The impact of environmental management systems on financial performance in fashion and textiles industries

With rising environmental concerns from consumers and stakeholder groups, environmental management has become an important responsibility for today's fashion and textiles manufacturers. The production of fashion and textiles related products often requires high levels of energy and water consumption, and emits large quantities of pollutants to the environment. Therefore, the adoption of environmental management systems (EMSs) is important and could have a significant impact on these firms' operational performance. This study presents empirical evidence on the performance impact of EMS adoption in the fashion and textiles related industries (FTIs). Although EMSs have emerged as a passport to business in the FTIs, their actual impacts on firms' financial performance have not been explored. We reveal that the adoption of ISO 14000, the most popular EMS, improves manufacturers' profitability in the FTIs over a three-year period as measured by return-on-assets (ROA). Based on our sample, we find that profitability improvement started during the implementation stage and continued at least one year after the firm obtained ISO 14000 certification. We also find that profitability improvement is mainly due to improvement in cost efficiency, measured by return-on-sales (ROS). Specifically, certified firms improved up to 2.9% in ROA and 3.3% in ROS over the three-year period since they implemented ISO 14000. We conclude that there is a positive impact of EMS adoption on firms' financial performance in the FTIs.     

ISO 14000与企业可持续发展

指出了企业贯彻实施ISO14000和建立可持续发展战略的重要意义，强调具备一个有效的环境管理体系的企业必须承担社会责任，并坚持不懈地走可持续发展道路；分析了ISO14000系列标准和ISO9000族标准的联系与区别；通过提高环境意识、重视环境评估、降低环境成本等战略重点，树立企业环境价值，追求最优价格差异性战略，不断持续改进，创造和维持企业竞争优势，使企业获得成功。     

Inside Ownership, Risk Sharing and Tobin's q-Ratios: Evidence from REITs

We investigate relations among inside ownership, managerial expenses, risk sharing and equity valuations. Our engine of analysis—Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs)—provides a unique and rich framework for analysis since we can calculate extremely accurate measures of asset replacement costs, and hence relative valuation (Tobin's q ). Further, the nature of the financial statements allows us to examine the impact of insider ownership on agency costs since we can accurately measure the costs of the entire management team. Our results show that firms with greater insider holdings tend to invest in assets with lower systematic risk and use less debt in their capital structure. At the same time, managerial expenses are lower as inside ownership increases. Finally, higher levels of insider ownership are associated with higher relative valuation as measured by both higher premiums to net asset value and higher multiples of cash flows. The results have implications for the design of optimal management contracts for both REITs and firms in general.     

Effects of data localization on digital trade: An agent-based modeling approach

Post the Snowden and Cambridge Analytica episodes, concerns have been raised by governments and regulators on protecting consumer data collected and transmitted by various digital firms. Driven by concerns of privacy, national security, surveillance, and cyber terrorism, governments around the world have been erecting barriers in cyberspace through data localization. The extent of data localization varies from free flow of data, to stringent restrictions requiring all data to be stored only within the territorial jurisdiction of the country. Though there are certain legitimate concerns regarding protection of personal data, scholars and liberal economists have long proclaimed that any restrictions on the Internet and associated digital trade will have serious economic consequences. Data localization affects digital trade between consumers and producers of digital services to varying degrees. In this paper, we use agent based modeling to study the properties and behaviours of consumers and producers under varying data localization regimes. An augmented gravity model of trade with iceberg coefficient is incorporated to reflect distance-related costs between producers and consumers. Varying data localization compliance costs are included to reflect the effect of non-tariff barriers of data restrictions. Our extensive simulations indicate that there is often clustering of consumers around local firms in highly restrictive data localization regimes, thus enabling local firms to effectively compete against global multinationals. However, results also indicate that while free cross-border data flow enables intense competition amongst producers, data localization restrictions often limit consumer choice due to its effect on price and quality of services.     

