Defining and Measuring High Technology in Georgia

This report defines and measures the high technology sector in Georgia

Southeast Asians in North Carolina: Settlement Patterns and Socioeconomic Outcomes.

The relevance of place characteristics of both sending and receiving regions on the socio-economic success of immigrants constitutes an under examined yet potentially highly important factor explaining differential adjustment outcomes of groups from a similar geographic region. This research looks at major Southeast Asian refugee groups in North Carolina to compare them with each other in the same state and with the success of the same groups in other states. Census figures from PUMA and SF3 files are used to trace education attainment, income levels, and clustering in five demographic divisions from 1990 – 2007, depending on data availability. Interviews with community leaders supplement quantitative sources. Cultural factors, proclivity to settle in an urban or rural location, and the role of leadership are all found to play important explanatory roles

Developing China’s West: producer services in metropolitan Xi’an

China's maturing economy raises questions as to the convergence of urban-economic spatial patterns with those in developed countries. Three major components of producer services – financial, information consultancy and computer services – indicate the development of advanced economic functions that drive growth. This research assesses producer services in Xi'an, the biggest city in Western China. Methods include ArcGIS analysis of the spatial layout of service sector companies and interviews with corporate managers. Highly agglomerated sectors display different spatial characteristics resulting from the interaction of market demand, urban planning and government policy directing the growth and place of these tertiary functions. Resumen. La economía China, en fase de maduración, plantea interrogantes en cuanto a la convergencia de los patrones espaciales urbano-económicos con los de los países desarrollados. Tres componentes principales de los servicios a la producción – financiamiento, consultorías de información y servicios de informática – sirven de indicadores del desarrollo de aquellas funciones económicas avanzadas que impulsan el crecimiento. Este estudio evalúa los servicios a la producción en Xi'an, la ciudad más grande de China Occidental. Los métodos incluyen el análisis mediante ArcGIS de la distribución espacial de las empresas del sector servicios y entrevistas con ejecutivos de empresas. Los sectores con una elevada aglomeración muestran diferentes características espaciales que resultan de la interacción de la demanda del mercado, la planificación urbana y las políticas gubernamentales para gestionar el crecimiento y la ubicación de estas funciones terciarias

The Emergence of the Knowledge Economy: A Regional Perspective

The essays that compose this book, many by authors quite well known for previous work on related topics, grew out of conferences organized by the multidisciplinary Regional Science Association. Indeed, a primary stated aim of the collection is to pull together new insights from growth theory, economic geography, and innovation theory to bear on the common question of the role of innovative knowledge creation and diffusion on differential regional growth. Essays are divided fairly evenly into four sections dealing with: theory and measurement (a tricky but necessary combination); knowledge spillovers from university research (common but constricted); ICT (Information and Communication Technology) as a knowledge-intensive sectoral focus; and geographically disparate regional case studies from Canada, Japan, Norway, and Spain. In addition to the introduction, I have selected sample chapters from each of these sections for further discussion

One of a Kind: Bhutan and the Modernity Challenge

A small Buddhist nation long isolated in the Himalayas between China and India, Bhutan navigates the passage to internal modernity and global integration by using the precepts of ‘Gross National Happiness’: cultural and environmental preservation, economic equity and sustainability, and clean and transparent governance. Challenges include the degree of homogeneity desirable under the doctrine of ‘One Nation, One People’. The country's youth wrestle with an education often unsuitable for job prospects, urban migration, social temptations, and the waning of traditions. Choosing cultural elements suitable for preservation, modification, or substitution incorporates key elements of spiritual continuity for easing the development path

Brewing a New American Tea Industry

The article discusses the tea industry and market in the U.S. It comments on a transformation in agriculture that emphasizes health and environmental sustainability. The author describes early attempts to grow tea in the Southeastern U.S. during the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. She also reflects on modern tea-growing locations, including Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Salem, Oregon, and Hawai'i, and modern tea companies, including Lipton Tea and Bigelow Tea Company. Demographic characteristics of U.S. tea consumers are also considered

An Analysis of the Relationship between Spatial Patterns of Water Quality and Urban Development in Shanghai, China

Recent urban development in Shanghai, the largest city in China, and its impact on the water environment are examined in this study. The area of built-up surface was obtained from the classification of the Landsat 7 ETM+ images of the year 2000 for Shanghai. The proportion of built-up surface and population density were extracted from buffer zones with radii ranging from 100 to 2000 m, and used in regression analysis against various water quality parameters at 44 water quality monitoring stations across metropolitan Shanghai. Results suggest that in most cases, the pattern of urban land use as represented by the built-up surface was a stronger predictor than population density in explaining spatial patterns of water quality parameters in Shanghai. The best models of most water quality parameters were found for buffer zones of 2000 m radius rather than for smaller buffers, indicating the regional nature of the factors that influence water quality in the study area. Evidence suggests that strong associations between land use, population density, and water quality result from the contribution of untreated domestic wastewater and non-point pollution sources to waterways in Shanghai. Such relationships should remain strong in the near future until measures to increase the capacity of wastewater treatment and control of non-point pollution sources are fully implemented

Metropolitan Spatial Dynamics: Shanghai

As China‘s largest and wealthiest city, Shanghai‘s dynamic growth since the 1990s indicates the spatial form of new metropolitan expansion patterns. This research deals with mechanisms shaping emerging patterns, including the rise of a land market, settlement of inner suburbs by urban core and "floating" populations, and peri-urban in-filling. Growth drivers flow from planning and targeting high technology manufacturing based on domestic research and development, foreign companies, and joint ventures as well as new sources of domestic capital based on property development schemes and cooperation between Party cadres and local entrepreneurs. Evidence comes from the 2000 Census, remotely sensed photography, and interviews with city planners. The match between new residential and occupational spaces and transportation infrastructure connections for a more mobile and spatially diffuse population is of concern for future policy

The Chinese Diaspora: Space, Place, Mobility and Identity

This book contributes to research on Chinese who are living outside China, a corpus that has steadily expanded since the mid-1960s. Ma’s introductory essay clearly sets out the historical periodicity of the explosion of population from China as part of global push-pull movements reflecting early efforts to escape domestic rebellions by building railroads. The migration flow, which was unleashed in the watershed restructuring year of 1965, has culminated in the contemporary bifurcation, from highly educated aspirants to desperate “container migrants” following shady “snake heads.” Schools of theoretical explanations and classifications of migration are also set out, along with their shortcomings for dealing with the complexity of the Chinese experience. Well-published authors who are conversant in their geographic locales, including Cindy Fan on Los Angeles, Sen-dou Chang on Hawaii, Lily Kong and Brenda Yeoh on Singapore, David Lai on the Canadian experience, and Jack Williams on the Taiwanese as hua ch’iao, contribute meaty and thoughtful essays that touch on the varied nature of receiving areas

Chinese Industrial and Science Parks: Bridging the Gap

This article proposes the addition of a ?bridge high technology? stage to Park’s (1996) Asian development model, based upon field research and analysis of four ?science and technology parks? in different regions of China: Shenzhen, Shanghai, Suzhou, and Xi’an. Initially established as learning districts to foster technology transfer from foreign to domestic enterprises, these specially configured spaces exhibit a variety of interactions indicating an increasing shift toward domestically generated technology for native companies. The mix and type of companies in parks at different locations within China reflect the locational comparative advantages of each place, whether as an outgrowth of local research or by government design