Childhood obesity has serious consequences both immediately and in adulthood. The rates of obesity in children and adolescents are rising rapidly in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. We systematically searched the literature to explore adverse effects associated with childhood obesity in this region and the management efforts for dealing with it. Inclusion criteria were: English-l...

Food safety standards are a necessity to protect consumers' health in today's growing global food trade. A number of studies have suggested safety standards can interrupt trade, bringing financial and technical burdens on small as well as large agri-food producers in developing countries. Other examples have shown that economical extension, key intermediaries, and funded initiatives have substa...

f rom the viewpoint of economic theories, total factor productivity (tfp) is the most important component that leads to economic growth and development. the main purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of knowledge-based economy on total factor productivity in the member countries of the middle east and north africa (mena) region. for this purpose, the panel data regression analysis ha...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of social media in communication discourse in the Islamic Middle East and North African (MENA) countries. Design/methodology/approach – By applying the theory of social networks and a method known as critical discourse analysis (CDA) this study investigates the role of social media in the recent waves of popular unrest in the MENA r...

This paper starts from the premise that private sector development is of crucial importance to the future development of MENA countries. It demonstrates the relative importance of various institutional constraints, in general, and impediments to dispute resolution, in particular, in reducing the competitiveness of private firms in the MENA region through by increasing transaction costs. It desc...

The purpose of this paper is to investigate vulnerability to financial contagion in a set of expanding emerging markets of the Middle East and North Africa, during seven episodes of international financial crisis. Using Fry & Baur (2005) fixed-effect panel approach, we significantly reject the hypothesis of a joint regional contagion. However, using a battery of bivariate contagion tests based ...

INTRODUCTION The status of HIV and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections among incarcerated populations in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and the links between prisons and the HIV epidemic are poorly understood. This review synthesized available HIV and HCV data in prisons in MENA and highlighted opportunities for action. METHODS The review was based on data generated through the system...

This paper offers new evidence on the sources of cross-country income differences. It exploits the idea that observing immigrant workers from different countries in the same labor market provides an opportunity to estimate their relative human capital endowments without having to adjust for other sources of country-specific productivity differences. Based on such estimates, a neoclassical growt...

The mere association of the words sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV/AIDS, and sexuality, to Middle East and North Africa (MENA) in any discussion, social or academic, seems to elicit heated debates and controversy. The MENA region is, in the minds of many, an area where socio-cultural sensitivities surrounding sex and disease still abound. Are there HIV epidemics shrouded be...