Government Interest Research Articles

INTEGRATED DIGITAL PLATFORMS FOR THE DOCUMENTATION AND MANAGEMENT OF CULTURAL HERITAGE AT RISK

Abstract. Research definition of strategies and instruments for the prevention, mitigation, and management of hazards resulting from natural or man-made catastrophes is increasingly experimenting with an integrated approach to the digital documentation and visualisation of the built and cultural heritage. In actuality, recent conflicts and events, as well as the rise in natural disasters in previously unaffected regions, demonstrate the growing interest of governments, public administrations and entities, as well as academics, in the development and preservation of the digital memory of man-made landscapes. However, the management of recent catastrophic events allowed for the development of techniques that today enable the transfer of tools and processes from emergency management to routine management.Based on data from recent earthquakes in northern Italy, the current work describes some outcomes of the development of an integrated digital platform for seismic risk management that aims to integrate historical data from previous seismic events, data from existing databases, integrated digital surveys, carried out using integrated survey techniques, and semantically enhanced BIM-based models. The tool is being created as part of a transnational research cooperation initiative with thirteen partners from nations and regions along the Adriatic Sea. The program's overall goal is to improve cross-border emergency services while also raising their degree of safety and efficacy.

The Clémentel moment: the reform of 1918 and the beginnings of regional economic planning in France

Abstract In 1918 Clémentel, the ministre du Commerce organized the 149 chambers of commerce in France into regional groupings. He hoped they would be effective partners with the government in the economic development of their regions. Clémentel’s reform should be seen not just as a manifestation of economic regionalism but also as part of a new approach to managing the French economy which made widespread use of corporate bodies as intermediaries between the government and private interests. The article shows how the reform emerged from pre-war debates on economic regionalism and also from wartime planning for the post-First World War economy. It describes how Clémentel encouraged a number of intermediary corporate bodies, including chambers of commerce, to play a significant role in economic affairs. Based on original research it analyses the initiatives these bodies took in transport, power generation and technical education after the war in many regions of France. This economic regionalism was part of a major institutional change in economic policy making. It was also the precursor of the regionalization of economic planning after the Second World War.

TOWARDS THE DIFFERENT: A CASE STUDY OF A SYRIAN ASYLUM SEEKER IN CROATIAN SCHOOL CONTEXT

Migrations and migrants have been in the focus of interest and activities of many governments, organizations, and institutions, both worldwide and in Croatia. According to international policies, children who seek or are under international protection have the right to education. To access the education system of the Republic of Croatia more easily, they are given the opportunity to attend Croatian language preparatory or remedial classes. The research aim was to determine the needs and challenges posed by the inclusion of a Syrian asylum seeker in a Croatian primary school. The qualitative approach was applied. The case study presents a ten-year-old Syrian girl, attending a primary school in Zagreb. The data were gathered with the use of semi-structured interviews with the girl's sister, teachers in the primary school, and her classmates. In order to gain a deeper insight into the girl's functioning in the school context, notes made by teachers during observation of the girl’s performance in the course of the educational process were gathered and analysed. Guidelines and recommendations were developed that could have a positive impact on quality inclusion of children refugees and asylum seekers in the Croatian education system. Keywords: children asylum seekers, educational process, qualitative research

Are environmental regulation tools effective? An analysis based on financial investment of entity enterprises

Environmental regulation and economic development are consistent in the long run, but there are certain contradictions in the short term. Examining the characteristics of available environmental regulation tools and using them in a way that will align the interests of local governments and enterprises can improve environmental regulation and enhance green transformation and development. This study considers two general types of environmental regulation tools: negative punishment types and positive incentive types. Applying an intermediary effect model and the two-stage least squares method, a sample of Chinese A-share listed companies from 2007 to 2019 is used to test the impact of these different types of environmental regulation tools on the financial investment levels of entity enterprises. The mechanism through which these macro-environmental regulation tools function and the micro-enterprise heterogeneity factors that influence their impact are systematically studied. The results show that negative punishment type environmental regulation tools have a positive impact on the financial investment levels of entity enterprises, while positive incentive type environmental regulation tools inhibit financial investment levels. This impact is formed through managerial incentive mechanisms referred to as “whipping the fast ox” and “heavy rewards and light punishments.” Factors such as financing constraints, relocation costs, pollution levels, and enterprise scale have heterogeneous effects on these paths. Policy suggestions are offered based on the findings. This study makes a significant contribution to the literature by clarifying the channel through which environmental regulation influences micro-enterprise decision-making. It provides a theoretical basis and policy reference for local government officials as they address the conflict between economic growth and environmental protection in the short term. Moreover, the results offer long-term development decision-making ideas for shareholders and managers in the process of green transformation and upgrading of enterprises.

