Supplier certification and quality investment in supply chains

Global sourcing has made quality management a more challenging task, and supplier certification has emerged as a solution to overcome suppliers' informational advantage about their product quality. This article analyzes the impact of certification standards on the supplier's investment in quality, when a buyer outsources the production process. Based on our results, deterministic certification may lead to under‐investment in quality improvement technology for efficient suppliers, thereby leading to potential supply chain inefficiency. The introduction of noisy certification may alleviate this under‐investment problem, when the cost of information asymmetry is high. While allowing noisy certification always empowers the buyer to offer a menu to screen among heterogeneous suppliers, the buyer may optimally choose only a limited number of certification standards. Our analysis provides a clear‐cut prediction of the types of certifiers the buyer should use for heterogeneous suppliers, and we identify the conditions under which the supplier benefits from noisy certification. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2013     

构建土地资源管理专业人才培养方案与体系的探讨

本文以石河子大学理学院新审批土地资源管理专业为例,根据土地科学的学科性质和土地管理实际工作对人才规格的需求,结合兵团实际,主要从人才培养目标定位、课程体系构建,师资队伍培养、实践教学体系及实践教学平台搭建等四个方面对该专业人才培养方案与体系进行了初步的探索与实践。     

高中生饮酒行为及心理影响因素研究——以石河子市某高中为例

目的：研究高中生饮酒现状及相关心理影响因素。方法：采用问卷调查的方法,对在石河子市某高中就读的500名学生进行问卷调查研究工具：酒精使用障碍筛查量表（AUDIT）。UCLA孤独量表（第三版）。焦虑自评量表（SAS）结果：①高中生中不饮酒者323人,占受调查人数”．9％,饮酒学生114人;占受调查人数26．1％。饮酒者中男生74人,占39．6％,女性40人。占16％。②高中生饮酒情况因年级、性别、母亲饮酒、朋友饮酒而有所差异（P〈0．05）。具体表现为：男性、高年缴、母亲饮酒者、朋友饮酒者,其自身饮酒情况较重。③高中生饮酒与孤独感负相关,与焦虑正相关（上述结果p〈0．05）。     

纯方位目标运动状态的极大似然估计及迭代算法

针对非线性最小二乘法在国内目标运动分析中应用较少的现状,首先在二维平面内推导出关于纯方位目标运动状态的极大似然估计的计算公式并给出了基于高斯-牛顿迭代算法的计算过程及步骤,随后分析了极大似然估计的性能和迭代算法的收敛性.仿真计算的结果表明:当迭代初值与目标真实状态充分接近时,用所推导出的计算公式能够快速稳定地得到关于目标运动状态的极大似然估计,迭代算法形式简洁,计算量小.该研究成果可应用于舰艇作战系统目标被动跟踪定位软件.     

Book reviews

Book Review: The Future of the Defence Firm: New Challenges, New Directions. Edited by Andrew Latham and Nicholas Hooper NATO ASI Series, Kluwer Academic Publishers ISBN 0–7923–3268–7

James E. Payne and Anandi P. Sahu (eds.) Defense Spending &; Economic Growth, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993.     

Missile systems: “Flexible modularity” and incremental technological change in military production∗

It is often stated that technological change in the military field is characterised by the introduction of radical innovations rather than by incremental processes of technological change. This article illustrates the diversity of military innovation by arguing that technological change in missiles systems is dominated by incremental change. While some large weapons platforms display the design rigidities normally associated with complex systems, missiles are characterised by “flexible modularity”. Flexible modularity facilitates the continuous introduction of upgrades, and makes missile systems amenable to gradual technological change. Besides, it has significant implications for the future role of missile systems, and poses special problems for missile disarmament and technology control initiatives.     

A RANDOM RATIONING MECHANISM WHICH REDUCES THE RISKS OF NO SON LEFT AT HOME

This paper empirically re‐examines the long‐run co‐movements and the causal relationships between GDP and defence expenditures in a multivariate model with real defence expenditure per capita (ME), real GDP per capita (GDP), and real capital stock per capita (K). We apply the view of the aggregate production function to construct the empirical model. Using up‐to‐date data for 27 OECD countries and 62 non‐OECD countries for the 1988–2003 period, we combine cross‐sectional and time series data to re‐investigate the relationship between GDP and ME. Previous studies using time series data may have yielded misleading results on account of the short time span of typical datasets. By contrast, we use recently developed panel unit root tests and heterogeneous panel cointegration tests, and conclude that there is fairly strong evidence in favour of the hypothesis of a long‐run equilibrium relationship between GDP and ME. The long‐run panel regression parameter results, such as the fully modified OLS, indicate that a positive relationship between GDP and ME only holds for OECD countries, whereas a negative relationship from ME to GDP only exists in non‐OECD countries under examination and in the panel as a whole. Furthermore, by implementing the dynamic panel‐based error correction model, we determine that GDP and ME lack short‐run causalities, but do show long‐run bidirectional causalities in both OECD and non‐OECD countries.