ISO14000认证与企业管理

章简单明了地介绍了ISO14000认证的发展历程和基本知识，阐述了ISO14000标准的实施，既是为了保护人类生存发展的需要，也是实现两个根本转变的需要，同时也是为了促进国内外贸易，实现企业管理现代化的需要。ISO14000认证必将对未来世界各国企业管理造成深远影响。     

Price competition when three are few and four are many

I examine price competition in a market for a homogeneous good when consumers observe prices subject to a random shock (perception error). When firms have symmetric costs, there exists a unique equilibrium in pure strategies, which is symmetric. When there are up to three sellers in the market, the sellers extract the entire consumer surplus. However, with at least four firms, assuming that the marginal cost is sufficiently low relative to consumers’ valuation, both consumers and producers may enjoy a positive surplus. The marginal-cost pricing is never observed in an equilibrium with finitely many firms. Potential policy implications are discussed.     

A new test for manufacturing industry efficiency: An analysis of the results of import licence tendering in New Zealand

One test of the relative productive inefficiency of the protected manufacturing industries found in many newly industrialising countries is the percentage by which domestic prices exceed world prices. It is suggested that these price differentials are reflected in the premiums paid for import licences under the public sealed bid tendering scheme currently operating in New Zealand. The premium results for 22 roughly compiled industries suggest that nearly three quarters (15) have estimated unit costs 40 percent or more above those of efficient overseas producers. Evidently the long-term policy of industrial diversification through protection has produced substantial resource misallocation in the economy.     

Inducing Innovation in the Environmental Technology of Oligopolistic Firms

This paper characterizes environmental regulations which induce polluting Bertrand competitors to invest efficiently in environmental R&D. Post–innovation benefits to raising rivals' costs provide firms with incentives to innovate. Although optimal behavior cannot be elicited with pollution taxes alone, an optimum can be achieved by combining emission taxes with environmental performance standards that are higher for firms which reveal superior environmental technologies. Faced with this policy, successful innovators voluntarily reveal their technological discovery to the government, despite the apparent regulatory penalty that results. Implications for automotive fuel regulation are discussed.     

建立和完善环境管理体系实现企业可持续发展

针对加入WTO后石油天然气行业所面临的形势，从国际、国内、行业三个方面进行了详细分析，找出了我国石油行业之间的差距以及自身存在的问题。只有巩固与完善石油行业HSE管理体系，建立并实施加14000环境标准管理体系，正确处理好HSE管理体系与ISO 14000环境标准管理体系间的关系，才能最终实现我国环境标准与国际环境标准接轨。同时还要积极推行清洁生产，使企业从传统的由资源到产品再到污染物排放的线型经济模式中解脱出来，实现由资源到产品最终到再生资源的循环经济模式。只有这样，企业才能做到环境与经济的融合，才能提高企业市场竞争力，最终实现可持续发展。     

The investment opportunity set and disclosure policy choice: Some Malaysian evidence

Recently researchers have shown that certain corporate and accounting policy decisions are related to the firm's portfolio of growth opportunities or its investment opportunity set (ios). This paper augments the research by examining whether the firm's ios is also predictably related to disclosure policy decisions made by the firm. We hypothesize that because agency costs between managers and shareholders are an increasing function of the firm's growth opportunities, managers in high growth firms will be motivated to disclose information about the firm's future prospects in order to commit themselves to particular courses of action and thereby limit their future managerial discretion. Our empirical results indicate that for a sample of 67 Malaysian firms, this is supported only amongst a sample of lower growth firms.The authors are Associate Professor and lecturer, respectively, at the Department of Accountancy, Massey University, Palmerston North, New Zealand. Correspondence should be addressed to S F Cahan at the above address, e-mail: S.F.Cahan@massey.ac.nz.     

