Impact of Mandatory Provisions on the Validity of Juristic Acts: A Path for Legal Policy Analysis

Contrary to the approach in judicial practice,Paragraph 1,Article 153,of the Civil Code of the People’s Republic of China,as a rule of invalidity for violating mandatory provisions,does not adopt a dichotomy towards mandatory provisions with effectiveness and administrative characteristics,yet it maintains the legislative philosophy of differentiation.It leaves unspecified whether mandatory provisions that do not explicitly render a juristic act invalid impact the act’s validity,entrusting this determination to the discretion of judges on a case-by-case basis.When judges,under the authority of Paragraph 1,Article 153 of the Civil Code,explore the normative intent of mandatory provisions to assess their effect on the validity of juristic acts,they should engage in legal policy analysis centered on consequence-based argumentation to overcome the limitations of norm typological analysis.This analysis employs a reasoning model predicated on the normative purpose,utilizing a consequencefocused interpretative approach for formulating and arguing propositions of rules applicable to pending cases,thereby arriving at case-specific conclusions.Since the invalidation of juristic acts serves as an auxiliary regulatory tool for the state economy and society,a consequence-oriented interpretation needs to be based on the idea of mutual instrumentalization of public and private laws.This entails predicting the outcomes of negating the validity of a juristic act in industrial regulatory scenarios and assessing these outcomes within the framework of public and private regulatory instruments.

Instructions for Authors

1.Aims,The provision of low carbon energy to our society is a key issue at the heart of sustainable development of global energy supply.The Global Energy Interconnection(GEI)publishes original research on theories and developments as well practical applications on principles of large scale low carbon energy generation,transmission,distribution&storage technologies,global energy interconnection&system developments,global energy policy and energy market operations,global climate changes&environmental impacts,global energy transition strategies and global energy governance.

Instructions for Authors

1.Aims The provision of low carbon energy to our society is a key issue at the heart of sustainable development of global energy supply.The Global Energy Interconnection(GEI)publishes original research on theories and developments as well practical applications on principles of large scale low carbon energy generation,transmission,distribution&storage technologies,global energy interconnection&system developments,global energy policy and energy market operations,global climate changes&environmental impacts,global energy transition strategies and global energy governance.

Provision of Preconception Care by Midwives, Nurses and Doctors at Ndola Teaching Hospital in Ndola District, Zambia

Background: The goal of preconception care is to improve the outcome of a mother’s pregnancy and childbirth. Nevertheless, in most developing nations;Zambia included, there are still issues with implementation of preconception care. Therefore, the aim of this study was to establish the provision of preconception care by midwives, nurses and doctors at Ndola Teaching Hospital in Zambia. Methods: A concurrent embedded mixed methodology utilising a descriptive explorative study design, where 107 respondents were randomly selected using the lottery technique for quantitative part and two focused group discussions for qualitative part of the study was used. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect quantitative data and a focus group discussion guide was used for the focus group discussions. Statistical Package of Social Sciences version 26 with significance set at 0.05 and at 95% confidence level and thematic analysis were used for data analysis. Results: 75% of the respondents in this study were not providing preconception care and only 25% of respondents were providing preconception care;however, this was provided randomly because there were no guidelines to follow. Among the respondents, 81.3% had medium knowledge, 70.1% had good practices and 92.5% had positive attitudes towards preconception care. Further analysis showed that the association between preconception care and knowledge, practices and attitudes was not statistically significant (p = values 0.336;0.344;1.000 respectively). Multivariate logistic regression revealed that participants with high knowledge were five times more likely to provide preconception care (OR = 5.00, CI = 0.42 - 59.7, P = 0.203). Generally, all the participants acknowledged that preconception care was an important package that could prevent maternal and child morbidities and mortalities. Conclusions: The study revealed that most of the respondents were not providing preconception care. Provision of preconception was done by a small fraction of the respondents and it was done in an unorderly manner due to lack of set standards and guidelines. Despite medium levels of knowledge and generally good practices and positive attitudes towards preconception care, its random provision indicates a need for established standards to enhance maternal and child health outcomes.

From EBIT to SEBIT(Sustainable EBIT):Sustainable Performance Accounting(SPA)Using the Example of CO_(2) Accounting

Corporate sustainability reporting has become increasingly important in recent years.However,conventional approaches reach their limits when it comes to quantifying and measuring the actual sustainability performance of a company.This article presents a new approach:Sustainable Performance Accounting(SPA),which is based on an extension of bookkeeping by including ESG bookkeeping.SPA enables companies to systematically measure and manage their sustainability performance.The article provides an overview of the basics of SPA methodology and uses a comprehensive example showing how SPA can be implemented in practice.The article is aimed at interested readers from science and practice as well as decision-makers who are interested in future-oriented sustainability reporting.

