Understanding how policy settings affect developer decisions

Key points Private sector residential development is driven by profit. Developers want policy certainty so they can factor these policy settings into their assessment of the potential financial feasibility of a development site. The complexity of the development process, the structure of development organisations, the variety of products delivered, and land ownership issues mean the development decision-making process varies by organisation and site by site. Therefore, it is too simplistic to assume policy settings will have exactly the same impact on each and every developer and on each and every site. Housing market conditions drive private sector development. Policies that stimulate or restrict market demand will impact levels of housing supply. Once a developer has purchased land for development, any new costs introduced through regulation will impact profitability. Developers will try and pass these costs onto consumers through higher prices in order to maintain profit but their ability to do so will depend on market conditions. Reducing development costs will not automatically result in a more affordable end product. Such cost reductions could end up in a higher price paid for the land, additional profits for the developer or a combination. Reducing development approval timelines has a positive impact on profitability outcomes. New construction technologies that reduce development timelines can also have a positive impact on profitability outcomes. Affordable housing contributions required from a development site need to be known by a developer well in advance of land purchase so they can be factored into assessments of profitability and land price. Mandatory affordable housing contributions are the most likely source of large-scale affordable housing contributions in Australia and many sites would be able to absorb the costs of such delivery under a well-designed, efficient and consistent policy. Key findings This research examined how policy settings affect developer decisions, necessary to provide policy makers with an understanding of how private sector housing supply is likely to react to settings and events which affect development costs, revenues and timeframes. The research also examines the issue of new construction technologies and processes to establish their potential for reducing development costs and timelines, improving affordability. The development industry is incredibly complex, made up of hundreds of different organisations with a myriad of different structures. As such, a project like this can only take a broad-brush approach to highlight the impact of a range of settings on traditional approaches to development. The general findings show the importance of market conditions in driving supply and how factors such as infrastructure costs, delays in development approvals and construction timelines have a negative impact on profit outcomes if they cannot be factored into a developer's initial assessment of site profitability. Such assessments are conducted through a discounted cash-flow based feasibility modelling process. Factors that are certain to the developer, such as prevailing taxes and construction costs, can be carefully considered in a decision to develop, it is the unknowns that developers fear. Clear and consistent policy settings, certainty in development timeframes and certainty in policy advice create the ideal conditions for development. The rest is dependent on market conditions. Private sector development is driven by profit, specifically the balance between risk and return. There are a number of factors that affect this balance: Market conditions: strong demand, rising prices, cheap and accessible credit and high levels of consumer confidence are the perfect conditions for developers. Unexpected price rises during a development period will result in higher than anticipated profits for a developer. Risk: there are a number of factors developers consider when assessing risk and the level of return required to compensate for that risk. Market conditions is one, with the other being related to costs and timelines that a developer in unable to fully predict in their feasibility modelling. Those settings are fixed and easy to predict, and therefore assess. If costs are too high for the level of return required from a given site, the site will not be considered profitable and no development will occur. It is those factors that may vary after a developer has set the development process in motion that are problematic. Unforeseen delays caused by development approval processes, unexpected infrastructure costs, new taxes, labour and/or supply shortages, weather events and changes to design requirements can mean an increase in costs or a decrease in revenue and result in a lower than expected return. Landowner expectations: landowners will often be well aware of prevailing market values in an area and will engage consultants who will adopt feasibility modelling