The Influence of Board Factors and Gender Diversity on the ESG Disclosure Score: A Study on Indian Companies

The focus of stakeholders is shifting from the growth of profits and maximizing shareholders’ wealth towards more sustainable growth. The stakeholders are carefully emphasizing various environmental, social and governance issues, such as low carbon economy, climate change adaptation, social impact, transparency in governance etc. This, in turn, is increasing investors’ attention and interest in environment, social and governance (ESG) factors. Many investors are integrating ESG considerations into their mainstream portfolios. This article aims to study the impact of board factors on the ESG disclosure score of Indian listed companies. Using panel data for 327 firms listed on NSE and BSE over 7 years, this study examines the impact of board characteristics on the ESG disclosure score of a firm. We apply two-way fixed effect panel regression for analysis and find that board size and board gender diversity are the two significant factors playing a positive influence on the ESG disclosure score for the sample companies. CEO duality is a consistent factor across all the tested models impacting the ESG disclosure score.

THE DETERMINANT OF DECOMPOSITION OF FOREIGN DEBT IN INDONESIA

Since 1990 there have been reforms in both monetary policy and fiscal policy in Indonesia, which can affect the decomposition of foreign debt. The World Bank report in international debt statistics 2021 shows that Indonesia is one of the countries that have the most debt, which ranks 7th in the world and first in ASEAN with total foreign debt. This study uses time-series data from 1990 to 2021 using the VAR method to determine the response of foreign debt to macroeconomic fluctuations. Based on the results of the study shocks to the GDP variable will be responded to negatively by debt. The sensitivity of the debt response is shown to be positive when there are shocks to government spending and interest rates. The results of the variance decomposition show that government spending has the largest contribution to variability compared to other variables in the model. The implications of the research need to be careful in adding new debt amid uncertain macroeconomic conditions because it can burden the state budget

New Technologies to Diagnose and Treat a Multidrug-Resistant Candida auris: A Patent Review.

Candida auris is responsible for hospital outbreaks worldwide. Some C. auris isolates may show concomitant resistance to azoles, echinocandins, and polyenes, thereby possibly leaving clinicians with few therapeutic options. In addition, this multi-drug-resistant yeast is difficult to identify with conventional methods and has the ability to persist on environmental surfaces causing hospital-acquired infections. The development of new treatment options and tools for identification is critical to control, prevent, and establish an early diagnosis of this emerging pathogen. The aim of this study was to perform a critical patent review to explore and identify the latest advances in therapeutic strategies as well as diagnostic methods for C. auris. A total of 19 patents were identified for a preliminary assessment from the Espacenet database. Three patents were excluded as they were out of focus for this review according to their abstract and/or description. The final selection covered 16 patents, which were surveyed by country, year and classified as treatment or diagnostic methods for C. auris. As noted in the patent reading, in recent years, the interest of academic, government and industry sectors have shown an increasing tendency focused on research and development of new therapeutic molecules and diagnostic methods to combat this emerging pathogen.