谈ISO 14000与HSE相结合建立综合管理体系

首先从适用范围、标准的级别等方面对ISO 14000环境管理系列标准和HSE管理体系的差异作了详细分析，并阐述了两者的相似之处．进而从石化企业生产管理的实际情况论述了将两者结合起来建立综合管理体系的可行性．分析了石化企业建立此综合管理体系可能存在的问题．并提出了几点建议。     

Signaling valuable human capital: Advocacy group work experience and its effect on employee pay in innovative firms

Research Summary: The ability of innovative firms to create and capture value depends on innovations that are quickly and widely adopted. Yet, stakeholder concerns can establish important barriers to diffusion. We study the human capital aspect of this challenge and investigate whether innovative firms pay salary premiums to new hires with work experience from advocacy groups like Transparency International. We integrate strategic human capital with stakeholder theory and suggest that advocacy group experience creates signals for valuable human capital in terms of stakeholder knowledge and legitimacy transfers to innovative firms. Using matched data for 3,562 employees in Denmark, we find that new hires with advocacy group experience enjoy larger salary premiums at technologically leading firms, in occupations with direct stakeholder interaction, and for advocacy group top management. Managerial Summary: Innovation research is increasingly aware of the non-technological factors behind successful innovations. Users, regulators, or public opinion can be benevolent supporters or stingy opponents of innovations. Employees with an understanding of the needs and sensitivities of societal stakeholders should therefore be valuable to innovative firms. We find this to be the case when innovative firms hire employees from advocacy groups representing such stakeholders (e.g., Transparency International). Such employees receive higher salaries than an otherwise comparable reference group. These findings indicate that recruiting needs of innovative firms reward stakeholder experience, not merely technological expertise. They demonstrate how firms can create value in the pursuit of the public interest. Further, advocacy groups emerge as an important career stage allowing individuals to develop credible signals for stakeholder expertise.     

Switching costs in the US seed industry: Technology adoption and welfare impacts

We evaluate the role of brand and technology switching costs in the US soybean seed industry using a unique dataset of actual seed purchases by about 28,000 farmers from 1996 to 2016. Using a random coefficients logit model of demand, we estimate brand and technology switching costs, characterize the distributions of buyers’ willingness to pay for seed brands and the glyphosate tolerance (GT) trait, and assess the implications of brand and technology switching costs for farmers’ welfare, technology adoption, firm profits, and firm market shares. We find that farmers are willing to pay large premiums for brand labels, and even larger premiums for the GT trait, although there is considerable heterogeneity in these values. Switching costs play an important role in the soybean seed industry. Eliminating these costs would significantly increase buyers’ welfare, reduce seed prices and firm profits, decrease adoption of the GT trait, and impact industry consolidation by expanding smaller firms’ market shares.     

Transaction costs and competition policy

This paper evaluates current antitrust policy in light of our current understanding of how transaction costs influence the ability of firms and consumers to deal with market power. The paper shows how the failure to consider transaction costs can lead to erroneous policy decisions. Many models employed today make simplifying assumptions about transaction costs that can lead to biased results in analyzing vertical and horizontal issues. The increased ability to monitor the effect of promotional behavior should cause us to reexamine whether free riding justifications, previously accepted as justifications for various vertical restrictions, still hold. Nash bargaining and Nash-in-Nash models raise concerns about the simplified assumptions assumed in which supposedly high transaction costs restrict the choice and form of the assumed competitive alternatives. The increasing importance of two-sided markets together with an understanding of transaction costs is needed to understand antitrust conduct in those markets. The recent Amex case is likely to lead to confused litigation in these types of markets. Finally, the establishment of property rights for a consumer to his or her data could fail to remedy antitrust concerns that certain dominant firms are immune to competition because consumers do not own their data unless that property right is limited so that consumers cannot exclusively sell their data to one firm.     

垂直合约与产业环境贸易政策——环境成本内部化及中国的策略选择

全球经济一体化背景下,发达国家利用环境贸易政策来实现竞争优势已经出现趋势。本文介绍了欧盟的环境贸易政策,基于环境贸易政策的背景,预设国内外上、下游企业之间已经构成一个产业链,应用Stephen F.Hamilton的垂直型结构模型,将数量竞争分为四种不同情况,给出了最大均衡供给量。分析表明,如果采用垂直合约,则数量竞争和价格竞争的最佳非合作环境政策均是庇古(Pigouvian)税。在国内下游出口商与上游进口品供应商能够达成合约的条件下,政府之间存在着非合作环境政策。因此,我国的产业环境贸易政策应当是努力实现环境成本的内部化。     

Demand for farm animal welfare and producer implications: Results from a field experiment in Michigan

This study utilizes a Becker-DeGroot-Marschak (BDM) mechanism to assess Michigan consumer demand for animal welfare practices. Results are examined in the context of changing farm production costs and producer marketing margins. We find that while consumers are willing to pay significant premiums for animal welfare standards, failing to account for the costs associated with producing the entire animal under the new system could lead to suboptimal policy that negatively affects producer welfare. Our results suggest that consumer premiums for animal welfare are product specific and that WTP estimates should not be generalized to the entire animal. We discuss policy implications of our findings and highlight the importance of considering producer costs when evaluating consumer demand for farm animal welfare practices.     

