In Search of a Breakthrough for the Korea-EU FTA Negotiations

The purpose of this paper is to seek a breakthrough for the Korea-EU FTA negotiation in agriculture which started last year, but has not made much progress yet. The EU has been asking Korea to open its agricultural market to the same extent that was agreed upon in Korea’s free trade agreement with the U.S. while the Korean government firmly opposes the EU’s request, saying that FTA negotiations differ from multilateral trade talks as in the WTO. An examination of agricultural trade among Korea, the EU, and the U.S. shows that there may be many niche markets of which the EU can take advantage over other agricultural exporting countries including the U.S. Also, it is expected that the EU could gain much from its agricultural trade with Korea through an FTA, even without a market access level equal to one stipulated in the Korea-U.S. FTA accord. As far as agriculture is concerned, the slower does the talk proceed, the better to Korea, with the EU losing huge expected trade gains. It is suggested that the EU needs to be more flexible in the talks by focusing on a new strategy that can maximize trade diversion effects stemming not only from price but from non-price factors, rather than simply asking for the same level of market opening as in Korea-U.S. FTA. This would be the better way for the EU to become a winner in the battle for Korean agricultural market.Korea-EU FTA, Agricultural Trade, Trade Diversion Effects, International Relations/Trade,

Putin and Trilateral Economic Cooperation between Moscow, Seoul, and Pyongyang: Motivation, Feasibility, and Korean Peace Process

Since 2000, President Vladimir Putin of Russia has persistently pushed for trilateral economic projects involving Moscow, Seoul, and Pyongyang, especially in the fields of energy (oil, gas, and electricity) and transportation (railroad). The Kremlin has long maintained that its proposed trilateral projects would not only be economically beneficial to all but also pave the road to inter-Korean reconciliation and peaceful unification. This article addresses three questions regarding Putin’s trilateral economic projects. What motivates Russia to push for the projects? Would they bring benefits to the three countries? Would they facilitate Korean peace process? The authors argue that Putin’s trilateral economic projects are part of Russia’s quest for power and search for a multipolar world order and should be understood from the theoretical framework of Bstructural realism.^ The research finds that the projects are not feasible due to North Korea’s nuclear crisis and economic uncertainties and may be implemented after the current North Korea’s nuclear crisis is resolved diplomatically, if North Korea’s leadership changes or if inter-Korean reconciliation and cooperation is achieved by the progressive government of Moon Jae-In

Determinants Of Audit Report Lag: Evidence From Korea - An Examination Of Auditor-Related Factors

This study examines whether audit report lag (ARL) is determined by certain auditor-related factors. Understanding the determinants of ARL is important as ARL is the single most important factor in determining the timing of earnings releases and, therefore, improving the timeliness of companies’ announcements of earnings. Unlike prior studies, we are particularly interested in examining various auditor-related factors including audit and non-audit fees received from clients, auditor tenure, type of auditor and audit opinion. Using a recent Korean sample, we find that ARL is negatively associated with non-audit fees paid to incumbent auditors, consistent with “knowledge spillover” from the provision of non-audit services. We also find that ARL is negatively associated with the use of Big 4 auditors and unqualified audit opinions. We are, however, not able to find significant associations between ARL and auditor tenure, or abnormal audit fees paid to incumbent auditors. Additional analyses provide evidence that abnormal audit hours and the provision of tax services, and services relating to the design of internal control systems, significantly reduce ARL

Locally Adaptive Products for Genuine Spherical Harmonic Lighting

Precomputed radiance transfer techniques have been broadly used for supporting complex illumination effects on diffuse and glossy objects. Although working with the wavelet domain is efficient in handling all-frequency illumination, the spherical harmonics domain is more convenient for interactively changing lights and views on the fly due to the rotational invariant nature of the spherical harmonic domain. For interactive lighting, however, the number of coefficients must be limited and the high orders of coefficients have to be eliminated. Therefore spherical harmonic lighting has been preferred and practiced only for interactive soft-diffuse lighting. In this paper, we propose a simple but practical filtering solution using locally adaptive products of high-order harmonic coefficients within the genuine spherical harmonic lighting framework. Our approach works out on the fly in two folds. We first conduct multi-level filtering on vertices in order to determine regions of interests, where the high orders of harmonics are necessary for high frequency lighting. The initially determined regions of interests are then refined through filling in the incomplete regions by traveling the neighboring vertices. Even not relying on graphics hardware, the proposed method allows to compute high order products of spherical harmonic lighting for both diffuse and specular lighting

The role of motivation and vocabulary learning strategies in L2 vocabulary knowledge: A structural equation modeling analysis

This study explores the complex relationships between language learning motivation, vocabulary learning strategies, and two components of second language vocabulary knowledge (i.e., vocabulary size and depth), within the framework of self-regulated learning. Responses to questionnaires were gathered from 185 secondary-level Korean adolescent learners of English as a foreign language, regarding their motivation and vocabulary learning strategy use; additionally, the results of their vocabulary size and depth tests were collected. We adopted structural equation modeling for analysis, with vocabulary learning strategies consisting of memory, cognitive, and metacognitive categories, and vocabulary knowledge consisting of vocabulary size and depth. The results showed that motivation directly predicted vocabulary learning strategies and vocabulary knowledge, and indirectly predicted vocabulary knowledge via vocabulary learning strategies. When further classified, intrinsic motivation was found to have a stronger influence on the use of vocabulary learning strategies and vocabulary knowledge than extrinsic motivation. We discuss the implications of increasing learners’ motivation and repertoire of strategies for improving vocabulary size and depth.This study explores the complex relationships between language learning motivation, vocabulary learning strategies, and two components of second language vocabulary knowledge (i.e., vocabulary size and depth), within the framework of self-regulated learning. Responses to questionnaires were gathered from 185 secondary-level Korean adolescent learners of English as a foreign language, regarding their motivation and vocabulary learning strategy use; additionally, the results of their vocabulary size and depth tests were collected. We adopted structural equation modeling for analysis, with vocabulary learning strategies consisting of memory, cognitive, and metacognitive categories, and vocabulary knowledge consisting of vocabulary size and depth. The results showed that motivation directly predicted vocabulary learning strategies and vocabulary knowledge, and indirectly predicted vocabulary knowledge via vocabulary learning strategies. When further classified, intrinsic motivation was found to have a stronger influence on the use of vocabulary learning strategies and vocabulary knowledge than extrinsic motivation. We discuss the implications of increasing learners’ motivation and repertoire of strategies for improving vocabulary size and depth

RFID Tag Antenna Moutable on Metallic Plates

RFID tag antenna which could be mountable on metallic plate is designed and measured for 900MHz band. The proposed antenna consists of ground plane, substrate (εr = 4.7), feed line with shorted circuit and radiating patch with L-shaped slit. The feed line with shorted circuit is designed for the direct impedance matching between the antenna and the RFID microchip. Especially, it is possible to obtain considerably the easy impedance match with the proposed design. Overall dimension of the proposed antenna is 90×54×5mm3. When the antenna is placed in free space and mounted on 125×150mm2, 250×300mm2 metallic plates, the maximum reading distance is 6m, 4.8m and 5.2m, respectively