The European Regulatory Response to the Volcanic Ash Crisis Between Fragmentation and Integration

More than twenty years after the EU eliminated its internal land borders, the Union still lacks an integrated airspace. This seems to be the most immediate regulatory lesson of the recent volcanic ash crisis. Yet more research is needed before establishing its net effects. In this brief report, I will provide a first-hand analysis of the regulatory answer developed across Europe in the aftermath of the eruption of the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull. While reconstructing the unfolding of the events and the procedures followed by the regulators, I will attempt to address some of the questions that I have repeatedly asked myself when stranded in Washington DC between 16 and 25 April 2010. Who did the assessment of the hazard posed by volcanic ash to jetliners? Who was competent to take risk management decisions, such as the controversial flight bans? Is it true that the safe level of volcanic ash was zero? How to explain the shift to a new safety threshold (of 2,000 mg/m3) only five days after the event? Did regulators overact? To what extent did they manage the perceived risk rather than the actual one? At a time when the impact of the volcanic ash cloud crisis is being closely scrutinised by both public authorities and the affected industries, it seems particularly timely to establish what happened during the worst aviation crisis in European history. This report was written one week after the event and relied on a limited number of sources available by 30 April 2010.

Comparing Regulatory Oversight Bodies Across the Atlantic: The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the US and the Impact Assessment Board in the EU

‘Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?’ asked the Roman poet Juvenal – ‘who will watch the watchers, who will guard the guardians?’1 As legislative and regulatory processes around the globe progressively put greater emphasis on impact assessment and accountability, (Verschuuren and van Gestel 2009, Hahn and Tetlock 2007), we ask: who oversees the regulators? Although regulation can often be necessary and beneficial, it can also impose its own costs. As a result, many governments have embraced, or are considering embracing, regulatory oversight--frequently relying on economic analysis as a tool of evaluation.We are especially interested in the emergence over the last four decades of a new set of institutional actors, the Regulatory Oversight Bodies (ROBs). These bodies tend to be located in the executive (or sometimes the legislative) branch of government. They review the flow of new regulations using impact assessment and benefit-cost analysis, and they sometimes also appraise existing regulations to measure and reduce regulatory burdens. Through these procedures of regulatory review, ROBs have become an integral aspect not only of regulatory reform programs in many countries, but also of their respective administrative systems. Although most academic attention focuses on the analytical tools used to improve the quality of legislation, such as regulatory impact assessment (RIA) or benefit-cost analysis, this chapter instead identifies the key concepts and issues surrounding the establishment and operation of ROBs across governance systems. It does so by examining and comparing the oversight mechanisms that have been established in the United States and in the EU and by critically looking into their origins, rationales, mandates, institutional designs and scope of oversight.

Equalizzazione e decodifica iterative per sistemi MC CDMA

in questa tesi considerareremo i sistemi MC-CDMA i uniscono le caratteristiche della modulazione multiportante OFDM con quelle dell’acceso multiplo CDMA. Per migliorarne ulteriormente le prestazioni, si ricorre anche alla codifica di canale realizzata mediante l’uso di codici “turbo” che hanno una elevata capacità di correzione degli errori e tecniche di equalizzazione iterativa del canale che avvalendosi del feedback dei dati in uscita dal decoder turbo, iterazione dopo iterazione, consentono una migliore stima del canale, una migliore equalizzazione dello stesso e quindi una migliore rilevazione dei dati trasmess

Isolation and characterization of three members of the multigenic family encoding ACC oxidase from H. brasiliensis during plant development : [Draft]

