The youth today face an increasingly pressurized and complicated world where youth unemployment and its direct consequences such as poverty, crime, prostitution, drug abuse among others, remain as some of the youth‟s critical development challenges. The need of empowering the youth to participate in their own development initiatives is important. It was on this basis that the Government of Kenya introduced YEDF in 2006 to foster positive youth development. The purpose of YEDF was to empower the youth by providing them with financial resources and training to ensure that they are engaged in meaningful business activities and also increase their economic opportunities and participation in nation building. This study sought to examine the contribution of Youth Enterprise Development Fund (YEDF) on empowerment of the youth aged between 18 to 35 years in Kangundo Constituency. The study assessed this by considering the activities that the youth were engaged in before and after receiving the YEDF loans. The study argued that provision of the loans to the youth and training has improved their economic and social status through the income generating activities the youths engaged in. The research was conducted in Kangundo Constituency where there were 58 youth groups funded by YEDF between 2007 to 2012. The study used descriptive research design and random sampling was used to select 100 youth from 29 sampled youth groups. Interviews and questionnaires were used to collect data from the respondents. Data was analyzed by use of SPSS and presented in form of tables. The study presented its findings by discussing specific activities (unemployed, tree planting/vegetable planting, animal rearing, petty traders and untrained teachers) and trends of improvement among the youth. This study also discussed the extent to which loans provided by Youth Enterprise Development Fund (YEDF) have empowered the youth in Kangundo Constituency. It argued that empowerment took place in two main forms; group and individual empowerment. This empowerment is what the YEDF loans set out to achieve initially through the seed money product. The study concluded that the provision of YEDF loans led to empowerment of the youth and that training given to the youth further enhanced the chances of youth empowerment after receiving the loans. The study recommended that; a) For an increase in the amount of money given to the youth to enable them venture into diverse activities and for sustainability of their income generating activities. b) Subsequent loans should be given to the youths as requested by them either as individuals or as groups. c) Continuous training be conducted for the youth to ensure sustainability of their businesses and for more improvement in their lives to empower them further. The study recommended for further research to: 1) Examine the viability of YEDF as a tool for tackling youth unemployment in Kenya 2) A comparative study between group funding and individual funding method of financing youth businesses by YEDF 3) Factors influencing uptake of Youth Enterprise Development Fund loans.

As electricity markets undergo deregulation all over the world, the approach to generation scheduling or unit commitment(UC) changes significantly. In traditional electric markets with electricity utilities which act as system operators and known as generation units, UC is done based on a cost minimization ejective.

The human gut microbiome has emerged as an important factor in many traits, including those associated with human health. Change in diversity and community composition of the gut microbiome is linked continuously to various health implications; recently, we are witnessing the rise of a variety of complex diseases related to dramatic changes in daily environments that are maybe related to mismatches between human and microbial evolution as population transit from rural to urban areas. The human gut microbiome composition in industrialized populations is hypothesized to be different from those living in traditional lifestyles. To test this, I studied the Turkana community with an aim of finding out the gut microbiome variations of the traditional and urban group, and the various phenotypic factors that influence the changes. The Turkana gave me an opportunity to understand this, in that it is a unique Nilotic group in Kenya whose population has a common ancestry, but different levels of modernization. Some individuals live a traditional pastoralist lifestyle, while others are sedentary within the Turkana region or urban centers. The transitions from a pastoralist diet centered on meat, blood and milk to an urban diet rich in carbohydrates and fats can give a better understanding of the rising epidemic of chronic metabolic-related diseases around the world. I characterized fecal microbiota of 133 individuals from the Turkana community, 90 - traditional and 43 – urban by paired-end v4 region of 16s rRNA region in the Illumina MiSeq platform. With this data, I asked two main questions: 1) How does the community composition and diversity of the Turkana microbiome compare between traditional and urban groups? 2) How are changes in the microbiome associated with phenotypic variations and the environment? Community structure comparison of the traditional and urban population using UniFrac and Bray Curtis distances showed in the composition of gut microbiome between the two groups. Bacteroidetes, Firmicutes, and Proteobacteria were more abundant in the two populations; the Bacteroidetes were dominant in the urban population while the Firmicutes and Spirochetes dominated the traditional community. For alpha diversity, the traditional and urban people had a different microbial richness and Fisher diversity, but no observed differences with the Shannon and Simpson diversity measures. The ANCOVA correlation results showed that BMI, Age, blood pressure, and residence time in current location correlate microbial richness and Fisher diversity, but Cholesterol and HDL do not. But none of the phenotypes associated with Inverse Simpson, Shannon, and Simpson, could have resulted from not having the sample size necessary to perform the comparisons. In conclusion, the rural to urban areas transition has an impact on the gut microbiome both within and between the populations. I observed a gradual reduction in the microbial diversity in the Turkana population who've moved to urban areas. These, coupled with the loss of beneficial microbiome as has been observed in populations that transited to urban areas several years ago, indicate a possible increased risk to metabolic diseases. Therefore, Future studies should perform a complete sampling of both groups; and determine the metabolic profiles of every sample in order to provide a better understanding of the microbial community structure of the Turkana population.

