Category: Conversation

National Energy Supply and Demand Outlook

Having sufficient energy can support for the country in the stage of developing country like Myanmar. This is focuses on estimation of electricity demand & supply rate for future which can be supported to reduce the energy gap in long-term. Based on the methodologies and framework constructed to define what action and plan should be taken to fulfill the electricity demand for our country Myanmar. In order to make the research problems more specific and to find a solution based on the results of the research, the following statements are presented as research objectives:

1. To study the existing industries outputs capacity (supply);
2. To study the corresponding amount of energy consumption (demand);
3. To find the gap between supply and demand;
4. Finding gap information would be taken into account for ‘National Energy Master Plan’.

Introduction

Energy is vital for the country’s economic development. Myanmar is one of world’s fastest growing economies, after market liberalization during recent years, which has led to major international investment. It is widely forecasted that GDP growth rate is 8.73% per year from 1994 until 2017 (TRADINGECONOMICS, Central Bank of Myanmar 2018). The country has many of natural resources, competitive labor costs, an advantage location and opportunities in developing infrastructures as one of the Southeast Asia’s investment destinations. In order to be ready for the kind of foreign investment opportunity, provision of supply energy is one of the challenges as per focuses of energy demand. Myanmar energy supply and demand overview would be carried out based on below mentioned material and methods in topic IV.

Overview of Myanmar’s Energy Supply and Demand

Currently, from total households of nearly 11 million, and estimated 6 million households remain without electricity (Myanmar Living conditions Survey 2017, World Bank Data). In addition to electrify the powerless areas, robust economic and demographic growth pushes energy demand higher. Nationwide energy demand in Myanmar is rising fast for the availability and accessibility of modern energy resources to improve the living standards and support industrial activities.

Statistically, the consumption rate of electricity in Myanmar is increasing annually, and this is to be estimated and analyzed for demand forecast.

Overview of Yangon’s Energy Supply and Demand

Yangon is the capital city of Myanmar which is the economic zone and most developed area of our country with strongest electricity demand. Population of Myanmar is 54, 078,481 (worldometers,18 December 2018, Myanmar Population). In Yangon alone contains 5,157,461 people (UNdata, 2018). From 2016 data, shows that electricity consumption throughout Myanmar is limited to 2500 megawatts from both hydropower and thermal power production. The commercial capital of Yangon accounts for more than half of the country’s total consumption (The Irrawaddy, 2016).

Material and Methods

By using case study analysis method that is simplifies complex concepts for real life situations from different sides, different views to analyze and explore the data to find out the solutions. Moreover, we can get many useful information, solutions on the same subject, same problem. In this subject, we need to analyze the below data which can help to solve the challenge ‘how to find way to reduce the energy consumption gap for long term provision plan?’. In this research, I would like to use MARKEL and SPSS analysis tool for analyzing data. SPSS analysis for complex statistical data analyzing, processing and MARKEL tool which is used for methodology of energy environmental policy analysis, basic standard model that finds lease-cost solutions for directly comparable national results, set of national energy technology databases that are current and consistent, track record of transferring its soft technology to new users (etSap, MARKAL).

Finding the Gap Between Supply and Demand

Understanding how electricity demand evolves and grows over time helps plan investment for future. Forecasting demand is difficult, especially in developing country like Myanmar. Factors such as income and credit availability influence when households acquire energy-using assets. This is to find and research the gap between electricity supply, demand and targeting to long term plan to be addressed as per research questionnaires.

Household Energy Consumption Questionnaire Design

By using research statistics and case study methods, surveys were conducted in across Yangon and main townships were selected to ensure appropriate coverage across each state and region. The reports set out statistics from the surveys for urban and rural households covering to those areas such as:

• Households floor space, size, and income ranges;
• Household income, expenditure levels and expenditure on energy;
• Household appliance and usage of different fuel sources;
• Energy consumption per household;
• Fuel and appliance usage for water heating;
• Types of cooking appliances used in households;
• Energy sources used for lighting;
• Quantity of electricity and non-electricity energy consumed;
• Whether households are electrified and for how long;
• Appliances used in households;
• Energy fuel bill per month;
• Statistics on household vehicle usage (Asian Development Bank, Myanmar Energy Consumption Survey Report, 2017).

Industry Energy Consumption Survey Questionnaire Design

Currently, Yangon region has 29 industrial zones and one special economic zone (Myanmar Times, 2018). Questionnaires are designed to be flexible to account for the variations in the business operations of the industrial energy consumer and designed with below key feature of the survey:

• Plant location: important to determine or analyze the underlying fuel/energy source availability to a particular region;
• Process description: to better understanding of what energy source is used for and how to group business into general categories;
• Production and plant capacity: to gauge the size of operation and the total potential energy usage if the plant is at full capacity;
• Fuel consumption: this is to know type of fuel consumption which each business would rely on only several fuel types;
• Generation capability: to determine whether the facility is grid-connected, and/or has backup (Myanmar Energy Consumption Report, 2017).

Results

By using survey questionnaires methods to get quantitative and qualitative research data by sampling 1000 households, industrial zones covering all large and small to medium enterprise (SME) survey for some 100 premises including restaurants, hotels and business associations (Myanmar Energy Consumption Report, 2017). The information from respondents to be used for estimation the specific annual consumption rate. The information was come out from these respondents shows that firewood is mainly used for cooking (73%) and candles and torches for lighting (65%), followed by electricity for cooking (13%) and battery for lighting (17%) while the demand for modern energy sources is rapidly increasingly from per respondent’s data, data gathering, analyzing were performed and Myanmar energy supply and demand’s gap were addressed as below.

Myanmar is expected to consume about 4531 megawatts of electricity in 2020-2021. Currently, the total annual electricity production is 3189 megawatts with 1342 megawatts still needed to product more on demand (Win Khaing, Minister of Energy, ‘The global new light of Myanmar’, 2018).

Yangon region alone is expected to require 3,000 MW of electricity, in another words, Yangon will require the equivalent amount of current power consumption by the whole country from 2021 to 2022 (Su Hlaing, Assistant Manager, Yangon Electricity Supply Corporation, Myanmar Times, June 2018).

That’s the amount of electricity currently being generate across Myanmar, of which Yangon now consumes just over half at 1548 MW.

Conclusion

As per research findings, energy demand forecast, Myanmar is increasing more than 10% annually, and it is estimated that Myanmar is expected to consume more than 7000-8000 megawatts (MW) of electricity in 2025, where the current annual total electricity production is 3,200 MW, with around 4,000 MW still needed. After conducting work shop with all related parties, National Energy Policy as following is reported for government’s road map:

• To invite the local and foreign investments for the extraction and utilization of natural resources in order to fulfill the nation’s energy needs by minimizing the environmental impacts and practicing the HSE and corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities measures;
• To adopt prioritized plans on energy efficiency and conservation;
• To define the energy pricing by observing the ASEAN and international energy pricing policy for the affordable and reliable energy prices for end users and customers;
• Not only for increasing the power generation of hydropower, renewable energy sources, thermal power plants but also the feasible alternative energy sources;
• To establish the regional cooperation for energy by expanding the power grid and pipeline network to neighboring countries;
• To implement full-fledged power generation as short term and long-term plans in order to get stability of power generation;
• To establish energy database system and to draw and execute the energy supply plans.

References

1. Myanmar Energy Consumption Survey Report 2017, Retrieved from https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/…/myanmar-energy-consumption-surveys.pdf
2. Myanmar Living Conditions Survey, 2017. Retrieved From https://themimu.info/…/Report_Myanmar_Living_Conditions_Survey_2017_Jun2018.p…
3. Current Status of Myanmar’s Energy, Workshop On Energy Statistics for ASEAN Countries (2017). Retrieved From https://unstats.un.org/unsd/energy/meetings/2017a/7.3.pdf
4. Tim, D., Energy of Myanmar, International Growth Center (2016). Retrieved from https://www.theigc.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Dobermann-2016-1.pdf
5. Myanmar GDP Annual Growth Rate, TRADINGECONOMICS, https://tradingeconomics.com/myanmar/gdp-growth-annual?embed&embed/survey
6. Myanmar Population 2018, Retrieved from http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/myanmar-population/
7. Yangon Population 2018, Retrieved from http://worldpopulationreview.com/world-cities/yangon-population/
8. Myanmar Energy Still need to produce more on demand, Retrieved from http://www.globalnewlightofmyanmar.com/myanmars-growing-electricity-needs/
9. Yangon Electricity Consumption, News, The Irrawaddy 2016, Retrieved from https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/burma/burmas-electricity-demand-predicted-to- nearly-double-by-2020.html
10. Ben, F., (2018) What is SPSS. Retrieved from https://www.surveygizmo.com/resources/blog/what-is-spss/
11. MARKAL Analysis Tool. Retrieved from https://iea-etsap.org/index.php/etsaptool/model-generators/markal

Corruption, Hindrances To Ethical Practice And Quality Control In Forensic Science

CORRUPTION IN FORENSIC SCIENCE

ISSUE

Corruption or debasement is a type of unworthiness or criminal movement done by an individual or association endowed with a place of power, frequently to procure unlawful advantage and it might incorporate pay off. In view of late overview examines, the accompanying components have been ascribed as reasons for defilement which are voracity of cash, power and extravagance, larger amounts of market and political restraining infrastructure, low dimensions of majority rule government, low press and monetary opportunity and so forth. Legal sciences are identified with logical strategies for illuminating wrongdoings, including looking at the articles or substances that are associated with the wrongdoing. Follow proof examination is whatever is exchanged amid the responsibility of a wrongdoing.

As per Balko, notwithstanding when experts are not complicit in degenerate practices, inclination frequently prompts blame outcomes and there is no framework set up to keep these setbacks. While the outside academic network plays it safe to avert such oversights, scientific science comes up short on this basic part. Legal examination isn’t exactly equivalent to the logical strategy, for the most part since it has distinctive goals, said by Balko. Be that as it may, in case we will give it the heaviness of science, we have to figure out how to expose it to fundamental logical standards.

SOLUTION

As should be obvious, a standout amongst the most critical callings in a wrongdoing scene is Forensic. Investigative lab corruption happens much of the time in numerous nations which lead to gigantic accumulations in the conclusion of horrendous wrongdoings including sex ambushes. Debasement in criminological may demolish somebody’s life in only a split of second, the conclusion of a case can be changed, it resembles changing the law itself and it might harms somebody’s life who isn’t blameworthy. On the off chance that we inquired as to why this is going on, the most widely recognized answer will be insatiable for cash. Indeed, it is difficult to accept to imagine that somebody who has the influence and learning to distinguish the criminal will release him only for cash. This is what’s going on the planet. Debasements are all over the place and in each and every calling. With respect to aversion dependent on Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2009, the two gatherings who are engaged with defilement ought to be rebuffed by fine or detainment for their wrongdoing in spite of the individual’s position or position.

