coals is classified as semi-bituminous hard coal of the lower bituminous coal group, based on chemical analysis results. This study contributes to the understanding of the geology and coal potential of Eocene basins in Anatolia and provides valuable information for future exploration and exploitation activities.

Oil exploitation drives environmentally- and trait-mediated diversity of non-native plants in the Yungas forest in Argentina

Anthropogenic disturbances profoundly affect forest ecosystems worldwide. Oil exploitation is one of the major stressors driving the high co-occurrence of different non-native plant species in the Yungas forest of Calilegua National Park, Argentina. Using a dataset of records collected from 2010 to 2020, we evaluated environmental drivers and oil exploitation activity shaping the occurrence and diversity of non-native plant species in 18 study sites.To do so, we first compared species richness and diversity at different levels of anthropogenic disturbance. Then, we used regression models to investigate species-environment relationships. Lastly, a fourth corner analysis was applied to investigate how the interaction between explanatory variables and plant functional traits shapes the occurrence of the studied non-native plant species.We found that oil exploitation activities promoted the diversity of non-native plants in the protected area. Presence of the three most widespread non-native plant species was influenced by the topographic slope and organic matter content. The fourth corner analysis further showed that the positive interaction between plant N-fixation capacity with either close proximity to oil boreholes, a low organic matter content or a high coverage of herbs positively affected the presence of non-native plant species.To our knowledge, this is the first time that trait-environment relationships under a gradient of anthropogenic disturbance were investigated to explain the occurrence and diversity of non-native plant species. Given that abundant non-native plant species have partially overlapping niches in the Yungas transition forests, it is advisable that future restoration actions focus on groups of non-native plants rather than single species. Additionally, non-native plant species of concern, which are able to successfully establish in both disturbed and undisturbed areas require adapted eradication measures.

Mediating impact of the protection and exploitation of intellectual property rights of local intellectual property on tourism development: An empirical study in Central Vietnam

After the global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the tourism industry encounters opportunities and challenges worldwide, including limited tourism resources, while considering intellectual property aspects such as place names, natural resources, traditional knowledge, and regional cultural heritage. This topic research is limited in Vietnam, especially quantitative one. Thus, this study aims to determine the impact of local intellectual assets (LIAs) on tourism development through the mediation of protection and exploitation activities of local intellectual assets. The data for the study were collected through interviews with 296 individual business households in Central Vietnam. The study utilized the SPSS and AMOS 25 software as research tools, and the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was applied to test the hypotheses. The research results indicate that local intellectual assets, consisting of reputation, specialties, traditional knowledge, and folk culture, directly and statistically significantly affect the residents’ perception and the local government’s support. Furthermore, through these two factors, local intellectual assets indirectly and statistically significantly affect protecting and exploiting local intellectual assets and the development of tourism activities. The study’s findings also provide a basis for local authorities and businesses to propose policy implications and management strategies that pay more attention to the issue of local intellectual assets and the protection and exploitation of local intellectual assets to serve tourism development.

Sapar Alliance Movement (Syarekat Perjuangan Rakyat) Against Geothermal Project In Padarincang Prakasak Mountain

Mount Prakasak is a protected forest located in Batukuwung village, Padarincang district, Serang Regency, Banten Province which has the potential for geothermal energy to be used as electricity. This study aims to describe the rejection of the Padarincang community who are members of the SAPAR (Syarekat Perjuangan rakyat) alliance movement against the development of geothermal projects. The research method used is descriptive qualitative, with data collection through interviews, observation, and documentation. This research shows that the Padarincang community who are members of the SAPAR alliance reject the construction of geothermal projects because they can damage the preservation of nature. Ecological damage due to geothermal exploration and exploitation activities that damage forests and is feared to cause significant natural damage that affects people's economic activities from the agricultural sector.