Comparative Performance Measurement of the Pareto Optimal Combination and Multi-Objective Combination Models for Controller Placement in Software-Defined Networks

The evolution of the current network has challenges of programmability, maintainability and manageability, due to network ossification. This challenge led to the concept of software-defined networking (SDN), to decouple the control system from the infrastructure plane caused by ossification. The innovation created a problem with controller placement. That is how to effectively place controllers within a network topology to manage the network of data plane devices from the control plane. The study was designed to empirically evaluate and compare the functionalities of two controller placement algorithms: the POCO and MOCO. The methodology adopted in the study is the explorative and comparative investigation techniques. The study evaluated the performances of the Pareto optimal combination (POCO) and multi-objective combination (MOCO) algorithms in relation to calibrated positions of the controller within a software-defined network. The network environment and measurement metrics were held constant for both the POCO and MOCO models during the evaluation. The strengths and weaknesses of the POCO and MOCO models were justified. The results showed that the latencies of the two algorithms in relation to the GoodNet network are 3100 ms and 2500 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively. In Switch to Controller Average Case latency, the performance gives 2598 ms and 2769 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively. In Worst Case Switch to Controller latency, the performance shows 2776 ms and 2987 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively. The latencies of the two algorithms evaluated in relation to the Savvis network, compared as follows: 2912 ms and 2784 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively in Switch to Controller Average Case latency, 3129 ms and 3017 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively in Worst Case Switch to Controller latency, 2789 ms and 2693 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively in Average Case Controller to Controller latency, and 2873 ms and 2756 ms for POCO and MOCO in Worst Case Switch to Controller latency respectively. The latencies of the two algorithms evaluated in relation to the AARNet, network compared as follows: 2473 ms and 2129 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively, in Switch to Controller Average Case latency, 2198 ms and 2268 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively, in Worst Case Switch to Controller latency, 2598 ms and 2471 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively, in Average Case Controller to Controller latency, 2689 ms and 2814 ms for POCO and MOCO respectively Worst Case Controller to Controller latency. The Average Case and Worst-Case latencies for Switch to Controller and Controller to Controller are minimal, and favourable to the POCO model as against the MOCO model when evaluated in the Goodnet, Savvis, and the Aanet networks. This simply indicates that the POCO model has a speed advantage as against the MOCO model, which appears to be more resilient than the POCO model.

Joint optimization of maintenance inspection and spare provisioning for aircraft deteriorating parts

With the wide application of condition based maintenance(CBM) in aircraft maintenance practice, the joint optimization of maintenance and inventory management, which can take full advantage of CBM and reduce the aircraft operational cost, is receiving increasing attention. In order to optimize the inspection interval, maintenance decision and spare provisioning together for aircraft deteriorating parts, firstly, a joint inventory management strategy is presented, then, a joint optimization of maintenance inspection and spare provisioning for aircraft parts subject to the Wiener degradation process is proposed based on the strategy.Secondly, a combination of the genetic algorithm(GA) and the Monte Carol method is developed to minimize the total cost rate.Finally, a case study is conducted and the proposed joint optimization model is compared with the existing optimization model and the airline real case. The results demonstrate that the proposed model is more beneficial and effective. In addition, the sensitivity analysis of the proposed model shows that the lead time has higher influence on the optimal results than the urgent order cost and the corrective maintenance cost, which is consistent with the actual situation of aircraft maintenance practices and inventory management.

Adaptive Service Provisioning for Mobile Edge Cloud

A mobile edge cloud provides a platform to accommodate the offloaded traffic workload generated by mobile devices.It can significantly reduce the access delay for mobile application users.However,the high user mobility brings significant challenges to the service provisioning for mobile users,especially to delay-sensitive mobile applications.With the objective to maximize a profit,which positively associates with the overall admitted traffic served by the local edge cloud,and negatively associates with the access delay as well as virtual machine migration delay,we study a fundamental problem in this paper:how to update the service provisioning solution for a given group of mobile users.Such a profit-maximization problem is formulated as a nonlinear integer linear programming and linearized by absolute value manipulation techniques.Then,we propose a framework of heuristic algorithms to solve this Nondeterministic Polynomial(NP)-hard problem.The numerical simulation results demonstrate the efficiency of the devised algorithms.Some useful summaries are concluded via the analysis of evaluation results.

