THE EFFECT OF QUALITY COST MANAGEMENT ON FIRMS PROFITABILITY (Published)
The paramount objective of a firm or organization is to earn and maximize profit in the long run. To achieve this, firms put in place diverse strategies, one of which is quality improvement. This value-added activity has some attendant cost implications, so also do the failures in a firm’s product or service. These cost implications together make up the group of quality costs, and they put a strain on the profit making ability of a firm. The objectives of this study were to find out how quality costs can be managed and how their management affects the profitability of firms. The survey design was adopted to gather data from the hospitality industry in Bayelsa State. The correlation analysis (SPSS version 20) was used to analyze the data and from the results obtained it was concluded that there is a significant relationship between quality cost management and firm profitability. It was recommended that effective quality cost management systems be put in place by firms to enhance their profitability and that firms should channel more efforts towards prevention and appraisal activities, this will reduce the extent to which they spend on internal and external failures and lead to increased profitability
Keywords: Cost, Effect. Quality, Management, Profitability
Assessment of Cost and Returns of Cattle Marketing In Central Zone of Adamawa State, Nigeria. (Published)
The study was to assess the cost and returns in cattle marketing in central Adamawa State, Nigeria. Data for this study were collected from activities of cattle marketer for the year 2012. The data were collected using structured questionnaire. One hundred and twenty (120) Cattle marketers were administered with questionnaires. A total of Ninety questionnaires were used for analyzed. However, both descriptive (frequency, percentage and mean) and inferential statistics was used for analyzing the data generated from the study. Analysis of the structure and performance of cattle marketers was done using Gini coefficient and marketing margin analysis. The results obtained from the study revealed that, performance of cattle marketers which was analyzed using marketing margin techniques was found to be 9.09 percent. This indicates that, marketers obtained 9.09 percent of the final sales which is paid by the consumers. Also, the analysis of seller concentration of cattle marketing shows that, a Gini coefficient of 0.65 was obtained. The relatively high Gini coefficient which by the analysis tends to approach one (1) is a clear indication of inequality in earnings from the sales of the animals and high marketing concentration. The study therefore recommends that, marketers should form / strengthening their associations and cooperatives for extensive information sharing and in-leading between and among members, government at all levels should also be willing to provide information to marketers and researchers so as to help in addressing the problems associated with cattle marketing for necessary support and legislations
Keywords: Assessment, Cattle, Cost, Marketing, Returns