Revista Internacional de Economia e Ciências de Gestão

This paper focus on the examination of the competitive positioning of textiles, clothes and leather (TCL) sectors, in the actual context of integration within Europe. The first aim of the paper is to empirically confirm the relation between the strong competition from emerging market economies and the regional job loss in these sectors. Secondly, we argue that localised capabilities are important factors for the economic resilience of TCL firms in the global economy. Using clustering analysis, a set of 13 Southern European Nuts 2 regions was selected because of their strong specialization on TCL industries. For the selected regions, data on the evolution of TCL trade balance was compared with performance indicators (firm density, employment and investment per capita in TCL). The results allow to examine the relationship between the liberalisation process and the evolution of job loss and disinvestment, in regions whose economic tissues are not able to provide employment alternatives.

The paper examined the efficacy of financial incentives in motivating employees of ICT medium scale enterprises. Seven financial incentives (profit sharing, bonus, premium pay, stock options, cash bonus, and commission and retirement savings incentives) were examined in the paper. Convenience sampling techniques was adopted with a sample size of 167. Descriptive tools involving percentages, frequency distributions and cumulative frequency was used to analyze the data. The result confirmed that cash bonus, premium pay and profit sharing constitute the effective financial incentive entrepreneurs used in motivating their employees. Senior staffs of the establishment were found to be the major beneficiary of retirement savings incentives.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are often credited with innovative entrepreneurial practices and conceiving new market opportunities. Government has reinforced these positive economic externalities through policy programmes and designated support structures. Venture capital organisations often galvanise innovative knowledge by entrenching and sustaining nascent businesses through value-creating funding behaviours. In this way, the venture capital industry financially supports entrepreneurial activity for economic growth and governs and nurtures the growth of the SMEs. These show that the venture capital industry embraces value-creating opportunities on the basis of rational partnerships with enterprises that have limited track records and less formal control mechanisms. The tentative factor analysis findings suggest an integrated framework for the venture capital industry from the significant inter-correlations among the variables. The most important focus of this article, however, is its attempt to examine the behavioural traits of SMEs and venture capitalists regarding systematic finance and investment for inclusivity and due diligence.

This study comprehensively evaluated the impact and links between human resource practices and employees performance of the textile sector of Pakistan. This is achieved by developing and testing the model based on human resource practices including recruitment and selection, training and performance appraisal as independent variables on the employee?s performance as a dependent variable. This study also helps us to understand the significance of human resource practices on the employee?s performance. Questionnaires along with cover letter were sent to the different textile mills and used for the study purpose. Research findings prove significant relationship of Human Resource Management practices and employees performance.

The Penn World Table 7.0 is a comprehensive database covering measures of GDP and its components for almost all countries over the period 1960-2009. We explore the relationship between government expenditure, as a share of GDP, and economic growth, as annual change in real GDP per capita for 155 countries over the period 1970-2009 utilizing a Solow growth model. We utilize a battery of statistical tests to analyze the data including panel unit root tests and panel regression methods. The complete panel results are compared to various subsets. The results indicate that there is an inverse relationship with government expenditure and economic growth and that there is a positive relationship with private investment and economic growth. Thus, much of government expenditure appears to either have been used inefficiently or not for the promotion economic growth, while private investment on the other hand does lead to increased economic growth.

The Turkey?s new policy that is called ?Zero Problems with Neighbors? and increasing trade volume between Turkey and Middle East has ushered the idea of new regional cooperation in the Middle East. In July 2010 a multilateral regional free trade agreement was signed between Turkey, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, the so-called ?Close Neighbors Economic and Trade Association Council? (CNETAC). The council envisages establishing a free-trade and visa free area. In addition it aims improving the cooperation in trade, transport, tourism and energy. This paper attempts to make a formal analysis of these issues, and estimates a gravity model of trade and migration flows to examine whether intra-region is lower or higher than what is predicted by an economic model. The results indicate that the variables traditionally included in the gravity equation present the expected signs and highlight the role played by intra-bloc effects. The estimated coefficients present, in most cases, the expected signs and magnitudes.

Over the past few decades, the issue of corruption, in terms of the abuse of public office for private gain, has attracted both academicians and policy makers. Corruption scandals, as well as other reasons, have toppled governments in both major industrial countries and developing countries. Corruption, per se, is a phenomenon that exists in societies from an early age. In fact, it is a phase which all countries go through before they reach maturity. In developed countries, social, political and judicial reforms are now intertwined and streamlined to reduce cases of corruption. This practice has now been prompted with the conception that, at least in developing countries, corruption is a serious obstacle to development. To date, no empirical research has yet been conducted to provide evidence that these elements fully describe corruption. This text is left to further research. Regression analysis shows that when a country manages to improve its standing on the corruption index from 6 to 8, it will experience a 4 percent point increase in its investment rate and a 0.5 percent point increase in its annual per capita GDP growth rate. In addition, the government of the country in question will raise its spending on education by 0.5 of 1 percent of GDP. Those large effects suggest that policies to curb corruption could have significant payoffs. This paper aims at conducting an empirical investigation of the relation between the level of development in developing countries and their standing vis-a-vis the corruption index. In this context, the paper will test the relation between Corruption and distortion resource allocation in ESCWA countries as the required data is available. This paper concluded that one point improvement of corruption will increase public spending on education and health by 0.016 and 0.07 of GDP respectively.