Another approach to counteract defilement happens is to stop the reason of debasement itself more often than not debasement happens in light of cash. So if the administration or a privately owned business expands the pay of the legal researcher, they don’t need to take reward or include in defilement since they as of now have enough cash for their own utilization.

Other than that, debasement by criminological researcher can be avert by having confirmation that they have done their work for instance, having CCTV in each working spots so they are not have the capacity to control the proof or to not disguise proof of specific cases.

HINDRANCES TO ETHICAL PRACTICE IN FORENSIC SCIENCE

Issue

A lawful analyst must not misshape or misrepresent his capacities. For instance Fred Salem Zain. He was a police logical ace in West Virginia and Texas for more than 10 years. With a style for being inducing inconceivable, he wrongly insisted in a few criminal cases and won favors with juries, judges, and agents who never tended to him. He slowly rose the venturing stool while certifying about tests he’d never anytime driven. At last, his work in West Virginia was criticized provoking dismissal of charges and disquieting of choices in various cases. He was charged for lie and distortion, anyway passed on in 2002 going before he could be arraigned. The above model shows precisely the measure of an impact a legitimate analyst’s assertion can have on a case and how it can decimate the lives of those included. The wonder of making up data in a sensible demand as opposed to getting it by methods for discernment and experimentation is known as dry labbing.

Another hazard to the decency of legitimate evidence is the closeness of tendency. Since quantifiable labs are regulatory affiliations, they are dependably in contact with the police and the prosecution and there is all over gigantic load on them to convey results which will incite a conviction, paying little regard to the real truth. Regardless of the way that the inspiration driving lawful science was to help the genuine equipment in meeting up at reality having consistent help, truth be told, it has transformed into the science that just helps law approval specialists. Besides, quantifiable scientists called as ace spectators by one assembling in a legitimate proceeding will by and large help that side much equivalent to a lawful guide as opposed to being objective in their judgment.

As indicated by D.S. Manhas and J.R. Gaur of the State Forensic Science Laboratory, Himachal Pradesh proposed two moral prerequisites that are Forensic researchers ought to be in fact capable and utilize dependable techniques for investigation and criminological researcher is to be straightforward concerning his capability or encounter and limit his answer to region of his aptitude.

Solution

To keep up a vital separation from or ease the impact of these issues, all controllers need to successfully add up to the material getting ready program for the picked request. Getting ready projects need to fuse units’ on morals and criminal and custom-based law. The wellness of the investigator ought to be assessed going before unreservedly working cases. Instruments to test the capacity of the auditor need to consolidate an ‘easily proven wrong court’ prologue to overview presentation aptitudes. A period of directed casework under the course of a practiced expert will fantastically help the new investigator in getting contribution and assurance. Irregular ability testing the expert, preferably with an outwardly hindered model, can fill in as an approach to evaluate specific aptitudes. Partner overview of all results point by point by the new auditor for a time allotment can ensure exact results. Finally, the investigator needs to hold quickly to a code of master lead or code of good practices. Most of the above are segments of a convincing Quality Assurance System. Further affirmations can be gotten if the lawful research focus accomplishes accreditation.

QUALITY CONTROL IN FORENSIC SCIENCE

ISSUE

Exactly when a thing of confirmation that could be critical to securing a conviction appears in court, judge and jury need to verify that it genuinely is imperative to the bad behavior. The principle strategy for fulfilling this essential is to make esteem key to everything the logical pro does with the evidence, from social occasion it to appearing in court. This trying quality isn’t confined to quantifiable science; it is found in most extraordinary ventures, from pharmaceuticals to avionics. The fundamental target is to offer things and organizations to individuals when all is said in done that are ensured and suitable. In criminological science, nature of evidence is basic assuming that first class verification isn’t submitted in court, the subject may go unpunished or, likewise, a guiltless individual may lose their opportunity.

The terms quality control and quality certification are frequently used on the other hand. In like manner, their suggestions may shift from place to put and between different kinds of development. Put basically, QC covers all the various activities done to fulfill quality necessities for a thing or organization. In criminological science, this may cover the need to run control tests while finishing a DNA examination or to follow exactly what was done in the minor examination of a hair test. The term QA is an increasingly broad one, covering the general game plan of overseeing evidence and fuses issues, for instance, staff getting ready and abilities and the lab condition. A tangled research focus, with no unquestionable chain of command of initiative, can’t sensibly be said to give extraordinary QA. In this article, the term QA/QC will be used to cover all parts of significant worth in logical examination.

Individuals who work in criminological science for the most part do as such in light of the fact that they have a distinct fascination in the subject and are persuaded to help fathom wrongdoings and see equity done. Notwithstanding, it isn’t obscure for a scientific examiner, perhaps under the worry of his or her outstanding burden or possibly for increasingly evil reasons, to lose or decimate proof, commit errors, or even to adulterate outcomes. The QA/QC framework ought to take into account the quick location and adjustment of this sort of occurrence.

A few factors that influence the nature of the measurable science results are chain of care that is proof that can be rendered unacceptable if the chain guardianship isn’t kept up. Next, conservation of proof, Forensic researcher need to save all proof in each viable case and to guarantee the proof isn’t ruined or demolished if the proof isn’t taken consideration appropriately the nature of the proof can diminishes. Other than that, testing of proof in view of numerous cases there is so much proof that examining turns into an issue. This regularly occurs with huge medication cases in which there might be hundreds or thousands of comparative shows; it can likewise be valid for bloodstains, filaments, or any sort of proof. The inverse may likewise be valid: inadequate example for finish or rehash examination. At last, at times any kind of investigation might be ruinous, and there is no open door for reanalysis.

Being a gifted methodical analyst is only an extensive bit of the battle in a logical science lab. The lawful scientist ought to in like manner have the ability to clear up his or her revelations to a judge or jury in an official court. This is one of the key factors that perceive callings in criminological science from those in various sciences.

There are different implications of a pro. For criminological science purposes, a master may be thought of as a person who has a mix of data, aptitudes, and limits in an explicit region that licenses the individual being referred to draw deductions from substances that the typical individual would not have the capacity to do. To say it obviously, a master get some answers concerning something than the typical individual and has the capabilities to show it. A master does not need a Ph.D. various masters have accumulated aptitude over various extensive stretches of involvement and probably won’t have much guidance. For example, expect that a man is killed while driving his vehicle in light of the way that the brakes failed and he crashed into a tree. In case a typical social event of people was to research the brakes of the vehicle, those people would not be prepared to choose why the brakes failed or paying little mind to whether they did. This would require the organizations of a pro worker to take a gander at the moderating system and after that settle on choices about it, why, and how the brakes failed. A qualification exists, regardless, between an authority and a lawful scientist: A professional is genuinely not a quantifiable specialist. That refinement is what this book is about.

Solution

With respect to lab examination of the confirmation, there will be Standard Operating Procedures and Standard Methods that must be sought after. These are formed bearings in regards to how to complete a given errand using suitably endeavored and attempted methodologies. These SOPs and SMs will change after some time, as new strategies, equipment. In addition, evidence creates. A court would, legitimately, not be enlivened to find that a logical research office was at the same time doing, for example, one of kind stamp examinations according to a method from the 1950s

Other than that The Forensic Science Regulator has attracted up plans to guarantee that the arrangement of legal science benefits over the criminal equity framework is liable to a proper routine of logical quality standard. His recommendations imply that all research facilities offering scientific science administrations to the Criminal Justice System should receive a quality administration framework. This necessity will apply to any police research center endeavor any kind of scientific science work: from screening displays to recovering body liquids and other follow proof for consequent examination. The Forensic Science Regulator is the point at which an association has no past understanding of structuring, actualizing and keeping up such quality benchmarks, particularly for a control as unpredictable as legal science, attempting to get ready for such can be an overwhelming errand this is the place The Forensic Science Regulator help and bolster their exploration in the meantime endeavor to build up their examination quality or to enhance them.

Professional Credentials

Issue

These incorporate deception of the accreditations under the watchful eye of the official courtroom. Deceptions incorporate instructive degree achievement proficient licensures or affirmations work history and information about past declarations, for example, number of times, areas, and so on. Frequently this is done to inspire the customer, the judge or jury to avoid the difficulties, for example, interrogation by misrepresenting the capabilities. Because of absence of assets and reality checking strategies, such embellishments are only here and there gotten, and such acts are dishonest and must be prevented.

In an occasion that a logical scientist is exceptional to the social occasions for the circumstance, or if the best system of the threatening party is to not test the analyst’s abilities as a pro, by then there may be an assention or stipulation among the get-togethers that the specialist is a master with the true objective of this preliminary or hearing in an explicit and consistently limit specific point. In such cases, the analyst wont’ need to examine singular capacities in court, and will not have to show instructive projects vitae for the record, yet normal practice is to do thusly. If there is such a stipulation, by then the ace’s capacities may not be comfirmed at whatever point in the midst of that case and the jury may never hear their capabilities. Once recognize by the court, a pro remains a master for the range of the methodology

CONCLUSION

The conclusion is every issue has a solution like the issues mentioned above. For the first issue which is Corruption in Forensic Science, the solution was topunish both parties who are involved in corruption by paying fine or imprisonment for their crime despite the person’s rank or position. Lastly, the third issue which is Quality Control in Forensic Science, the solution was the Forensic Science Regulator has drawn up plans to ensure that the provision of forensic science services across the criminal justice system is subject to an appropriate regime of scientific quality standard. His proposals mean that all laboratories offering forensic science services to the Criminal Justice System will have to adopt a quality management system. This requirement will apply to any police laboratory undertaking any type of forensic science work: from screening exhibits to retrieving body fluids and other trace evidence for subsequent analysis. The Forensic Science Regulator is when an organization has no previous experience of designing, implementing and maintaining such quality standards, especially for a discipline as complex as forensic science, trying to plan for such can be a daunting task this is where The Forensic Science Regulator help and support their research at the same time try to develop their research quality or to improve them. All the issues can be solved with the right and correct solution.

