Are Family Members Allowed in Code Blue? Essay

Allowing family members to remain with patients during code blue procedures has been a debated topic in the healthcare environment for many years. A great diversity in opinions exists on the subject among healthcare providers. A great diversity in opinions exists on the subject among healthcare providers. According to statistics, only 5% of hospital units have any type of formal written policy to use as a guideline for these situations. This lack of written policy has added controversy and confusion amongst healthcare providers. Current trends are moving towards allowing family members to be present during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and other procedures. Studies show great disparity in opinion exists depending on the type of practice. Nurses are far more likely to support family presence than are doctors. Resident physicians are the least open to family members remaining with the patient during a cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). Should Family Members Be Allowed In Code Blue? Allowing family members to remain with patients during code blue procedures has been a debated topic in the healthcare environment for many years. A great diversity in opinions exists on the subject among healthcare providers. According to statistics, only 5% of hospital units have any type of formal written policy to use as a guideline for these situations (Doyle, 2007). This lack of written policy has added controversy and confusion amongst healthcare providers. Current trends are moving towards allowing family members to be present during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and other procedures. Most healthcare professionals have been found to have positive feelings about allowing family members to remain during code situations. Studies show great disparity in opinion exists depending on the type of practice. Nurses are far more likely to support family presence than are doctors. Resident physicians are the least open to family members remaining with the patient during a cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). One study done by the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma, found that 75-80% of its physician members were opposed to family members being present during resuscitation or invasive procedures (Duran, Oman, Jordan, Koziel, & Szymanski, 2007). According to physicians, having family presence during resuscitation also has some serious drawbacks. Resuscitation is an intense situation; where every second is critical. Their major concern is that there is no distressed family member present that could interfere with the resuscitation efforts. If family members are present, this will distract attention from the patient and the care he/she needs. Not having family members present during cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) will allow the staff to continue to work effectively in the midst of this critical situation. One question that is asked many times by medical providers is the following: â€Å"Is it feasible to implement a family presence intervention during medical resuscitation in an emergency department using national guidelines to ensure appropriate family member behavior and uninterrupted patient care†? For some, it is also believed that family presence throughout cardiopulmonary resuscitation present problems. Fear that the staff might be distracted from providing needed patient care by distraught family members, is a physician’s main concern (Walsh, 2004). Throughout these codes, many times the cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) team demonstrates a quick ability to provide the best care under stressful and intense situations. Many physicians fear the cardiopulmonary resuscitation team will have difficulty controlling their own emotional response with the family present. Another point they are also concerned with is the patient’s code might be prolonged in futile situations because of the requests of the family members. This increases anxiety that an overwrought family member might hurt himself due to their reaction of the scene. If the family member faints, resources could be diverted away from resuscitating the patient. There could be accidental exposure to blood and body fluids thus endangering family members to other unknown pathogens. This then leads to a final point, but most valid point, that there is not enough room in an emergency to accommodate the family throughout a code. There may have to be a limit to the amount of family members that may be present in a code due to the small rooms available in healthcare facilities and the amount of equipment needed to save the patient’s life. In a survey, when asking several physicians about their opinion on having family members present throughout a cardiopulmonary resuscitation, a Vancouver physician stated: â€Å"To watch a team of strangers frantically shove tubes down the throat of a relative pierce each arm with large-gauge needles, or, in extreme situations, crack open the chest, would not only be traumatic to observe but could also leave the relative with a horrifying final memory. † (American College of American Physicians, 2008). As mentioned before, there is a very high percent of physicians that do not believe that this may be particularly safe for the patient. As patient advocates, physicians feel their main concern is first the well being of the patient and then the family They feel that the family will have an unpleasant, haunting, constant memory reminding them when the patient was at the worse time of their lives. In conclusion, bringing a family member to the bedside should not happen haphazardly but should be handled with careful consideration and define expectations. The best practice should be to educate healthcare staff during advance cardiac life support (ACLS), advance trauma life support (ATLS), and fundamental critical care support (FCCS).  The patient’s and family wishes should be honored whenever possible.

