Search results for "Strategy"
showing 10 items of 2256 documents
Attempts at diversification: Mexico and Pacific Asia
2002
This article aims to explain the development of Mexico's relations with Pacific Asia. Based on the historical background of Mexico's relations with Asia and on internal and international transformations, we identify the interests of Mexican political actors in Pacific Asia. We provide an overview of the existing political and economic relations between Mexico and Pacific Asia, demonstrating that the success of diversification has been very limited. By trying to explain the gap between the strategic goals and the existing relations we focus on the domestic politics in Mexico. We conclude that intra-elite conflicts had a negative effect on the diversification attempts, since those conflicts p…
Trends in EU Energy Policy 1995–2007
2011
Today, climate change and a significant increase in energy consumption are considered to be the two greatest global challenges facing the energy world (e.g., Hasselmann et al. 2003: 1923; IPCC 2007; Kara 2007: 5; Karl and Trenberth 2003: 1719). In addition to the scientific community having a common understanding about these two issues relating to each other, the political decision makers also need to acknowledge it and start building a framework around it – with the same longterm targets. On the EU-level, climate change concerns were already manifested in the White Paper on Energy Policy for the European Union in 1995. The development of the EU’s common energy policy is also the result of …
Eco-efficiency assessment of wastewater treatment plants using a weighted Russell directional distance model
2016
Abstract Improving the performance of wastewater treatment plants is essential to ensuring their long-term sustainability. Most of the previous studies on this topic have assessed the techno-economic efficiency of wastewater treatment plants and ignored the emission of greenhouse gases. For the first time, the weighted Russell directional distance model was applied to estimate the eco-efficiency of a sample of real wastewater treatment plants. Moreover, this approach allowed an inefficiency score to be obtained for each variable (cost factors, pollutant removal and greenhouse gases) involved in the model. Subsequently, a second stage of analysis was applied to identify factors influencing t…
Measuring the wastewater treatment plants productivity change: Comparison of the Luenberger and Luenberger-Hicks-Moorsteen Productivity Indicators
2019
Abstract It is essential to assess the productivity of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) to improve their economic and technical performance over time. In doing so, reliable indexes should be used to avoid biased conclusions leading to unsuccessful policy and managerial measures. Ratio-based indexes are typically employed, but are infeasible when any of the variables are equal or close to zero. To overcome this limitation, this paper presents the innovative approach of applying and comparing two difference-based productivity indicators, Luenberger (LPI) and Luenberger-Hicks-Moorsteen (LHMPI), to evaluate how productivity changes in a sample of WWTPs. Because the LHMPI is an additively com…
Analysing the efficiency of wastewater treatment plants: The problem of the definition of desirable outputs and its solution
2020
Abstract Evaluating the efficiency of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) is highly relevant to improve their performance from an economic and environmental perspective. The issue is even more critical in countries where WWTPs are benchmarked to regulate water companies and define WWTPs’ economic and environmental objectives. Despite the large number of previous studies on this topic, none has considered that the amount of outputs produced by the WWTPs is restricted by the concentration of pollutants in the effluent. To overcome this limitation, the study’s main objective was to propose a new variant of the Weighted Russell Directional Distance Model (WRDDM) that would solve problems regard…
Impact of Industrial SMEs in the Environment Conservation : A Systematic Mapping Study
2020
Small and medium-sized companies have an impact on the environment where they operate. In some cases, the effects on the environment can be significant within local communities leading to a series of negative processes, such as emission pollution into the atmosphere, the discharges to rivers and seas, the production of waste; in some cases, it makes the contamination to the soil. This paper presents the results of the systematic mapping study aimed at assessing environmental management in industrial SMEs. Descriptive studies of SMEs emphasize their poor environmental commitment, describing them as primarily interested in controlling pollutant emissions just to comply with regulations. Ninet…
Microplastics in the Center of Mediterranean: Comparison of the Two Calabrian Coasts and Distribution from Coastal Areas to the Open Sea
2021
Plastic is everywhere—increasing evidence suggests that plastic pollution is ubiquitous and persistent in ecosystems worldwide. Microplastic pollution in marine environments is particularly insidious, as small fragmentation can increase interaction with biota and food chain access. Of particular concern is the Mediterranean Sea, which has become a large area of accumulation of plastic debris, including microplastics, whose polymeric composition is still largely unknown. In this study, we analyzed the polymeric composition, particle size distribution, shape, and color of small plastic particles (ranging from 50 to 5000 µm) collected from the sea surface in six stations at the center of the M…
A computational approximation for the solution of retarded functional differential equations and their applications to science and engineering
2021
<p style='text-indent:20px;'>Delay differential equations are of great importance in science, engineering, medicine and biological models. These type of models include time delay phenomena which is helpful for characterising the real-world applications in machine learning, mechanics, economics, electrodynamics and so on. Besides, special classes of functional differential equations have been investigated in many researches. In this study, a numerical investigation of retarded type of these models together with initial conditions are introduced. The technique is based on a polynomial approach along with collocation points which maintains an approximated solutions to the problem. Beside…
Is Podemos a Populist Party? an Analysis of Its Discourse and Political Strategy
2021
On the basis of a thick qualitative study of Podemos’ political communication and strategy since its emergence in the Spanish party system in 2014, this article asks to what extent can it be characterized as a “populist party.” It shows that a populist discourse and strategy has been theorized and used by Pablo Iglesias and the party leaders to “dichotomize” the Spanish political space and allow the emergence of a new political alternative. However, while radical critiques against the elites, the political and economic systems have been activated, Podemos’ discourses and propositions have evolved through its institutionalization process. Thus, Podemos illustrates a typical case of protest p…
Evolution of strategy narration and leadership work in the digital era
2019
This paper examines the evolution of strategy narration, contributing to ongoing discussions in this field. Our empirical data, gathered from a large Finnish co-operative bank, cover three decades. According to our findings, digitalisation has brought about an epoch change in strategy narration, as top management has strongly adopted digital media in their leadership work, which has replaced ‘traditional’ face-to-face strategy meetings and public presentations by gatherings on digital platforms, including webcasting, intranet and Skype. This has brought about a leadership vacuum, and left organisational members long for their superiors to ‘exercise’ some traditional leadership practices, su…