Discouragement Of Vandalism At Historical Sites By The Usage Of Virtual Technology

It is the land that breaths by its vivid pattern of culture, customs, traditions, and ancestral practices. This vividness resulted in the formation of a nation that has a strong history of evolution and architectural advancement. India is a diverse country with thousands of listed Historic Sites, preserved and maintained by various organizations, but in the last few decades, the increased number of footfalls and other factors of loss are being observed ensuing in the inefficiency of maintenance and tourist management system. This kind of culpability along with other social and religious influences, impacts preservation practice and maintenance of the site. Vandalism by human activities at historic sites has become a major sensitive issue of conservation. This content explores the probable behavioral change for the discouragement towards vandalism of Historic Sites through the engagement of virtual technology. This Paper extends to the framework towards the holistic approach of preventing vandalism through the learning and understanding of values associated with the heritage sites.

Introduction

With its colorful and versatile heritage, traditions, and customs, India has become a popular country amongst travelers, visitors, and architectural enthusiasts with millions of footfalls recorded on various Historic, Traditional, and Cultural sites each year. India has diversity at its par, right from food, clothing, lifestyle and language, even religion, cast, rituals, practices, and beliefs. Being a secular democratic republic nation, there is respect and acceptance of all kinds of practices performed by anyone within the law.

In recent decades the heritage sites are being used by the film industry for shoots and in a way promoting scenic adherence. This in turn resulted in the rising number of exploratory footfalls, and over the years it has been increased in a large number. This also created a disbalance between the managing committees and the heritage sites.

Despite the growing interest in heritage tourism, there is a surprising lack of understanding of how visitors define a heritage site and what activity of visiting a heritage site means to them. While some researchers have thought heritage to be” undefinable”, others have agreed that different types of heritage and heritage sites are distinguishable, namely, natural heritage, cultural heritage, and built heritage. Still, others have stated that the importance of heritage sites is their potential for educating the public. Yet, however useful they may be, these distinctions have been made by scholars and professionals. Do visitors themselves think of heritage sites in terms of nature, culture, and the built environment as predominantly educational places, or are known about visitors’ experiences with, definitions of perspectives on heritage tourism.

Vandalism: A social behavioral issue

Vandalism is an issue currently affecting a number of World Heritage properties. The term may refer to many types of property damage, such as graffiti, rubbish dumping, smashing off pieces of the heritage, or defacement of other kinds. Although, generally speaking, some acts of vandalism (particularly graffiti) may be seen by some as artistic in nature, this is certainly not the case, when considering World Heritage properties, and may constitute a significant threat to their integrity. Of course, a larger, more willful destruction of property for political or social reasons may also be considered vandalism. Vandalism may sometimes take place as isolated cases or maybe part of a pattern of damage over time. Unfortunately, however, this phenomenon is common in all regions of the world.

The most basic fact that emerges out as the reason for Vandalism is lack of cognizance amongst the tourists in India, also if we look at the old records of our film industry the easiest role that showcases the rich heritage of India usually shoots a romantic scene by carving names on the walls of historic structures. This makes tourists grab quick attention towards the unlawful act of Vandalism on the historic sites. Though eventually the use of such activities has been stopped in the films it has left a huge impact on the psychological behavior of the tourists as these activities are still continuing and have not stopped on the heritage structures.

Vandalism is a social phenomenon that becomes particularly apparent when one looks at the approaches which have been adopted to its investigation. Research into vandalism has tended as a rule to rely on the methodology of sociology and social psychology, despite the fact that the main actors of interest, i.e. the vandals themselves, are difficult to identify. Above all, however, the use of a general framework of social variables corresponding to targets, vandals, or the relationship between the two, highlights the social nature of vandalism.

During the past few years, it has been observed that some structures are still fronting the issue of vandalism despite awareness, this might be due to lack of maintenance and the old graffiti still influence the psychology of the visitors, not only graffiti but the defacing of historic elements still exists and provides excitement amongst some unkind minded visitors.

The most psychologically interesting c use of vandalism which is without tactical, ideological, play or revenge bases are that a senseless act is more reinforced than one that is understandable and predictable. A person makes his mark, gains his rep, is remembered or feared for behavior that is out of the ordinary, unaccountable, and unlikely to be performed by others in the same situation. A Justifiable act of violence or vandalism is situationally determined. Thus, almost anyone under the same situational forces would act similarly. To do a thing (or do in a thing) for its own sake is to show the arbitrariness of your personal power and the purely internal forces controlling the action.[4]

Awareness of Social Responsibility

Tourism research has widely addressed the significance and effect of the concept of place attachment originated from attachment theory, depicting the mother-infant link. This concept relates to “the process whereby an individual’s experiences with both the physical and social aspects of an environment results in the development of strong emotional bonds with that place”. In tourism, place attachment is analyzed as a multidimensional construct, which is constituted of two or more sub-constructs. The first dimension, place identity, refers to the cognitive link between the personal self and a place, representing the identification of the tourist with a certain place or with its symbolic value. The second, place dependence, relates to the functional aspect of place attachment, describing the importance of a specific place for specific activities and needs by tourists. The third, affective attachment, refers to the strong feeling tourists feel towards a place. The fourth, social bonding, relates to the social relations a specific place enhances. The question of whether place attachment is best described by two, or more, components is still open. In tourism, place attachment is also often described as “destination attachment” and linked to visitors’ loyalty to places, behavioral intentions, and pro-environmental behavior.

It is not easy to develop an understanding of the sense of place amongst the visitors. But this psychological understanding can create a huge impact on the discouragement of vandalism. The visitors shall understand the value of the place and the consequences of defacing the heritage.

Impact of Virtual Technology on Psychological paradigm

In recent years the virtual technology has proved to affect the behavior of the user whether it is by visual or audio or by using both simultaneously, Virtual technology provides a complete informative experience of the site and develops an understanding of the sense of belongingness with that site.

Humanity’s legacy can be unlocked and shared between people through digital representations. Digital representations can communicate elements of our cultural heritage in a variety of ways. For clarity, we can define three types that distinguish different uses for these representations, art and entertainment, visualization, and digital surrogates of the world we experience.[6]

Digital content can be fine art in its own right. It can also entertain. This content can also be used to visualize concepts and illustrate hypotheses. For example, a computer animation of a large asteroid impacting the Yucatan Peninsula 65 million years ago is helpful to visualize the cause of worldwide dinosaur extinction. These images are useful not because they faithfully show the shape and color of the actual asteroid moments before impact but because they effectively communicate an idea. Visualizations are speculative in nature to varying degrees. Current research is exploring ways to explicitly describe the extent of this speculation. Digital surrogates serve a different purpose. Their goal is reliably representing real-world content in a digital form. Their purpose is to enable scientific study and personal enjoyment without the need for the direct physical experience of the object or place. Their essential scientific nature distinguishes them from speculative digital representations.[6]

Despite several laws regarding the act of vandalism, the practice is continuously being performed, the reason that strikes the most is uninteresting and less attractive signboards and instructions that create the least connectivity and sense of responsibility of preservation. The probable initiatives proposed in this paper may foresee a creative and interesting arrangement of understanding and induce good and responsible behavior on the Historic sites discouraging the act of vandalism by visitors.

Proposal

According to the sociology of the visitors performing vandalizing behavior or defacing the heritage property, the act is prominently performed to express the presence or message that could be stopped by following proposed concepts.

• There has to be a proper continuous audio announcement at the entrance of each protected site, describing the consequences of vandalism and providing information about the historic importance of the site;
• There has to be a proper board not only at the entrance but in front of each structure, describing the lawful action that can be taken under the act of vandalism;
• Also, there has to be proper full legal information and code of conduct of tourists that have to be performed by tourists while visiting a site, there has to be deed mentioning that the tourist is bound to follow the code of conduct at the site, this all should be printed on each ticket purchased by the visitors;
• These can make the visitors aware of the unlawful activities that happen on the site and the ways to avoid them;
• Another proposal to change the behavioral psychology of vandalizing activity could be set up at the Information center or interpretation center.
• This can be achieved by giving Virtual reality experiences to visitors, in groups with proper VR gear, and providing information about the site, its importance, and a warning not to deface any of the heritage property;
• There should be a complete VR tour of that particular site provided to the visitors, to make their experience better than the actual site visit. Also, there should be an additional section in the VR experience of the places where the tourists are restricted to reach physically;
• One more proposal that can contribute to increasing the footfall and awareness about the local heritage sites can be attained with the help of audio-visual advertisements;
• This paper also proposes an idea of an advertisement about the unlawful act of defacing and vandalism of places of historic importance. The advertisements should be played at every movie theatre just as the ads of public interest are played.

Just as the state tourism department airs advertisements about the tourist destinations, in a similar way each movie theatre should play an advertisement describing the national importance of the ASI protected monuments at least including the World Heritage Sites identified by UNESCO, and make the audience aware of the unlawful activities performed under vandalism and defacing of heritage property.

Conclusion

This paper discusses and concludes about the behavioral psychology of tourists engaged in defacing and vandalizing the heritage property emerges with an intention of leaving a mark of the presence or a non-subjected message of emotions.

It is not an easy method of composition to guide the unlawfully excited minds but the proposal can contribute to lower down the activities of harm to the Heritage Structures.

The proposals might work as a footstone towards the change of behavioral pattern, built up a sense of responsibility and belongingness. To lower down the harmful activities on the structures the mentality should be changed and if possible one awareness program in every year should be conducted at the school level to create the responsible vision of the future coming generation towards our rich heritage and history associated with it. Striking on the behavior and psychology of all age levels and create awareness has become a necessity to lower down the act of vandalism for a better future of Conservation of heritage in our Country, the proposal mentioned in this paper could give a good start to stop vandalism.

References

1. B. A. Masberg and L. H. Silverman, “Visitor Experiences at Heritage site: A phenomological approach,” J. Travel Res., vol. XXXIV, pp. 20–25, 1996.
2. “Convention concerning the protection of the world cultural and Natural Heritage,” Krakow, Poland, 2017.
3. J. C. Sperandio, “Vandalism as a fact of life in society,” in Vandalism Behaviour and Motivations, C. Lévy-Leboyer, Ed. New York: Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., 1984, p. 105.
4. P. G. Zimbardo, “A Social-Psychological analysis of Vandalism: Making sense of senseless violence,” Stanford, 1970.
5. P. Buonincontri, A. Marasco, and H. Ramkissoon, “Visitors’ experience, place attachment and sustainable behaviour at cultural heritage sites: A conceptual framework,” Sustain., vol. 9, no. 7, 2017.
6. M. Mudge, M. Ashley, and C. Schroer, “A digital future for cultural heritage,” CIPA 2007, Anticip. Futur. Cult. past, pp. 521–526, 2007.

Environmental Vandalism Or Economic Stimulus?

Whilst the country is grappling with the effects of COVID, the federal government, although not short of any criticism regarding the states’ individual responses to the corona virus, is seeking to hand off the jurisdiction of approving major infrastructure projects to them, right under our noses.

