Corporate social responsibility,mining and sustainable development in Namibia: Critical reflections through a relational lens

For its advocates, corporate social responsibility (CSR) represents a powerful tool through which business and particularly multinationals can play a more direct role in global sustainable development. For its critics, however, CSR rarely goes beyond business as usual, and is often a cover for business practices with negative implications for communities and the environment. This paper explores the relationship between CSR and sustainable development in the context of mining in Namibia. Drawing upon extant literatures on the geographies of responsibility, and referencing in-country empirical case-study research, a critical relational lens is applied to consider their interaction both historically and in the present.     

The determinants of capital intensity in Japan and the US

We estimate the determinants of capital intensity in Japan and the US, characterized by striking different paths. We augment an otherwise standard Constant Elasticity of Substitution (CES) model with demand-side considerations, which we find especially relevant in the US. In this augmented setting, the elasticity of substitution between capital and labor is placed between 0.74 and 0.90 in Japan, and around 0.30 in the US. We also find evidence of biased technical change, which is capital-saving in Japan but labor-saving in the US. These differences help us explain the diverse experience in the capital deepening process of these economies, and lead us to conclude that demand-side drivers, quite relevant in the US, may also be relevant to account for different growth experiences. A close look at the nature of technological change is also needed before designing one-size-fits-all industrial, economic growth, and/or labor market policies.     

Unconventional monetary policies and the corporate bond market

The paper uses a reduced-form vector autoregressive framework to study the effects of quantitative easing and operation “twist”, as well as a conventional monetary expansion, on corporate bond yields and spreads. We construct rating- and maturity-based weekly bond portfolios using TRACE and simulate monetary policies as shocks to the Treasury yield curve. We find that none of the policies can persistently lower corporate spreads, and that operation twist is the only policy capable of lowering corporate yields. This latter finding can be accounted for by the operation twist’s ability to keep the monetary base constant and, therefore, to flatten the riskless yield curve without generating inflationary expectations.     

Overnight information flow and realized volatility forecasting

This study compares various approaches for incorporating the overnight information flow for forecasting realized volatility of the Australian index ASX 200 and seven very liquid Australian shares from March 2007 to January 2014. The analysis shows that considering overnight information separately rather than adding it to the daily realized volatility estimates leads consistently to better out-of-sample results despite the higher number of involved parameters. A novel, very promising approach is to combine the assets’ own overnight returns with realized volatility estimates of related assets from other markets for which intraday data is available while the Australian exchange is closed.     

基于Flexsim的社区蔬菜直销配送流程仿真优化研究

文章以乌鲁木齐沙依巴克区社区蔬菜直销配送流程为仿真对象,运用Flexsim仿真软件对其进行模拟,对配送流程涉及到的关键设备利用率、人员空闲率等数据比较分析,提出社区蔬菜直销配送流程合理的运营模式。     

基于多级库存的电网运维物资安全库存优化配置研究

针对电力公司运维物资多级库存体系与安全库存配置现状,结合安全库存聚集效应,文章提出了周转库安全库存差异聚集策略。在综合考虑库存持有成本与普通、紧急配送成本的基础上,构建了安全库存优化配置模型。通过两类电网运维物资实际数据的分析,验证了差异聚集策略下成本低于全部聚集以及全部分散策略,可以为电力公司物资集约化、差异化、精益化管理以及仓库定额配置提供依据。     

基于Nelson—Siegel模型的我国利率期限结构的构建

利率问题一直都是经济金融研究中最基础、最核心的问题。利率可以反映出资金的供求状况，并受到物价水平、经济周期和预期等的影响。本文基于中国银行间债券市场的交易数据，利用基于贝叶斯推断的马尔科夫链蒙特卡罗模拟（MCMC）方法估计Hautsch＆Ou（2008）提出的动态的Nelson—Siegel模型，以构建我国的利率期限结构模型。     

集团化办学的内涵与功能

集团化办学是以职教组织为核心,以专业建设、人才培养、科技研发为主要纽带,以集团章程为共同行为规范的职业教育联合体。文章主要从集团化办学的内涵和功能进行了简单介绍。     

图山寺高瓦斯隧道施工管理

结合兰渝线13标段图山寺高瓦斯隧道施工管理,兰渝铁路图山寺隧道为单线铁路高瓦斯隧道,介绍该隧道的施工管理及组织结构,以供参考。