processes to come up with what they believe is a realistic price. Add additional costs into the development process and a developer may not be able to meet the landowner's price expectations, preventing development on a site until the landowner lowers their expectations, a developer is somehow able to reduce costs or predicted revenues rise. The current model of determining land purchase price benefits the landowner rather than the developer as the landowner benefits from the uplift in value associated with re-zoning and development approval. Reducing the land cost input could enable a developer to deliver a dwelling product to the market at a lower price. However the prices of new dwellings are generally set with reference to the comparable products in the local market, meaning there is little incentive for the developer to price below market other than to increase sales rates. Cost certainty and price setting: the costs of development will be factored into the price a developer pays for land. Unexpected cost increases post land purchase will need to be either absorbed by the developer in the form of lower profits, or passed onto the end consumer to maintain predicted profit levels. In some cases, developments will be profitable enough to absorb unexpected increases, but in a competitive development industry these are the exception rather than the norm. While the development industry often states that increased costs will end in higher prices for the end consumer, the ability of developers to pass on these costs depends on market conditions. Prices are determined in the local market and unless the developer has created an entirely new market with no local competition, that market will determine prices, i.e. how much consumers are prepared to pay. In a market with strong local supply and weak local demand, a developer will be lucky to maintain prices predicted at the start of the development process let alone increase prices to absorb costs. This research conducted feasibility modelling to examine how changes to key input variables affect development return outcomes. The modelling was based on a developer purchasing the land upfront with their own equity. While there are many other models of the development process and the timing of land purchase, this is considered the most common. The modelling outputs can be summarised as follows: Small increases or reductions in end sales prices have major implications for Internal Rate of Return (IRR) outcomes. A 10 per cent fall in revenue can mean a 50 per cent drop in the IRR. This means end sale prices are the biggest risk factor in the development process. Small increases or reductions in direct costs of construction can also have major implications for returns. A 10 per cent increase in costs can mean a 40 per cent reduction in the IRR. Significant reductions in the time taken from the commencement to completion of construction can have a positive impact on feasibility. Even a one or two month reduction in a 24 month build time can mean the difference between a profitable and unprofitable development. An increase in the time taken for development approval after land purchase will have a modest, ne ative impact on return outcomes. The longer the delay, the greater the impact. Policy development options Stimulating the market The Australian Government's response to COVID-19 through HomeBuilder and associated state government grants showed how quickly demand side incentives can stimulate the housing industry and deliver new housing supply. Grants increase a consumer's capacity to buy while also increasing confidence in the market. This reduces risk for the developer, which along with higher prices, stimulates the development of new sites. If governments are to use such spending to stimulate housing markets in the future, they must learn from HomeBuilder and how sharp increases in supply puts pressure on the building industry through labour shortages and material price increases. Smoothing housing supply over a longer period rather than a HomeBuilder-like rush would help the industry cope and avoid capacity constraints. A stimulus scheme operating across the entire industry, rather than concentrating on detached homebuilding, would also be more equitable. But what HomeBuilder has shown is demand side grants are an effective way of boosting housing supply in the short term and bringing forward development activity reliant on greater certainty and improved market conditions. Inclusionary zoning The introduction of affordable housing contribution requirements through inclusionary zoning can have a major impact on development feasibility. While density and height bonuses can help replace revenue, the developer needs to be able to pass costs onto the landowner and that means knowing well in advance what such requirements are likely to be. It will then be up to the landowner to determine if the resulting land price is sufficient to stimulate a sale. © AustralianHousing and Urban Research Institute Limited 2022.