Changes to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act of 1999 (EPBC Act) have been rammed through the House of Representatives to the dismay of the Labor Party, the Greens and the cross bench. The bill, if it passes, plans to hand off the power to approve major infrastructure projects to the respective state governments, instead of following the current federal procedures. It regulates a broad range of projects including roads, rails, mining and power infrastructure. Put simply, divesting this responsibility to the states, which have inadequate expertise to gauge environmental implications as well as an inherent conflict of interest due to the gains which are likely to generated from these works, poses great risk to the environment and is an abrogation of the federal government’s responsibilities. The Minister for the Environment, Sussan Ley says “it will allow projects to be fast-tracked.” and that moving to a “single touch” approval system would “reduce regulatory burden, promote economic activity and create certainty around environmental protections”. She claims that the deregulation of these powers is necessary for Australia’s economic response to COVID-19.

Tony Abbott proposed extremely similar policy as the Prime Minister in 2014, and although it was defeated at that point in time, under the cloak of COVID, it may just slip through the cracks.

To attempt to make these changes whilst there are two enquiries in progress which will provide vital insight into environmental policy direction in Australia, is highly questionable. The first of these enquiries is the Royal Commision into National Natural Disaster Arrangements, and whilst its final report is yet to be released, the Interim Report, states very clearly the need to centralise our response to these disasters and certainly did not suggest divesting accountability to the states. The following quotation clearly supports the importance of a national approach. “We have conducted our inquiry during the COVID-19 pandemic, which has highlighted to us the importance and feasibility of, and public expectation for, national coordination in response to a national crisis… The Australian Government also has capability and capacity not available to the states and territories.” The report also contains strong recommendations for a set of national standards which is a glaring omission in the proposed bill.

The statutory review of the EPBC Act which commenced in late October 2019, is the second of enquiry that is still underway, and is arguably even more relevant to environmental policy. Headed up by Professor Graeme Samuel AC, the final report is due later on this month. Despite this, these changes to the act are scheduled to be debated during the October budget sittings in the Senate in advance of the final publication of Samuel’s findings. With the outcomes of these reviews imminent, the rushing through of the bill suggests a reluctance to have an informed debate. Sussan Ley has said that “where there are opportunities to make sensible changes ahead of the final EPBC review report, [the she] will be prepared to do so.” Given that the changes proposed by the bill are of enormous significance in divesting accountability to the states, it seems like an extraordinary assumption to make without being informed by the outcomes of these important reviews.

The government would argue, under the auspices of economic stimulus, that fast-tracking approvals of these projects, even despite arguable environmental impacts, should be a priority . In line with this, 15 major infrastructure projects, including the Narrabri Gas Project, have been approved within the last 4 months, which seems relatively high and begs the question if appropriate scrutiny has been applied.

A further concern with this bill is that there will be minimal accountability on a national level. It must be noted that the federal government is the signatory to Australia’s international environmental commitments, of note the Conservation of Migratory Species as well as the World Heritage Convention. It seems irresponsible to devolve power to the states when these commitments are becoming progressively more important, and the bill doesn’t compel them to meet these obligations. In the Royal Commision Interim Report, it is explicitly stated that “current arrangements do not provide a clear mechanism to elevate matters to national leaders.” This would only be exacerbated if this bill passed.

Another really significant flaw in the bill is that states have an inherent conflict of interest in regards to the approval of projects. In many cases they will profit through royalties or other mechanisms from the very projects, that they are being asked to approve.

Beyond the specifics of the bill, there is a real question around the democratic process surrounding this bill. The government suppressed debate in the lower house as evidenced by failure to speak to the bill and no consideration of the proposed amendments by the Labor Party, the Greens and the cross bench. It was simply passed using the government’s majority position without debte. Reflecting this, representatives from both Labor and the Greens expressed their concern for the lack of political discourse stating that “to just gag that debate, to prevent people from having their say… is a real disgrace” [Terri Butler, Labor] and that the coalition is “trashing the environment and trashing democracy” [Adam Bandt, Greens]. There has also been significant outcry from the cross bench. Zali Steggall, an independent MP, proposed an amendment which directly referenced the recommendations of the interim report for the Royal Commission, regarding the requirement for national standards. Stegall has said that “this is appalling conduct by government minister [Sussan] Ley, the prime minister and every coalition MP that is supporting this… This was about abrogating your rights, all of you, in having a voice in this parliament and knowing that you will actually have an environment that is going to be protected.” Andrew Wilkie, another independent, dismissed the bill as “environmental vandalism in the extreme”. He criticised its blatant disregard towards the recommendations of the interim report, and called it a “complete contempt for democracy”.

The bill has been met with general dismay from key stakeholders and experts in the environmental space. Rachel Lowry, Australia’s chief conservation officer at WWF said, “if approved, this bill will fail Australians at this critical moment in time because it fails to incentivise win-win solutions that stimulate our economy and protect the places and animals we love.” There has also been condemnation of the democratic process, that surrounded the absence of debate and the speed with which this bill was passed. The Policy and Law Reform Director at the Environmental Defenders Office, Rachel Walmsley believes the bill may undermine the statutory review of the EPBC. She also argues that “it was a fairly atrocious process that, moments before adjournment, they rammed it through… The gagging of the debate, the fact they prevented voting on amendments and the fact no government MP stood up to justify the policy – it prevented proper parliamentary scrutiny.”

There is no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic has had enormous ramifications for the Australian community. And at the same time, the environmental crisis that Australia faces remains ever-present. Allowing these changes to go through under the guise of economic stimulus will have dire consequences for the Australian environment and future generations. We can only hope that the democratic process in the upper house and evidence based policy will prevail.

Massachusetts Et Al. V Environmental Protection Agency: Implications for Public Health Policy and Practice

Theodore Roosevelt once stated, “I recognize the right and duty of this generation to develop and use the natural resources of our land; but I do not recognize the right to waste them, or to rob, by wasteful use, for the generations that come after us”. This quote by one of our nation’s former presidents, exemplifies the view many citizens have towards the idea of environmental conservation.

The Supreme Court case of Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) embodies the importance of environmental conservation for people in the United States. The concept of environmental conservation is a more recent idea in American history and has only been publicly recognized in the past century. Although the concept of air pollutants is a relatively new discovery, there have been many rules and regulations created in order to combat this pressing issue. The rising concern towards the emissions of greenhouse gases has instigated many Supreme Court cases. Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency was one of the most influential court cases on pollution in United States history, and its outcome has had lasting effects on the Nation.

Throughout the United States’ brief history, there has been a great need for environmental conservation. The first major event that caused Americans to entertain the idea of protecting the environment was the Industrial Revolution. This age of technological advancement caused many corporations with factories to release large sums of pollutants into the air, as well as the exploitation of natural resources in order to make way for human development. However, the recognition of this problem led American citizens to realize the need for reform. Although there were no laws or regulations to keep this misuse of resources in check they knew that something would have to be done. One such influential figure on this concept was Theodore Roosevelt. Over the years he saw the effects of these technological advancements and saw that if attention was not brought to this problem then there would be dire consequences. He was an iconic symbol of environmental conservation in the United States through his love for the outdoors and advocating for national parks. His influence led to the creation of national parks throughout the country and brought to light the idea of environmental conservation. Over the past few decades, the recognition of harmful greenhouse gases has caused the concern for the emission air pollutants to dramatically increase. There have been many investigations and debates on the topic of global warming and its cause, but there has never been a definitive answer. However, in an attempt to combat the escalating issue of global warming, many policies and regulations have been put in place in order to subside the effects of this potential crisis. One such regulation was enacted in 1970 and it was deemed The Clean Air Act. According to ……… this federal law that placed standards on the amount of air pollutants that can be emitted in the United States from stationary and mobile sources. This law also authorizes the EPA to establish National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) to protect public health and to regulate emissions of hazardous air pollutants. The Clean Air Act defines air pollutant as “any air pollution agent … , including any physical, chemical … substance … emitted into … the ambient air.”(Cornell University Law School). Although there is a recognition of the issue of greenhouse gases, there has not yet been a permanent solution to this environmental crisis. The tension between individual and business autonomy and increasing government regulation has brought many disputes up to the highest level in the American legal system the Supreme Court of the United States. According to …… Massachusetts and several other states petitioned to the Environmental Protection Agency in order to have them place standards and regulate the amount of carbon emissions given off by newer vehicles. These states believed that the air pollutants emitted from these vehicles were detrimental and harmful to the environment and society. The Environmental Protection Agency declined the petition, stating that the Clean Air Act does not authorize the EPA to issue regulations concerning climate change. They claimed that even if they had the authority to set greenhouse gas standards it would be unwise because the effect of greenhouse gases and the increase in temperature was not unequivocally established. Since the EPA declined the petition Massachusetts and several other states review in the D.C. Circuit working their way towards the Supreme Court.

Possibly one of the most influential court cases on the topic of air pollution in the United States was Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency that occurred on November 6, 2006. According to Oyez law, eventually the case made its way to the Supreme Court in November of 2006. There were two topics discussed in the court. The case continued the discussion on whether the EPA had to require corporations to regulate the amount of carbon emissions, or any other air pollutants that may be harmful, that a motorized vehicle could emit in the United States.

First the Plaintiff, Massachusetts and company, claimed that the EPA cannot choose to decline emission regulations for motorized vehicles based on policy considerations not enumerated in the CAA. They also stated that the EPA under the Clean Air Act was required and had the authority to air pollutants including greenhouse gases. The defendant, the EPA, denied these claims and stated that they were not required to regulate the carbon emissions under the CAA. It took many months to discuss this intricate case and a final decision was difficult to come upon. Although the Massachusetts and other states included in this case thought that carbon emissions were a significant and controversial issue to bring to the Supreme Court. After several months of debate the Supreme Court gave their opinion on the subject matter. According to ……. The case was decided in D.C. on April 2, 2007. The court came to two decisions on the matter. First the court voted 5-4 in favor of Massachusetts and claimed that the EPA had the power and duty to regulate corporate air emissions. The Court decided that the Clean Air Act enabled the EPA to protect and preserve the environment of the United States by restricting the amount of air pollutants released.

However, the court agreed with the EPA in stating that they did not have to regulate carbon and other greenhouse gases as air pollutants. The dissenting opinion, written by Justice Scalia, stated that the CAA was not responsible for combating global warming and that it was only for stopping lower atmospheric pollutants. The Supreme Court compromised and agreed with both the defendant and plaintiff in stating their opinion. This case was one of the most influential court decisions in US history and had many rippling effects throughout the course of the next decade. After the decision of the court the EPA placed regulations on emission for motorized vehicles in the US.

