Environmental technology foresight: New horizons for technology management

Decision-making in corporate technology management and government technology policy is increasingly influenced by the environmental impact of technologies. Technology foresight (TF) and environmental impact assessment (EIA) are analyzed with regard to the roles they can play in developing long-term strategies and policies for reducing the environmental impact of technologies. The methods for TF and EIA are quite well developed, but remain within a tradition of rational decision-making. However, recent studies of tecnology management and innovation have shown that technology development can be explained only to a certain degree by rational decision-making. EIA is usually presented as an objective and scientific method, based on normative underpinnings that usually remain hidden. Thus, systematic information-providing instruments such as TF and EIA can play only a limited role. We propose a procedure for environmental technology foresight. The case is made that environmental technology management will be most helped by a 'constructive' approach in order to stimulate incorporation of long-term environmental objectives.     

An efficient budget allocation policy for decentralisation of responsibility for site decontamination projects

Selection and execution of site decontamination projects is often best left to local authorities, in accordance with the subsidiarity principle, even though the budget for such projects is made available through a central authority. In this paper we suggest a practical budget allocation policy which a central authority can employ to allocate budgets to local authorities, while still optimising the central authority's environmental objective function. The procedure is fully consistent with the principle of decentralisation of responsibility for selection and execution of projects, and requires a minimum information exchange between local and central levels. Despite the information asymmetry between local and central levels, incentive compatibility problems can be (partially) prevented by choosing an appropriate evaluation mechanism. At the same time, the procedure is computationally effective and efficient, and can guarantee a fair budget allocation, making it easy to implement and politically acceptable.     

How do the success factors driving repurchase intent differ between male and female customers?

As customers’ repurchase behavior leads to long-term corporate profitability, managers should know the success factors influencing repurchase intent. Knowledge of gender differences in these success factors would enable managers to separately optimize repurchase intent for men and women. This research thus develops original hypotheses on gender differences in the formation of repurchase intent. Based on hierarchical linear modeling of data from five countries and ten industries, this research finds that public brand image more strongly influences customer satisfaction and repurchase intent for women than for men. Perceived value has a weaker effect on repurchase intent for women than for men. The analyses do not detect any gender difference in the influence of customer satisfaction on repurchase intent. Contrary to conventional wisdom, relational switching costs more strongly influence repurchase intent for men than for women. Further analyses illustrate moderating effects of country differences in gender egalitarianism and of contextual differences between products and services.     

Market games with differential information and infinite dimensional commodity spaces: The core

Summary We provide an alternative proof of the existence of core allocations in exchange economies with differential information and infinite dimensional commodity spaces. We also identify a critical feature of information sharing rules that ensures nonemptiness of the core. In essence, the only condition we require on the sharing rules is that profitable insider trading be prohibited. In the absence of insider trading, balancedness is guaranteed and core nonemptiness follows.I thank Dan Arce, Erik Balder, Myrna Wooders, and Nicholas Yannelis for helpful comments. This paper is a greatly revised version of my paper entitled. A Variational Problem Arising in Market Games with Differential Information, written in August of 1991.     

Analysing tax evasion dynamics via the Ising model

We develop a model of tax evasion based on the Ising model. We augment the model using an appropriate enforcement mechanism that may allow policy makers to curb tax evasion. With a certain probability tax evaders are subject to an audit. If they get caught they behave honestly for a certain number of periods. Simulating the model for a range of parameter combinations, we show that tax evasion may be controlled effectively by using punishment as an enforcement mechanism.     

Grid analysis for sales supervision

Falling to recognize the unique need and desire of salespeople, the sales manager tends to allocate supervisory time according to the amount of his or her past selling experience. This time allocation results in either the excessive or insufficient supervision of sales personnel. This article describes a process of arriving at a more optimum allocation of supervisory time.     

Seasonal Variation in Cost-of-Funds at Thrift Institutions

The purpose of this note is threefold. First, in addition to the well-known seasonal pattern to the eleventh-district cost-of-funds (COF), we document a twelve-month seasonal in the national median COF. Second, we demonstrate that the cause of seasonality in each of these COF series is due to the maladjustment of length-of-month effects. In particular, the eleventh-district COF is biased upwards in relatively short months while the national median is biased downward. Third, we show that the popular partial adjustment model for modeling the COF is misspecified.     

Financial comparability and environmental diversity: an international context

Accounting and environmental management both hold improved resource‐use efficiency as an ultimate goal, but intermediate processes and objectives vary and consequently it is separately assessed within each discipline. This paper intends to make visible the globalizing trends in accounting practice, which aim to standardize financial reporting to produce comparable information so that shareholders can maximize their economic wealth. This paper seeks to contrast this comparability strategy with the apparent need for diversity in accounting information exhibited by actual accounting practices, the information needs of environmental management and, ultimately, the cultural needs of sustainable development. We argue that a more pluralistic model, that enables a holistic assessment of corporate performance and balances diverse stakeholder objectives, is better suited to an uncertain future. Implementation requires accountants and environmental managers jointly to create and test a new order of reporting. There are many practical challenges but most significantly accountants and environmental managers must combine to enhance the visibility and credibility of these diverse performance measures. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. and ERP Environment     

Development of agriculture in Ethiopia since the 1975 land reform

A stated objective of the Ethiopian Government since it came to power in 1975 has been to increase the production of crops for both domestic consumption and export. Consequently, a number of plans and programs have been proposed and implemented to bring about such development in Ethiopian agriculture. This paper mainly focuses 011 a macro review of the general course of Ethiopian agricultural development since the land reform of 1975. The food production in Ethiopia has lagged behind the population growth as evidenced by the gap between the growth rates of population (3%) and food production (1.8%) over the period from 1970 to 1983. Recently, this situation has, perhaps, further deteriorated. Seventy-one percent of the total land mass is estimated to be suitable for agriculture, but only about 19% is cultivated. This suggests an underutilisation of land. Moreover, Ethiopia has a persistent subsistence production problem in agriculture. Agricultural research and education which are essential to development have not been given due attention by the policy makers. As a result, the agricultural technologies used by farmers have changed little in this century. Moreover, small-scale farmers, although still the most potent economic force in the country, have not been given the incentives necessary to expand production, and currently receive less than adequate support from the central government. Some 85%, 50%, and 79% of total agricultural credit, fertiliser and improved seeds respectively go directly to socialist enterprises (state farms and producers' cooperatives) which, up to 1985, have jointly accounted for only 5% of the total cultivated land and 4% of the national crop production. The favouring of large-scale and capital-intensive state-owned farming enterprises with credit, subsidies, and fiscal incentives, while neglecting smallholders, has contributed to the stagnation of agricultural production in Ethiopia. Overall, the analysis indicates that there has been no significant development of agriculture in Ethiopia following the 1975 land reform.