Implementation of an Embedded Masked Face Recognition System using Huskylens System-On-Chip Module

Globally, Facial recognition systems have been increasingly adopted, by governments, as a viable means of identification and verification in public spaces such as the airport, train stations, and stadiums. However, in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared that wearing face masks is an essential safety precaution. As a result, current facial recognition systems have difficulties recognizing faces accurately, which motivated this study. This research aims to implement an embedded masked face recognition system using the HuskyLens SoC module to identify people, even while wearing a face mask. The developed method was actualized using the Kendryte K210 chip embedded in the HuskyLens module. This system-on-chip design was integrated with other peripherals using an Arduino Pro-mini board. The results of testing and evaluating the system's performance show that the system's facial recognition accuracy with masked and without masks faces was 90% and 95%, respectively. Implementing this solution in our environment would enable accurate real-time recognition of masked and unmasked faces © 2022 IEEE.

Historical account of dwindling national flexibilities from the Paris Convention to post-TRIPS era: What implications for access-to-medicines in low-and-middle-income-countries?

It is arguable that the most significant feature of the maiden Paris Convention is the creation of a remarkably broad national policy space which allowed Union members to balance the implementation of required obligations with the need to occasionally attend to national exigencies. Thus, a member may choose not to offer industrial property protection if national interests would be best served by doing so. While subsequent revisions to the Paris Convention chipped away at national flexibilities, the most strident attack to national flexibilities occurs under the Agreement for the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights and the period after it. This paper puts the almost-unnoticed whittling down of national flexibilities in international patent agreements in historical perspective. It subsequently discusses four ways through which this development could exacerbate access-to-medicines in low-and-middle-income-countries.

Potential medicinal, nutritive and antiviral food plants: Africa s plausible answer to the low COVID-19 mortality

The surge in severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has put the scientific community on overdrive to come up with a cure and/or possible vaccine to curtail the menace this virus has caused. Considering the morbidity rate from the Coronavirus and the World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations for healthy living, this review examined and documented the possible options of plant-based immune boosters for attaining wellness and protect against infections caused by viruses. This review documented 106 plants consumed largely in Africa as food or medicine after assessing over 172 articles from notable search engines. These plants were reported for antiviral activities and immune boosters for attaining wellness and immunomodulation, a key protective feature against infections caused by viruses. The documented plants contain several immune-modulating compounds like vitamins, flavonoids, phenols, macro, and micronutrients, which might be the possible reason for the current leverage on the mortality rate associated with the COVID-19 pandemic in the African continent. The study, therefore, concluded that medicinal/food plants are able to enhance healthy living and medicinal plants are a significant source of phytomedicinal content for the management of viral-induced diseases such as COVID-19. © 2022 Nickan Research Institute. All rights reserved.

Classification Schemes of COVID-19 High Risk Areas and Resulting Policies: A Rapid Review.

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed a significant global health threat since January 2020. Policies to reduce human mobility have been recognized to effectively control the spread of COVID-19; although the relationship between mobility, policy implementation, and virus spread remains contentious, with no clear pattern for how countries classify each other, and determine the destinations to- and from which to restrict travel. In this rapid review, we identified country classification schemes for high-risk COVID-19 areas and associated policies which mirrored the dynamic situation in 2020, with the aim of identifying any patterns that could indicate the effectiveness of such policies. We searched academic databases, including PubMed, Scopus, medRxiv, Google Scholar, and EMBASE. We also consulted web pages of the relevant government institutions in all countries. This rapid review's searches were conducted between October 2020 and December 2021. Web scraping of policy documents yielded additional 43 country reports on high-risk area classification schemes. In 43 countries from which relevant reports were identified, six issued domestic classification schemes. International classification schemes were issued by the remaining 38 countries, and these mainly used case incidence per 100,000 inhabitants as key indicator. The case incidence cut-off also varied across the countries, ranging from 20 cases per 100,000 inhabitants in the past 7 days to more than 100 cases per 100,000 inhabitants in the past 28 days. The criteria used for defining high-risk areas varied across countries, including case count, positivity rate, composite risk scores, community transmission and satisfactory laboratory testing. Countries either used case incidence in the past 7, 14 or 28 days. The resulting policies included restrictions on internal movement and international travel. The quarantine policies can be summarized into three categories: (1) 14 days self-isolation, (2) 10 days self-isolation and (3) 14 days compulsory isolation.

Health trends, inequalities and opportunities in South Africa's provinces, 1990-2019: findings from the Global Burden of Disease 2019 Study.

BACKGROUND: Over the last 30 years, South Africa has experienced four 'colliding epidemics' of HIV and tuberculosis, chronic illness and mental health, injury and violence, and maternal, neonatal, and child mortality, which have had substantial effects on health and well-being. Using data from the 2019 Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries and Risk Factors Study (GBD 2019), we evaluated national and provincial health trends and progress towards important Sustainable Development Goal targets from 1990 to 2019. METHODS: We analysed GBD 2019 estimates of mortality, non-fatal health loss, summary health measures and risk factor burden, comparing trends over 1990-2007 and 2007-2019. Additionally, we decomposed changes in life expectancy by cause of death and assessed healthcare system performance. RESULTS: Across the nine provinces, inequalities in mortality and life expectancy increased over 1990-2007, largely due to differences in HIV/AIDS, then decreased over 2007-2019. Demographic change and increases in non-communicable diseases nearly doubled the number of years lived with disability between 1990 and 2019. From 1990 to 2019, risk factor burdens generally shifted from communicable and nutritional disease risks to non-communicable disease and injury risks; unsafe sex remained the top risk factor. Despite widespread improvements in healthcare system performance, the greatest gains were generally in economically advantaged provinces. CONCLUSIONS: Reductions in HIV/AIDS and related conditions have led to improved health since 2007, though most provinces still lag in key areas. To achieve health targets, provincial governments should enhance health investments and exchange of knowledge, resources and best practices alongside populations that have been left behind, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic.