abstract

Helminthosis is a gastrointestinal infection caused by nematodes, cestodes and trematodes, which causes sub-optimal production, reproduction, early culling, work capacity, extra cost of treatment, reduced market values of the affected animals and death. The aim of our study was to investigate the prevalence of gastrointestinal parasitic infections by screening for helminth eggs and coccidian oocysts using MacMaster technique and the associated factors among zebu beef calves in Isiolo County Kenya. A cross-sectional study was conducted in 2020 between November and December in Isiolo North and Isiolo South sub-counties. Garbatulla and Burat wards in Isiolo North and Kinna in Isiolo South were purposively selected due to high number of large herds compared to other areas. A total of 411 calves from 34 herds aged between 3 weeks and 12 months were randomly selected. Calf level and management and environmental data were collected through semi-structured questionnaires, observations and by taking measurements. Faecal samples were obtained from the rectum or immediately after defaecation for laboratory analysis. In the laboratory, faecal egg counts were estimated using the McMaster faecal floatation technique. Descriptive and logistic regression data analyses was done using STATA version 13. In logistic regression, factors with a p-value ≤0.05 in the final models were considered significant, hence retained. The overall prevalence of GIP infection was estimated at 66.9% (275/411). Concurrent helminthosis and coccidiosis prevalence was slightly low, estimated at 16.5% (68/411). Coccidia was the most prevalent type of infection estimated at 45.7% (188/411) while the prevalence of helminths was 38.4% (158/411). Strongyle infection was predominant among other helminths detected with a prevalence 29.4% (121/411) followed by Strongyloides 6.5% (27/411), Monezia 2.7% (4/411), Toxocara 1% (4/411) and Trichuris 0.2% (1/411). The factors associated with GIP infections in the final multivariate logistic regression analysis for coccidia were: Location, with Isiolo North recording a higher prevalence than Isiolo South (OR=4.906, p-value=0.000, CI=2.033-11.84), availability of drinking water was associated with lower prevalence compared to calves not provided with drinking water (OR=0.282, p-value=0.000, 0.168-0.472), calves in areas covered with lush pastures recording a higher prevalence than in areas covered with dry pastures (OR=2.604, p-value=0.009, CI=1.273-5.328), calves raised in dry floor having lesser risk of infection compared with calves raised in wet floor condition (OR=0.208, p-value=0.000, CI=0.094-0.462), calves in farms receiving extension services from animal health providers recorded a lower prevalence of coccidiosis than calves in farms without extension services (OR=0.208, p-value=0.023, CI=0.239-0.896). Calves in larger herd sizes of 20 cattle and above were at a higher risk of coccidiosis than calves raised in smaller herd sizes of less than 20 cattle (OR=1.004, p-value=0.022, CI=1.001-1.008). For strongyle infection, the factors associated in the final model were: co-infestation with other gastrointestinal helminths and coccidiosis, with coinfected calves having a higher risk of strongyle infection than non-coinfected calves (OR=27.23, p-value=0.000, CI=12.76-60.62). Calves aged between 9 to 12 months were at the higher risk of strongyle infection compared to calves aged between 3 weeks to 4 months (OR=26.7, p-value=0.000, CI=10.32-68.78), also calves aged between 4 to less than 9 months, were at a higher risk of strongyle infection than younger calves aged between 3 weeks to less than 4 months (OR=19.7, p-value=19.7, p-value=7.69-50.59), calves raised in larger herd sizes were associated with a lower risk of strongyle infection compared with calves raised in smaller herd sizes (OR=0.99, p-value=0.000, CI=0.98-1.0). Calves raised in farms with extension services available recorded a higher prevalence of strongyle infection compared to calves raised in farms where extension services were unavailable (OR=3.74, p-value=0.005, CI=1.499-9.333). The results of this study indicated that prevalence of gastrointestinal parasitic infections in calves is high, dominated by strongyles and coccidian infections and management/environmental factors and animal factors were associated with the infections. Robust integrated control program is therefore important to curb the infections which should include proper clinical and laboratory diagnosis, deworming with anthelmintics especially during rainy seasons, and treatment of calves with anti-coccidial drugs, grazing management and isolation of infected animals.