From pond to plate: Towards a twin-driven commodity chain in Bangladesh shrimp aquaculture

Globalization of the agro-food system has led developing nations to orient their production to meet global markets. Consequently, local agricultural systems are increasingly linked to global commodity networks, and generate complex intersections and sometimes tensions. Cultured shrimp in Bangladesh is such a global commodity that connects the local producers with the global consumers starting from pond to plate via a network of diverse actors in a complex manner. Field research in Bangladesh shows that shrimp aquaculture in Bangladesh is moving towards a twin-driven commodity chain in which lead firms govern supply network, while the Shrimp Seal of Quality Organization (SSOQ), a recently emerged third-party certifier, as well as other environmental NGOs define regulatory aspects of the industry. While governance in twin-driven commodity chain offers opportunities for a sustainable aquaculture, it also poses many questions which have significant policy implications for different stakeholders involved in the chain.     

DO OLIGOPOLISTS POLLUTE LESS? EVIDENCE FROM A RESTRUCTURED ELECTRICITY MARKET*

Electricity restructuring has created the opportunity for producers to exercise market power. Oligopolists increase price by distorting output decisions, causing cross‐firm production inefficiencies. This study estimates the environmental implications of production inefficiencies attributed to market power in the Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland electricity market. Air pollution fell substantially during 1999, the year in which both electricity restructuring and new environmental regulation took effect. I find that strategic firms reduced their emissions by approximately 20% relative to other firms and their own historic emissions. Next, I compare observed behavior with estimates of production, and therefore emissions, in a competitive market. According to a model of competitive behavior, changing costs explain approximately two‐thirds of the observed pollution reductions. The remaining third can be attributed to firms exercising market power.     

Infant-industry tariff protection with pressure groups

This paper analyzes the increasing tariff protection in the Spanish iron and steel industry over the first third of the 20th Century. Learning effects are explicitly included to model a dynamic game of trade liberalization. The government chooses the tariff level while firms decide how much to produce each period. Firms' production decisions determine their future cost levels. Assuming that learning reduces only fixed costs, the dynamic game may be solved in closed form, so that the optimality and time consistency of the actual policy can be evaluated. Furthermore, the model is used to measure the relative importance of producers and consumers on the government's equilibrium tariff strategy. The model is calibrated for year 1913 and it is shown that the existence of important, unexploited, dynamic economies of scale may have justified high tariff levels at that time. In addition the results also show that the Spanish iron and steel producers behaved more competitively than what is commonly assumed, and that the government's protection policy was not significantly conditioned by steel producers.     

Sourcing green makes green: Evidence from the BRICs

Facing increasing environmental concerns, many developing countries—especially Brazil, Russia, India, and China (the BRICs), which serve as the world's major business-to-business (B2B) servicing hubs offering manufacturing and sourcing services—seek solutions to reduce damage caused to the environment. We draw on Systems Theory to investigate the manner in which sourcing options of input materials affect the environmental performance of servicing firms in the BRICs. We hypothesize that servicing firms in developing countries can lower pollution intensity by (i) substituting dirty inputs with clean inputs and (ii) substituting domestically sourced inputs with inputs imported from developed countries. Based on the industry-level input-output matrix for the BRICs over the period 1995–2009, our empirical findings suggest that firms significantly improved their environmental performance by using cleaner inputs and more inputs imported from developed countries. We demonstrate service innovation in the form of green sourcing by using clean materials accessible through trade liberalisation to achieve environmental benefits. We advance knowledge of green supply chain management and green sourcing strategies of servicing firms in developing countries.