Investigating the Role of Emotional Intelligence and Role Conflict on Job Burnout among Special Education Teachers

The need to take appropriate care of children with disabilities by the relevant stakeholders as the world moves into the post-COVID era has become imperative. Hence, this work investigated how family-to-work, work-to-family conflicts, and emotional intelligence influenced the four dimensions of job burnout (enthusiasm towards the job, psychological exhaustion, indolence, and guilt) among teachers administering children with disabilities. This was assessed using a cross-sectional online survey design of 276 special education teachers (female = 159;mean age = 32.5, SD = 10.1) from the Nigerian population of teachers. Data were collected using structured psychological tests, including the Work and Family Conflict Scale (WFCS), Emotional Intelligence Scale, and Job Burnout Scale. Results indicated that emotional intelligence predicted all the dimensions of job burnout in teachers except psychological exhaustion. The independent variables failed to predict psychological exhaustion;however, family-to-work conflict independently predicted indolence. Furthermore, the results revealed no gender difference in all four dimensions of job burnout. Based on these findings, it was recommended that an intervention strategy targeting the promotion of emotional intelligence and adequate provision of modern facilities to be used to assist teachers in their special skills delivery. © 2020 Olatunji et al.;Licensee Lifescience Global. All Rights Reserved.

Implications of COVID-19 in high burden countries for HIV/TB: A systematic review of evidence.

BACKGROUND: The triple burden of COVID-19, tuberculosis and human immunodeficiency virus is one of the major global health challenges of the twenty-first century. In high burden HIV/TB countries, the spread of COVID-19 among people living with HIV is a well-founded concern. A thorough understanding of HIV/TB and COVID-19 pandemics is important as the three diseases interact. This may clarify HIV/TB/COVID-19 as a newly related field. However, several gaps remain in the knowledge of the burden of COVID-19 on patients with TB and HIV. This study was conducted to review different studies on SARS-CoV, MERS-CoV or COVID-19 associated with HIV/TB co-infection or only TB, to understand the interactions between HIV, TB and COVID-19 and its implications on the burden of the COVID-19 among HIV/TB co-infected or TB patients, screening algorithm and clinical management. METHODS: We conducted an electronic search of potentially eligible studies published in English in the Cochrane Controlled Register of Trials, PubMed, Medrxiv, Google scholar and Clinical Trials Registry databases. We included case studies, case series and observational studies published between January, 2002 and July, 2020 in which SARS-CoV, MERS-CoV and COVID-19 co-infected to HIV/TB or TB in adults. We screened titles, abstracts and full articles for eligibility. Descriptive and meta-analysis were done and results have been presented in graphs and tables. RESULTS: After removing 95 duplicates, 58 out of 437 articles were assessed for eligibility, of which 14 studies were included for descriptive analysis and seven studies were included in the meta-analysis. Compared to the descriptive analysis, the meta-analysis showed strong evidence that current TB exposure was high-risk COVID-19 group (OR 1.67, 95% CI 1.06-2.65, P = 0.03). The pooled of COVID-19/TB severity rate increased from OR 4.50 (95% CI 1.12-18.10, P = 0.03), the recovery rate was high among COVID-19 compared to COVID-19/TB irrespective of HIV status (OR 2.23, 95% CI 1.83-2.74, P < 0.001) and the mortality was reduced among non-TB group (P < 0.001). CONCLUSION: In summary, TB was a risk factor for COVID-19 both in terms of severity and mortality irrespective of HIV status. Structured diagnostic algorithms and clinical management are suggested to improve COVID-19/HIV/TB or COVID-19/TB co-infections outcomes.