This study was carried in the academic year 2018-2019, aiming at assessing the situation of infrastructure and social care for disabled students in public universities in Albania. The goal of this survey was to contribute toward providing effective academic services and upgrading the infrastructure access for disabled students, to help them to get access and mobility in university settings. Twelve public universities were surveyed for the accommodation and the nature of specialized services to pursue successfully a higher education program for disabled students. Specialized teaching, supportive offices regarding academic accommodation, transportation, and social care, and other educational equipment are missing in most public universities. This survey revealed special needs and possible access to university settings. Achieving equitable inclusion and the implementation of higher education actions within HES in Albania remains a permanent challenge to create adequate learning and teaching spaces for special needs for disabled students.
Received: 2 March 2021 / Accepted: 15 April 2021 / Published: 10 May 2021
In this study we aim at assessing the willingness to invest of small-apple farms in Korça region-Albania. Furthermore, we want to identify and assess what are major determinants, as percept by farmers', willingness to invest. To this purpose we used data collected through face-to-face interviews with apple farmers. We used descriptive statistics, as well as classical and multinomial logistic regression. Most of farmers are willing to invest in view of their positive expectations for investment climate. Other important factors of willingness to invest are access to loans, advisory extension services, market competition, willingness to cooperate and willingness to take loans, and farm income, while socio-demographic factors such as age, education, and farming experience do not have significant effect on willingness to invest. Large farms are generally more willing to invest. We present also a general framework of constraints and policy levers to improving the investment climate which is almost valid also for Albania. Improving farmers' access to private credit sources, policy stability, providing information and public advisory services to small farmers, support farmers to adopt new technology, support to the creation of farmers' formal and informal groups, and mitigate risks of various type are some but essential policy measures to motivate farmers to invest more in apple.
Apple production sector in Albania is growing very fast in Albania but research about apple production efficiency is almost absent. This research aims at assessing the technical efficiency and factors affecting it for the Albanian apple farms. Data of 150 randomly selected farmers in the area of Korça region are analyzed with the Stochastic Frontier Approach. The average level of technical efficiency results 88%, with 12% potential for improvement. The efficiency gap is about 21%. Major factors with positive effect on technical efficiency result the access to advisory services, average plots size, number of apple plots; education and proportion of orchards under modern technology have negative effects; age, and farmer’s experience are not significant. Measures to support planting of apples should take into account the size of plots. There is much space to improve extension services to farmers, so adequate policies are needed to support farmers with training, information to improve their skills and knowledge, to ensure they are supplied with quality inputs and technologies at reasonable prices, and policies to improve farmers access to markets.
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