Supply chain finance for ameliorating and deteriorating products: a systematic literature review

Ameliorating and deteriorating products, or, more generally, items that change value over time, present a high sensitiveness to the surrounding environment (e.g., temperature, humidity, and light intensity). For this reason, they should be properly stored along the supply chain to guarantee the desired quality to the consumers. Specifically, ameliorating items face an increase in value if there are stored for longer periods, which can lead to higher selling price. At the same time, the costumers’ demand is sensitive to the price (i.e., the higher the selling price the lower the final demand), sensitiveness that is related to the quality of the products (i.e., lower sensitiveness for high-quality products). On the contrary, deteriorating items lose quality and value over time which result in revenue losses due to lost sales or reduced selling price. Since these products need to be properly stored (i.e., usually in temperature- and humidity-controlled warehouses) the holding costs, which comprise also the energy costs, may be particularly relevant impacting on the economic, environmental, and social sustainability of the supply chain. Furthermore, due to the recent economic crisis, companies (especially, small and medium enterprises) face payment difficulties of customers and high volatility of resources prices. This increases the risk of insolvency and on the other hand the financing needs. In this context, supply chain finance emerged as a mean for efficiency by coordinating the financial flow and providing a set of financial schemes aiming at optimizing accounts payable and receivable along the supply chain. The aim of the present study is thus to investigate through a systematic literature review the two main themes presented (i.e., inventory management models for products that change value over time, and financial techniques and strategies to support companies in inventory management) to understand if any financial technique has been studied for supporting the management of this class of products and to verify the existing literature gap

L'evoluzione del reddito dei cittadini milanesi (2000-2004) sulla base di archivi amministrativi

A livello regionale, una pubblicazione Eurostat (2008) attesta che nel quinquennio 2000-2004 si è avuta una diminuzione del reddito primario delle famiglie per la regione Lombardia pari al 9,2% rispetto alla media dei paesi EU E Milano? Purtroppo non esistono statistiche ufficiali a livello così dettagliato. Per questo motivo l’anagrafe tributaria rappresenta un patrimonio informativo che non può giacere inutilizzato: si tratta di 850.228 contribuenti nel 2000 e più di 856.000 contribuenti nel 2004. A questi si aggiungono circa 280.000 non dichiaranti, in calo nel 2004 di circa 12.000 unità (-4,3%). La copertura totale dell’archivio costituisce una grande ricchezza e assicura la robustezza statistica dei risultati evidenziati, che, pur risentendo dei fenomeni di elusione ed evasione che caratterizzano i dati fiscali, rispecchiano la realtà “dichiarata” dai milanesi. Va ricordato, in ogni caso, che anche le indagini sul reddito possono risentire dell’effetto di underreporting: difficilmente l’evasore dichiarerà i suoi reali guadagni all’intervistatore. La capillarità della banca dati e l’ampio ricorso allo studio complessivo della distribuzione del reddito ci hanno permesso di disaggregare i dati, incrociando età, genere, categoria di reddito, per considerare tutte le diverse sfaccettature del fenomeno. Cosa è rimasto nelle tasche dei milanesi? Come si evoluta la situazione delle donne, dei giovani e degli anziani? In questo lavoro si è cercato, tra l’altro, di dare una risposta a queste domande. Il principale obiettivo dello studio, evidenziare le potenzialità di questo archivio amministrativo, trova sostegno nei risultati, che incoraggiano il proseguimento di questo tipo di analisi poiché coerenti, in termini tendenziali, con quelli citati a livello nazionale

Updating CPI weights through compositional VAR forecasts: an application to the Italian index

Worldwide, monthly CPIs are mostly calculated as weighted averages of price relatives with fixed base weights. The main source of estimation of CPI weights are National Accounts, whose complexity in terms of data collection, estimation of aggregates and validation procedures leads to several months of delay in the release of the figures. This ends up in a non completely consistent Laspeyres formula since the weights do not refer to the same period as the base prices do, being older by one year and then corrected by the elapsed inflation. In this paper we propose to forecast CPI weights via a compositional VAR model, to obtain more updated weights and, consequently, a more updated measure of inflation through CPIs

Updating CPI weights through compositional VAR forecasts: an application to the Italian index

Worldwide, monthly CPIs are mostly calculated as weighted averages of price relatives with fixed base weights. The main source of estimation of CPI weights are National Accounts, whose complexity in terms of data collection, estimation of aggregates and validation procedures leads to several months of delay in the release of the figures. This ends up in a non completely consistent Laspeyres formula since the weights do not refer to the same period as the base prices do, being older by one year and then corrected by the elapsed inflation. In this paper we propose to forecast CPI weights via a compositional VAR model, to obtain more updated weights and, consequently, a more updated measure of inflation through CPIs

Simulazione dell'impatto di alcuni sistemi fiscali europei sui redditi delle famiglie milanesi

Il contributo indaga gli effetti dell'introduzione di sistemi fiscali alternativi sui redditi delle famiglie milanesi, basandosi su dati integrati da diverse fonti amministrative

Tax System Simulation Using Integrated Administrative Data

This paper presents the opportunities for measuring taxation effects by using combined administrative data from AMeRIcA Data Warehouse. Data combination provides demographic and income information on individuals and families resident in the Milanese area thereby permitting the evaluation of the impact of tax reforms on a specific taxpayer type as well as the simulation of the application of various tax systems

Servizi pubblici per l\u2019impiego e imprese: un\u2019analisi della relazione tra preselezione e job matching

L'articolo indaga gli effetti della promozione dei servizi pubblici per l'impiego, rivolta alle imprese, rispetto alle aspettative dei datori di lavoro nei confronti di un efficace servizio di mediazione tra domanda e offerta di lavoro

Energy efficiency measures for refrigeration systems in the cold chain

The refrigeration industry plays a major role in the global economy and has significant contributions in the energy and environmental domains which stakeholders need to better take into account. In particular, the electricity consumption for refrigeration and air conditioning increased over the last few years, reaching about 17% of the electricity worldwide used, and it is expected to further grow. In cold chains, an accurate refrigeration is required to ensure an optimal preservation of perishable goods and, in the food sector, it can be responsible for up to 85% of the total energy consumption, depending on the specific foodstuff considered. Refrigeration has relevant adverse effects on the environment. It is responsible of direct emissions due to leakage of fluorocarbons, and indirect emissions produced by fossil fuel power plants. Energy efficiency improvements of refrigeration systems represent a noteworthy solution for reducing the environmental impacts and can be obtained by investing in new and more efficient technologies, or by implementing simple and less expensive maintenance and operational practices. In addition to energy savings, and the consequent reduction of energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions, these measures have the potential to introduce multiple benefits, such as reduced operation and maintenance costs, and improved reliability and productivity. This work aims to investigate possible eco-efficient solutions related to the refrigeration systems and to briefly evaluate the related barriers and benefits. In particular, the study will be based on a holistic perspective on the life cycle of the perishable products which considers the whole cold chains including transport and storage activities