Emergent behavior of soil fungal dynamics:influence of soil architecture and water distribution

Macroscopic measurements and observations in two-dimensional soil-thin sections indicate that fungal hyphae invade preferentially the larger, air-filled pores in soils. This suggests that the architecture of soils and the microscale distribution of water are likely to influence significantly the dynamics of fungal growth. Unfortunately, techniques are lacking at present to verify this hypothesis experimentally, and as a result, factors that control fungal growth in soils remain poorly understood. Nevertheless, to design appropriate experiments later on, it is useful to indirectly obtain estimates of the effects involved. Such estimates can be obtained via simulation, based on detailed micron-scale X-ray computed tomography information about the soil pore geometry. In this context, this article reports on a series of simulations resulting from the combination of an individual-based fungal growth model, describing in detail the physiological processes involved in fungal growth, and of a Lattice Boltzmann model used to predict the distribution of air-liquid interfaces in soils. Three soil samples with contrasting properties were used as test cases. Several quantitative parameters, including Minkowski functionals, were used to characterize the geometry of pores, air-water interfaces, and fungal hyphae. Simulation results show that the water distribution in the soils is affected more by the pore size distribution than by the porosity of the soils. The presence of water decreased the colonization efficiency of the fungi, as evinced by a decline in the magnitude of all fungal biomass functional measures, in all three samples. The architecture of the soils and water distribution had an effect on the general morphology of the hyphal network, with a "looped" configuration in one soil, due to growing around water droplets. These morphologic differences are satisfactorily discriminated by the Minkowski functionals, applied to the fungal biomass

WTO accession, the changing competitiveness of foreign-financed firms and regional development in Guangdong of southern China

This paper investigates the changing competitiveness of foreign-financed manufacturing firms and its implications for regional development in Guangdong province of southern China in the run-up to World Trade Organization (WTO) accession. It is argued that transnational corporations (TNCs) and some competitive, large-scale, locally-funded firms in Guangdong will triumph after WTO accession. The crowding-out process of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in Guangdong will be accelerated in the near future, as they are competing directly with TNCs, and as their competitive advantages are diminishing, due to bureaucratic red tape and the rigorous enforcement of new government policies. Due to close business linkages with local privately-funded firms, the competitiveness and vitality of foreign-financed enterprises will have profound long term effects on the economic development of Guangdong, before and after WTO accession

Large firms and catch-up in a transitional economy: the case of Shougang Group in China

This study examines the possibility of catch-up of the Chinese steel industry, in particular the Shougang Group, with the leading global steel giants. Shougang is one of the four steel companies that have been selected by the Chinese government to constitute the core of the future Chinese steel industry. The contract system at Shougang, which operated from 1979 to 1995, unleashed an extraordinary entrepreneurial energy in the formerly traditional state-run steel plant. In the post-contract system, Shougang's range of decision-making independence in respect to the purchase of inputs, its production structure and product marketing has increased substantially compared to the contract system, when the government still controlled many of the key decisions. As a result of institutional constraint, the low value-added steel products dominate Shougang's portfolio. To challenge the established giants in the steel industry, Shougang has to divest the loss-making non-core businesses, slowly downsize employment in the core business, raise capital on the stock market and generates the resources for continued upgrading of its steel technology and diversifying its product portfolio

Monetary and Fiscal Interactions without Commitment and the Value of Monetary Conservatism

We study monetary and fiscal policy games in a dynamic sticky priceeconomy where monetary policy sets nominal interest rates and fiscal policy provides public goods financed with distortionary labor taxes. We compare the Ramsey outcome to non-cooperative policy regimes where one or both policymakers lack commitment power. Absence of fiscal commitment gives rise to a public spending bias, while lack of monetary commitment generates the well-known inflation bias. An appropriately conservative monetary authority can eliminate the steady state distortions generated by lack of monetary commitment and may even eliminate the distortions generated by lack of fiscal commitment. The costs associated with the central bank being overly conservative seem small, but insufficient conservatism may result in sizable welfare lossesoptimal monetary and fiscal policy, lack of commitment, sequential policy, discretionary policy

International Listing as a Means to Mobilize the Benefits of Financial Globalization: Micro-Level Evidence from China

This paper proposes a micro-level framework to account for how firms in developing economies overcome domestic institutional constraints. It illustrates that the mechanisms enabling those firms to benefit from financial globalization are more complex than the “direct” financial channels outlined in the neo-classical approach. China provides an important example in this context, as its capital market liberalization has been limited and neither the legal nor financial system is well developed. Yet micro-level evidence from China’s internationally listed enterprises indicates that innovative firms can overcome institutional thresholds, secure access to international capital, and benefit and learn from international capital markets. This can in turn induce market-level improvements through regulatory competition and demands for a more standardized system of economic regulation

Localists and “Locusts” in Hong Kong: Creating a Yellow-Red Peril Discourse

Hong Kong’s “localists” depict mainlanders as locusts ruining the territory and bringing an end to a vaunted way of life. In this article, we first discuss anti-mainlander prejudice in Hong Kong and its resemblance to earlier biases by Shanghai people against Chinese from neighboring provinces. We then empirically test claims localists make about the mainlander presence in Hong Kong and show that mainland visitors and migrants are not working the harms attributed to them. There follows a review of “insect language” as integral to racial vilification in several settings, with Hong Kong’s anti-locust movement a recent example. We go on to elaborate on the vilifiers themselves and on the Hong Kong government’s obligations, under international and local law, to punish them. Hong Kong nativism, we contend, is significant beyond the SAR and its relations with the rest of China. Nativist “anti-locust” agitation exemplifies the global advancement of ethnic antagonism as a putative solution to problems that are actually rooted in gross and increasing inequality, not ethnicity per se. Vilification of ethnic groups and these underlying problems must be addressed politically and legally and, while the Hong Kong case is both structurally similar to others and highly specific, what is done in the SAR will have wider implications

The Politics of the Debate over the Court of Final Appeal in Hong Kong

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