The regulation of this emission has had a major impact on motor companies throughout the country. The case also brought national attention to the pressing issue of carbon emissions. Prior to the case there was no connection between greenhouse gases and global warming, so this case raised a greater concern for the amount of air pollutants that are emitted into the atmosphere. The positive economic and environmental effects of this court decision are yet to be determined. The decision of the case will, most likely, have many implications on future generations.

There have been both positive and negative influences on the environment throughout American history, and Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency attempts to remedy the treatment of our atmosphere for future generations. The Supreme Court’s decision in the case of Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency has shaped and will continue to shape American views on environmental conservation.

Forensic Dentistry and Its Importance

Forensic dentistry is a branch of dentistry that collides with the legal system. It is defined as an investigational part of dentistry where professionals examine, evaluate, analyze and present dental evidence for recognition of human identity. Adding to that this field can be split into forensic odontology which is the study of prostheses, jaws, teeth, dental appliances and bite marks as an application of dentistry to the law. The other division is jurisprudence which is the philosophy or theory of law.

Dentistry has played a great role in human identification and that is because human teeth withstand wear, pressure and damage making them durable and hard-wearing. Moreover, dental dentitions can be taken as an individual’s fingerprint. And as they are more durable and recognizable than skeletal remaining after death, they offer much more help for professionals while identifying humans. In addition, if it is hard to identify the person from their teeth forensic dentistry helps in collecting information about the victimsuspect such as age, sex and social and economic factors that can be obtained from patterns of eruption, patterns of attrition, periodontal status, characteristics of the skeleton, diagnostic examination of blood serum and restorative material. Many different techniques and methods are used in forensic dentistry and identification. The most common of those methods are conservation and protection of jaw and dental remains, cast and impressions, making charts with before and after death information and comparing between them. In order to be specific while identifying investigators compare between the records and charts by using several comparison points which include teeth number and characteristic, malposition rotation and spacing of teeth, abnormalities of the form, function, tissue and bone of teeth (anomalies), appliances and restoration, dental caries, root canal treatment, fixtures, patterns of the bone, wearing of the tooth occlusion and erosion and lastly pathology. The process of identification happens very precisely and accurately in order to get results that are organized well with no slight errors and making the comparing process as smooth as possible. Firstly, the investigator or examiner starts by recording features and characteristics of each tooth after death and also records casts of teeth and radiographs. After that the start collecting before death records however in this process, they must be very careful and cautious since records and information vary in quality and how accurate they are. Another thing to be careful about is how radiographs are taken some take them from the lingual aspect others might take them from the front. And it is very important to know that not all identifications of teeth are taken by the Universal System. At the end professionals in this division of dentistry need to be well organized and carefully analyzed using methods that are systemic and consistent in order to get results with the lowest percentage of error.

Forensic dentistry is also used in civil litigation as it helps investigators and professionals determine if what people are saying is true. That can be demonstrated when a person has claims of dental care that is improper or caused damage or if food was incorporated with foreign material. Deception and claimed malpractice investigator will most likely get help from experts that will study radiographs and records and compare those using very precise techniques and methods with records and radiographs from dentists.

And as discussed before many techniques can be used in forensic dentistry but the most remarkable method which especially helped in cases of attack, assault, child abuse and homicides was bite marks. This is because bite marks can be severe and stay for a while leaving some characteristics of teeth that makes comparing bite marks on the victim to the suspect possible. Many techniques and methods are used to identify bite marks and compare them one of them is making a comparison between the tracings of the bite mark to the defendant’s or suspect’s pattern imprint tracing of the tooth. Then after getting a court order authorizing search, photographs from the suspect and dental casts are taken. Then recognizing and identifying the bite is done using ordered steps. These steps are: firstly, the dentist specialized in forensic dentistry should start with identifying if the bite mark is done by a human after that he should try to know what teeth were involved in the bite mark. Hyper erupted, tilted, rotated, missing and anomalous teeth are possibilities when trying to identify the bite mark. Moreover, when trying to identify bite marks the professional must be aware that the bite might be an animal bite or a mark by unknown objects or even a bite done by the victim himself. And even if the bite is one of those it is still a very helpful analysis for law enforcement agencies since they can connect the injuries to stuff owned by the suspect (it might be instruments or tools).

As much as forensic dentistry has helped in many small cases it has also helped in many large cases or disasters as it helps identify unidentified dead bodies that are found on the grounds of a disaster such as floods, air crashes, earthquakes and collapsing of structures. When any of those happen a team made up of medical and dental professionals are called for cooperation with a team chief that will help the team be more organized while approaching and recording all the unidentified bodies. The team chief will also be responsible for all the communications between the mass disaster medical/dental team and the radiology team, autopsy team and other many other teams. As mentioned before the process happens very smoothly and by being very organized. The team does that by getting separated into two per team and into an antemortem team and a postmortem team. However, an initial response to any disaster would be examining the scene and making sure that it is safe. Then comes the process which is done by one of the examiners looking and examining the bodies and specimens and the other doing and organizing all the chart work. After collecting all those information, a person from the dental team then checks all the outcomes of the examination. Postmortem records must be kept safe and separately from antemortem record that will be delivered to the team later. In order to succeed in the task, the dental examiner must be knowledgeable in dental anatomy knowing all the basics. And will only go back to books and notes for numbers. Adding to that it is important for the examiner to know that whatever is found on site could be an important key to human identification and nothing should be overlooked. Even if it is just a denture or a part of it or even an edentulous jaw those might be critical for identification. And that is because the jaw might contain dental casts, old fractions, metal, fractions or even trabecular bone that has a unique pattern. And lastly after all information of postmortem and antemortem has been collected. They are compared to each other and then results will be given. One more thing that is important for examiners to have knowledge about is forensic anthropology which is a part of physical anthropology that focuses on skeletal analysis. This will be very helpful for examiners when identifying victims.

And to make it more understandable there are several case studies that explain this topic. One of them is the case study about the tsunami that hit three countries in December 2004. The disaster killed 224,408 people. However, the way they treated the situation was great since they put a lot of effort in identifying and preserving dead bodies and they were able to identify 87% of the bodies. The key factors for the successful identification were that they preserved the bodies very well and also have recorded and photographed important information from each body to make it easier in the identification process. For the process they used all antemortem dental and regular records and compared them to whatever postmortem records they were able to get.

Lastly, forensic dentistry is not only important for identifying humans it is also important for whoever practices dentistry. And that is because it helps private practices in keeping and managing precise dental data and documentations that might be used in the future.

References

1. Dental Anatomy Its Relevance to Dentistry (by Julian B. Woelfel and Rickne C. Scheid).
2. Wheeler’s Dental Anatomy, Physiology and Occlusion. (By STANLEY J. NELSON).
3. PLOS medicine (https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0030195).

Walmart Corporation: Background And Analysis

Introduction

Walmart is a thriving business thanks to the strategical style of Sam Walton. This mass producer of goods, with superb service has expanded from physically selling the lowest prices all over the globe as well as making headway in the new ecommerce world. Walmart is one of the leading competitors in selling goods and services and its thanks goes to their bargaining power. Walmart’s style of bargaining power pushed out mom and pop shops because of their great competitiveness. Having one of the biggest inventories in retail combined with some of the best technological advancements had put Walmart ahead of their competitors before they even had a chance. Because customer satisfaction is so important, in the future Walmart will strive to make online buying easier and more affordable. Shipping costs through Walmart are free when spending over $50. When buying items that do not need to be fitted like food, shampoo, trash bags, and cleaning supplies; people can save even more on time and money from not having to make trip to the store. Walmart is targeting the homebodies while still maintaining happiness from their physical buyers. “Walmart has two goals for the future. To be the destination for customers to save money, no matter how they want to shop and to be the best retailer in the hearts and minds of consumers and employees” (Walmart, 2019).

Background of the Company

If you did not know, the founder of Walmart is Sam Walton. He was born in 1918 in Kingfisher, Oklahoma. In 1942, at the age of 24, he joined the military. “Shortly after the military he married he wife, Helen. When his military service ended in 1945, Sam and his wife Helen, moved to Iowa and then to Newport, Arkansas” (Walmart, 2019). During this time, Sam gained early retail experience, eventually operating his own variety store. In 1962, Mr. Walton opened the first Walmart. Since then, Walmart has transformed into one of the world’s largest companies and employers. Walmart has opened thousands of stores nationally and internationally. Walmart puts prominence on an increase of ease for their customers and manufacturing stores all over the world. Walmart has achieved this by always offering the lowest prices and the best customer service, wherever they go. According to Walmart’s Corporate website, (Walmart, 2019) “If we work together, we’ll lower the cost of living for everyone…we’ll give the world an opportunity to see what it’s like to save and have a better life.” Walmart offers a wide variety of goods and services, while concurrently keeping the lowest prices. Walmart has a hierarchical structure, because each employee reports to a superior, except for the CEO. This works well due to the strong relationship between employees. Walmart continues to advance this structure and relationships as they expand internally and externally.

Company Research

Wal-Mart’s company is truly the powerhouse of the retail industry receiving close to 500 billion dollars in revenue and holding high dollar stocks that continue to increase and grow. From their value chain analysis, Walmart’s primary activities include: inbound logistics, operations, outbound logistics, marketing and sales, and finally services. Their support activities emphasize on firm infrastructure, human resources, technology development, and procurement. Wal-Mart’s inbound logistics focus on forming strategic partnerships with vendors so they can continue to focus on purchasing at low prices to keep their bargain power. Nevertheless, when a possible retailer is signed as a supplier, “Walmart offers a strategic partnership for long-term perspective and engages in high volume purchases, although for lower prices” (Research Methodology, 2016). “Walmart runs operations in a global scale with more than 11,000 stores in 27 countries serving nearly 260 million customers each week” (Research Methodology, 2016). For Walmart, operations will be used for supercenters, warehouses, and because they own it, Sam’s Club. That’s right, Walmart owns a large retail chain, Sam’s Club. The wide variety of operations can be categorized for the United States, internationally, and Sam’s Club.

The two most important operations for Walmart are designs of goods and services and supply management chain. “Walmart’s use of statistics technology and bargaining power over suppliers successfully addresses this decision area of operations management. The company’s supply chain is integrated with advanced information technology” (Smithson, 2018). The business can now focus on the efficiency of the retail service employees. Walmart also stresses marginal production costs like when buying brands similar to, “Great Value”. This connection to cheaper goods allows Walmart to overstock and sell at the low prices we all know and love.

