The formulation of public policy framework : encouraging effective collaboration within the electric bus research and manufacturing cluster to accelerate the adoption of electric buses in Thailand

The automotive industry is considered one of the largest sources of revenue for Thailand. However, with the recent acceleration of electric vehicle’s technological development around the world, the Thai government was concerned that the domestic automotive sector might be at risk of losing its competitive edge since the whole supply chain in the automotive industry is centred around products based on the research and manufacturing of internal combustion engine vehicles. Therefore, the Electric Vehicles Committee of Thailand was formed by the government to support and promote the transition of the automotive industry towards an electric vehicles economy. However, the complexity and sheer size of the Thai automotive industry; both in terms of the supply chain of physical products and the amount of information being exchanged among public and private stakeholders have made the adoption process of public policies extremely strenuous. This research aims to facilitate and quicken the process by designing a policy framework for the adoption of public policies within a smaller segment of the electric bus industry and use it as a possible model for the development of the Thai electric vehicles industry in the future. This framework consisted of integrated tools and concepts from engineering management perspective, combined with the data which was collected from the researchers, manufacturers, and stakeholders in Thailand. The main objective of the framework is to assist the initial stage of public policies initiation in electric bus research, manufacturing, and requisition, which will ultimately cultivate the development of the electric bus manufacturing industry in Thailand. Moreover, this policy framework could also be applied to other segments of public policy, or even in the formulation of operational strategy in both public and private organisations.The automotive industry is considered one of the largest sources of revenue for Thailand. However, with the recent acceleration of electric vehicle’s technological development around the world, the Thai government was concerned that the domestic automotive sector might be at risk of losing its competitive edge since the whole supply chain in the automotive industry is centred around products based on the research and manufacturing of internal combustion engine vehicles. Therefore, the Electric Vehicles Committee of Thailand was formed by the government to support and promote the transition of the automotive industry towards an electric vehicles economy. However, the complexity and sheer size of the Thai automotive industry; both in terms of the supply chain of physical products and the amount of information being exchanged among public and private stakeholders have made the adoption process of public policies extremely strenuous. This research aims to facilitate and quicken the process by designing a policy framework for the adoption of public policies within a smaller segment of the electric bus industry and use it as a possible model for the development of the Thai electric vehicles industry in the future. This framework consisted of integrated tools and concepts from engineering management perspective, combined with the data which was collected from the researchers, manufacturers, and stakeholders in Thailand. The main objective of the framework is to assist the initial stage of public policies initiation in electric bus research, manufacturing, and requisition, which will ultimately cultivate the development of the electric bus manufacturing industry in Thailand. Moreover, this policy framework could also be applied to other segments of public policy, or even in the formulation of operational strategy in both public and private organisations

Basel III: Implications of Capital and Liquidity Regulations on Financial Stability during Economic Depression.

The dynamic global financial system has made it necessary to implement adequate regulatory measures that can effectively guarantee financial stability at the national and international levels. This thesis consists of three self-contained analytical chapters that focus on the effectiveness of evolving financial regulations in addressing systemic risk within the financial system. Despite numerous regulatory reforms introduced following the 2008 GFC, they are still concerns over the role of these regulations in mitigating complex issues related to systemic risk. The first study focuses on international and national regulatory frameworks in the context of conventional, hybrid, and Islamic banking. It analyses the guidance provided by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) and the Islamic Financial Services Board (IFSB) and examines the differences in the treatment of credit, liquidity, and systemic risk across four countries. The IFSB converts BCBS guidance to ensure compliance with Sharia principles for Islamic banks. Further insights show variations in liquidity and capital requirements imposed on banks in different countries, highlighting the need for countryspecific regulations to address the unique risks. The second study uses data from emerging market economies to investigate the relationship between capital and liquidity regulations under Basel III and their impact on default risk and systemic risk. The study addresses whether the new liquidity and capital requirements, such as the net stable funding ratio and higher capital adequacy ratio, contribute to alleviating the default risk and systemic risk in emerging market economies. The third study focuses on the relationship between credit and liquidity risks and their impact on bank default risk. It also addresses the effect of bank liquidity creation on systemic risk across different types of banks. The findings suggest that while credit and liquidity risks are positively related, no significant relationship exists. The impact of credit and liquidity risks on bank default risk is significant for conventional and hybrid banks, while bank size and capital adequacy ratio play a greater role in the stability of Islamic banks. The joint interaction between credit and liquidity risk negatively influences banking stability. The key findings demonstrate that Basel III's liquidity requirements, such as the Net Stable Funding Ratio (NSFR), play an important role in forecasting banks' default probability and mitigating systemic risk. The insights gathered emphasise the importance of incorporating new mitigating measures, including NSFR, leveraging requirements, countercyclical buffers, and globally systemically important institution surcharges to promote financial stability. Additionally, it demonstrates the relevance of liquidity creation in determining bank stability and its implications for systemic risk. This study offers substantial contributions to the growing body of literature by highlighting the differences in regulatory frameworks, the importance of this approach in developing bank risk profiles, and how they are adequately addressed. The study also contributes to understanding how financial stability can be enhanced while reducing systemic liquidity risk. The study shows that banks, regulators, and policymakers must collaborate adequately across all levels to align risk management and improve regulations and guidelines. This includes sharing information and fostering coordination at the international level

