Regional economic development
Для студентов экономических профилей подготовки (ЭП, ПМ)
REGIONAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
Regional economic development models, policy and practice have transformed significantly over the last decades. Their relevance has been challenged in recent years by the new economic geography that has emerged in view of globalization as most nations veer towards a more democratic and decentralized approach to plan and implement their various economic development activities.
Modern growth theory has devoted substantial attention to the search for the determinants of economic growth by means of aggregated models. In these approaches ‘economic development' has been often conceptualized as an increase in 'equilibrium' per-capita income and the interest of researchers mainly has concerned the identification of the main economic factors influencing it. Given these advances, the emergence of new regional dynamics calls on countries to fine-tune current Regional Economic Development (RED) perspectives and/or to develop new strategies and approaches that are not only more in sync with the present and future global context and with the governance systems being adopted, but are also becoming more and more business oriented. Regional economics is the branch of economics which incorporates the dimension ‘space’ into analysis of the workings of the market. It does so by including space in logical schemes, laws and models which regulate and interpret the formation of prices, demand, productive capacity, levels of output and development, growth rates, and the distribution of income in conditions of unequal regional endowments of resources. In the case study the paper analysis small transition country-Kosovo as one of the poorest in Europe with income per capita GDP ?3,332 in 2017 and ?3,277 in 2015 that shows slight increase. An unemployment rate of 31% and a youth unemployment rate near 60% in a country where the average age is 26 years old encourage emigration and presents a significant source of informal, unreported economy. Most of Kosovo's population lives in rural area outside of the capital, Pristina. Inefficient, near-subsistence farming is common – the result of small plots, limited mechanization, and a lack of technical expertise. Kosovo enjoys lower labor costs than the rest of the region. To design suitable strategies for the Regional Economic Development and for its effective implementation, the following aspects need to be focused upon:
a. A shared understanding on regional economic development across all levels of the government and private sectors.
b. The establishment of an agreed process for regional economic development activities, particularly at places where these activities would be implemented through common projects.
c. Strong cooperation and collaboration between governments and sectors, particularly with regard to co-investment and partnerships in regional economic development.
d. The establishment of incentives and rewards mechanisms for encouraging the most innovative, competitive, and productive regions.
e. The establishment of a dashboard for measuring the value generation and performance indicators for business and economic development at regional level.
In this context, the elaboration of an adequate strategy for Regional Economic Development is the basis for reducing regional disparities by supporting employment- and wealth/welfare-generating economic activities for the achievement of a balanced and sustainable regional development. Strategical management approach for the sustainable regional economic development in Kosovo reflects the challenges, problems, and shortcomings to be addressed for the purpose of approximation with the EU regional development strategies policies.
Для студентов архитектурных профилей подготовки (АРХ, ДАС, ГС, ЛА, ГКЗ)
BRITISH ARCHITECTURE
Apart from some ancient churches, the oldest buildings you will see in Britain are castles. They are dotted all over the country, with many beautiful examples in Scotland and Wales. They were first built by the Normans after their invasion of England in 1066. The Tower of London dates from about 1078. Because of the Normans' desire to control the population, they started to build castles everywhere, but especially in the more restless regions. For example, King Edward I built a series of massive castles in Wales at the end of the 13th century; his aim was to keep the lawless Welsh under English rule.
As the dominance of the English crown was established, the need for castles diminished. Then the use of gunpowder meant that they could no longer resist attack. So by the 15th century the castle-building age was over. Many Scottish castles are from a later period, but these are not military buildings; they are aristocratic family houses that imitated older styles.
Since the Middle Ages, architecture in Britain (as in most of Europe) has been based on three major styles: Gothic, classical, and modern. The great early cathedrals and churches are in Gothic style - tall, with pointed arches and highly decorated; they are covered in sculptures of people, animals and plants. The buildings are fantastic engineering achievements., constructed with very little machinery and designed by architects whose names have been forgotten. The tallest spire in Britain, at Salisbury Cathedral, is 123 metres high and was built in the 1330s. It is incredible that such size and perfection were achieved without a single crane or computer!