Support activities that play huge roles include technology development and procurement. Procurement is the purchasing of raw materials, supplies, and other consumable goods. Walmart Global Procurement was founded in 2002 to enable the uninterrupted acquiring of commodities. “Headquartered in Shenzhen, China, the organization has over 1700 associates sourcing products from 50 countries” (Walmart, 2019). With the strategy of bargaining power and buying low-cost goods, Walmart can control competitors to match their prices or force them to lose some business. Other businesses might have even worse luck. Stores have always had issues with supercenters because it causes them great struggles to stay with the low prices. With a huge inventory and a smart procurement strategy, Walmart will be consuming all the lost business from dying stores attempting to compete. While Walmart’s procurement process is welly established, their technological advancement is even more impressive. Walmart now has an electronic business which allows them to commercially sell goods online. The replacement of physical business does not hurt the company rather than expanding the revenue/net sales for the different style of consumer. The technological advancements do not stop there. Walmart is technology driven from barcodes on all of their inventory. They have self-checkout lines but more importantly they have the ability to use the, “just-in-time” style for inventory because of the data processed from each sale of goods. The idea that every single item has a statistic on how many have been sold and how many are left, helps Walmart anticipate when to put on sales, clearances, and when to order more. Without the inventory technology, Walmart would lose many perishable goods and lose money when items are not properly stocked for consumers.

Competitive Situation

Even though Walmart has millions of customers and can target half of the population for goods, they still have competition in the market. Two of Walmart’s biggest competitors consist of equally gigantic corporations, Amazon and Target. Amazon is the largest ecommerce company that has many similarities to Walmart from large inventories to low prices. Amazon’s prime feature, gives customer’s free shipping while meeting criteria of buying so many goods and having a certain user rate. Because of this, in mid-May 2019, Walmart stated “it began offering free next-day delivery in Phoenix, Las Vegas and Southern California, but only for orders costing $35 or more” (Herrera, 2019). Walmart’s other big competitor, Target, offers free one-day shipping on orders of at least $35 to their loyal customers. Gaining the experience and doing the research from the two major industries, Walmart is pushing to help all customers on low-cost shipping instead of having these customers meet criteria to be considered, “loyal” consumers. Because the low shipping affects everyone, Walmart has just taken a giant leap against their competitors which could alter Amazon’s prime package and Target’s loyalty program. In the future, Amazon and Target will need to alter their shipping ideas to either match Walmart or even drop lower than $35 for free shipping.

External Analysis

External factors are huge when discussing economic challenges, environmental challenges, opportunities, and threats. Walmart is under substantial pressure from commercial changes. This change most generally can/will lead to the company’s revenues. Walmart can seize opportunity in expanding growth in developing countries and decrease unemployment in the United States by opening more stores, warehouses, and positions in these areas. “The emphasis needs to be put on the developing countries because they have an increased demand for goods from retail firms” (Frue, 2018). While the U.S. is Walmart’s biggest consumer, international sales generate over 100 billion in revenue. The percentage of money that people pay vs what they earn is much higher in the other countries. Understanding this can spark marketing campaigns in these lesser developed countries to accelerate this increase. The ecological factors important in Walmart’s business relate to environmental safeguarding apprehensions. This threat can cost Walmart a lot of money but it also makes them look better in the eyes of the people. Recycling, using cleaner energy, donating money to conservation (charity), and researching on ways to help the environment is costly but they pay off in a different way. “Walmart’s strategies to make improvements include enhancing the environmental sustainability of agricultural commodities, reducing food and product waste upstream or downstream, and working to improve efficiency of factories for pollution” (Walmart, 2019). Better-quality policies and values on goods sold at the merchandising stores, will build up Walmart in addressing these conservational factors. Another threat is the threat of new entrants. This puts very little pressure on Walmart because of how hard it would be to take them down. Walmart is leading all the other retail brands and it would take too much investment to come anywhere close in building a similar store. In order to have the distribution system like the one Walmart establishes, a company would need to be dispersed globally, have great technological services, a great mission statement that brings employees to work harder, be environmentally sound, have tons of raw materials, and exhibit low prices annually just for starters. “All these things require investment and apart from that skilled human resources are also required to manage and maintain them. Walmart’s financial capital and other resources diminish the risk from the new entrants” (Walmart, 2019).

Internal Analysis

Internal factors for Walmart include some pros and cons. Tactical approaches are meant to help a company but they do not always work that way. All of Walmart’s strengths are because of how big the business is. “These competitive strengths enable the company to withstand threats despite its weaknesses as a low-cost retailer” (Frue, 2018). Most businesses cannot get by with the low-cost strategy that Walmart holds but because they have the inventory to back it up, they are allowing themselves to be more than competitive. Walmart’s international structural magnitude gives the business the resources for growth and expansion. Walmart has a very good supply chain. In addition, Walmart’s supply chain has high proficiency because of innovative technologies for monitoring and scheming the movements of goods from contractors to its stores. Walmart’s weakness reverts to their generic strategy in business (Smithson, 2018). Small time earnings are a typical effect of exhausting the cost leadership strategy. “Because Walmart minimizes selling prices, it also needs to minimize profit margins and rely more on sales volume. Walmart is meant to target quantity buyers and not quality” (Smithson, 2018) This causes people to shop elsewhere for items such as shoes, jewelry, dress clothes and much more, high-dollar items.

Financial Analysis

Walmart’s financial status is clear. In the millions, “Walmart’s net sales in the United States for groceries, general merchandise, wellness products, and other categories include 184,202, 108,739, 35,788, 2,937, and 331,666 respectively” (Dybeck, 2018). Walmart approximately received $15.7 billion related to ecommerce for the fiscal year of 2019. Total revenue was $514.4 billion, an increase of $14.1 billion, or 2.8%. Excluding currency2, total revenue was $515.1 billion, an increase of $14.8 billion, or 3.0%. Walmart U.S. comp sale increased 3.6%. Grocery pickup and delivery are available in more than 2,100 and nearly 800 locations, respectively. “Walmart U.S. ecommerce sales increased 40%. Net Promoter Score and the company’s Customer Value Index continue to improve” (Walmart, 2019). This makes Walmart the best company when it comes to revenue. Financially speaking, Walmart is looking to get even better. While their stock prices range from 83-103 dollars, Walmart has a goal set to 120 dollars per stock which will have the giant corporation needing over 520 billion dollars in revenue and having their online sales going up about 10%. This is one reason they are competing with Target and Amazon on shipping because when buying online this is a huge factor to consider.

Situational Analysis

Speaking again about strengths, Walmart has many including: customer loyalty, global expansion, strong market power over suppliers, and the low price strategy. Walmart sees its customer as the boss. This is that style Walmart’s founder, Sam Walton, developed. All of the Walmart associates are expected to serve the customer like their employer and ensure they meet or exceed the expectations of the customer. There are always multiple workers in each department ready to help a customer and they even have greeters to welcome in those customers. This type of hospitality is established in every Walmart across the globe. This consistency of low prices and appreciating workers’ sanctions Walmart to have a good reputation and good reputations attract customers. A problem they are facing is inventory to the stores itself. Past CEO Greg Foran, discussed the problem’s Walmart has with not having enough time to restock inventory in the supercenters which causes items to spoil. Walmart has grown so big that they thought they would not have enough inventory in their stores so they mass ship everything out and a lot of items are starting to go bad. The company has already started to implement some changes to fix these issues, such as marking down foods that are nearing their expiration date to reduce the amount of food that goes to waste. Selling items cheaper to focus on getting rid of them is the best solution to making money while also getting the product out of the store and into the consumer’s hands.

Alternatives

To stay competitive Walmart could minimize or eliminate some stores to create more space for inventory in the ecommerce field. Because Amazon does have the advantage in selling online goods, Walmart could cut back on 100-200 stores worldwide and help the matters in selling online goods while eliminating the wasted goods they are having problems with. “The strategy to downsize store and the strategy to increase inventory units would be exceedingly beneficial” (Favaro, 2015). Another alternative Walmart could use is creating a new position per store to help keep track of inventory going in and out. We rely on technology so much because essentially it is better but having a person type all of the data in and having managers look at the research conducted will give them a chance to pinpoint when items need to go on sale or be shipped in.

Contingency

When closing down stores, people are going to be nervous about one thing. Which stores are going to be shut down? The workers and consumers will be affected in certain areas for better and for worse. Worker will lose jobs but new jobs will arise when the factory needs shipping workers. These include drivers, operators, and your regular laborers. How to handle this situation is to focus on the pros while still recognizing the cons. Current CEO Doug McMillon, will host a conference administering the reasoning on why Walmart is so excited to implement this new strategy for our new aged online consumers. Many people are going to be upset but the goal is not to upset everyone, it is to have more good than bad overcome. “Upper management would be forced to exhibit a team on identifying every what if scenario as well as finding the trigger points” (Blackford & Digman, 2014).

So, what are your thoughts on Walmart? Is it as good as it sounds or am I over selling? The importance of this paper is not to get people to shop at Walmart rather than inform the people on what this corporation does right, wrong, and what they need to do. Whether it be the best in customer service, inventory, or low prices; Walmart is exceeding satisfaction to its shareholders by increasing profits, locations, jobs, and a variety of goods and services. Whatever the customer wants, they will get. The people of Walmart, in and out, have the convenience of a lifetime. Being able to go anywhere around the world or shop from a device at home will create opportunity for customers to change their lifestyle for the better. The vision statement for Walmart wants people to have a better life. Saving money, time, and knowing one is valued are all contributing factors to this process. I am a Walmart consumer and I appreciate everything it has to offer. Environmentally, economically, socially, technologically, and competitively; Walmart will continue to improve their well above average business style and contend their title as one of the best retail industries across the world.

