The finances of the communities and regions

Throughout the successive phases of the Belgian state reform, powers were increasingly devolved from federal level to the communities and regions. The present article deals with the revenues and expenditure of the communities and regions. The article also contains an analysis of the changes in the financing balance and debt level. Finally, the results of the projections regarding the movement in community and regional finances are also highlighted. The analysis concerns both the communities and regions as a whole, and the individual federated entities. In order to eliminate the influence of institutional differences and compare more uniform entities, a distinction is also made between the north and south of the country. The past decade has seen a systematic improvement in the financing balance of the communities and regions. The explanation for this improving trend lies in the fact that the real rate of growth in their primary expenditure was lower than the growth of their revenues. Revenues in fact increased sharply. During the so-called transitional period which ended in 1999, the special mechanisms provided under the Finance Act indeed contributed towards a very steep increase in the funds allocated in respect of personal income tax. As regards the part of personal income tax allocated to the communities and regions, the gradual switch to an allocation formula based on the proceeds of the personal income tax collected in each entity caused the Finance Act funding to rise faster in the north than in the south. Since revenues have grown faster than expenditure over the past ten years in each entity – with expenditure rising by more in the north than in the south of the country – all the communities and regions succeeded in achieving an improvement in their financing balance. In order to achieve the target of a balanced budget in 2010, set by the High Council of Finance, the increase in expenditure for the communities and regions as a whole must not outpace GDP growth. The permissible expenditure growth will probably not be the same for each individual entity. In the north, expenditure can increase by slightly more than in the south, partly because the north has scope for gradually reducing its surplus, while in the south the deficits – albeit small – need to be eliminated.public finance, fiscal devolution, Belgian administrative reform, Finance Act, communities and regions

Structure of public revenues

Leaving aside issues concerning the optimum size of the public sector and the optimum scale of public revenues, an important issue is to determine which is the public revenue structure that is the most favorable to growth. It is important to distribute the burden of fiscal and parafiscal levies as evenly as possible over the various tax bases, to minimise the disincentive to activate the available factors of production, and to coordinate or harmonise the tax system at international level to ensure that, for certain forms of taxation such as the tax on savings, the desirable level of taxation cannot be prejudiced by the risk of relocation. In Belgium, the burden of fiscal and parafiscal levies is relatively concentrated on labour, since – on the basis of the national accounts – the burden on that factor was over 6.8 percentage points higher than the EU average in 2001, while the rates of tax on consumption, corporate profits and capital were much closer to the European average. The difference between Belgium and the EU in terms of the marginal rates of fiscal and parafiscal levies on labour is actually considerably greater than the difference in the average tax burden recorded on the basis of the annual accounts. Part of the reason could be that the scale of tax expenditure is more favourable to taxpayers in Belgium is higher than elsewhere. Since the level of the marginal rates probably plays a key role in economic growth, it is questionable whether this is the ideal structure for the taxation of labour incomes. In 2001, the implicit rate of VAT was 1.4 percentage points above the EU average. Conversely, the implicit rate of the other consumption taxes is below the average. That is due to the level of those taxes on tobacco, alcohol, the purchase of private motor vehicles and mineral oils, particularly heating oil. In Belgium, the reductions in personal income tax and social security contributions already implemented or scheduled have reduced the levies on labour incomes in recent years, and that reduction will continue in the future. Conversely, certain indirect taxes have increased and further rises are planned for the years ahead. Following the entry into force of these measures, the burden of fiscal and parafiscal levies will diminish, and shift slightly towards consumption, correcting to some extent the heavy concentration of this burden on labour. This will bring the structure of taxation closer to that of the EU. Since it was cut in 2003, the nominal rate of tax on corporate profits has been slightly below the EU average in Belgium. The scale of tax expenditure for ordinary companies seems comparable to that observed elsewhere. Moreover, it seems that tax incentives for research and development – vital factors determining the economy’s growth potential – are relatively modest in Belgium.

