Analysing seasonal changes in New Zealand's largest inbound market

The purpose of the paper is to analyse seasonal changes in tourism demand by New Zealand's major tourist source market, Australia, for the period 1979-2005. A time series regression model is used to test the significance of monthly seasonality. By examining sub-periods that are based on major exogenous events which have had significant impacts on international travel demand to New Zealand, seasonal distributions and intra-year seasonal variations over the 27-year period are subsequently estimated using normalized seasonal indices, coefficient of variation, seasonal ratio and the Gini coefficient. Compared with the findings of previous studies for other countries, the empirical evidence suggests that, while the tourism flow distribution or concentration is not significant for New Zealand, the seasonality in tourism demand by New Zealand's largest inbound market has changed over time

The business of social responsibility: Evidence from the garment industry in Northeast Thailand

Many business managers demonstrate a reluctance to engage fully with corporate social responsibility (CSR). They often perceive CSR as a cost and their CSR activities tend to be piecemeal and defensive. Such suboptimal outcomes can stem from a failure to appreciate a firm’s social assets. We suggest that firms have the potential to engage much more fully with CSR, in a manner that is consistent with a profit-maximizing approach to business. But managers need help in both gaining an awareness of the social contributions that they can make and in navigating their way through CSR issues. To this end, we outline a program of four-Ds, namely dialogue, data, design and delivery, to assist managers integrate CSR issues into their overall business strategies. Our case study of the garment industry in Thailand illustrates how CSR issues can be leveraged to increase worker productivity and deliver positive social and community health outcomes, despite operating in an area that is often subject to criticism

Migration, household composition and child welfare in rural Northeast Thailand

In many developing countries, the composition of rural households is influenced by the migration of adult household members to urban locations in search of employment. Children may be left in the care of their mother alone, or in the care of grandparents when both parents have migrated. Using representative data from a household survey conducted in rural Northeast Thailand in 2003, this paper investigates whether household composition has any effect on the welfare of children, as measured by anthropometric measurements including height-for-age, weight-for-age, and weight-for-height. Our findings suggest that household types other than nuclear families result in some significantly worse child nutritional outcomes. The implication is that governments should protect the welfare of the children of migrants, either through targeted programs or through increased opportunities for employment in rural areas

Recognising and building on freshman students' prior knowledge of economics

The results of three surveys of freshman economics students (2008-2010) at the Waikato Management School, New Zealand, suggest that incoming students have significant levels of prior economics knowledge. Given this head start in knowledge, we have expanded our freshman lecture material with more advanced content than students would normally encounter in a microeconomics principles class. This paper examines the sources of incoming students’ prior economics knowledge and discusses some of the changes made to the learning material. The changes relate principally to the links we make between students’ basic, prior economics knowledge and the more advanced learning content that demonstrates how formal economics training can add considerable value in thinking more deeply about current affairs, business issues and daily life experiences

Modelling the Determinants of International Tourism Demand to Australia,

Prior to the recent Asian currency and economic crises, tourism from Asia had rapidly become Australia's major tourism export industry. Tourists from Singapore, which is Australia's fifth major market, represented 6% of international tourist arrivals to Australia in 1996. The average annual growth rate of tourist arrivals from Singapore of around 20% over 1990-96 far exceeded the 10.5% average annual percentage growth rate of all tourist arrivals to Australia over the same period (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1997). Despite the Asian currency and economic crises in 1997-98, tourist arrivals to Australia from Singapore has continued to grow slowly. It is imperative from the tourism marketing SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis to consider the economic factors influencing international tourism demand for Australia by Singapore, and to undertake a primary competitor analysis of New Zealand. The purpose of the paper is to estimate the income, price and transportation cost elasticities of inbound tourism from Singapore to Australia using seasonally unadjusted quarterly data, to determine if Australia and New Zealand are substitute or complementary destinations for Singaporean tourists, and to examine issues such as nonstationarity, cointegration and spurious regressions.

"Ecologically Sustainable Tourism Management"

One of the primary challenges facing ecotourism management is to establish a profitable and ecologically sustainable industry, while simultaneously achieving a satisfying experience for visitors and raising standards of living in the host community. This paper analyses the management practices and challenges faced by two ecotourism attractions on the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia, namely Couran Cove Island Resort and Boondall Wetlands Reserve. As an ecotourism-based resort on one of the world's few naturally-occurring sand islands, Couran Cove is active in implementing a range of initiatives for sustainable environmental management. This is particularly important as Couran Cove is home to a wide variety of plant communities and one of the largest remnants of the rare Livistona rainforest on the Gold Coast. The Boondall Wetlands Reserve is internationally recognized as an important feeding and resting habitat for migratory wading birds from Alaska, China, Japan, Mongolia and Siberia. Through the activities of the Visitor Centre, the Boondall Wetlands Reserve aims to: (i) promote environmental awareness within the local and regional communities; (ii) provide community education and information about wetlands systems within the local, regional and global context; (iii) offer nature-based recreation and tourism services; and (iv) demonstrate how wetlands can diversify the tourism and ecotourism industries.

