Natural resources and the extractive industries play a central role in the economy of developing countries and the lives of nearly half of the world’s population. The increasing demand for oil, gas, and mineral resources has led some countries to prioritize the extractive industries; yet, there is growing empirical evidence that in some cases governments have neglected other sectors of the economy, making them highly dependent and vulnerable to volatile commodity prices. Latin American countries face the challenge of changing their model of primary-export specialization and move away from their dependence on natural resource-intensive exports in order to avoid being vulnerable to commodity cycles. In this context, given the limited literature available on measuring the dependence on the extraction of oil, gas and minerals of the Ecuadorian economy, the objective of this article is to twofold. First, to provide a snapshot of the historical and current situation of Ecuador’s natural resource dependence. Second, to estimate the Extractives Dependence Index (EDI) scores for Ecuador for the years 2003 to 2017. The EDI is a generally accepted method for measuring a country’s aggregate dependence on natural and mineral resources. Based on the EDI scores obtained, we analyze the variation of this indicator and investigate the effect of extractives dependence on the Ecuadorian economy. Results show that despite the government’s significant efforts to diversify Ecuador’s economy, the country has a persistent dependence on the extractive sector.
For much of the last two decades, the Central and East European (CEE) economies have experienced a deep structural reform, moving away from a socialist economic system towards a market economy. The political situation of the second half of the 20th century had a significant impact on the economic development and competitiveness of these transition countries, when compared with their Western European counterparts. A vast number of studies have been conducted to analyze the structural changes required for resource-dependent economies to achieve long-term development and to understand the synergies between commodities and diversification. Yet, the dynamics of resource extraction and the resource dependence of regions that have experienced periods of sustained levels of growth have largely been overlooked, especially the Central and Eastern European region. In this context, this article presents an analysis of the level of resource dependence of six countries which joined the European Union between 2004 and 2007. Using data spanning from the year 2000 to 2017, we calculate the Extractives Dependence Index (EDI) of six former Soviet satellite nations and one former Soviet state. Our results indicate that the commodity structure of trade in the six countries which joined the European Union has changed considerably. These countries have reduced their economic dependence on extractive resources by developing their high value-added and technology-intensive sectors. Our findings also reveal that Poland experienced the highest decrease in EDI scores among the six CEE countries.
An unsustainable energy mix and energy overconsumption contribute to negative processes such as environmental pressure or energy dependency. The aim of the article is to assess the European Union countries situation in terms of sustainable energy consumption. Eurostat was were used in the analyses. The research was based on synthetic indicators for 2017 data. A non-standard method was used. In accordance with the assumptions of sustainable energy consumption, six indicators were proposed: primary energy consumption (2005=100), final energy consumption (2005=100), share of renewable energy in energy consumption, deficit/surplus in the 2020 renewable energy sources consumption target, energy import dependency (%), greenhouse gas emissions intensity of energy consumption (2000=100). The share of renewable energy in energy consumption and deficit/ surplus in the 2020 renewable energy sources consumption target are stimulants, other features are destimulants. The European Union countries were classified into four groups due to the situation in terms of sustainable energy consumption (first class – favorable situation, second class – quite favorable situation, third class – rather unfavorable situation, fourth class – unfavorable situation). According to the results in twelve countries the situation was identified as favorable or quite favorable, while in the other sixteen countries as rather unfavorable and unfavorable. However, all countries have entered the path of necessary changes. It is important to continue monitoring and analyzing the progress of European Union countries in the field of energy and climate policy.
Time-dependent behavior of rock mass is important for long-term stability analysis in rock engineering. Extensive studies have been carried out on the creep properties and rheological models for variable kinds of rocks, however, the effects of initial damage state on the time-dependent behavior of rock has not yet been taken into consideration. In the present study, the authors proposed a creep test scheme with controlled initial damage to investigate the influence of initial damage on the time-dependent behavior of sandstone. In the test scheme, the initial states of damage were first determined via unloading the specimen from various stresses. Then, the creep test was conducted under different stress levels with specific initial damage. The experimental results show that there is a stress threshold for the initial damage to influence the behavior of the rock in the uniaxial compressive creep tests, which is the stress threshold of dilatancy of rock. When the creep stress is less than the stress threshold, the effect of the initial damage seems to be insignificant. However, if the creep stress is higher than the stress threshold, the initial damage has an important influence on the time-dependent deformation, especially the lateral and volumetric deformation. Moreover, the initial damage also has great influence on the creep failure stress and long-term strength, i.e., higher initial damage leading to lower creep failure stress and long-term strength. The experimental results can provide valuable data for the construction of a creep damage model and long-term stability analysis for rock engineering.