Money is not only the facilitator of the economic exchanges, but affects the national identity of citizens and authority of governments and would be treated as a tool to empower governments. Today, monetary policies controlling becomes difficult, so slashing zeros from the national currency can be employed as a part of the economic reforms package. Removing zeros from the national currency per se cannot be effective to eliminate inflation. It should be carried out in the framework of a series of important economic reforms. Taking advantage of similar experiences of the other countries will lead to better, faster and less expensive consequences; hence, the condition in which zeros were removed from the national currencies of some countries is analyzed in this paper and their experiences will be used to cut zeros off of the Iranian currency. Likewise, Iranian economic status quo, advantages and disadvantages caused by lopping zeros from the Iranian national currency and finally conclusion and propositions will be dealt with in this study.

This paper focus on the examination of the competitive positioning of textiles, clothes and leather (TCL) sectors, in the actual context of integration within Europe. The first aim of the paper is to empirically confirm the relation between the strong competition from emerging market economies and the regional job loss in these sectors. Secondly, we argue that localised capabilities are important factors for the economic resilience of TCL firms in the global economy. Using clustering analysis, a set of 13 Southern European Nuts 2 regions was selected because of their strong specialization on TCL industries. For the selected regions, data on the evolution of TCL trade balance was compared with performance indicators (firm density, employment and investment per capita in TCL). The results allow to examine the relationship between the liberalisation process and the evolution of job loss and disinvestment, in regions whose economic tissues are not able to provide employment alternatives.

The purpose of this study was to explain physical distribution service quality in the soft drinks? demand chain using the collaboration dimensions of information sharing, incentive alignment and decision synchronization. The study was motivated by the desire to explore an area that has been understudied in Uganda and also make a contribution by providing knowledge on the factors affecting the performance of soft drinks? distribution chains. Data was collected from manufacturers and distributors in Kampala District. The findings revealed that the collaboration dimensions were significant predictors of physical distribution service quality. Incentive alignment was found to be a significant predictor of physical distribution service quality while decision synchronization and information sharing were insignificant predictors. This study makes numerous contributions that have been highlighted and also provides implications for theory and practice.

The paper examined the efficacy of financial incentives in motivating employees of ICT medium scale enterprises. Seven financial incentives (profit sharing, bonus, premium pay, stock options, cash bonus, and commission and retirement savings incentives) were examined in the paper. Convenience sampling techniques was adopted with a sample size of 167. Descriptive tools involving percentages, frequency distributions and cumulative frequency was used to analyze the data. The result confirmed that cash bonus, premium pay and profit sharing constitute the effective financial incentive entrepreneurs used in motivating their employees. Senior staffs of the establishment were found to be the major beneficiary of retirement savings incentives.

The paper examined the efficacy of financial incentives in motivating employees of ICT medium scale enterprises. Seven financial incentives (profit sharing, bonus, premium pay, stock options, cash bonus, and commission and retirement savings incentives) were examined in the paper. Convenience sampling techniques was adopted with a sample size of 167. Descriptive tools involving percentages, frequency distributions and cumulative frequency was used to analyze the data. The result confirmed that cash bonus, premium pay and profit sharing constitute the effective financial incentive entrepreneurs used in motivating their employees. Senior staffs of the establishment were found to be the major beneficiary of retirement savings incentives.

The application of fractional cointegration technique is very important in resolving the Rogoff?s (1996) puzzle of purchasing power parity (PPP). By allowing deviations from equilibrium to follow a fractionally integrated process, the fractional cointegration analysis can explain the persistence of a wider range of mean-reversion behaviour better than the standard cointegration analyses. Our empirical results which based on monthly data from January 1990 to September 2008 period illustrate that the PPP reversion exists and can be characterized by a fractionally integrated process in three out of four moneys. Using these results, we can analyze the modified GPH estimator, which has obviously lower bias. The econometric results obtained from the GPH tests hold PPP as a long-run occurrence, though significant short-run deviations from PPP can exist. Therefore, the fractional cointegration analysis permits the deviations from the equilibrium to follow a fractionally integrated process and hence captures a much wider group of research of parity or mean-reversion behavior.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are often credited with innovative entrepreneurial practices and conceiving new market opportunities. Government has reinforced these positive economic externalities through policy programmes and designated support structures. Venture capital organisations often galvanise innovative knowledge by entrenching and sustaining nascent businesses through value-creating funding behaviours. In this way, the venture capital industry financially supports entrepreneurial activity for economic growth and governs and nurtures the growth of the SMEs. These show that the venture capital industry embraces value-creating opportunities on the basis of rational partnerships with enterprises that have limited track records and less formal control mechanisms. The tentative factor analysis findings suggest an integrated framework for the venture capital industry from the significant inter-correlations among the variables. The most important focus of this article, however, is its attempt to examine the behavioural traits of SMEs and venture capitalists regarding systematic finance and investment for inclusivity and due diligence.

The pace of globalization is increasing continuously in terms of markets for goods and services, investment opportunities across borders amongst others. Enterprises face competition from all fronts. Human resource management is not left out in this transformation crusade as it has obligation to move along with the changing demands of the globalization process. One of the objectives of this paper is to show that effective managers should constantly be aware of the changes taking place in domestic (home country) environment, as well as around the globe (international and foreign environments) on HR issues and developments. By so doing, they can scan their environment on an ongoing basis, and when they detect opportunities and/or threats, they can transform their organization to seize the opportunities and/or combat or neutralize the threats as the case may be. In this presentation, problems, issues and trends in HRM practice in Nigeria in the current period were reviewed. The factors affecting HRM and its practice in a global context and what should be the direction of the profession and its practice in Nigeria constitute the main focus of this paper.