Long-lasting insecticidal nets are an effective tool in reducing malaria transmission. However, with increasing insecticide resistance little is known about how physiologically resistant malaria vectors behave around a human-occupied bed net, despite their importance in malaria transmission. We used the Mbita bednet trap to assess the host-seeking behavior of insecticide-resistant Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes under semi-field conditions. The trap incorporates a mosquito netting panel which acts as a mechanical barrier that prevents host-seeking mosquitoes from reaching the human host baiting the trap

The purpose of the study was to investigate the influence of school- based factors on provision of Free Primary Education (FPE) in Dagoretti Sub-County, Nairobi. The study was to address the following objectives: to determine the influence of pupil-teacher ratio, physical facilities, adequacy of teaching and learning materials and to assess the extent to which students‟ grade promotion policy influence the provision of FPE in Dagoretti Sub-County. The study was guided by the Education Production Function theory. The theory refers to all combinations of the inputs that produce any given set of outputs. It can also be explained as the relationship between school and pupil inputs and a measure of school output. The Education Production Theory was initially developed by Coleman et al., (1966) report. The study used cross-sectional survey. The target population in this study was 16 public regular primary school head teachers, 338 teachers TSC Office Dagoretti Sub-County and 3193 class 8 pupils in Dagoretti Sub-County. The study purposely sampled 16 head teachers by census. Thus the study took 20 percent of all the teachers and 13 percent of all the class 8 pupils. Stratified random sampling was employed in the study. The study used questionnaires which were administered to head teachers, teachers and pupils to obtain the data of the study. The observation checklists were used to collect information on the physical facilities in the schools. The study also used document analysis to obtain the information for the study. The quantitative data collected from the questionnaires were edited, coded and analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 21 to inform on descriptive statistics. The collected data was presented using tables and figures. The study used cross-tabulation and a Pearson Chi-Square Test which established that there exists no statistically significant relationship between pupil-teacher ratio, physical facilities, teaching learning materials and automatic grade promotion policy on provision of Free Primary Education as illustrated by P-Value > 0.05.This implies that pupil-teacher ratio across the classes from class 1-8 exceeds 1:40 as recommended ratio by UNESCO (2006) and TSC (2006). The high pupil-teacher ratio was attributed to low academic achievements in KCPE performance in Dagorreti Sub County. Further, the findings shows that inadequacy of physical facilities and teaching and learning materials negatively influence the provision of FPE in Dagoretti Sub-county. Finally, the study established that students‟ grade promotion policy negatively influences the provision of FPE in Dagoretti Sub-County. Based on the findings the study recommends that there is need for the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) to employ more teachers in the Sub-County. The physical facilities in schools ought to be adequate for effective learning. The government should increase capitation in public primary schools in order for schools to buy adequate teaching and learning materials. The policy on students‟ automatic grade promotion by the ministry of education is not fully implemented in many schools. Repetition of some low achievers in classes makes other pupils to drop out of schools. All pupils in schools should be promoted from one grade to the other regardless of their performance in examinations. Based on the findings, the study suggests; a similar study could be replicated to private primary schools in Dagoretti Sub County. The study suggests that a study could be carried out on influence of school-based factors on provision of FPE in other counties. Finally, a study could be done on the influence of socio-economic factors on provision of FPE in Dagoretti Sub County.

The study was carried out to examine the relationship between selected macroeconomic variables and share prices proxied by NSE 20 share index, for the period covering 1987 to 2008. The hypothesis tested aimed at showing the relationship that exist between NSE 20 share index and exchange rates, inflation, interest rates, money supply and gross domestic product. Secondary data were used in the study obtained from different sources including publications from the World Bank such as International Financial Statistics (1FS)S, Central Bureau of Statistics, Central Bank, African Economic Consortium and various publications of the University o f Nairobi. The data were regressed using the Error Correction Mechanism, due to non-stationarity. Results obtained showed that there is indeed significant relationship between NSE 20 share index and exchange rate, NSE 20 share index and inflation. Other variables used also indicated the existence of a relationship but the relationship was insignificant such as NSE 20 share index and interest rates, money supply and gross domestic product. Based on these results, the study recommends investor education, as they need to understand the relationship between the stock market and the entire economy. The government needs to ensure interest rates are stable and be careful in the application of monetary and fiscal policies. The NSE should also introduce options and futures so that it can be able to compete with the global financial market.

change in strategy is generally key both in public and private sector because organisations are open systems hence interact with both internal and external environment.

Energy systems based on fossil oil products have witnessed increased demand all over the world with prices reaching new peaks, and continue to further weaken African economies. Potential biofuel oil sources, production and their optimization in standard to fossil equivalent should be sought. Sour plum (Ximenia americana L.) seed oil as one potential biofuel was extracted from plant seeds using screw press then tests were carried out to evaluate its properties as substitute for kerosene