Is South Africa worthy of it's Bric in Brics?

'BRIC' is an acronym created by Jim O’Neil to describe some of the world’s leading emergingeconomies, namely Brazil, Russia, India, and China. During 2010, the members of the group included South Africa and 'BRIC' was renamed 'BRICS'. The primary objective of this study was to investigate whether South Africa should be included in BRICS, taking into account that the country represents the whole of Africa. Data was collected by means of self- administered questionnaires and face-to-face semi-structured interviews. The results suggest that South Africa should be included in BRICS as it is depicted as the regional leader and gateway to the continent. This is demonstrated by its global economic prominence especially through multilateral organisations such as SADC, AU, and it is the only African country in the G20. It is recommended that South Africa should work together with other African countries and encourage their inclusion in achieving common economic goals.Business ManagementM. Com. (Business Management

Risk Management in Environment, Production and Economy

The term "risk" is very often associated with negative meanings. However, in most cases, many opportunities can present themselves to deal with the events and to develop new solutions which can convert a possible danger to an unforeseen, positive event. This book is a structured collection of papers dealing with the subject and stressing the importance of a relevant issue such as risk management. The aim is to present the problem in various fields of application of risk management theories, highlighting the approaches which can be found in literature

Complexity in Economic and Social Systems

There is no term that better describes the essential features of human society than complexity. On various levels, from the decision-making processes of individuals, through to the interactions between individuals leading to the spontaneous formation of groups and social hierarchies, up to the collective, herding processes that reshape whole societies, all these features share the property of irreducibility, i.e., they require a holistic, multi-level approach formed by researchers from different disciplines. This Special Issue aims to collect research studies that, by exploiting the latest advances in physics, economics, complex networks, and data science, make a step towards understanding these economic and social systems. The majority of submissions are devoted to financial market analysis and modeling, including the stock and cryptocurrency markets in the COVID-19 pandemic, systemic risk quantification and control, wealth condensation, the innovation-related performance of companies, and more. Looking more at societies, there are papers that deal with regional development, land speculation, and the-fake news-fighting strategies, the issues which are of central interest in contemporary society. On top of this, one of the contributions proposes a new, improved complexity measure

Development of a risk reduction model for after-sales service on Chinese agricultural machinery in South Africa

