Natural and Consequence of Tourism Industry’s Susceptibility to Natural Disaster : A Conceptual Framework using Input-Output Model

Tourism business plays an important role in developing a region’s economy. Most of the operators are small businesses and are highly vulnerable to disaster. On top of bearing the direct loss such as personal asset damages, impacted and adjacent communities are concerned of the possibility of losing their jobs and future incomes due to business interruption between the primary and secondary industries. The government’s receipts of tax revenue would be disrupted as well. Despite recognition of indirect losses, the disaster literature’s focus had been on estimating the direct damages to local residents. Literature that studied impacts on the business community tended to focus on those that originated from the disruption in the economic system – such as economic recession rather than environmental disaster. Compared to direct losses, indirect losses are more difficult to estimate because of the complex task in obtaining relevant data to measure the multiplier impact, especially in smaller regions. This study extended the literature by highlighting a way to measure the indirect effects of natural disasters on the tourism and secondary industries and its local and adjoining communities. This study hopefully could contribute to a better understanding – by tourism industry analysts as well as public officials – of the trail of economic effects and its implications of carrying or not to carry-out restoration work

An empirical analysis of engel curve on energy for households in Sabah and Sarawak based on location and income group

The study was focused in forming an empirical model of Engel curve on energy for households in Sabah and Sarawak. Open-ended questionnaire was used as an instrument of study involving 1,002 respondents in Sabah and Sarawak. The dependent variable was budget share of energy expenditure meanwhile the independent variables were total household expenditure, age, household size, educational level, gender and regional variables. The Ordinary Least Square estimation was carried out on the cross sectional data. The coefficients were used to estimate the Engel curve expenditure elasticities. The findings revealed that total household expenditure (income) and household size were the important determinant in explaining the energy expenditure. Meanwhile the estimation of Engel curve expenditure elasticities showed that energy was a necessity good for all income groups in both urban and rural areas. Low income group was found to be more sensitive on energy expenditure to the changes in household income

An empirical analysis to derive the essential elasticities for energy demand:a case in Sabah And Sarawak

"Up to date the Malaysian government has been providing subsidy for various products like energy sources, health, food, education and so on. Among the subsidy given by the government, the most significant amount goes to energy subsidy. Misallocation of resources may lead to over consumption and high national deficit which eventually may lead the country to bankruptcy. However, subsidy cannot be eliminated as long as there is government and the existence of democracy political system. Therefore, the issue that needs to be addressed is to create a mechanism to distribute energy subsidy to the deserving subsidy beneficiaries and not in a blanket basis. This study looks into the impact of subsidy on energy demand in Sabah and Sarawak. Sabah and Sarawak are chosen as the scope of the study due to its difference with Peninsular Malaysia in terms of geographical location, economic activities, affordability, demographic structure and infrastructure. When assessing issues on who are the subsidy beneficiaries, the analysis should be carried out by analyzing the demand for each type of energy based on income groups and location. The demand function was established based on the linear Approximate Almost Ideal Demand System (LA-AIDS) model. With this, the essential elasticities of demand such as own price elasticity, cross price elasticity and expenditure elasticity was derived. The study found that the energy consumption pattern in Sabah and Sarawak referred to multiple fuel model where all income groups preferred to use combination of energy. Besides, the findings of descriptive analysis showed that largely over consumption of electricity was found among low income group In Sabah meanwhile the over consumption of diesel was highly caused by high irteOme group in Sarawak. The own price elasticity indicated that petrol was price elastic among low income and middle Income groups in Sabah meanwhile middle income and high income groups in Sarawak. Besides, diesel was found to be price elastic among high income group in Sabah and Sarawa k. For electricity, high income group in Sabah was found to be responsive to the changes to its own price on the over consumption of electricity meanwhile the responsiveness was found among low income and middle groups in Sarawak. In addition, LPG was price elastic for low income group in Sabah and Sarawak. The findings of cross price elasticities ascertained that electricity was a substitution for LPG and diesel. On the other hand, diesel was a complementary for petrol. Furthermore, the integrated expenditure elasticities indicated that petrol was luxury good for low income group meanwhile high income and middle income groups treated petrol as necessity good. Diesel was apparently a lUXUry good for high income and middle groups meanwhile it was a necessity for low irteOme group. Moreover, electricity and LPG was mostly a necessity good for households in Sabah. In Sarawak, only rural low income and middle income groups treated electricity as necessity meanwhile LPG was a necessity good only for middle income group in urban area. This will help the policy makers to effectively distribute energy subsidy without wastage

Estimating the elasticity of energy over consumption at micro level: a case study in Sabah, Malaysia

This study aims to estimate the over consumption and essential elasticity for energy (petrol, diesel, electricity and LPG) at micro level using LA-AIDS model after the implementation of managed floating mechanism. The findings show that low income group possesses the highest cost of over consumption for electricity. Besides, the own price elasticity indicates that petrol and diesel are price elastic for low income group while households are not responsive towards price changes for electricity and LPG. Lastly, households treat both petrol and LPG as luxury goods while diesel and electricity are necessity goods for low income group based on the integrated expenditure elasticity. Thus, measures should be taken to develop the subsidy rationalization for electricity and LPG in the future

Is Transportation Infrastructure Important to the One Belt One Road (OBOR) Initiative? Empirical Evidence from the Selected Asian Countries

The One Belt One Road (OBOR) initiative is implemented to improve the linkage between China and its neighboring countries in terms of economic ties, connectivity, partnership, and security cooperation. The crucial challenge encountered in OBOR initiative is the different gauge standards from different countries in the development of railway along the Silk Road. Another issue arose from the regulation of education sector in the aspect of quality, cost, and efficiency. To the best of our knowledge, there is still lack of study on the transportation infrastructure and education towards the GDP in the selected Asian countries, especially for Central Asia. Therefore, this study aims to examine the impact of OBOR initiative and its importance towards economic growth by further investigating the determinants such as transportation infrastructure, education, labor, trade, and inflation rate. This study employs panel data analysis using the annual data from the period of 2000⁻2015. The selected Asian countries are divided into three regions, namely Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan), ASEAN (Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia), and East Asia (China, Mongolia). Besides, we use fixed effect model (FEM) to obtain the results based on the support of Hausman test and Poolability F-test. The findings reveal that transportation infrastructure possess a positive effect on GDP. Surprisingly, education is negatively related to GDP. With this, policy makers are suggested to encourage OBOR countries to expand and upgrade their system in terms of transportation infrastructure, human capital, culture, and education. In future studies, the advanced model is recommended to investigate the pre- and post-efficiency of OBOR initiative

Estimating the Elasticity of Energy Over Consumption at Micro Level: A Case Study in Sabah, Malaysia

This study aims to estimate the over consumption and essential elasticity for energy (petrol, diesel, electricity and LPG) at micro level using LA-AIDS model after the implementation of managed floating mechanism. The findings show that low income group possesses the highest cost of over consumption for electricity. Besides, the own price elasticity indicates that petrol and diesel are price elastic for low income group while households are not responsive towards price changes for electricity and LPG. Lastly, households treat both petrol and LPG as luxury goods while diesel and electricity are necessity goods for low income group based on the integrated expenditure elasticity. Thus, measures should be taken to develop the subsidy rationalization for electricity and LPG in the future