The aim of this article is to analyze the role of phraseological units (PhUs) in discourse and to investigate their co(n)textual dependency. The paper presents a typology of the lexical and phraseological units, labelled as co(n)textual supports and developed by Olza y Losada (2011): expressions that paraphrase the initial phraseological meaning; expressions that highlight a specific component of this meaning; lexical and phraseological units that are synonymous with the ‘central’ phraseological expression they co-occur with; and lexical and phraseological units that are antonymous with the ‘central’ expression. These units orient and specify the use and interpretation of PhUs. The analysis also focuses on the so-called markers of phraseological units that function as (quasi) PhUs that serve to introduce phraseology within discourse in a (more or less) explicit way and have pragmatic discursive value (cfr. Olza 2013). The last part of the article examines some PhUs whose implicatures can be affected by contextual circumstances and characterized by greater dependence on the general context of the statement despite showing some degree of conventionalization.
Traces of the idea of verbal valency structure in nineteenth-century grammars – This paper aims to show how K.F. Beckers’s notion of “subjektive” and “objektive Verben” (i.e. those always used with an “ergänzende Objekt”, a ‘completive object’) is a rough forerunner to the modern idea of dependency grammar. In Italy, this theoretical core was assumed by Raffaello Lambruschini in 1840 (and, after him, by the basic school grammar La grammatica del mio Felicino written by Ulisse Poggi, 1865, 18722), but with a huge trivialisation: subjective verbs were identified with intransitive verbs and objective verbs with transitive ones.
The aim of this paper is to describe selected syntactic phenomena concerning non-finiteness and to show the most frequent types of the non-finite subordinate clauses in the historical German language of the 17th century. The use of the non-finite constructions appears to be especially frequent in Early New High German. Also today, non-finite clauses can be observed. However, their role in the modern discourse is different to that of the diachronic constructions.
The pathogenesis of porcine contagious pleuropneumonia is poorly understood. In the present study, a mouse model of intranasal infection by Actinobacillus pleuropneumoniae (App) was used to examine lung inflammation. The pathogical results of lung tissues showed that App-infected mice showed dyspnea and anorexia, with severe damage by acute hemorrhage, and infiltration of eosinophils and lymphocytes, as well as increased expression of caspase-1 p20, interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6, IL-8, IL-18 and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α. Caspase-1 inhibitors reduced both lung tissue damage and the expression of caspase-1 p20, IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8, TNF-α and IL-18 in infected mice. These findings suggest that the caspase-1 dependent pyroptosis involved in the pathogenesis of the mouse pleuropneumonia caused by App and the inhibition of caspase-1 reduced the lung injury of this pleuropneumonia
Mining ventilation should ensure in the excavations required amount of air on the basis of determined regulations and to mitigate various hazards. These excavations are mainly: longwalls, function chambers and headings. Considering the financial aspect, the costs of air distribution should be as low as possible and due to mentioned above issues the optimal air distribution should be taken into account including the workers safety and minimization of the total output power of main ventilation fans. The optimal air distribution is when the airflow rate in the mining areas and functional chambers are suitable to the existing hazards, and the total output power of the main fans is at a minimal but sufficient rate.
Restructuring of mining sector in Poland is usually connected with the connection of different mines. Hence, dependent air streams (dependent air stream flows through a branch which links two intake air streams or two return air streams) exist in ventilation networks of connected mines. The zones of intake air and return air include these air streams. There are also particular air streams in the networks which connect subnetworks of main ventilation fans. They enable to direct return air to specified fans and to obtain different airflows in return zone. The new method of decreasing the costs of ventilation is presented in the article.
The method allows to determine the optimal parameters of main ventilation fans (fan pressure and air quantity) and optimal air distribution can be achieved as a result. Then the total output power of the fans is the lowest which makes the reduction of costs of mine ventilation.
The new method was applied for selected ventilation network. For positive regulation (by means of the stoppings) the optimal air distribution was achieved when the total output power of the fans was 253.311 kW and for most energy-intensive air distribution it was 409.893 kW. The difference between these cases showed the difference in annual energy consumption which was 1 714 MWh what was related to annual costs of fan work equaled 245 102 Euro. Similar values for negative regulation (by means of auxiliary fans) were: the total output power of the fans 203.359 kW (optimal condition) and 362.405 kW (most energy-intensive condition). The difference of annual energy consumption was 1 742 MWh and annual difference of costs was 249 106 Euro. The differences between optimal airflows considering positive and negative regulations were: the total output power of fans 49.952 kW, annual energy consumption 547 MWh, annual costs 78 217 Euro.