Forest soil conservation based on eco-service provision unit method and its value in Anji County,Huzhou,Zhejiang,China

We propose an eco-service provision unit method for estimating the benefit and spatial differences of forests in controlling soil erosion.A total of 197 eco-service provision units were grouped on 1424.43 km2 of forest according to differences in vegetation,slope,soil,and rainfall.The amount of soil conservation and its economic value were estimated.The forests in Anji County prevent4.08 9 105 tons of soil from eroding annually,thereby avoiding 1.36 9 104 tons of nutrient loss（on-site cost） and preventing 149 tons of nutritive elements from entering water systems（off-site cost）.From an economic perspective,the soil nutrient conservation in the forests of Anji County generated an annual benefit of 43.37 million RMB（Chinese Currency,6.20 RMB = US$1）.On average,each hectare of ecological forest contributed up to 436 RMB annually because of soil conservation.Ecological complexes with higher rainfall intensity,such as broadleaf forest and red soil on slope gradients [25°,contributed the highest soil conservation benefits.This study identified and quantified the dominant contributors and magnitudes of soil conservation provided by forests.This information can benefit decision making regarding differentiated ecological compensation policies.

COVID-19:Effect on gastroenterology and hepatology service provision and training:Lessons learnt and planning for the future

In late 2019,reports arose of a new respiratory disease in China,identified as a novel coronavirus,severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2.The World Health Organisation named the disease caused by the virus‘coronavirus disease 2019(COVID-19)’.It was declared a pandemic in early 2020,after the disease rapidly spread across the world.COVID-19 has not only resulted in substantial morbidity and mortality but also significantly impacted healthcare service provision and training across all medical specialties with gastroenterology and Hepatology services being no exception.Internationally,most,if not all‘nonurgent’services have been placed on hold during surges of infections.As a result there have been delayed diagnoses,procedures,and surgeries which will undoubtedly result in increased morbidity and mortality.Outpatient services have been converted to remote consultations where possible in many countries.Trainees have been redeployed to help care for COVID-19 patients in other settings,resulting in disruption to their training-particularly endoscopy and outpatient clinics.This has led to significant anxiety amongst trainees,and risks prolongation of training.It is of the utmost importance to develop strategies that continue to support COVID-19-related service provision,whilst also supporting existing and future gastroenterology and Hepatology services and training.Changes to healthcare provision during the pandemic have generated new and improved frameworks of service and training delivery,which can be adopted in the post-COVID-19 world,leading to enhanced patient care.

Space- and time-efficient approach for virtual machine provisioning

As a new promising paradigm, cloud computing can make good use of economics of scale and elastically deliver almost any IT related services on demand. Nevertheless, one of the key problems remaining in cloud computing is related to virtual machine images, which require a great amount of space/time to reposit/provision, especially with diverse requests from thousands of users simultaneously. In this paper, by using the splitting and eliminating redundant data techniques, a space and time efficient approach for virtual machines is proposed. The experiments demonstrate that, compared with existing solutions, our approach can conserve more disk space and speed up the provisioning of virtual machines.

Resource provisioning for computation and communication in multi-cell wireless networks

The convergence of computation and communication at network edges plays a significant role in coping with computation-intensive and delay-critical tasks.During the stage of network planning,the resource provisioning problem for edge nodes has to be investigated to provide prior information for future system configurations.This work focuses on how to quantify the computation capabilities of access points at network edges when provisioning resources of computation and communication in multi-cell wireless networks.The problem is formulated as a discrete and non-convex minimization problem,where practical constraints including delay requirements,the inter-cell interference,and resource allocation strategies are considered.An iterative algorithm is also developed based on decomposition theory and fractional programming to solve this problem.The analysis shows that the necessary computation capability needed for certain delay guarantee depends on resource allocation strategies for delay-critical tasks.For delay-tolerant tasks,it can be approximately estimated by a derived lower bound which ignores the scheduling strategy.The efficiency of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated using numerical results.

Enhanced Cloud Service Provisioning for Social Networks

In the era of cloud computing and social networks prosperity, new requirements rise up for cloud services that meet social network’s needs. Several cloud service providers deliver social network services for cloud services users. The aim of this paper is to develop a framework to pick the best cloud service providers from group of available providers based on many Quality-of-Service (“QoS”) criteria attributes in order to enhance efficiency, accuracy and service provisioning. This paper also aims to provide a classification for QoS criteria attributes, which is divided into five main attributes and sub-attributes, helping in enhancing ranking process in the provided framework.