Thesis (PhD (Project Management))--University of Pretoria, 2021.There is a plentiful of arable land in Africa and South Africa. Africa remains the region all over the world with the lowest power usage and the lowest level of agricultural mechanization (Daum and Birner 2019; Makini et al. 2020). As the development of cross-border e-commerce and economy progress, more and more Chinese farm equipment has been sold in Africa and South Africa. As of now, one of the most significant problems that trap the farmers and users in Africa and South Africa is after-sales service. However, many researchers focus on agricultural mechanization in Sub-Sahara Africa (Mrema, Kienzle, and Mpagalile 2018; Makini et al. 2020). Few academics are concentrating on the risk reduction of after-sales service of agricultural machinery in Africa and South Africa, which is largely beneficial to the sustainable agri-machinery enterprise as well as agricultural economic growth. This research aims to meet this gap mentioned above. This research aims to develop a risk reduction model of after-sales service on Chinese agricultural machinery in South Africa. The information on arable land and agricultural mechanization in Africa and South Africa will be shown in the literature review. The development process of Chinese farm machinery, the status quo of export on the farm machine as well as Chinese agricultural equipment in Africa and South Africa will be addressed in the literature review. Furthermore, the detailed knowledge of the after-sales service of agricultural machinery and risk management will also be elaborated in this part. This study's research methodology is an explanatory research method and design in which quantitative data will be collected and analyzed first, followed by qualitative data collection and analysis. The research population in this study includes staff, workers, directors, managers, CEOs as well as presidents who work at agricultural machinery enterprises. The government officials, staff, fellows, directors who research agricultural machinery and provide the service, information and knowledge for agri-machinery users have also been involved in this study. Meanwhile, the research population consists of academics, including professors, doctors and researchers whose study is about after-sales service of agricultural machinery or the relevant. On the other hand, the small-holder farmers or users who make use of farm machinery in both South Africa and China as well as other relevant people who know the after-sales service of agricultural machinery are also in the probe of the study population. Seven hundred thirty-nine closed-end questionnaires have been collected in Shandong province and Henan province in China. Due to the Covid-19, we cannot gather the questionnaires in South Africa. Furthermore, focus-group interviews have been conducted in South Africa and China. The principal axis factoring (PAF) with Promax rotation is employed to analyze the factors that influence the research's agricultural machinery's risk reduction. Bartlett's Test of Sphericity was highly significant at a p-value of 0.05, implying that the data is suitable for the factor analysis. Furthermore, the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy (KMO) was 0.903 and was more significant than 0.500, implying that the sample was adequate for the factor analysis. The result shows that experts (0.879), spare parts (0.841), and timely repair (0.823) are revealed to be the top three high loading factors that impact the risk reduction of agricultural machinery. A multiple regression analysis (MRA) is utilized to analyze the data collected from the structured questionnaires. Evidence from this study suggests that combining these financial resource factors have a large effect (F2 = 0.802) on the after-sales service of farm equipment. An analysis of the data using the structural equation modeling (SEM) procedure shows relative contributions of a better understanding of risk reduction for after-sale services on agricultural machinery. From the standardized estimates, the study reveals that all the hypotheses have been supported. Finally, the risk reduction model of the after-sales service has been certified by means of the method employed mentioned above. Furthermore, the thematic content analysis is employed to analyze the data from the focus-group interviews conducted both in South Africa and China. In conclusion, the findings obtained from the questionnaires and focus-group interviews do indeed meet the research questions and validate the objectives largely. The risk reduction of agricultural machinery can facilitate sustainable agri-machinery enterprises that can enhance and improve the agricultural economic growth. Finally, this research provides an empirical contribution to the socio-economic sphere and literature via which it can benefit the South African and Chinese agricultural economy and policy-making sector.Graduate School of Technology Management (GSTM)PhD (Project Management)Unrestricte

GIS applications for poverty targeted aquaculture development in the lower Mekong Basin.

In the lower Mekong Basin, marginal socio-economic conditions prevail amongst rural small scale farming households which heavily depend on highly seasonal, rain-fed farming systems for their livelihood. Persistent rural poverty is aggravated by frequently occurring droughts and floods. A yearly flood-drought cycle, while essential to their household economy based on rice and fisheries, renders rural poor livelihoods vulnerable to recurrent periods of food insecurity. This research demonstrates how a combination of publicly accessible Remote Sensing imagery and disaggregated poverty maps, within a comprehensive rural development framework, can provide an effective method to target pro-poor aquaculture development interventions at the local level. An agro-ecosystems analysis is performed in order to capture the seasonal dynamics of water- and aquatic resource exploitation. A holistic farming systems approach emphasises the potential of ponds in integrated rural smallholder systems to reduce poverty and vulnerability under rain fed conditions. A Geographic Information System (GIS), an efficient spatial inventory tool and decision support system in resolving real world problems, is used to identify where rural poor households can potentially benefit from the integration of aquaculture into existing production systems. A time series of satellite derived vegetation index data reveals distinct agro-ecosystem seasonality over large parts of the study area, which is indicative for farming systems under rain fed conditions. The developed methodology is capable of identifying functionally different agro-ecosystems. Socio-economic indicators for Cambodian parts of the lowland areas point to widespread rural poverty and vulnerability to recurrent food insecurity, which is directly related to agro-ecosystems seasonality and annual climate variability. Dependence of farming households on low productivity rain fed rice agro-ecosystems in Cambodia’s southern provinces is in stark contrast to the highly productive farming systems directly bordering it, in the freshwater fluvial zone of the Vietnamese Mekong Delta. A rapid increase in rice productivity in this densely populated area went hand-in hand with a considerable reduction in rural poverty. In this flood-prone but fertile area, resource competition and falling market prices of rice may have prompted the development of a range of integrated farming systems. The incorporation of ponds on farm in these systems facilitates reuse of nutrients from farm by-products for low-input aquatic resource production. In Northeast Thailand, crop production and low-input aquaculture have been successfully integrated along a tradition of water- and living aquatic resources management in farmer managed systems under resource poor conditions. A spatially linked commune level rural development database for Sisaket province in Northeast Thailand provides a useful framework for planning of aquaculture development through systems that are appropriate and relevant to local socio-economic and agro-ecological conditions. It was concluded that the socio-economic and agro-ecological context of rural poverty in Southeast Cambodia offers scope for similar pathways to improve rural wellbeing and reduce vulnerability to poverty and food insecurity by integrating aquatic resources development in pond based systems as part of an interdisciplinary approach towards rural development

