CHINA’S MARKET CLIMATE AND THE ECONOMIC PROSPECT AFTER ITS WTO ACCESSION

Reform and opening up to the outside world constitutes a basic long-term state policy that China adheres to 20 odd years’ reform and development has brought about profound changes to the Chinese economy. First, China has transformed from a planned economy to

MIIT Plans to Open Broadband Access Market

November 28, 2014--Reeently, MIIT issued the ＂Opinions On Open Access To Broadband Market （Draft）＂, which regulates that private enterprises should be enc：ouraged to participate in the construction and operation of broadband access network infrastructure; encourage the private enterprises to participate in the relevant investment and carry out cooperation with infrastructure companies anti provide broadband resale services etc. The mainthree telecom operators shall not sign exclusive agreements with private enterprises and dynamic adjustment mechanism of prices should be estahlished.

Dual Focus upon Industrial Restructuring and Market Access Management

The Central Economic Working Conference of the CPC sets out an important mission for China’s economic development in 2007:"tak- ing energy conservation and protection of the ecological environment as the starting point,actively promote optimization and upgrade of the industrial structure".

Contribution of Rural Roads to Access to-and Participation in Markets:Theory and Results from Northern Ethiopia

Road accessibility is considered to be one of the major factors influencing (or correlated to) rural households’ access to- and participation in markets. However, there are few studies that investigate this important topic. This paper, therefore, explores the issue from both theoretical and practical perspectives with household and village level data from Northern Ethiopia. It is generally assumed that road accessibility significantly contributes to both access to- and participation in markets by rural households. The results in this study, however, suggest that neither participation in major markets nor the amount of purchased agricultural inputs use are significantly different for households with respect to the degree of road accessibility in the study area. Nevertheless, the situation seems somewhat better in locations with good access to roads. On the other hand, the results in this study confirm that road accessibility significantly contributes to reducing farm gate prices of manufactured goods and increasing farm gate prices of agricultural goods.

Impact of ICTs on Core Competences of SMEs in Bukavu, DRC

Currently, it has been noticed a strong use of ICTs in several companies. The objective of this study was to analyze and measure the impact of the implementation of ICTs on the strategy and structure of management of core competence in SMEs in Bukavu, DRC. The scale used shows the good psychometric properties (χ2 = 75.045;P = 0.16;χ2/ddl = 1.471;CFI = 0.92;IFI = 0.92;RMSEA = 0.049;NFI = 0.79;GFI = 0.94;AGFI = 0.91. This study analyzed primary data collected from 195 SMEs in the city of Bukavu. Data processing was achieved using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and flat sorting. The results indicate that the use of ICTs by SME managers in the city of Bukavu has a positive impact on all dimensions of core competence selected in this study. They also reveal that the views of these leaders on the importance attached to the adoption of ICTs were divided and the level of ICT use was above average.

Can the improvement of competitive adequacy and fairness reduce discriminatory M&A behavior?Evidence from the market access negative list pilot in China

Corporate mergers and acquisitions(M&As)are subject to skewed logic due to excessive government regulation.China is progressively adopting the Market Access Negative List(MANL)pilot to transfer the power of resource allocation from the government to the market.Using the DID method,we examine the impact of relaxing market access regulation on firms’M&A behavior against China’s institutional background and the M&A events of listed companies from 2012 to 2019.The MANL significantly increases firms’M&A tendency and amount and strengthens the competitive adequacy and fairness of market-oriented M&A decisions.Post-M&A financial performance does not increase,but human capital productivity,innovation effectiveness and total factor productivity do,demonstrating the dynamic balance of profit and efficiency in M&As.

An Assessment of Youth Involvement in Agricultural Activities in Eastern Cape Province, South Africa

Youth, who make up the majority of South Africa’s population and will be the future responsible citizens, confront numerous obstacles, including a lack of access to land, finance, markets, practical training, and incentives. The low interest of youngsters in agriculture is attributed to the poor status of agricultural output in Africa’s rural areas due to a lack of government support. The study was conducted to assess the involvement of youths in agricultural activities in Eastern Cape Province, South Africa. The convenient sampling technique was used, and qualitative data were collected from 104 participants using a pre-tested structured questionnaire. The questionnaire covered demographic characteristics, land ownership status, contact with extension personnel, and involvement in farming activities, funding, and constraints. Descriptive statistics and chi-square test were used for data analysis. The results showed that there were more males (59.6%) participants than females (40.4%) and the majority (74%) were between 20 - 35 years of age, 52.9% had senior secondary school level of education and came from a household size ranging from 6 - 19. Approximately 88.5% of participants had an agricultural background with an annual income of less than R20,000.00. More than half (51.9 %) of the study population, had farming experience less than 5 years, while 52.9% owned less than 2 hectares of land, and 78.8% were self-employed. Findings revealed that age (χ2 = 5.519, P < 0.01) and farming experience (χ2 = 43.981, P < 0.001) had a significant association with extension contact and farming enterprises respectively. Furthermore, lack of land ownership, high input costs, access to credit, visibility of extension personnel, lack of market access, low returns, high cost of mechanization, and lack of farming knowledge were the most ranked constraints hindering youth involvement in agricultural activities. Youth involvement in agricultural activities can be improved through land availability, financial support, and information dissemination on rural development programs by extension personnel.