After the Gothic period, architectural fashion looked back to the classical age of Greece and Rome for its inspiration. So we see columns and triangular pediments as on Greek temples; round arches, domes and perfect Latin lettering as on Roman public buildings. Many of the finest London churches are in this style; St Paul's Cathedral (built by Sir Christopher Wren between 1675 and 1710) is the biggest and most celebrated, but there are many more all over the city.
Not only churches were in the classical style. Rich aristocrats built huge and impressive houses surrounded by parkland; they are on such a grand scale that it is difficult to imagine that they were once private homes, but of course they had dozens and sometimes hundreds of servants.
Many of the most beautiful parts of British cities consist of houses in this style. The period of kings George I to George IV is known as the Georgian period, and cities such as London, Edinburgh, Bristol and Bath still today have large numbers of elegant Georgian houses, which give the streets a striking sense of unity and design.
In the 19th century, during the Victorian age (taking its name from Queen Victoria), architects went back to medieval Gothic ideas for their inspiration. At first sight it is sometimes difficult to tell whether a Victorian church is 100 or 500 years old! At the same time, classical styles did not disappear altogether. In fact, there was a "Battle of the Styles" between classical and Gothic. The British Museum (1823) was a victory for the classical, and the Houses of Parliament (1836) for the Gothic. There was also debate about the use of iron and steel: should these new materials be visible, as in the new bridges and railway stations, or hidden, as in the Natural History Museum, London, where the metal frame is covered by coloured brick and stonework?
From the 1920s on, new ideas were transforming art and music, and architecture, too, was caught up in the modernising culture. People wanted buildings which were not just copies of the past. Having abandoned both classical and Gothic styles, the challenge was to create - to invent -something really new. Luckily, this change in attitude came at the same time as exciting new engineering materials were becoming available.
With concrete and steel together and new types of glass, it was possible to escape from the traditional forms. For the first time in history, architects were free to make almost any shapes they liked.
Для студентов направления подготовки «Строительство» (ПГС, АДА, ТСК, ТГВ, ВВ, ПУС, ГСХ, ИСИ, ЭУН, ТИМС)
CIVIL ENGINEERING
The term "engineering" is a modern one. The New Marriam-Webster Dictionary gives the explanation of the word "engineering" as the practical application of scientific and mathematical principles. Nowadays the term "engineering" means, as a rule, the art of designing, constructing, or using engines. But this word is now applied in a more extended sense. It is applied also to the art of executing such works as the objects of civil and military architecture, in which engines or other mechanical appliances are used. Engineering is divided into many branches. The most important of them are: civil, mechanical, electrical, nuclear, mining, military, marine, and sanitary engineering.
While the definition "civil engineering "dates back only two centuries, the profession of civil engineer is as old as civilized life. It started developing with the rise of ancient Rome. In order to understand clearly what civil engineering constitutes nowadays, let us consider briefly the development of different branches of engineering. Some form of building and utilization of the materials and forces of nature have always been necessary for the people from the prehistoric times. The people had to protect themselves against the elements and sustain themselves in the conflict with nature.
First the word "civil engineering" was used to distinguish the work of the engineer with a non-military purpose from that of a military engineer. And up to about the middle of the 18th century there were two main branches of engineering — civil and military. The former included all those branches of the constructive art not directly connected with military operations and the constructions of fortifications, while the latter, military engineering, concerned itself with the applications of science and the utilization of building materials in the art of war.
But as time went on, the art of civil engineering was enriched with new achievements of science. With the beginning of the Industrial Revolution and later there came a remarkable series of mechanical inventions, great discoveries in electrical science and atomic energy. It led to differentiation of mechanical, electrical, nuclear engineering, etc.