Archeologisch begeleidingsonderzoek in het voormalige Kartuizerklooster te Leuven

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Crowdsourcing for smart engagement apps in an urban context : an explorative study

This paper elaborates on the first results of an ongoing living lab project on ‘smart’ city engagement and offers a theoretical, methodological and empirical contribution to the field of user-driven innovation by describing a crowdsourcing experiment conducted in collaboration with the city of Ghent (Flanders). Our presented living lab approach has a double goal. First, it wants to empower citizens by systematically transforming the relationship(s) between citizens and between citizens (as service users) and local city-related governmental institutes (as service providers) by offering smart city applications. Second, it has the ambition to go beyond reactively studying information systems as change agents and wants to pro-actively improve engineering systems that can contribute to the desired changes in city engagement. Supporting citizens as self-actuating sensors to open up more innovative ways of collecting data is an important boundary of the research within a living lab context. We aim for user-driven innovation by involving citizens in the co-production of new electronic public services. Therefore we choose to go through a co-design process (Sanders & Stappers, 2008) with citizens defining the smart engagement applications that most probably will be developed and implemented in a living lab setting. Today, various innovation companies and organizations envision a central role for the user when looking for innovations. The attention for participation of the user is growing since the 80’s, although that the meaning of the concept ‘participation’ is not stable. Different people have used ‘participation’ in a wide variety of different situations and the widespread use of the term has tended to mean that ‘participation’ is used to refer to a wide variety of different situations by different people (Pateman, 1972). Therefore some point to participation as an empty signifier (Carpentier, 2007). The history and origin (and radicalism) of the concept as related to power issues is fading away under the diversity of its different meanings. Recently different participative methods were developed and are used to learn about users and their needs. Some known user-centered methods within industry are working with living labs (Niitamo, Kulkki, Eriksson, & Hribernik, 2006) and crowdsourcing (Hudson-Smith, Batty, Crooks, & Milton, 2009). Although participative methods were initially mainly focused on handing over the power to the user, currently much more attention is given to usability of applications and market forecasting when in the context of user involvement or co-creation. The analysis of power relations is fading slowly away. In our research the notion of participation is used in two ways: as a political phrase, referring to users who are gaining more power and impact on societal changes, and as a practical phrase referring to the forecasting of the success of urban smart engagement apps. This paper is structured in four parts. The first part of the paper introduces the concepts of engagement and ‘smartness’. The second part of the paper introduces crowdsourcing and also elaborates on the related concepts of ‘Web 2.0”, ‘collective intelligence’ and ‘wisdom of crowds’. The third part of the paper describes our methodology, introduces the online crowdsourcing enabler ‘mijndigitaalideevoorgent’, and presents the first, preliminary results of our crowdscourcing experiment. The fourth and last part of the paper formulates a conclusion and discussion of the results

Opvelp - Verbranden Toren

Dit rapport werd ingediend bij het agentschap samen met een aantal afzonderlijke digitale bijlagen. Een aantal van deze bijlagen zijn niet inbegrepen in dit pdf document en zijn niet online beschikbaar. Sommige bijlagen (grondplannen, fotos, spoorbeschrijvingen, enz.) kunnen van belang zijn voor een betere lezing en interpretatie van dit rapport. Indien u deze bijlagen wenst te raadplegen kan u daarvoor contact opnemen met: [email protected]

Systemic Inflammation and Reperfusion Injury in Patients With Acute Myocardial Infarction

Despite early recanalization of an occluded infarct artery, tissue reperfusion remains impaired in more than one-third of the acute myocardial infarction (AMI) patients owing to a process of reperfusion injury. The role of systemic inflammation in triggering this phenomenon is unknown. Proinflammatory factors (hs-CRP, TNF-α) and anti-inflammatory mediators (IL-1 receptor antagonist, IL-10) were measured in 65 patients during the acute phase of a myocardial infarction as well as in 11 healthy control subjects. Myocardial reperfusion injury was defined as the presence of persistent ST-segment elevation despite successful coronary intervention (≥ 50% of the initial value) and was observed in 28 patients. Systemic proinflammatory mediators (particularly hs-CRP and leukocytes) were higher in AMI patients compared to control subjects. Within the group of AMI patients, only serum TNF-α differed significantly between patients with versus without reperfusion injury: a median value of 25 versus 13 pg/mL was observed, respectively. Logistic regression analysis identified a high level of TNF-α as the most important independent determinant of reperfusion injury (P = .001), beyond total ischemic time (P = .01) and extent of jeopardized myocardium (P = .08). There was no correlation between the TNF-α level and the total ischemic time (P = .8) or the extent of jeopardized myocardium (P = .6). Systemic inflammation, in particular high levels of TNF-α, is strongly associated with the occurrence of reperfusion injury after successful recanalization. Our findings suggest that TNF-α is involved in the triggering and/or amplification of local inflammatory responses related to ischemia-reperfusion injury

