Efficiency and Productivity in the Spanish Food Distribution Sector

This study investigated the efficiency and productivity change of a sample of food distribution units (MERCAs) in Spain over the 1.997-1.999 period, applying non-parametric frontier methodology in a sales efficiency framework. We specified a mean sales model composed of two blocks of variables, the production block, and the marketing management block. Then we applied output oriented DEA methodology to perform the efficiency analysis, also taking into account the overall efficiency decomposition into pure and scale efficiency. The Malmquist index was calculated in order to analyse the components of the productivity change. The mean pure sales efficiency index was high, around 0.8, the mean scale index being 0,9. As appears from the results, six food distribution units were efficient, but some of the wholesale markets need to adapt their sales technology in order that their input bundle reaches a Most Productive Scale Size unit. We found no evidence of technical change during the period considered, but concluded that a notable scale efficiency change took place during the studied period. To summarise, we conclude that improvement in sales efficiency could be reached in the studied sector in both the pure and the scale efficiency.Efficiency, Productivity, DEA method, Malmquist index, Food Distribution Unit, Productivity Analysis,

Alberto Lista: An anglophile pioneer in Spanish translation

Alberto Lista es una figura pionera en la traducción literaria española. Una persona multicultural del siglo dieciocho, miembro de un grupo literario en Sevilla que tornó su mirada hacia la literatura inglesa en una época en la que la mayoría de los escritores españoles estaban centrándose en la musa francesa. Es un representante de la Ilustración. Su legado literario incluye poemas de realización propia, trabajos traducidos desde otras lenguas así como obras que están inspiradas en literatura foránea. Lista, educado bajo las doctrinas estéticas de André, Batteux, Marmontel y Blair se dedicó a una poesía de factura cuidada y de retórica sublime. Los poemas traducidos muestran su predilección por la poesía filosófica y cosmopolita similar a la de Meléndez y Cienfuegos. Le corresponde un lugar pionero por haber traducido tanto a Milton como a Alexander Pope al español, cuando la traducción de poesía de latitudes extranjeras se consideraba como un ejercicio infructuoso. Lista y el grupo hispalense representan un nuevo amanecer en la cultura española y allanan el camino para escritores venideros tales como Belmonte Müller o Juan Valera.G.I. HUM 767 (ayudas a Grupos de Investigación de la Junta de Andalucía) / Editorial Comares (colección interlingua

The Impact of Information Technology in Trade Facilitation on Small and Medium Enterprises in the Philippines

The paper is focusing on electronic lodgment through web-based applications of value-added service providers as the IT-based trade facilitation measure, the survey of Customs Brokers conducted in this study revealed that lodgment time in the Philippines dropped to one hour or less as a result, compared to previous lodgment times of one and a half to one day.Information Techonology, Trade Facilitation, SME, Philippines

High order and energy preserving discontinuous Galerkin methods for the Vlasov-Poisson system

We present a computational study for a family of discontinuous Galerkin methods for the one dimensional Vlasov-Poisson system that has been recently introduced. We introduce a slight modification of the methods to allow for feasible computations while preserving the properties of the original methods. We study numerically the verification of the theoretical and convergence analysis, discussing also the conservation properties of the schemes. The methods are validated through their application to some of the benchmarks in the simulation of plasma physics.Comment: 44 pages, 28 figure

Discrete choice modelling incorporating attribute thresholds of perception

In this paper we formulate a discrete choice model that incorporates thresholds in the perception of attribute changes. The model considers multiple options and allows changes in several attributes. We postulate that if thresholds exist they could be random, differ between individuals, and even be a function of socio-economic characteristics and choice conditions. Our formulation allows estimation of the parameters of the threshold probability distribution starting from information about choices. The model is applied to synthetic data and also to real data from a stated preference survey. We found that where perception thresholds exist in the population, the use of models without them leads to errors in estimation and prediction. Clearly, the effect is more relevant when the typical size of change in the attribute value is comparable with the threshold, and when the contribution of this attribute in the utility function is substantial. Finally, we discuss the implications of the threshold model for estimation of the benefits of transport investments, and show that where thresholds exist, models that do not represent them can overestimate benefits substantially

Explaining inflation and output volatility in Chile : an empirical analysis of forty years

We present a data oriented analysis of the effect of different kind of economic shocks on Chilean output growth and inflation over the last 40 years. Two important results are: (1) foreign shocks only explain 17% of the variability of the output growth in the period 1984-2006 whereas it used to account for the 47,2% of output variability in 1966-1983; (2) The participation of foreign shocks to explain the Chilean inflation reaction becomes more importan in the last twienty years because of the price liberalization and Chile's openness to international trade. Results highlight specific features of the Chilean economy not present in other countries.

MODELLING THE DISCRETE AND INFREQUENT OFFICIAL INTEREST RATE CHANGE IN THE UK

This paper is an empirical analysis of the manner in which official interest rates are determined by the Bank of England. We use a nonlinear framework that allow for the separate study of factors affecting the magnitude of positive and negative interest rate changes as well as their probabilities. Using this approach, new kinds of monetary shocks are defined and used to evaluate their impact on the UK economy. Among them, unanticipated negative interest rate changes are especially important. The model generalizes previous approaches in the literature and provides a rich methodology to understand central banks’ decisions and their consequences.

Achievable DoF-delay trade-offs for the K-user MIMO interference channel with delayed CSIT

©2016 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.The degrees of freedom (DoFs) of the K-user multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) interference channel are studied when perfect, but delayed channel state information is available at the transmitter side (delayed CSIT). Recent works have proposed schemes improving the DoF knowledge of the interference channel, but at the cost of developing transmission involving many channel uses (long delay), thus increasing the complexity at both transmitter and receiver side. This paper proposes three linear precoding strategies, limited to at most three phases, based on the concept of interference alignment, and built upon three main ingredients: delayed CSIT precoding, user scheduling, and redundancy transmission. In this respect, the interference alignment is realized by exploiting delayed CSIT to align the interference at the non-intended receivers along the space-time domain. Moreover, a new framework is proposed where the number of transmitted symbols and duration of the phases is obtained as the solution of a maximization problem, and enabling the introduction of complexity constraints, which allows deriving the achievable DoF as a function of the transmission delay, i.e., the achievable DoF-delay trade-off. Finally, the latter part of this paper settles that the assumption of time-varying channels common along all the literature on delayed CSIT is indeed unnecessary.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Muon energy reconstruction in ANTARES and its application to the diffuse neutrino flux

The European collaboration ANTARES aims to operate a large neutrino telescope in the Mediterranean Sea, 2400 m deep, 40 km from Toulon (France). Muon neutrinos are detected through the muon produced in charged current interactions in the medium surrounding the detector. The Cherenkov light emitted by the muon is registered by a 3D photomultiplier array. Muon energy can be inferred using 3 different methods based on the knowledge of the features of muon energy losses.They result in an energy resolution of a factor \~ 2 above 1 TeV. The ANTARES sensitivity to diffuse neutrino flux models is obtained from an energy cut, rejecting most of the atmospheric neutrino background which has a softer spectrum. Fake upgoing events from downgoing atmospheric muons are rejected using dedicated variables. After 1 year of data taking, the ANTARES sensitivity is E^2 dF/dE < 8 10^-8 GeV cm^-2 s^-1 sr^-1 for a 10 string detector and an E^-2 diffuse flux spectrum.Comment: May 200