Bibliography

1. Blackford & Digman, (2014). Strategic Management: Competing in the Global Information Age (10th ed.). Thomson Custom Pub.
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3. Walmart Value Chain Analysis – Research-Methodology. (2016, March 30). Retrieved June 03, 2019, from https://research-methodology.net/walmart-value-chain-analysis/
4. Herrera, S. (2019, June 03). In Amazon vs. Walmart Delivery Battle, a Fresh Salvo. Retrieved June 06, 2019, from https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-in-war-with-walmart-touts- one-day-delivery-gains-11559563200
5. Frue, K. (2018, April 23). SWOT Analysis of Walmart. Retrieved June 06, 2019, from https://pestleanalysis.com/swot-analysis-of-walmart/
6. Dybeck, M. (2018, July). Walmart Inc. (WMT) | Financial Analysis and Stock Valuation. Retrieved from https://www.stock-analysis-on.net/NYSE/Company/Walmart-Inc
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8. Smithson, N. (2017, January 28). Walmart: Operations Management 10 Decisions, Productivity. Retrieved from http://panmore.com/walmart-operations-management-10-decisions-areas- productivity-case-study-analysis

Nike Company: Strategy And Development

Nike is a multinational company that produces Nike offer the products in footwear products like running, Training, Basketball, Soccer, Casualshoes, Skateboarding, Tennis, Volleyball, apparel for sports activities for dance and yoga, sports equipment like baseball bats and weights also technology accessories including heart-rate monitors and altitude wrist compasses under the brand of Nike which attracts people. The founder of the Nike is Bill Bower man field coach in the University of Oregon and his former student Phil Knight in 1964 as a Blue Ribbon sports it will be pronounced as NI-KEY, initially Nike began as a very distributor for Japanese shoe company Onitsuka Tiger in the back side of knight’s car. In 1966 the first retail outlet was opened in Santa Monica, California. In 1971 they started manufacturing their own line of shoes, BRS first introduced shoe is soccer shoe with brand name Nike, referring to the Greek Goddess of victory and the swoosh trade mark. The “swoosh” is the logo for Nike which is a curved check mark designed by a graphic lady student at Portland state university student called Carolyn Davidson in1971 and then it became a registered trademark. In 1972, it was the first launch of the Nike brand shoe then it went public two years later After 2000s to present Nike is the largest manufacturer and supplier in the world. Its operation technology used are, initially the first advantage used is Ecommerce and the variety of products offer on the web, products like footwear, apparel, sporting equipments etc…Only the Nike company gives best opportunity to the customer to design their own shoes online. The another special technology used is AIR SOLE technology. The operations that are covered by the Nike are Process, Materials, Machine tools, packaging, inform systems and maintenance.

Nike is socially responsible .it is working on improving the condition for workers as it is also trying to reduce its environmental impact like water conservation by partnering with Dyecoo Textile Systems and took their carbon-based dyeing process. That dyes garments without using water.as a result this process has saved gallons of water that Nike consumes then Nike was considered this to be the first water free dyeing .Moreover,Nike is trying to reduce the waste as much as possible by producing more environmentally products like the Nike’s Women’s Board Shorts are made from 100 percent recycled polyester in addition, Nike Zoom and Flywire technology use 100 percent green rubber. Furthermore,Nike has a great role in making special products for hejab woman even if it is not the first company to create hijabs for athletes but it is the first large-scale global corporation to prioritize the needs of Muslim athletes.also, it produced new boxes. This new box is not only made from recycled materials and is recyclable to reduce the waste of packing.At the beginning Nike approached the light green then market approach for environmentally friendly products then stakeholder approach then dark green then it become more greener by its achievments in industry and social resposibilty then it became one of the world top ten in the current SustainAbility Global Reporters Program ranking.

Nike’s organizational culture is spiritually, organizational, sustainability and innovative to support business flexibility and power. The Organizational culture of Nike is a mix of traditions, habits, values, and the expected attitude among employees. The Innovation and Risk Taking ,Stability and Attention to Detail dimensions of Nike’s culture are achieved by c challenging the employees by giving them some instructions and rules and they try to achieve them and reach the target to be rewarded also, they are motivated by working conditions , company polices ,pay and benefits etc.. This approach ensures that the company maintains its organizational culture, which partly contributes to the success of the business. This organizational culture encourages human resources to behave in ways that address business objectives. It is based on creativity and innovation to provide products that approves current consumer demands. The following main characteristics of Nike’s corporate culture sustain business and market competence:

1. Talented: Nike uses training programs to enhance employee talent which can reinforce in producing some of the world’s most popular athletic shoes, equipment and apparel.
2. Diverse: Nike makes HR programs, such as the Speak Up! program, which is sharing of ideas among workers which can reinforce in creating new designs for its sports shoes, apparel and equipment.(team orientation dimension)
3. Inclusive: Nike makes a team-based approach to management. Also, Nike employs a number of programs, such as Bias to Breakthrough (a program for removing barriers to creativity) and NCourage (a set of employee networks for cultural awareness and community building) which can reinforce in producing athletic shoes, apparel and equipment design.

Nike’s products are sold for more than 110 countries all over the world for instance, Indonesia, China, Taiwan, India, Thailand, etc…… Nike is a transnational organization because according to the management orientation it reflect ethnocentric global attitude. by investing the HR professional to have the right people with the right skills in the right roles who are empowered in developing their business to achieve the law of Nike and the code leadership standards first establish ways to see how workers are engaged and also estimating supplier management strengths and weaknesses and identifying opportunities for investments .Nike went global .global sourcing by manufacturing low cost shoes in Japan that can compete with the German shoe market.Then in 1990s,it opened stores in England and Germany in addition U.S and start exporting andselling online via websites.Then foreign subsidiary .as in 2003 the international sales were greater than the U.S sales.

Nike’s intensive growth strategy reflects the company’s focus on innovation to develop the business. An intensive strategy shows how a company grows. Founded in 1964, Nike Inc. has grown to become one of the biggest players in the global athletic shoes, apparel and equipment market. To keep its position and competitive advantage, Nike must ensure that its generic strategy and intensive growth strategies are always suited to current business conditions.

One of Nike’s supporting intensive growth strategies is concentration strategy. This strategy facilitates the company’s growth by targeting new markets or market segments. For example, Nike enters new markets in Africa and the Middle East to increase its shoe sales revenues. Alongside product development, the company applies the concentration strategy intensive growth strategy by investing in new technologies to penetrate new market segments, such as segments composed of bodybuilders.In addition,it achieved the divertication strategy after Nike for years has had a special relationship with Apple that has propelled Nike into the tech business. It’s produced some popular mobile apps and portable fitness devices.like wristband it calls a ‘FuelBand,’ for the activity-tracking the company made them available at just two sellers: Nike and Apple stores.it emphasizes that its wristband app is designed for Apple’s iPhone 5, 4s and 4, and iPod Touch. Sales of such devices are expected to nearly double to $1.5 billion in 2014 from $800 million for coming years, according to a recent report from U.K.-based Juniper Research. converse started struggling due to competition,poor business decision making and lack of sufficient funds for. so Nike acquired converse in 2003 with an estimated $305 million.Therefore Nike combined operation with its competitor converse and increase competitive strenghth and achieving the horizontal integration strategy. SWOT analysis of Nike analyses the brand/company with its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities & threats. In Nike SWOT Analysis, the strengths and weaknesses are the internal factors whereas opportunities and threats are the external factors.

Here are nike’s strengths:

• Nike is the world’s leading brand for sports shoes and apparel having a a global presence
• It has been recognized many times by fortune magazines on “100 best companies to work for”
• Nike is listed among 50 most innovative corporate companies worldover.

Here are nike’s weaknesses:

• The Nike company faced allegations of labor and wage laws with employees, poor working conditions etc
• Constant competition means limited market share growth for the company.

Here are nike’s opportunities:

• Product expansion in areas like more concentration in sunglasses, sportswear etc. which gives high profit
• Nike can open their stores in tier 2 cities in emerging economies as well
• Enhance brand visibility by opening sports academies across the world for nurturing talent

Here are nike’s threats:

• Footwear market is so competitive, major competition from other brands
• As it is an international brand currency fluctuations of countries affects the business of Nike
• Fake imitations and replicas often cause a problem for a brand like Nike.

Value chain means to understand what the activities through which firm can develops a competitive strategy and creates a shareholder value and it is used to separate the business system in to series of several business activities is known as value chain. The main aim of the value chain is to bring the products to markets and produce raw materials to retailers and delivers the finish products to consumer. Value chain means different companies work together to satisfy the market demand. Value chain management (VCM) is a strategic business analysis tool used for the seamless integration and collaboration of value chain components and resources. VCM focuses on minimizing resources and accessing value at each chain level, resulting in optimal process integration, decreased inventories, better products and enhanced customer satisfaction. VCM was introduced in the mid-1980s by Michael Porter, a business strategy authority and longtime Harvard Business School professor. VCM has evolved into a universally applied business management strategy, and is a powerful strategic planning tool that extends from organizations to distribution and supply networks. VCM requires the following components:

1. Integrated chain strategy, planning and scheduling.
2. An efficient supply chain.
3. Full and interdependent chain resource management and optimization.
4. Integrated customer insight data and information.

In my opinion, unexpected negative conditions like covid-19 has a great impact nowadays towards the value chain management. It is impacting Nike’s business inside and outside of China. Nike’s business in China, Europe and even US are expected to take a hit as the virus remains uncontained.

Nike is one of the biggest company in the world and always be a competitor for other competitors in the case of athletic wears. They continuously improve the financial performance from equipping athletes with the sport equipment in the world. They keep on going on the product lines and they became a most powerful global brand. The basic strategy of Nike is to provide the customers with good quality products.

Starbucks And Its Corporate Social Responsibility

Starbucks is an American coffee company that started in 1971 in Seattle, Washington by three partners that got to know each other through the University of San Francisco, who are Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gordon Bowker. They were all influenced to sell high-quality coffee beans and equipment by a contractor called Alfred Peet who taught them his way to do a delicious coffee. Starbucks is an Italian-styled coffeehouse chain that sells one of the best coffees worldwide, they have about 28,218 coffee stores internationally. “ Starbucks represents something beyond a cup of coffee (Schultz, 2012). After Howard Schultz became the CEO of Starbucks, the revenue of the company rose to over nine billion American dollars with a market cap of almost eighteen billion dollars. And of course, one of Starbucks ‘ main purposes to be successful is being socially responsible.

The term corporate social responsibility means different things to different people but mainly it focuses on doing the right thing and the aspects that include business ethics, customer, employees, globalization, environment, responsible market, and social reporting. So basically, it means that businesses go beyond what they are obligated to do, they choose to do some particular social need and look at what it could do to improve the society because they believe it is the right thing to do.

Starbucks is one of the top companies that are famous for CSR, they have a strategy that’s built on three things: environment, ethical sourcing, and community. One of their CSR work is promoting community stores that associate with local nonprofits. Starbucks donates 0.05$ to 0.15$ per transaction to the nonprofit partner. The company has also pledged to implement one million trees to farmers as a partner of Conservation International’s which is like a sustainable coffee challenge. Starbucks is planning to hire ten thousand refugees across the globe in 75 countries in the upcoming five years, as well as hiring twenty-five thousand veterans by 2025.

Business ethics is strongly related to corporate social responsibility, when there is good ethics in the organization then there will be good corporate social responsibility. It is common sense that when a company has great ethical behavior then the possibility that they would be more responsible about social actions is higher than those organizations who don’t because if they don’t consider ethical behavior, they might not as well consider being socially responsible.

