Golf tourists in South Africa: A demand-side study of a niche market in sports tourism

The targeting of tourism market segments is considered to increase repeat visitations to tourism destinations because it allows destination marketers to accurately determine the needs and expectations of targeted tourists, develop more effective marketing strategies, which in turn, assists with ensuring that the targeted tourists segments support and return to the destination. Consequently, the aim of the study was to determine the profile of golf tourists attending an international golf event in South Africa by shedding some light on their key trip-related and general golf tourism behaviour patterns. To date, most research undertaken has focused on product-driven research concerned with golf course facilities and the marketing thereof and little emphasis on demand-side research concerning the golf tourist. Personal interviews were conducted using a structured questionnaire involving 314 golf tourists selected through a systematic random sampling technique. The paper investigates the level of development of golf tourism, analyses the golf tourism market and highlights critical factors for its success, in South Africa.     

Consumption-investment problem with transaction costs for Lévy-driven price processes

We consider an optimal control problem for a linear stochastic integro-differential equation with conic constraints on the phase variable and with the control of singular–regular type. Our setting includes consumption-investment problems for models of financial markets in the presence of proportional transaction costs, where the prices of the assets are given by a geometric Lévy process, and the investor is allowed to take short positions. We prove that the Bellman function of the problem is a viscosity solution of an HJB equation. A uniqueness theorem for the solution of the latter is established. Special attention is paid to the dynamic programming principle.     

Tracking Progress Towards Statistical Capacity Building Efforts: The African Statistical Development Index

This paper presents the development of the African Statistical Development Index, a composite index that aims at supporting the monitoring and evaluation of the implementation of the Reference Regional Strategic Framework for Statistical Capacity Building in Africa. It also helps to identify, for each African country, weaknesses and strengths of the National Statistical Systems so that support interventions can be developed. The paper first gives the rationale behind the development of the index as well as the context. It then elaborates on the methodology used to develop the index, including the selection of components and variables, the scaling of the variables, the weighting and aggregation schemes, and the validation process. The methodology is applied to a sample of African countries. Finally, the paper compares the proposed index to existing statistical capacity building indicators and highlights the related limitations.     

Short or long-term contract? Firm’s optimal choice

This article studies the behaviour of a firm searching to fill a vacancy. The main assumption is that the firm can offer two different kinds of contracts to the workers, either a short-term contract or a long-term one. The short-term contract acts as a probationary stage in which the firm can learn about the worker. After this stage, the firm can propose a long-term contract to the worker or it can decide to look for another worker. We show that, if the short-term wage is fixed endogenously, it can be optimal for firms to start a working relationship with a short-term contract, but that this policy decreases unemployment and welfare. On the contrary, if the wage is fixed exogenously, this policy could be optimal also from a welfare point of view.     

Stabilization and Association Agreements (SAAs), Europe Agreements,and Public Procurement

This paper initially presents Stabilization and Association Agreements (SAAs) provisions in terms of trade openness to the EC competition. It also makes reference to Europe Agreements (EUs) provision in this matter. It aims more precisely at specifying the impact of public procurement provisions of those Agreements to five Western Balkan public procurement markets. Combining the extent of “Buy National” policies within these countries, with information on the current international competitiveness, the paper identifies those industries that are likely to be particularly sensitive to the abolition of “Buy National” practices due to the provisions of the SAAs. These results can help national authorities overcome part of the negative impacts due to the EU competition.     

The Decentralization of Information Processing in the Presence of Interactions

We propose a model of organizational decision making, in which information processing is decentralized. Our model incorporates two features of many actual organizations: aggregation entails a loss of useful information, and the decision problems of different agents interact. We assume that an organization forms a portfolio of risky assets, following a hierarchical procedure. Agents' decision rules and the organization's hierarchical structure are derived endogenously. Typically, in the optimal hierarchical structure, all agents have one subordinate, and returns to ability are at least as high at the bottom as at the top. However, these results can be reversed in the presence of returns to specialization.     

Detecting break in oil price series using the Box-Tiao method

This paper presents an Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average procedure which allows one to test a time series for a structural break at an unknown point in time. It is a variation of the Box-Tiao method designed to test for a structural break due to an intervention at a known time. Applying the procedure to the crude oil market, we were able to statistically show the existence of a structural break in the oil price series and to pinpoint the month during which it took place, January 1986. The results also underscore the need for testing the stability of models estimated using oil price data covering both sides of the structural break and may assist those who study the political events of the period.     

Strategic Trading in a Dynamic Noisy Market

This paper studies a dynamic model of a financial market with a strategic trader. In each period the strategic trader receives a privately observed endowment in the stock. He trades with competitive market makers to share risk. Noise traders are present in the market. After receiving a stock endowment, the strategic trader is shown to reduce his risk exposure either by selling at a decreasing rate over time or by selling and then buying back some of the shares sold. When the time between trades is small, the strategic trader reveals the information regarding his endowment very quickly.