"Modelling International Travel Demand from Singapore to Australia"

Prior to the recent Asian currency and economic crises, tourism from Asia had rapidly become Australia's major tourism export industry. Tourists from Singapore, which is Australia's fifth major market, represented 6% of international tourist arrivals to Australia in 1996. The average annual growth rate of tourist arrivals from Singapore of around 20% over 1990-96 far exceeded the 10.5% average annual percentage growth rate of all tourist arrivals to Australia over the same period (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 1997). Despite the Asian currency and economic crises in 1997-98, tourist arrivals to Australia from Singapore has continued to grow slowly. It is imperative to consider the economic factors influencing international tourism demand for Australia by Singapore, and to undertake a sensitivity analysis of tourist arrivals to changes in the factors. The purpose of the paper is to estimate the income, price and transportation cost elasticities of inbound tourism from Singapore to Australia using seasonally unadjusted quarterly data. Initially, estimation is undertaken using ordinary least squares. Given New Zealand's proximity to Australia, it is also useful to determine using a single-equation model if Australia and New Zealand are substitute or complementary destinations for Singaporean tourists by examining the effects of the relative price changes in New Zealand and Australia on international travel demand for Australia. In addition, seasonal influences are examined using the single-equation model. The OLS estimates of the appropriate single-equation model are also compared with the estimates obtained using the cointegration method in Lim and McAleer (2001).

"Old Wine in a New Bottle: Subprime Mortgage Crisis—Causes and Consequences"

This paper seeks to explain the causes and consequences of the United States subprime mortgage crisis, and how this crisis has led to a generalized credit crunch in other financial sectors that ultimately affects the real economy. It postulates that, despite the recent financial innovations, the financial strategies—leveraging and financial risk mismatching—that led to the present crisis are similar to those found in the United States savings-and-loan debacle of the late 1980s and in the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s. However, these strategies are based on market innovations that have heightened, not reduced, systemic risks and financial instability. They are as the title implies: old wine in a new bottle. Going beyond these financial practices, the underlying structural causes of the crisis are located in the loose monetary policies of central banks, deregulation, and excess liquidity in financial markets that is a consequence of the kind of economic growth that produces various imbalances—trade imbalances, financial sector imbalances, and wealth and income inequality. The consequences of excessive risk, moral hazards, and rolling bubbles are discussed.

The Emotional Impact of Casino Servicescape

This study investigates the emotional impact of casino servicescape among Chinese table games gambling participants, and its impact on their approach/avoidance behavior. Data on casino servicescape, pleasure, arousal and dominance emotion (PAD) and approach/avoidance responses were obtained from 158 Chinese gamblers in Macau and analyzed using path analysis. The results of this study suggest that aesthetic factors within servicescape significantly influence the customers\u27 perception of the overall servicescape quality. While gambling facilitating factors within servicescape have significant impact on PAD emotions, they are not significant components of the perceived overall servicescape quality. Both overall servicescape quality and PAD emotions have significant positive influence on approach responses. The current study shows that besides inducing pleasure (satisfaction) emotion in customers, a successful strategy would include arousal and dominance emotions when designing and managing the casino servicescape. Casino operators could benefit from designing facilities that can make a customer feel satisfied, excited, and in control

Time Series Forecasts of International Tourism Demand for Australia,

This paper examines stationary and nonstationary time series by formally testing for the presence of unit roots and seasonal unit roots prior to estimation, model selection and forecasting. Various Box-Jenkins Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) models are estimated over the period 1975(1)-1989(4) for tourist arrivals to Australia from Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore. The mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) and root mean squared error (RMSE) are used as measures of forecast accuracy. As the best fitting ARIMA model is found to have the lowest RMSE, it is used to obtain post-sample forecasts. Tourist arrivals data for 1990(1) to 1996(4) are compared with the forecast performance of the ARIMA model for each origin market. The fitted ARIMA model forecasts tourist arrivals from Singapore between 1990(1)-1996(4) very well. Although the ARIMA model outperforms the seasonal ARIMA models for Hong Kong and Malaysia, the forecast of tourist arrivals is not as accurate as in the case of Singapore.