Transforming competitiveness into economic benefits: Does tourism stimulate economic growth in more competitive destinations?

This research note investigates the impact of a destination's competitiveness upon tourism's contribution to economic growth using a cross-section with 131 countries. Destination competitiveness is measured with the World Economic Forum's Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index, while tourism's contribution to economic growth is measured with the growth decomposition methodology. Results reveal that destination competitiveness has no statistically significant impact on tourism's contribution to economic growth. Tourism policy implications and directions for future research are also discussed.     

Price competitiveness of tourism packages to Australia: Beyond the “Big Mac” index

One issue facing any country or region concerns its price competitiveness as a package tour destination. One method of measuring this is to use what in other contexts has been referred to as the Big Mac approach. The “Big Mac” is a simple product with ingredients in fixed proportions, whereas the tourism product is a very complex one comprising different components depending on tourist expenditure patterns. There is no equivalent tourism product offered across countries, as the nature of the product is tailored to the origin market, expenditure levels and the length of the trip involved. The key issue is that of how to standardize the products being compared, so as to determine their relative price competitiveness. A method of constructing price competitiveness indexes, developed by the authors, can be applied to develop measures of the price competitiveness of different tour packages. This paper has three aims: To set down the essence of the preferred approach to measuring price competitiveness, noting its advantages and limitations; to employ this approach to construct price competitiveness indexes for package tours to Australia from Japan and the USA; and to indicate areas for farther research into the price competitiveness of package tourism worldwide.     

新疆中小民营企业核心竞争力的构建与培育

中小型民营企业只有培育核心竞争力，才能在日趋激烈的竞争中取得优势。本文分析了新疆中小民营企业核心竞争力的现状，针对其存在的问题提出了培育中小民营企业核心竞争力的途径。     

Human resource management approaches in Spanish hotels: An introductory analysis

Although Spain is one of the most important tourism destinations in the world, Spanish tourism firms need to be more competitive in order to continue attracting citizens from other countries and human resource strategies can help. The present study aims to identify the specific human resource practices applied by hotels. The variables of interest are those related to human resource profile (number of employees, nationality and sex) and to human resource strategies (recruitment, hiring and training strategies). A survey of the hotel establishments in the Valencian Autonomous Region shows that a hard human resource approach prevails and that hotels apply the same human resource strategies regardless of their category or competitive strategy (universalistic approach).     

The influence of land-use change paradigm on Romania’s agro-food trade competitiveness—An overview

The current transformations of the Romanian agricultural sector have imposed new paradigms in using the land resources. The objective of this study is to assess Romanian agro-food products competitiveness on world market, in terms of land use changing paradigms. The research question is whether the land is cultivated with crops which are competitive on world market. For assessing agro-food competitiveness, Balassa index is calculated. The findings show relative performance for barley, maize, triticale, wheat, poultry meat, oilseeds, and tobacco. But the areas cultivated with barley and wheat decreased in the period under analysis, although these products have highest relative performance of exports. The paper also proposes structural changes of land use needed for encouraging those crops and products which have high revealed comparative advantages on world markets.     

提升中国企业所得税制竞争力的探讨

税制竞争力是指税制吸引经济资源和促进国内企业及产品参与国际竞争的能力。本文通过构造社会利益集团之间争夺税收优惠的委托代理模型,剖析了我国税制决策机制的缺陷,提出了以增强税制的立宪性、公平性、效率性为目标,通过统一税制、优化税收政策、强化税务管理的路径,提升中国企业所得税制竞争力的建议。     

The reference model of competitiveness factors for SME medical sector

The paper presents the issue of SME competitiveness in terms of determining their competitive position on the market. The proposed reference model, focused on the evaluation of the competitiveness of a selected group of SMEs on the market of medical services, was developed to support strategic decision-making. The usefulness of the model is verified in the process of determining the competitive position of a selected group of participants, applying research methods of strategic analysis. Relationships, observed during the study, occurring between the competitiveness factors and the competitive position taken by a company, provide knowledge, whose utilization directs the company's business to improving its market performance, organizational and economic conditions.     

日本的环境立国战略及其启示

2007年6月,日本内阁会议通过了《21世纪环境立国战略》。该战略进一步明确了通过发展环境、能源技术和改革社会经济系统以实现经济发展与环境保护的双赢,走经济社会可持续的发展道路,奠定了日本对内对外环境政策的基础。环境交流与合作是我们与环境先进的发达国家互利共赢的一个结合点。因此,我们应当充分利用国际环境合作的平台,积极引进环境先进国家的环保节能技术和经验,以推动我国资源节约型和环境友好型社会建设。     

城市竞争力研究综述

本文对城市竞争力的相关概念进行了辨析。这些概念主要有：比较优势、竞争优势、核心竞争力等。在梳理这些概念的同时对这些概念与城市竞争力的关系进行了分析，确定了本文研究的城市竞争力概念。     

劳动力成本提高条件下如何保持竞争力

近年来我国劳动力成本呈上升趋势,许多人担心我们在国际市场上的竞争优势将被削弱。文章认为,对此既要防止无所作为,又要避免反应过度。只要能够实现增长方式的转变,仍然可以获得动态比较优势的收益,寻找到新的经济增长源泉。应通过改善就业、再就业环境,挖掘劳动力供给的制度潜力,延缓劳动力成本上升趋势;避免对劳动力市场的过度干预;通过发展教育和培训,有效扩大人力资本存量,减少劳动力成本带来的冲击。