Implementation Evaluation Tax Holiday and Tax Allowance Policies on the Growth of Foreign Investment

This study investigates the impact of tax holidays and tax allowance policies on the development of foreign investment in the BKPMD South Sulawesi Province from 2017 to 2020. Documentation is used for data collection techniques that involve direct observation of the object of study. Descriptive statistical analysis, classical assumption tests (normalizes test, heteroskedasticity test, multicollinearity test), and testing of the entire hypothesis via partial testing, simultaneous testing, and determination coefficient test are employed for data analysis. This study demonstrates that applying tax holidays and tax allowances do not affect the growth of a foreign investment. Therefore, the government should streamline licensing and conditions and promote policy facilities, so investors are fully aware of them. This is because factors other than tax incentives determine investment, such as the size of the domestic market, wage levels and worker productivity, infrastructure availability, government spending growth, inflation rates, interest rates, and investment risks. Tax exemptions and tax credits are still inadequate for enthusiasts. This demonstrates that the tax holiday and tax credit cannot be considered effective and efficient regarding investor interests. We recommend that the government or relevant agencies immediately improve and review the licensing process at the central and regional levels so as not to diminish investor confidence in Indonesia's legal certainty; improving the investment climate through better regulations can positively impact the investment climate. The investment tax incentive policy must be widely publicized and promoted so that investors can be aware of it and benefit from it.

Influence of Micro-Controller-Based Single Axis Solar Tracker System on Solar Panel’s Performance: Case Study

There is governmental, academic, and business interest in new emerging renewable energy sources, such as solar energy. In particular, how and how much it produces energy and the environmental impact of these sources. To highly benefit from renewable energies, new methods should be utilized. In this paper, the Microcontroller Arduino Uno board has been used and programmed by Arduino software to build a system as a photo-sensor (Active) Single Axis Solar Tracker System (SASTS). The system was created using a solar panel, two Light Dependent Resistance (LDR) have been used on the two sides (north/south) of the photovoltaic (PV), and a servo motor is connected to the Uno board. The tracking system is constructed to procure the data using the Microcontroller Uno board and specially designed mechanical base. Based on the extracted results, the influence of the SASTS on increasing the solar panel performance is more evident than the outcome Maximum Power Point (MPP) of MATLAB Simulink. Continuously, the SASTS searches for the sun and its position in the sky and puts the PV direct to the sun. Significantly, the tracker system raises the power ratio of the PV. As a result, it significantly increases the solar panel's performance and increases by 55.2% on average during the daytime.

Analysis of the application of artificial intelligence technology in the protection of corporate governance rights and interests.

Corporate governance delivers feasible and controlled company operations using a group of common shareholders and appropriate policies. The roles and responsibilities of the shareholders suggest and improve corporate development through monotonous and independent rights. The implication of artificial intelligence provides knowledgeable insights for decision-making and control management. This article introduces a Mutual Consent-based Governance Regulation Model (MCGRM) for dissimilarity mitigation in corporate rule implications. The proposed model exploits transfer learning for balanced rule implication and decision-making. The learning states are defined based on mutual agreement, individual interest, and operational features. Based on the governance policies, the above rules are employed without hindering the pioneer regulations implemented in different periods. Therefore, artificial intelligence technology is utilized for prompt and swift governance decisions in delivering special rights for consumers and shareholders. The performance of this model is validated and verified using data sources related to governance policies from a real-time industry. The impact of varying policy features with dissimilarity is analyzed for varying occurrences. The analysis is given based on the considered data sources for which the classification and its impact over reports, sharing, voting, complaint, and market are analyzed. The availability before and after the proposed improves the above metrics by 10.48, 10.65, 9.78, 13.39, and 9.26%.

State-owned success in the air

Abstract African Airlines are not commonly associated with success, rather they recall instances of bad management, security concerns, and outdated machinery. This paper focuses on the success of two airlines during the first two postcolonial decades in Africa. During this time, the new national airlines of African states were important symbols of sovereignty, as well as providing crucial mobility for politicians and experts of all kinds. Addressing a gap in the literature on aviation in Africa on the one hand, and the research on state-owned enterprises on the other, the paper takes a closer look at expectation formation and management decisions regarding fleet modernisation and maintenance, as well as Africanisation politics in both enterprises. Contrary to blanket statements that refer to ideological goals as a reason for the failure of African state-owned enterprise, the political goal of independence made Africanisation of staff and the acquisition of company-owned equipment and facilities a priority. Using archival sources, company publications, and observations of contemporaries, it can be shown that through taking advantage of entangled interests of governments and the aviation industry, the two African airlines managed to break into the global air transport market at the beginning of the 1960s and stayed competitive for many years.