It is a well-known fact that with the invention of the steam engine and the growth of factories a number of civil engineers became interested in the practical application of the science of mechanics and thermodynamics to the design of machines. They separated themselves from civil engineering, and were called "mechanical engineers".
With the development of the science of electricity, there appeared another branch of the engineering — electrical engineering. It is divided now into two main branches: communications engineering and power engineering.
In the middle of the 20th century there appeared some other new branches of engineering—nuclear engineering and space engineering. The former is based on atomic physics, the latter — on the achievements of modern science and engineering.
At present there are hundreds of subdivisions of engineering, but they all, at one time or another, branched off from civil engineering.
The term "civil engineering" has two distinct meanings. In the widest and oldest sense it includes all non-military branches of engineering as it did two centuries ago. But in its narrower, and at the present day more correct sense, civil engineering includes mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, metallurgical, and mining engineering.
Here are some fields of civil engineering:
1. Housing, industrial, and agricultural construction.
2. Structural engineering comprises the construction of all fixed structures with their foundations.
3. The construction of highways and city streets and pavements.
4. The construction of railroads.
5. The construction of harbours and canals.
6. Hydraulic engineering which includes the construction of dams and power plants.
The above enumeration will make clear the vast extent of the field of civil engineering.
Для студентов направления подготовки «Техносферная безопасность» (ИЗОС)
THE ECOSYSTEMS
Towards 1950 the ecologists elaborated the scientific notion of ecosystem, defining it as the unit of study of ecology. In agreement with such definition, the ecosystem is a delimited space unit, integrated on the one hand, by the alive organisms and environment in which these are developed, and by another one, the interactions of the organisms to each other and with their surroundings. In other words, the ecosystem is a unit formed by biotic factors (or alive members like vegetables and the animals) and abiotic factors (components that lack life, like for example minerals and water), in which vital interactions exist, energy flows and the matter circulates.
An example of an ecosystem in which the elements included in the definition can be seen clearly is the tropical forest. There are thousands of vegetal and animal species that inhabit the air and the ground; in addition, million interactions between the organisms and these species take place in the surrounding environment. The extension of an ecosystem is always relative: it doesn’t constitute an invisible functional unit, but it is possible to subdivide it into infinity of units.
Two concepts in relation to the ecosystem are: habitat and ecological niche. The habitat is the physical place of an ecosystem that brings together the natural conditions where a species lives and to which it is adapted. The ecological niche is the way in which an organism is related to the biotic and abiotic factors of its environment. It includes the physical training condition, chemical and biological that species needs to live and to reproduce in an ecosystem. The temperature, the humidity and the light are some of the physical and chemical factors that determine the niche of species. Between the biological conditioners they are the feeders, the predators, the competitors and the diseases, that is to say, species that compete by the same conditions.
The ecosystem experiences constant modifications that sometimes are temporary and other cyclical ones (they are repeated in the time).
The biotic elements react before a change of the physical conditions of environment; for example, the deforestation of a forest or a fire has direct consequences on the fertility of the ground and affects the food web.
The ecological succession is the replacement of some elements of the ecosystem by others in the course of the time. Thus, a certain area is colonized by more and more complex vegetal species. If the environment allows it, the appearance of mosses and lichens is happened by the presence of grass, shrubs and trees. The state of balance reached once the evolution has been completed, denominates climax. In him, the modifications occur between the members of same species: for example, new trees replace the old ones.
There are two types of successions: primary and secondary; first one starts from land the second one is the one that is registered after a disturbance, for example, a fire. In this case the environment contains organic nutrients and remainders that facilitate the growth of vegetables.
In the operation of the ecosystems it doesn’t happen wastefully: all the organisms dead or alive are a potential food source for other beings. An insect feeds itself on a leaf; a bird eats the insect and simultaneously is devoured by a zoo bird.
When dying these organisms are consumed by the decomposers that will transform them into inorganic substances. These relations between the different individuals from an ecosystem constitute the food web.
Для студентов механических профилей подготовки (ААХ, ПТМ)