Starbucks has the largest coffeehouse chain in the world and is considered one of the most liked and most known consumer brands across the world. Starbucks is known to be one of the most ethical companies in the world (Smith, 2012). Starbucks makes a lot of effort to handle business in an ethical manner and be responsible through diversity, community, and environment. Many business analysts have agreed that Starbucks is a respected company due to its social responsibility. It has earned this reputation through its actions such as posting on their website how they are willing to help the environment by offering to buy and sell environmentally friendly products. Another ethical example is when the company has publicized its values on the walls of Starbucks shops across the world stating the company’s values which are community, ethical sourcing, environment, diversity, and customer wellness. Starbucks is one of the rarest companies that provide health benefits to both their part-time employees and full-time employees. A lot of part employees who work in fast-food restaurants or other stores like Starbucks are not provided with health benefits. They also allow their employees to choose what charity they wish to promote through volunteering hours and cash contributions. An example of that is in April of 2012 they have reached 230,000 hours of community service.

Starbucks sometimes face challenges and dilemmas for maintaining being ethical, one of their very nice behaviors is that when a coffee drink is spilled, they offer a free coffee just like the coffee that was spilled to the person who spilled it, to make the person’s stay at Starbucks more pleasant and do not embrace the customer because they care a lot about their customers. Ney York times have conducted a survey to know the reasons why they are losing ethical customers, the survey questioned their customers about their opinion they rated as one of the worst fast food and coffee shop. Starbucks has faced criticism when they attempt to put obstacles in an Ethiopian attempt to register the trademark of its coffee “Fairtrade” which caused the company to lose 47$ million a year in the country. However, Starbucks now has fixed its issues with Ethiopia. So, this shows that Starbucks cares about their customers and they take their surveys and opinion into consideration to make their coffee company a better place.

Supply Chain Management In Starbucks

Supply Chain Management:

Overview:

Supply Chain is defined as an operation which coordinates flow of material and services starting from sourcing, acquisition, inventory management and production. The goal of supply chain management is to provide competitive advantage to the organization through achievement of quality and timely deliverables to the customers, optimum investment and optimum cost. Supply chain management keeps business ahead of market changes. Starbucks purchases green coffee beans from coffee growing parts across the globe and process them according to their standard processes. Supply volume and price depend on multiple factors like weather, crop yield, political and economical condition etc. With well maintained relationships with suppliers, Starbucks believe that risk of non-delivery on committed deal is very rare.

Starbucks global operations strategy and surrounding macro-environment:

Supply volume and price depend on multiple factors like weather, crop yield, political and economical condition. To find suppliers who can provide quality material on time is very challenging. In addition to cost and time, long term relationship is essential.

If there is a natural disaster in the supplier’s country there will be shortage of materials and eventually its price goes up. Weather and crop diseases also play important role in supply of raw materials. Transportation is the biggest challenge for global supply chain management. Transportation cost itself is dependent on multiple factors like mode of transportation, fuel price etc. Economic condition in supplier’s country is key factor to decide price of the raw materials. For example, in emerging countries labour work is cheap and so political factors come into picture when company is sourcing materials internationally. There is always some lead time to establish relationship with customer from newer geographical area which is due to approval according government policies. War and cold-war between two countries can impact global market of the material. If there is more volume of available raw materials than demand, price goes down and supplier may leave the business and opt for another business. That is the biggest threat for long-term business goals. In the 90’s due to oversupply of lower grade coffee beans led lower price of coffee beans across the globe. Farmers were so depressed due to lower revenue than production cost that they started to leave growing coffee beans. Starbucks were expanding that time and they require premium coffee beans for long term. Starbucks partnered with a non-profit organization Conservation International to develop (Coffee and Farmer Equity Practices) C.A.F.E for welfare of farmers and long-term premium quality coffee beans supply. Most of the coffee growing farms are very difficult terrain and difficult to access. Farmers are uneducated and living in poor conditions. C.A.F.E practices increase economic, social and environment sustainability to speciality coffee cafe industries. It also builds mutually beneficial relationship with suppliers.

Key requirements, capabilities and challenges

C.A.F.E guidelines are designed to support buyers, suppliers, farmers and to maintain high-quality coffee beans for long-term.

As of September 2018, Starbucks operate approximately 29,324 stores in 78 countries across the globe. Starbucks supply chain is centralized system with multiple distribution centres spread in different continents. Starbucks follows make-to-stock strategy. Starbucks measures four parameters to evaluate efficiency:

1. Operations safety
2. Delivery timeliness
3. End-to-end supply cost
4. Enterprise savings

Starbucks uses digital platform for inventory management. Starbucks has mutually beneficial engagement with suppliers for sustainable supply chain. Coffee and Farmer Equity (C.A.F.E) enables supplier to maintain quality with farmer welfare which eventually strengthen long-term relationship and sustainability. Raw coffee beans suppliers must have follow Coffee Sourcing Guidelines (CSG). Starbucks emphasises on research and innovation. Starbucks is rated at number 10 by ‘The Gartner Supply Chain Top 25 for 2018’. Starbucks supply chain is agile, adaptive and aligned.

Challenges:

Management at global scale: Operate in the global market is very complex when it comes to supply chain management. To maintain inventory and distribution to regional stores from centralized global centre is complex and time consuming.

Risk management: To make product available according to demand and irrespective of macro-environmental parameters such as weather, natural disaster, politics, international relations, and crop yielding or economical parameters is very essential.

Laws and regulation: When company is operating globally, they must be aware of local laws and regulation. They must also have to be aware of any latest update on change in such laws and regulations. As far as supply chain management is concerned, employment laws, minimum wages law, labour welfare laws, laws regarding transportation, minimum base price to the commodities, taxes and duties etc comes into the picture.

Analysis and Evaluation of Supply Chain Management:

In this section, resources and capabilities of Starbucks are discussed along with analysis of supply chain management system. There are two types of resources found in any organization. One is tangible resources which are physical resources such as land, offices, manufacturing units and money. For Starbucks, its globally spread stores, distribution centres and manufacturing units are tangible assets. Other is the intangible resources. Intangible resources are non-physical identities like intellectual property and expertise. For Starbucks, its intangible resources are its globally recognized brand name, its skilled labour, its long learning curve etc. Resources are more useful when it’s rare. Having healthy relationship with suppliers, Starbucks has upper hand when it comes to raw material, especially premium coffee beans. Supplies also found their business safe when they have giant client like Starbucks who purchases raw material in huge volume for longer duration.

Starbucks emphasises on welfare of its employees. Starbucks provides benefits such as medical, insurance, paid holidays and employee assistance program to all his employees including part-time employees. Starbucks provides training sessions for its employees on regularly. Good management of employees and their skills is very important to operate such a giant supply chain.

The positive point of Starbucks regarding decision making is its flexibility. For example, To purchase green coffee, Starbucks signs contract under both fixed-price and price-to-be-fixed contracts. Price-to-be-fixed contracts are deal in which parameters such as quality, quantity and delivery period are fixed but delivery date and price are not fixed at the time of agreement. As of September 2018, Starbucks committed to $996 million under fixed-price contracts and $166 million under price-to-be-fixed contracts for green coffee bean purchase.

Starbucks purchases most of raw coffee beans from Latin America and East Africa. Most of these countries are emerging countries. Their economic structures are not matured yet and there are significant social and political transformations take place frequently. Sourcing raw materials from these countries are highly unstable and risky. However, Starbucks think-tank came with a novel idea. They started to emphasis on the problems of farmers, labours and suppliers along with environment and ecology. Starbucks established developed Coffee and Farmer Equity Practices (C.A.F.E) with the help of an NGO called Conservation International.

C.A.F.E contains product quality guidelines for green coffee beans and cups. It’s also consist of Social Responsibility guidelines which address hiring practices, minimum wages, working condition, child labour prohibition, safety, medical care etc. It also emphasises on water quality, water conservation, improving soil quality, protecting wild life, energy conservation and waste management. By resolving farmer’s issues, premium coffee beans production can be increased and the possibility of coffee bean’s scarcity can be reduced. Moreover, as farmers can earn better, they are willing to be in this business for longer duration which eventually strengthen the supply chain.

Recommendations:

After analysing a successful supply chain management system, there is very less left to recommend for sustainable supply chain management. However some of the potential factors are discussed in this section.

Exploring and developing new sources with the help of research:

For Starbucks, major raw materials are premium green coffee beans, tea, fluid milk, vegetables, bakery products etc. Except coffee beans and tea, Starbucks purchase other materials from local markets. Yield of this agriculture products swings drastically depending upon various factors such as climate, crop diseases and natural disasters. Sourcing these materials from international markets also depends on economical and political situation in supplier’s country. Considering all this, unavailability of the raw material is a big threat.

To counter this, Starbucks should look for other potential region where these agriculture products can be grown. As Starbucks operates in global market, they should establish some research labs across the globe to find potential regions. The key role of these labs is to study climate and soil for particular agriculture product, especially coffee beans. They can grow coffee plants there for experimental purpose and can estimate production per unit land area. They can also experiment with nutrition and fertilizer required to the crop and paste control. By doing this, Starbucks can help the farmers who already grows coffee plants. Secondly, they can find and encourage the farmers in the other region where coffee can be planted.

Innovative Way to Store and Preserve Coffee Beans for Longer Time:

Many times it happens that there is more than enough quantity of raw materials in present but the near future is unpredictable. To compensate scarcity of coffee beans, it should be stored for longer time. However, quality and aroma of the coffee beans change with time. Starbucks should focus on to find out innovative and scientific way to store and preserve coffee for longer time maintaining its quality.

Sourcing from Local Market:

Starbucks should focus on local market in case where total cost including transportation and taxation is greater compared to local market product cost.

Dynamic and Agile Supply Chain:

Supply chain should be dynamic and agile. In the traditional methods, decisions are taken monthly and quarterly. In dynamic model, decisions are taken rapidly on market changes.

Redundancy in Manufacturing Unit:

Manufacturing units are active and important part of supply chain. If there is breakdown in manufacturing unit, product can’t be delivered on time. To avoid this, there should be redundancy in manufacturing units.

Conclusions:

We have discussed that supply chain is integral part of business and it depends on multiple factor like climate, political, economical factors and which is highly unpredictable. To cope up with this sustainable supply chain model is required. Starbucks achieved this by developing C.A.F.E guidelines. C.A.F.E enables farmer welfare, ensures high quality of coffee beans, reduce threat of supply scarcity over long time. It encourages farmers and suppliers to be in business for longer time. It also takes care of environment and ecology. Involvement of science and technology can find new dimensions of supply chain management beneficial for the business.