The small scale high value manufacturer in New Zealand : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Geography at Massey University

The interest in the development and restructuring of the New Zealand economy with increasing emphasis upon industrial development has seen the emergence of what has been termed the 'Small Scale High Value' concept. The dichotomy of firms which are small scale and producing high unit value products would seem appropriate to the New Zealand economy which is characterised by smallness. Two major considerations are involved. First there is the conceptual problem of small scale firms. This necessitates the evaluation of the small scale concept and the recognition of the main characteristics and advantages of small scale operations. This evaluation builds a conceptual framework within which small scale firms in New Zealand can be assessed and their contribution and potential contribution to the New Zealand economy placed in perspective. This raises the second major focus, that of an empirical study identifying and examining small scale firms within the New Zealand context. The need is to ascertain the contribution of the Small Scale High Value firms to the New Zealand economy and the extent to which government or industrial policy should be directed to their assistance. A number of authors have promoted Small Scale High Value firms as worthy of special attention due to their characteristics and advantages being suitable to the structural development and growth of the national economy. These special features or characteristics associated with Small Scale High Value firms include: flexibility and versatility, good labour relations, export orientation, technology orientation, inventiveness and innovation as well as being footloose. The combination of these 'special' qualities is seen to provide the small scale firms with comparative advantages. Discussion centres upon establishing the validity or otherwise of these qualities. Small Scale firms have also been applied to an urban hierarchy framework focusing on their spatial location within New Zealand and the implication these hold for Industrial and Regional development policy

Energy release in the solar atmosphere from a stream of infalling prominence debris

Recent high-resolution and high-cadence EUV imaging has revealed a new phenomenon, impacting prominence debris, where prominence material from failed or partial eruptions can impact the lower atmosphere, releasing energy. We report a clear example of energy release and EUV brightening due to infalling prominence debris that occurred on 2011 September 7-8. The initial eruption of material was associated with an X1.8-class flare from AR11283, occurring at 22:30 UT on 2011 September 7. Subsequently, a semi-continuous stream of this material returned to the solar surface with a velocity v > 150 km/s, impacting a region remote from the original active region between 00:20 - 00:40 UT on 2011 September 8. Using SDO/AIA, the differential emission measure of the plasma was estimated throughout this brightening event. We found that the radiated energy of the impacted plasma was L_rad ~10^27 ergs, while the thermal energy peaked at ~10^28 ergs. From this we were able to determine the mass content of the debris to be in the range 2x10^14 < m < 2x10^15 g. Given typical promimence masses, the likely debris mass is towards the lower end of this range. This clear example of a prominence debris event shows that significant energy release takes place during these events, and that such impacts may be used as a novel diagnostic tool for investigating prominence material properties.Comment: Accepted by AstroPhysical Journal Letters, 6 pages, 5 figure

Using Simulation-based Inference with Panel Data in Health Economics

Panel datasets provide a rich source of information for health economists, offering the scope to control for individual heterogeneity and to model the dynamics of individual behaviour. However the qualitative or categorical measures of outcome often used in health economics create special problems for estimating econometric models. Allowing a flexible specification of the autocorrelation induced by individual heterogeneity leads to models involving higher order integrals that cannot be handled by conventional numerical methods. The dramatic growth in computing power over recent years has been accompanied by the development of simulation-based estimators that solve this problem. This review uses binary choice models to show what can be done with conventional methods and how the range of models can be expanded by using simulation methods. Practical applications of the methods are illustrated using data on health from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS).

Using Simulation-Based Inference with Panel Data in Health Economics

Panel datasets provide a rich source of information for health economists, offering the scope to control for individual heterogeneity and to model the dynamics of individual behaviour. However the qualitative or categorical measures of outcome often used in health economics create special problems for estimating econometric models. Allowing a flexible specification of individual heterogeneity leads to models involving higher order integrals that cannot be handled by conventional numerical methods. The dramatic growth in computing power over recent years has been accompanied by the development of simulation estimators that solve this problem. This review uses binary choice models to show what can be done with conventional methods and how the range of models can be expanded by using simulation methods. Practical applications of the methods are illustrated using on health from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS)Econometrics, panel data, simulation methods, determinants of health