Co-clustering of multivariate functional data for the analysis of air pollution in the South of France

Nowadays, air pollution is a major threat for public health with clear relationships with many diseases, especially cardiovascular ones. The spatiotemporal study of pollution is of great interest for governments and local authorities when deciding for public alerts or new city policies against pollution increase. The aim of this work is to study spatiotemporal profiles of environmental data collected in the south of France (Région Sud) by the public agency AtmoSud. The idea is to better understand the exposition to pollutants of inhabitants on a large territory with important differences in term of geography and urbanism. The data gather the recording of daily measurements of five environmental variables, namely, three pollutants (PM10, NO2, O3) and two meteorological factors (pressure and temperature) over six years. Those data can be seen as multivariate functional data: quantitative entities evolving along time for which there is a growing need of methods to summarize and understand them. For this purpose a novel co-clustering model for multivariate functional data is defined. The model is based on a functional latent block model which assumes for each co-cluster a probabilistic distribution for multivariate functional principal component scores. A stochastic EM algorithm, embedding a Gibbs sampler, is proposed for model inference as well as a model selection criteria for choosing the number of co-clusters. The application of the proposed co-clustering algorithm on environmental data of the Région Sud allowed to divide the region, composed by 357 zones, into six macroareas with common exposure to pollution. We showed that pollution profiles vary accordingly to the seasons, and the patterns are similar during the six years studied. These results can be used by local authorities to develop specific programs to reduce pollution at the macroarea level and to identify specific periods of the year with high pollution peaks in order to set up specific health prevention programs. Overall, the proposed co-clustering approach is a powerful resource to analyse multivariate functional data in order to identify intrinsic data structure and to summarize variables profiles over long periods of time.

An Efficient and Secure Identity-Based Signature System for Underwater Green Transport System

The smart ocean has aroused the interest of government, business, and academia because of the wealth of marine resources. It has been suggested to use underwater Internet of Things (IoT) frameworks to collect a variety of data from smart seas that can aid in the underwater green transport system, ecological sustainability, military intelligence gathering, and a variety of other operations. Because of the limited resources accessible to IoT devices regarding communication overhead, processing expenses, and battery capacity, security and privacy concerns in underwater green transport systems have lately been a critical source of worry. In this context, We presented a unique identity-based authentication mechanism for underwater green transport systems. Our suggested solution uses lightweight authentication mechanisms that prove secure communication between different elements of the green transport system.

Corporate Governance by South African State-Owned Entities (SOEs) – Contributing to Achieving Agenda 2063

Following centuries of institutional colonization, Africa remains in dire need of development and has failed to realize its potential to drive sustainable economic growth and prosperity. Despite the residual contribution of Africa’s colonial legacy to this malaise, it is suggested that African states should stop blaming coloniality for their failure to develop and accept responsibility for their own socioeconomic development. To arrest the downward spiral and provide the platform necessary to drive sustainable development across the African continent, the African Union launched Agenda 2063. To claim its rightful place in the global economy with a renewed focus on accountability, African states must change their development trajectory and address the economic, environmental, social, and governance interests of their legitimate stakeholders as they strive for sustainable development and their beneficiaries with added value. African states can no longer afford to remain passive participants in the process, providing raw materials for beneficiation by the Global North. The findings of this paper are based on the assertion that effectively governed state-owned entities (SOEs) represent vehicles available to states to leverage their drive for socioeconomic development in their respective countries, thereby contributing to achieving the Agenda 2063 goals. Despite relying on quantitative data to inform a corporate governance conformance matrix, purposively developed from the OECD Guidelines, World Bank Toolkit, and Agenda 2063, the study adopts an interpretative approach to thematically analyze the content of the published annual reports of South African SOEs. While the relatively high conformance scores achieved by the South African SOEs appear to suggest conformance with strong corporate governance practices. It belies the fact that several of these highly compliant SOEs are currently under investigation in relation to numerous instances of serious fraud and corruption. The incongruence of these public disclosures with the de facto situation implies that they do not represent a meaningful attempt by SOEs to discharge their governance obligations effectively. Instead, they may simply be an attempt to placate stakeholders that these SOEs were being effectively governed rather than to account to stakeholders meaningfully. The study concludes that merely imposing a regulatory, corporate governance framework will not be sufficient to ensure the effectiveness of governance in SOEs, but rather that effective processes must be established to monitor and enforce compliance with these frameworks, together with effective consequence management for non-compliance.