Cloud Service Provisioning Based on Peer-to-Peer Network for Flexible Service Sharing and Discovery

In this paper, we present an approach to establish efficient and scalable service provisioning in the cloud environment using P2P-based infrastructure for storing, sharing and discovering services. Unlike most other P2P-based approaches, it allows flexible search queries, since all of them are executed against internal database presenting at each overlay node. Various issues concerning using this approach in the cloud environment, such as load-balancing, queuing, dealing with skewed data and dynamic attributes, are addressed in the paper. The infrastructure proposed in the paper can serve as a base for creating robust, scalable and reliable cloud systems, able to fulfill client’s QoS requirements, and at the same time introduce more efficient utilization of resources to the cloud provider.

Several New Issues Relating to the Enforcement of the Enforcement Provisions of the TRIPS Agreement under the WTO System

由于知识产权在国际贸易中的特殊性质,TRIPS 协定中的执法条款在 WTO 争端解决机制中将产生一些新问题。一方面,TRIPS 协定规定了知识产权执法的最低要求,WTO 成员方必须履行。WTO 其他成员方可以就 WTO 成员方是否履行了这些知识产权执法义务的争端提交 WTO 争端解决机构。另一方面,TRIPS 协定却没有规定请求方如何证明他们的请求。其中的问题包括:TRIPS 协定中的知识产权执法条款的目标是什么,是这些条款被规定在 WTO 成员方的国内法中,还是 WTO成员方要保证这些条款在实践中的有效性?诉由是制度性的违约,还是个案的违约?救济方式是违约之诉,还是非违约之诉或者特情之诉?有关知识产权的执法措施的审查标准和举证责任如何确定?所有这些问题是通过谈判修改 TRIPS 协定,还是由WTO 争端解决机构(专家组和上诉机构)通过司法判例途径解决?本文结合 WTO争端解决机构(专家组和上诉机构)的司法判例就上述问题进行探讨和研究。

Provisions on the Administration Of Foreign-invested Advertising Enterprises

The Provisions on the Administration of Foreign-invested Advertising Enterprises,which were amended by the State Administration for Industry & Commerce(SAIC)and the MOFCOM,is hereby promulgated and shall enter into force as of October 1,2008.

Provisional Regulations for Foreign Businessmen to Run Investment Companies in China

With a view to encouraging foreigninvestors to in vest in China, andimporting overseas advanced technologyand management, expertise, foreigninvestors are permitted to run in vestment-nature companies (hereinafter referred toas investment co.)in China in accordancewith the Chinese related foreigninvestment laws, decrees rules and theRegulations.Article 1 In the Regulations, the investmentco. is that the foreign investors useexclusive capital or joint capital with theChinese investors to run a company inChina engaged in direct in vestment.

International Telecommunication Union Standardization for Trust Provisioning in Information, Communication and Technology Infrastructure toward Achieving United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals

The advancement of the fourth industrial revolution has shaped the integration and interaction of different information, communication and technologies (ICTs) in the merging cyber, physical, and social infrastructures. The impact of ICT has accelerated the progress of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) and influenced the evolution of smart, sustainable, stable society development. Making the trustworthy information and communication technologies infrastructure widely available will promote the community innovation needed to stimulate domestic economics, provide decent work, and reduce inequalities. This article attempts to outline a big picture about the International Telecommunication Union (ITU)’s trust provisioning framework, including its motivation, current status, and application for achieving the UN SDGs by 2030. This article first describes the purpose of the UN SDGs and the evolution of the industrial revolution, then demonstrates the challenges of global risks affecting the fourth industrial revolution and the need for trustworthy ICT infrastructures. Subsequently, the article evaluates the ITU trust provisioning framework and assesses its applications in the future knowledge society, trust provisioning ecosystem, and cyber, physical, and social infrastructure toward achieving UN SDGs. Use cases are also presented in this article to show the effectiveness of the ITU trust provisioning framework on achieving UN SDGs.

Provisional Regulations on Directing Foreign Investment

Article 1 These regulations are formulated according to the rules of the State Law on foreign investment and the requirements of industrial policies to direct foreign investment, ensuring that it adapts to the programmes of China’s national economy and social development and protecting the legal rights and interests of investors.

Instructions for Authors

1.Aims The provision of low carbon energy to our society is a key issue at the heart of sustainable development of global energy supply.The Global Energy Interconnection(GEI)publishes original research on theories and developments as well practical applications on principles of large scale low carbon energy generation,transmission,distribution&storage technologies,global energy interconnection&system developments,global energy policy and energy market operations,global climate changes&environmental impacts,global energy transition strategies and global energy governance.