The Transition to CSRD and ESRS

Abstract Purpose: This paper examines Norwegian companies’ perceptions of the transition to widespread mandatory sustainability reporting (CSRD) and related frameworks (ESRS) initiated by the EU. Their perceptions are investigated by elucidating the effect it will have on companies’ practices, while covering possible areas of resistance. Method: The paper is based on a cross-sectional interview study with 13 Norwegian companies, which are all defined as large undertakings according to Directive 2013/34/EU. The analysis follows an inductive approach and is conducted utilizing a thematic analysis. Findings: The CSRD and ESRS are considered comprehensive, but necessary to improve sustainability performance of affected companies. Norwegian companies describe a need for resources and competencies within sustainability reporting, more evident in smaller-sized companies. Respondents claimed, inter alia, that streamlining of processes would ensure compliance and optimal prioritization. The transition was regarded as feasible, given that resources, competencies, and systems facilitate it. Research limitations/implications: This study’s findings extend prior research on mandatory sustainability reporting, by examining sustainability reporting practices in light of this widespread mandate. In terms of limitations, varying knowledge among interviewees placed a heavier burden of interpretation on the interviewers. Value: This study contributes to the ongoing discussion of widespread mandatory sustainability reporting. In addition, we believe that our findings will provide useful insights that can aid in improving the quality of sustainability reports

A informação dada nos relatórios financeiros dos analistas portugueses

Mestrado em GestãoThis paper studies the importance of Portuguese financial sell-side analysts’ reports by testing reliability in firms’ Price Target calculation and information aptitude (deliver ability) in the content of sell-side analysts’ reports. The importance of sell-side analysts reports has long been studied, mainly in two different perspectives: the consequences of their work (market price reactions, trading strategies based in analysts’ recommendations) and the externalizations that influence their work (herding and bias behaviors). We believe that before either perspective can explain their value, analysts through their reports should be able to deliver the information users need and offer coherent calculation that justifies the Price Targets. We explore and encode the complete content of 73 reports from PSI20 listed companies, and apply consistency and reliability procedures to test them. Informativeness is tested against an ideal report (built mainly from the Jenkins Report conclusions). To test reliability in the Prices Targets calculations we investigate if the method and the parameters of the evaluation are clearly disclosed and if the calculative procedure is according to the theoretical conventions.O presente trabalho propõe-se avaliar a importância dos analistas financeiros Portugueses testando para isso a fiabilidade no cálculo dos Price Targets e a capacidade informativa dos relatórios que produzem. A utilidade dos analistas financeiros tem sido há muito estudada, por norma através de duas perspectivas: avaliando as consequências do seu trabalho (reacção dos mercados às suas recomendações e estratégias de investimento baseadas nessas mesmas recomendações) e por outro lado considerando as variáveis exógenas que influenciam o seu trabalho (comportamentos tendenciosos e de “arrebanhamento”). Acreditamos que antes de avaliar a pertinência destas perspectivas, importa averiguar se através dos relatórios que produzem os analistas financeiros fornecem a informação que os seus utilizadores necessitam. Para isso examinamos e codificamos 73 relatórios financeiros de empresas que integram o PSI20, testando-os em termos de informatividade e fiabilidade. A capacidade informativa é testada em confronto com um relatório ideal (baseado nas conclusões do Relatório Jenkins). Para testar a confiabilidade no cálculo dos Price Targets investigamos se o método e os parâmetros utilizados são expressos com clareza e se o processo de cálculo está em conformidade com aquilo que são os princípios teóricos aceites