Whither the pin factory? Modern food supply chains and specialization in India

What is the relationship between smallholder participation in modern food supply chains and their degree of economic specialization? We investigate this research question by looking at whether there is a systematic relationship between whether a household grows crops for a supermarket chain—participation in the supermarket channel—and how concentrated among fewer crops are that household's total landholdings and its output. Using longitudinal data from India, we find that there is no relationship between whether a household participates in the supermarket channel and that household's Herfindahl–Hirschman index for land, but there is a robust statistically significant and negative relationship between whether a household participates in the supermarket channel and that household's Herfindahl–Hirschman index for output. These findings hold true at both the extensive margin (i.e., when considering whether a household participates in the supermarket channel) and the intensive margin (i.e., when considering how much of a household's marketed output is sold through the supermarket chain). This suggests that instead of fostering a greater degree of specialization, participation in modern food supply chains might lead to greater diversification.     

制造业投入服务化对碳生产率影响的理论建模和实证检验——以珠三角为例

制造业投入服务化有利于制造业提高劳动生产率,且具有生态效益。在短期内,制造业服务化的发展会引起碳生产率的降低;但随着制造业服务化发展到一定程度,服务化对碳生产率的负向影响转为正,促进制造业碳生产率的提高。碳生产率与制造业服务化之间存在非线性关系且呈U型。     

预约定价与税收公平原则关系之探究

预约定价作为调整跨国公司转移定价的新制度体现了税收效率原则,但这一制度是否同样体现了税收公平原则值得认真研究。本文通过对预约定价与税收公平原则相互关系的剖析,重点考察了预约定价影响税收公平原则的若干因素,并结合我国预约定价的实践,得出了相应的结论。     

The motives and performance of cross-border acquirers from emerging economies: Comparison between Chinese and Indian firms

During the recent decade, the world has witnessed the rapid growth of MNEs from emerging economies. Their increasing participation in cross-border mergers and acquisitions has raised great attention in the extant literature. This study evaluates the value creation from these cross-border transactions from two representative emerging countries, namely China and India, and determines factors that result in the different performance of these international acquisition activities. Cross-border acquisitions conducted by these countries’ companies indeed lead to significant shareholder wealth creation. Furthermore, Indian shareholders are more likely to benefit from deals in small cultural distance countries, while Chinese investors gain from the cross-border expansion of manufacturing companies. Location also affects the performance of cross-border acquisitions, with acquisitions into developed countries generating higher returns to shareholders. Our sample consists of 203 Indian and 63 Chinese cross-border deals over the period 2000–2010 and our results hold after controlling for various deal-level and firm-level characteristics.     

Private Label Vendor Selection in a Supply Chain: Quality and Clientele Effects

We model a supply chain consisting of a national brand manufacturer and an independent manufacturer, both of whom are potential suppliers of store brand to a single retailer. The retailer serves two customer segments—a quality sensitive segment (high type) and a price sensitive (low type) segment. The retailer serves these two segments by targeting the national and store brands to the quality and price sensitive segments, respectively. When the national brand manufacturer supplies the store brand he internalizes the effect of store brand quality on the national brand's retail prices. This leads the national brand manufacturer to choose a lower store brand quality than the independent manufacturer. This decrease in store brand quality has the benefit of increased revenues from the high type customers along with an associated cost of decreased revenues from the low type customers. Thus, when the benefit outweighs the cost the retailer chooses the national brand manufacturer to supply the store brand. We show that the retailer will choose the national brand manufacturer to supply the store brand when (a) the size of the high type customer segment is large relative to the low type customer segment, (b) the valuations of the high type customer segment is large relative to the low type customer segment, and (c) the retailer's margin requirement on the store brand is not very high. Overall, these results suggest that retailers who serve a bigger sized quality (price) sensitive clientele would have the national brand (independent) manufacturer supply the store brand.     

高校考试管理模式改革探索

高等学校的考试是检验高校教学效果和人才培养质量的一个重要手段,高校考试管理工作是高校教务管理的一项重要内容.受到传统考试观念和考试管理模式一些弊端的影响,考试不能完全发挥其效能,阻碍了高校人才培养质量的提高.因此,要加强高校考试管理工作的力度,完善考试的管理措施,积极探索管理的新途径、新方法,以促进高校良好学风的形成,提高我国高等学校教育质量,促进高等教育的发展.     

西部地区政府对中小企业技术创新的投入——从博弈角度分析

本文从西部地区的现实情况出发,以博弈分析的方法讨论了政府与中小企业之间技术创新投入在完全信息与不完全信息条件下双方的行为,从一个特定的角度证明了西部地区政府建立中小企业技术创新投入制度安排的合理性。     

Development and validation of a measurement instrument for studying supply chain management practices

It is widely argued that competition is no longer between organizations, but among supply chains. Effective supply chain management (SCM) has become a potentially valuable way of securing competitive advantage and improving organizational performance. This research conceptualizes, develops, and validates six dimensions of SCM practices (strategic supplier partnership, customer relationship, information sharing, information quality, internal lean practices, and postponement). Data for the study were collected from 196 organizations and the measurement scales were tested and validated using structural equation modeling. It is hoped that this study will provide a parsimonious measurement instrument to assess the performance of the overall supply chain.     

Daviken Studnicki-Gizbert. A Nation upon the Ocean Sea: Portugal's Atlantic Diaspora and the Crisis of the Spanish Empire, 1492-1640

Studnicki-Gizbert, in this book, attempts to trace the historyof Portuguese Diaspora and the crisis that emanated in the Spanishempire. The book covers the period 1492–1640. The endof the fifteenth century is an important period in the historyof Portugal and Spain. It was in this century that the Portugueseand Spanish sailors had successfully found the trade routesthat revolutionized European trade and commerce, resulting     

Ethics Gap: Comparing Marketers with Consumers on Important Determinants of Ethical Decision-Making

Studies in marketing ethics often revealed that ethical gaps do exist between marketers and other groups in society. The existence of these ethical gaps could be extremely counterproductive for marketing management. In order to effectively narrow these gaps, a marketing manager must first have a better understanding of causes of these gaps. To this end, this study compares marketing professionals with consumers on some important determinants of the ethical decision-making process. In particular, the marketers and consumers were compared with respect to their personal moral philosophies and ethical perceptions in marketing situations. The data were obtained from a national survey of the practitioner members of the American Marketing Association and members of a consumer panel of a major southern university in the United States. The results generally indicate that marketing professionals are different from consumers with respect to some of the determinants of ethical decisions investigated. Some important managerial implications based on these findings were discussed.