A flock of sparrows in the city of Ghent: a multidisciplinary case study

This article elaborates on the deployment of multipurpose, aesthetic smart objects, called ‘The Sparrows’ in the city of Ghent (Belgium, Europe).  The goals of the integration of the sparrows in the city were two-fold (1) augmenting the social engagement of citizens using a playful aesthetic smart artifact, and (2) exploring the ambient interaction zones with smart artifacts in a city context.  In this article we present the case study carried out on the integration of the smart artifacts in the city and we describe the experiences of the involved citizens with the sparrows and the embedded ambient interactions

Dual disseminated infection with Nocardia farcinica and Mucor in a patient with systemic lupus erythematosus : a case report

INTRODUCTION: Infections remain a major cause of morbidity and mortality in immunocompromised patients and require early diagnosis and treatment. However, correct diagnosis and treatment are often delayed by a multitude of factors. We report what we believe to be the first case of a combined disseminated infection with Nocardia and Mucor in a patient with systemic lupus erythematosus. CASE PRESENTATION: A 74-year-old Caucasian woman with systemic lupus erythematosus presented with recurrent pneumonia. Despite empirical treatment with antibiotics, her condition gradually deteriorated. Microbiological sampling by thoracoscopy revealed the presence of Nocardia. Despite the institution of therapy for disseminated nocardiosis, she died of multi-organ failure. A post-mortem investigation confirmed nocardiosis, but showed concomitant disseminated mucormycosis infection as well. CONCLUSION: Members of the bacterial genus Nocardia and the fungal genus Mucor are ubiquitous in the environment, have the ability to spread to virtually any organ, and are remarkably resistant to appropriate therapy. Both pathogens can mimic other pathologies both on clinical and radiological investigations. Invasive sampling procedures are often needed to prove their presence. Establishing a timely, correct diagnosis and a specific treatment is essential for patient survival

Comparing maternal genetic variation across two millennia reveals the demographic history of an ancient human population in southwest Turkey

More than two decades of archaeological research at the site of Sagalassos, in southwest Turkey, resulted in the study of the former urban settlement in all its features. Originally settled in late Classical/early Hellenistic times, possibly from the later fifth century BCE onwards, the city of Sagalassos and its surrounding territory saw empires come and go. The Plague of Justinian in the sixth century CE, which is considered to have caused the death of up to a third of the population in Anatolia, and an earthquake in the seventh century CE, which is attested to have devastated many monuments in the city, may have severely affected the contemporary Sagalassos community. Human occupation continued, however, and Byzantine Sagalassos was eventually abandoned around 1200 CE. In order to investigate whether these historical events resulted in demographic changes across time, we compared the mitochondrial DNA variation of two population samples from Sagalassos (Roman and Middle Byzantine) and a modern sample from the nearby town of Ağlasun. Our analyses revealed no genetic discontinuity across two millennia in the region and Bayesian coalescence-based simulations indicated that a major population decline in the area coincided with the final abandonment of Sagalassos, rather than with the Plague of Justinian or the mentioned earthquake.Belgian Programme on Interuniversity Poles of Attraction grant: (IAP 07/09, http://iap-cores.be/); University of Leuven grant: (GOA 13/04); KU Leuven BOF Centre of Excellence Financing on ‘Centre for Archaeological Sciences 2–New methods for research in demography and interregional exchange’; Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) grants: (Projects G.0562.11, G.0637.15); Leverhulme Trust (UK) grant:(F/00212/AM); Institute of History of Leiden University