Exploitation of an operative wave forecast system for energy resource assessment in the Mediterranean Sea

Ocean Energy is now emerging as a viable long-term form of renewable energy, which might contribute around 10% of EU power demand by 2050, if sufficient support is guaranteed along its road to full commercialization, allowing to further demonstrate the reliability, robustness and overall economic competitiveness of technologies. Although wave energy is still less developed than other marine renewables, its high density, great potential and minimal environmental impact have renewed the interest of developers, investors and governments globally, also in view of the increasing awareness of climate change and of the necessity to reduce carbon emissions. In parallel with technological development, the reliable characterization of wave climate and of the associated energy resource is crucial to the design of efficient Wave Energy Converters and to an effective site-technology matching, especially in low-energy seas. The preliminary scrutiny of suitable technologies and the identification of promising sites for their deployment often rely on wave climatological atlases, yet a more detailed characterization of the local resource is needed to account for high-frequency spatial and temporal variability that significantly impact power generation and the economic viability of WEC farms. We present a high-resolution assessment of the wave energy resource at specific locations in the Mediterranean Sea, based on a 7-years dataset derived from the operative wave forecast system that has been developed at ENEA and has been running since 2013. The selected areas correspond to the target regions of the Blue Deal project, where energy resource estimates were combined with technical and environmental considerations, so as to identify optimal sites for Blue Energy exploitation, from a Maritime Spatial Planning perspective. The available resource at selected sites is analysed together with site theoretical productivity for three state-of-the art WECs, showing interesting potential for future deployment.

Voices and Perspectives of Dalit Elected Women Representatives in Local Governance and Politics in Kerala, India

This article explores how gender socialization as women along with other intersecting identities influence the perspectives of Dalit Elected Women Representatives (EWRs) on power relations in the political space of Kerala. The purpose of the article is to understand the perspectives of Dalit EWRs on power relations in local governance, which reveal the barriers, their interest and aspirations in local governance and politics. The perspectives are elicited through detailed interviews of EWRs for two time periods. The study finds that EWRs participation in local electoral politics and the extent to gain space for decision-making would depend on their ability to overcome barriers to their representation and acceptance in decision-making fora. They also faced caste discrimination and allegations of favouritism in the governance.

Assessing the reliability of ethnicity data recorded in health-related administrative datasets in England.

ObjectivesDuring the COVID-19 pandemic, higher mortality among some ethnic minority groups was identified and has become the subject of significant public and government interest, highlighting an urgent requirement to quantify the reliability of ethnicity classification across health administrative data sets, which are utilised in health analysis and pandemic planning. ApproachThe aim of our work was to assess how ethnicity data recorded in Census and health admin records varied across ethnicities and provide recommendations for how missingness can be accounted for by statisticians. Combining population level data from general practice (GP) records with hospital episode statistics (HES) for patients in England, we created a linked data set with Census 2011 data to reliably assess coverage and missingness between data sources. Most recent and modal ethnicity classifications were derived on a person-level from both HES and GP administrative data for comparison to gold-standard Census 2011 records. ResultsAgreement rates were calculated to assess the reliability of ethnicity data recorded in health administrative datasets compared to Census data. We found that the agreement rates vary by ethnic group and other demographic characteristics. Furthermore, we highlighted groups of people who exist in one health-admin source, but not Census, and vice versa, illustrating the importance of accounting for the sample bias in health analysis when relying solely on primary or secondary care data sources. Implementation of techniques to account for bias and missingness were tested to propose methodology to improve reliability of ethnicity estimates from both HES and GP data, in order to ensure estimates of health disparities are as accurate as possible. ConclusionWe have linked GP records to Census 2011 and HES data to provide population-based ethnicity estimates of coverage, missingness and bias between data sources, in order to improve our understanding of ethnicity data quality. This work aims to inform policies tackling ethnic health inequalities in England.