Sequence stratigraphy and petrographic characteristics of Oligocene sediments in the West trough of the Cuu Long Basin, Vietnam

The Cuu Long Basin is the major source of Vietnam's oil and gas production. In clastic sediments, the Oligocene and Lower Miocene formations are the main objects of oil and gas exploration and exploitation activities. Oligocene sediments are both source and reservoir rocks; therefore, studying the petroleum system of these formations is of great interest. This paper discusses detailed stratigraphy and lithological properties to clarify the Oligocene sedimentary characteristics and their significance in the petroleum system. Study results show that Oligocene sediments are divided into three sequences, including eight parasequences and are dominated by the terrestrial sediments. Sequence E, mainly coarse-grained, contains low palynomorphs and rich organic matter with mainly palynomaceral 1 and is deposited in freshwater fluvial settings under high-energy conditions, showing sediments not so far from the original areas. The high level of detrital matrix materials is the main cause of poor or negligible porosity of the rock. The parasequences of Sequence D contain abundant palynomorph assemblages, characterized by swamp and freshwater alga taxa. They are deposited mainly in the shallow lake with a decreasing energy level pointing upward. The volume of organic matter in sediments is very rich, with sapropel organic matter (SOM) rates reaching up to 80%, indicating that the hydrocarbon generation potential is mainly oil-prone and some oil-gas mixtures. The porosity is poor and reservoir quality is affected by detrital matrix and authigenic minerals. The parasequences of Sequence C are characterized by the extreme abundance of freshwater algae, deposited mainly in the shallow-to-deep lake under moderate energy conditions, and rich sapropel organic matter, suggesting mainly oil-prone in hydrocarbon generation potentials. The porosity ranges from fair to good and the reservoir quality is estimated as the best in Oligocene sediments. A new finding of marker assemblages provides evidence to pinpoint the stratigraphic boundary between the Lower Miocene and Upper Oligocene. This finding helps to complete the stratigraphic framework of the area and to correlate the stratigraphy to adjacent sedimentary basins. This study provides information on depositional environmental conditions, organic matter content, hydrocarbon generation potential, and reservoir quality that relate to source rock, reservoir, and seal; these are the elements of a petroleum system. A complete petroleum system assessment requires a holistic view of all the petroleum system elements.

Copper smelting technology at 2nd millennium BC Taldysai (Kazakhstan) and its place in the wider Eurasian metalmaking framework

The 2nd millennium BC in the Eurasian Steppe has widely been recognised as the period of exponential surge in circulation of metals, as well as metal exploitation activities across this area. Nevertheless, there is a general paucity of data on metal production in the steppes, which comes in as crucial in the interpretation of the role metalmaking played in the Bronze Age Eurasian Steppe communities.Here we report analyses of a pilot sample of nine smelting slags from the 2nd millennium BC metalmaking workshop of Taldysai in Central Kazakhstan. Our preliminary results identified at least two metal production lines: copper and arsenical copper. Copper metal was obtained by co-smelting copper oxides and sulfides most likely originating from local cuprous sandstone in a single step. Arsenical copper production is exhibited through co-smelting of copper and arsenic-rich ores in two steps, one to remove sulfur, the second to release the iron present in the charge.Compared against a reference database of nine 2nd millennium BC Bronze Age metal production sites across Eurasia, our results suggest that metalsmiths had mastered multiple ways to extract copper-based alloys: by combining raw materials in different recipes, applying diverse pyrotechnological solutions and exploiting a variety of locally and regionally available ores. This perspective allows for postulating local inventiveness at play for copper and copper alloy production in the Bronze Age steppes, and beyond.

Securing State’s Asset: Legal Protection of Natural Resources of Oil and Gas

The legal framework for oil and natural gas activities in Indonesia is established by Law Number 22 of 2001 concerning Oil and Natural Gas, which was officially published in the State Gazette in 2001. SKK Migas, which replaced BP Migas, is responsible for the management of upstream oil and gas activities based on Cooperation Contracts (KKS). The upstream activities are conducted through Cooperation Contracts (KKS) as specified in Article 6 of the Oil and Gas Law. According to Article 1, number 19 of the Oil and Gas Law, a Production Sharing Contract (PSC) refers to a cooperative arrangement that aims to maximize the benefits from exploration and exploitation activities for the state and ensure the welfare of the people.