How Does E-Commerce Policy Affect Consumption Disparities of Rural Households?-Evidence from China

In the context of China’s ongoing efforts to promote countryside revitalization and facilitate domestic economic circulation,it is of great significance to reduce the consumption disparity among rural households and unleash the consumption potential in the countryside.Based on data from China Family Panel Studies,this paper adopts a staggered difference-in-differences method to assess the impact of the e-commerce to enter rural areas on the consumption disparity among rural households.Findings:the comprehensive demonstration work of promoting e-commerce to enter rural areas has reduced the consumption disparity among rural households through the following mechanisms.Firstly,this policy initiative has mitigated the consumption-inhibiting effect on rural household consumption due to the local market size and external market accessibility by promoting the distribution of consumer goods to villages.Secondly,this policy initiative has also increased the agricultural income of rural households and reduced their consumption disparity by distributing farm produce to cities and enhancing the agricultural income of rural households.Moreover,the work is characterized by inclusive growth and is not susceptible to the“elite capture”phenomenon.

A corpus-based approach to understanding market access in fisheries and aquaculture international business research:A systematic literature review

Although fisheries and aquaculture studies might seem marginal to international business(IB)studies in general,fisheries and aquaculture IB(FAIB)management is currently facing increasing pressure to meet global demand and consumption for fish in the next coming decades.In part address to this challenge,the purpose of this systematic review of literature(SLR)study is to investigate the use of the term‘market access’in its context of use in the generic literature and business sector discourse,in comparison to the more specific literature and discourse in fisheries,aquaculture and seafood.This SLR aims to uncover the knowledge/interest gaps between the academic subject discourses and business sector practices.Corpus driven in methodology and using a triangulation method of three different text analysis softwares including AntConc,VOSviewer and Web of Science(WoS)analytics,the SLR results indicate a gap in conceptual knowledge and business practices in how market access is conceived,studied and managed in the pharmaceutical and healthcare marketing industry in comparison to fisheries and aquaculture.FAIB's complexity is directly acknowledged in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Zero Hunger.And while the product orientation of different business sectors might differ,this SLR study works with the assumption that both business sectors are international in orientation,and complex in their operations from product to market.To that extent,research scholars and practitioners in FAIB will need to broaden their efforts in understanding the multiplicity of forces that influences fisheries and aquaculture and its international orientation towards both emerging as well as mature markets.This SLR suggests a conceptual model in understanding the challenges,the potential barriers as well as avenues for solutions to developing market access for FAIB.

Impact of market access and comparative advantage on regional distribution of manufacturing sector

We discuss the effects of trade costs and comparative technology on industry location by employing the model presented by Martin and Rogers(1995).The model supposes comparative technology differences and different intraregional and interregional trade costs and argues how different factors influence location of industrial value added.By processing the designed model,equations were set up to check whether the conclusions from our mathematical model are credible under panel data at the provincial level of China from 1995 to 2014.We find that location of industrial value added in a region is strongly related to infrastructure and local market size while geographical location of a region is an important determinant for deciding which factor should be handled first.

Analysis of a Firm's Optimal Size Based on Accessible Market Capacity

E-commerce has dramatically reduced the limitation of space and time on economic activities,resulting in individuals having access to a huge number of consumers.In this paper,we propose a company's optimal size decision model containing management costs as a means of investigating the evolution of the company size in e-commerce.Given that production decisions are made based on accessible market capacity,we explain how a company enters the market,and we draw an evolutionary path of the optimal company size.The results show that in the early expansion stage of accessible market capacity,a firm's optimal size keeps increasing;after reaching a peak,the change in a firm's optimal size depends on its cost management.When the accessible market capacity reaches a threshold,the firm will no longer be in the market,and may no longer exist.Finally,we construct a simulation framework based on complex adaptive systems to validate our proposed model.A simulation experiment confirms our model and reveals the dynamic co-evolution process of individual producers and firms.

Trade Balance: Numbers Can be Deceiving

Trade disputes have become more prevalent and acute in recent years. Almost all center on bilateral trade balance and/or market access of certain merchandise or services. However, since at least the mid 1980s, affiliate sales have become a more direct and more powerful form of market access than the traditional cross-border commercial transactions for developed countries, whereas developing countries still rely predominantly on traditional trade. The importance of the international production supply chain is increasing with a bias against downstream producers. The current data collection and compilation system of trade balance can not reflect these changes in the world economic environment. It overstates exports of developing countries and understates their imports. None of the countries in the world can illustrate the weakness of the conventional system better than China.