"Each Council shall appoint a competent person for the borough, hereinafter called "Inspector of Buildings"": The development of building controls in the second decade of the twentieth century

In 1903 the first edition of the Municipal Handbook of New Zealand was released by the Census and Statistics Office. From then on published biennially, it provided detailed statistical and administrative information on each borough, city, independent town district, and harbour board. This included a brief statistical summary with details of the various activities as well as the names of "Chief Officials," including those responsible for buildings. These included engineers (e.g. Borough Engineer), inspectors (e.g. Building Inspector) and surveyors (e.g. Building Surveyor). From 1910 the numbers of these officials increased, suggesting a growing interest in building controls. The 1915 edition of the Handbook listed 176 municipalities, of which 44 (25%) listed a chief official with a role related to buildings. These included 35 engineers, eight inspectors and one surveyor. The paper explores, based on the Municipal Handbook series, the changing interest of New Zealand local government in the buildings constructed within their boundaries in the second decade of the twentieth century.

Central coordination, regional competition, and local protectionism: Social decentralisation in China's long‐term care reform

AbstractChanging central‐local relations shape social policymaking and implementation in China. We develop a social decentralisation perspective to explore various inter‐governmental dimensions in the formulation and implementation of social policy, based on experimentation in the provision of long‐term care insurance starting in 2016. As localities devised new programmes, they initiated innovations in the context of central‐local relations with Chinese characteristics. Three areas are duly examined: central coordination, regional competition, and regional protectionism. Intending to develop a national programme but reluctant to provide support through tax revenues, central government coordination reflects in both the central government's selection of cities across regions and allowing room for local diversity—some with deliberate experimental purposes—a feature which generated regional competition between pilot cities. Furthermore, as additional contributions for pilot programmes in some cities are waived, this process entails resource extraction from existing funding surpluses, unleashing local protectionism contrary to central government interests. Our analysis finds that the central government faces a dilemma: either meeting new social needs at the cost of increased regional inequality or balancing social policy developments across regions by enacting necessary programmatic reforms that sap central resources and weaken the central government's coordination capacity. These dynamics of social decentralisation will shape the future development and impact of Chinese social policy.

Information Security Risk Management Model for Big Data

In the current society of rapid expansion of information, big data have achieved vigorous development in all walks of life, considerably promoting data transmission and information sharing. Meanwhile, individuals are becoming increasingly reliant on big data and the Internet, but at the same time, the threat of information security posed by big data is becoming increasingly visible. As a result, how to protect the information security of big data has piqued the interest of both government and businesses. The essence of information security management is risk management, which is closely related to each other. Therefore, this study focuses on the following two aspects of research work. On the one hand, most existing risk management models merely describe risk management in the abstract from a macro-level, and they lack research on risk assessment, making them ineffective. This research builds a novel information security risk management model on the basis of existing risk management models based on the concept of multidimensional risk management. To achieve multidimensional dynamic management of big data risks and to keep them within an acceptable range as much as possible, the model is divided into five levels and two dimensions. On the other hand, this research also optimizes and improves the fuzzy mathematical analysis method and proposes a fuzzy comprehensive assessment method as the core algorithm for the risk assessment layer in the model. As a post-event risk assessment method, the advantage of this method is that it can comprehensively consider factors affecting risk and can quantify some assessment factors in the real network to achieve an effective combination of qualitative and quantitative, thereby providing a basis for decision-making in risk analysis and risk control. Finally, the effectiveness of the risk model in the real application is verified by example analysis, and it is intended that the study work would provide assistance and assurance for big data information security management.