Applying Ethephon, an ethylene releaser, to increase rubber production in H. brasiliensis has been practised for a long time. The effect of ethylene on latex production has been amply described, notably for lengthening latex flow and its regeneration. Nevertheless, little is known about the expression of genes involved in ethylene biosynthesis and response to ethylene. In this paper, we isolated and characterized genes encoding ACC oxidase, a key enzyme in ethylene biosynthesis in the plant. We then studied the effect of ethylene stimulation on the expression of ACO genes in various tissues during plant development. Three members of the ACO multigenic family were isolated from a bark cDNA library with RACE technology: HbACO-H4, HbACO-H5, and HbACO-O48. Full length cDNA sequences encoded for peptides of 318, 315, and 318 amino acids respectively for these 3 members, which had 79 to 92% protein identity and 75 to 86% nucleotide homology between them. Two genomic sequences were isolated: HbACO-H4, which was 1504 bp long and consisted of 2 introns and 3 exons, while Hb-ACO-H5 was 1456 bp long and consisted of 3 introns and 4 exons. These three genes were differentially expressed in different plant organs in response to ethylene stimulation. (Résumé d'auteur

Comparing Regulatory Oversight Bodies Across the Atlantic: The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the US and the Impact Assessment Board in the EU

‘Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?’ asked the Roman poet Juvenal – ‘who will watch the watchers, who will guard the guardians?’ As legislative and regulatory processes around the globe progressively put greater emphasis on impact assessment and accountability, we ask: who oversees the regulators? Although regulation can often be necessary and beneficial, it can also impose its own costs. As a result, many governments have embraced, or are considering embracing, regulatory oversight--frequently relying on economic analysis as a tool of evaluation. We are especially interested in the emergence over the last four decades of a new set of institutional actors, the Regulatory Oversight Bodies (ROBs). These bodies tend to be located in the executive (or sometimes the legislative) branch of government. They review the flow of new regulations using impact assessment and benefit-cost analysis, and they sometimes also appraise existing regulations to measure and reduce regulatory burdens. Through these procedures of regulatory review, ROBs have become an integral aspect not only of regulatory reform programs in many countries, but also of their respective administrative systems. Although most academic attention focuses on the analytical tools used to improve the quality of legislation, such as regulatory impact assessment (RIA) or benefit-cost analysis, this chapter instead identifies the key concepts and issues surrounding the establishment and operation of ROBs across governance systems. It does so by examining and comparing the oversight mechanisms that have been established in the United States and in the EU and by critically looking into their origins, rationales, mandates, institutional designs and scope of oversight

Do you mind my smoking? Plain packaging of cigarettes under the TRIPS agreement

Plain packaging, a new tobacco control tool that a growing number of countries are considering, mandates the removal of all attractive and promotional aspects of tobacco product packages. As a result of plain packaging, the only authorized feature remaining on a tobacco package is the use of the brand name, displayed in a standard font, size, colour and location on the package. In opposing this new strategy, the tobacco industry is particularly keen on emphasizing the uselessness of plain packaging in reducing smoking rates and its incompatibility with trade mark provisions of international treaties. In particular, the tobacco industry and other regulated sectors believe that plain packaging jeopardizes trade mark rights and particularly contravenes several trade mark provisions outlined in the TRIPS Agreement and the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property. This article, after introducing the reader to the genesis and rationale of plain packaging within the broader context of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, offers a detailed analysis of the compatibility of this tobacco control tool with the international system for trade mark protection as enshrined in the TRIPS

How to nudge Barroso out of the revolving door

The appointment of former EC chief José Manuel Barroso as an adviser at Goldman Sachs has raised eyebrows, but many observers have fretted to comment that the move, though morally questionable, was entirely legal. But how legitimate is this defence in reality? Alberto Alemanno and Benjamin Bodson argue the time has come to redefine what we think of as tolerable in the political space and offer three avenues through which citizens can oppose this turn of events

The Case of Plain Packaging for Cigarettes - an Overview

Plain packaging of tobacco products is a new tobacco control tool which has been considered in recent times by several governments throughout the world. By standardizing the appearance of all cigarette boxes, plain packaging aims to make all packs look unattractive and render health warnings more prominent. Australia is set to become the first country in the world to introduce legislation requiring “plain packaging” for cigarettes. Plain packaging raises both health-related and legal tricky issues. Indeed, it is being persistently challenged not only by the tobacco industry as to its legality, but also in its genuine effectiveness.After summing up the state of the art of the debate triggered by this innovative tobacco control tool, this report predicts that plain packaging is a thorny issue which is likely to keep busy IPRs and WTO specialists as well as academics in the years to come