Marketing Paper Final Exam Essay

Final Paper Marketing encompasses the complex cycle of every stage of a product, from conception to the final sale and everything in between. Marketers are challenged with identifying the consumers needs/wants and managing the process to meet those needs. Every product a marketer develops goes through four stages in its life, The Product Life Cycle. Each stage of the product life cycle (Introduction, Growth, Maturity, and Decline) have unique characteristics that a marketer faces as they create utility and try to maintain or grow their market share. Through each stage advertising is critical and marketers try to inform, persuade and remind consumers about their product. The difference is the approach and focus of the advertising. Every product that comes to market enters into the Introduction Stage. This is the stage where consumers are first introduced to the product. â€Å"During the introductory stage of the product life cycle, a firm works to stimulate demand for the new market entry. † (Boone & Kurtz, 2006, p. 371) A marketer must connect with consumers to create a market for the new product. Every year hundreds of new products enter the introductory stage. Currently a product that is just beginning to take hold is high-definition televisions (HDTVs). HDTVs broadcast pictures with increased clarity and give the viewer (consumer) options on camera angles and additional information. Currently, â€Å"Yankee Group estimates that 15 percent of American households now own (a HDTV), with Forrester estimating 10 percent at most. † (Crawford, 2005) During the introductory stage, marketers are trying to introduce the product to consumers. One of the ways marketers succeed is in offering promotions or discounts to distributors to get the product in the marketplace. Most of the advertising focuses on informing the public about the new product. While information is key, advertisers also try to persuade consumers to purchase the product and often times remind consumers where they can find the product. The Introductory stage is where all products start. It is in this early stage that products are refined based on consumer and distribution feedback. Often times the numbers of marketers are minimal in the introductory stage as the market is being developed. As a product finds its market and begins to gain acceptance, it moves into the Growth Stage of the product life cycle. The growth stage is where a product sees its sales volumes increase dramatically. At this stage in the product’s life, â€Å"new customers make initial purchases and early buyers repurchase. † (Boone & Kurtz, 2006, p. 372) Early marketers find increased competition as their competitors enter the product space to share in the profits. Satellite television has entered into the growth market with the advent of the small dish. Early satellite television was mainly limited to rural areas that were inaccessible to cable television. The dishes were large and unattractive. As the technology has advances and the satellite dish has shrunk to less then twenty-four inches, consumers have rushed to the alternative to cable television. Satellite television marketers are continuing to refine their product in this growth stage. Recently, the top two providers of satellite television signed deals to provide affordable high-speed internet service. â€Å"For satellite-TV providers, the service is another way to offer a full line of products. † (AP, 2006) The growth stage is where marketers move from a heavy focus on information in advertising to a more persuasive approach. The persuasive approach allows the marketers to differentiate from competitors and encourage individuals to not be left behind. If the product space attracts multiple marketers, pricing, features and other differentiators are used in the advertising to help marketers gain or maintain market share. The Growth Stage of the product life cycle is complex and changing. Marketers rely on word-of-mouth, mass advertising and falling prices to sustain the momentum and interest in the product. The goal of the growth stage is to get reluctant buyers to buy and current customers to repurchase. As a product matures and growth stabilizes, the product moves in the Maturity Stage. Sales start to plateau and supply exceeds demand for the first time in the products life cycle. Competing marketers have flooded the field and profits begin to become depressed. All of these factors create pressure on marketers to continue their brands sustainability. Carbonated soft drinks are a very mature product. According to the American Beverage Association (ABA) the beginnings of the modern soda started in the 1830’s. (ABA, 2006) The ABA estimates that there are over 450 brands in the product space. The number of brands creates fierce competition for American’s 65 billion in annual purchases. Adverting in the mature stage of a product’s life is all about increasing purchases, differentiating your brand and finding new uses or markets for the product. In the soft drink space marketers try celebrity endorsements and product differentiation. 7-UP is â€Å"the un-cola†, trying to draw its distinction among more popular cola brands. Whatever approach the marketer takes in advertising, the goal is to extend the maturity stage and maintain profits for as long as possible. A product in the mature stage of the product life cycle does not indicate imminent demise. As illustrated above, soft drinks continue to command consumer’s dollars. Marketers will often look to new markets and changes in the product to extend the life of the product. One of the largest struggles for mature products is maintaining profits as competition drives down prices. As the product leaves maturity it enters the Decline Stage in the Product life cycle. A products decline is most often linked to new technologies. Marketers focus on reminding the remaining customers in the market that they are there for the consumer’s needs. Sales decline, profits decline and the product space eventually looses money. VCRs are a product on the decline in the United States. With the advance of DVDs and the reduction in price of DVRs, VCRs are loosing shelf space and market share. Marketers often times search for new markets as products decline in their existing markets. So while the United States and Europe may transition to a new technology, emerging economies may embrace the â€Å"older† and cheaper technology, thus extending the products life. Advertising a product in the stage of decline focuses on reminding the remaining consumer base the product still exists.

Employee Complaint Handling Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

Employee Complaint Handling - Coursework Example What is a grievance (Dentron and Boyd 2005, p. 61) A grievance can be defined as any complaint that is raised by an individual worker of a group of workers in an organization. A grievance is usually raised in allegation of violation of the terms of agreement in the workplace. Therefore it can be said to a complaint that is raised and which is aimed at expressing the dissatisfaction of the employees by what is happening in the organization. A grievance however differs from a complaint in that while a complaint can be verbally expressed, a grievance is usually stated in writing. A grievance can be caused by many things. It has been shown that some of the most controversial issues which usually ends up in a grievance include the discharge of employees from their workplace, lack of a process of collective bargaining for the employees which can be used to express their dissatisfaction, unfair labor practices, and others which are likely to happening in the work places. (Rahul 2005, p. 31) Therefore we can expound on this point by looking closely at the process which is usually used to handle these complaints. For the effective functioning of an organization, there is usually a need to look at the welfare of the employee. Any management will recognize that the employees are the most important asset that an organization holds and therefore the most important thing in the management of the resources of an organization will be first to look at the welfare of the workforces. It has been shown that most of the grievances which hare not well looked at often precipitate to a form of dissident by the workforce which in most case comes as strike. A strike in an organization will not only have economic effect on the organization but it will also have effects on the image of the management of the organization. Therefore many organizations have come up with an effective procedure that can be used to handle complaints of het employees. In order to ensure that there is less participant of the workforce in mass movement of labor unions, many organization came up with human resource departments which are well positioned to handle the complains of the employees. Therefore it is the duty of the human resource department to come up with a well structured way that can be used to look at the welfare of the workforce. The human resource department is the one which is entrusted with the duty of handling all the complaints regarding the employees. Human resource department must come up with a grievance handling procedure. (Finegan 2004, p. 71) A grievance handling produced clearly defines a process which is used by the organization to look at the complaints that has been given by the employees. It presents a process of initial resolving of the complaints through arbitration. It is a process that is used to indentify and resolve the companies in a timely manner in order to promoted the prevail a constructive discussion between the management and the representatives of the employees. therefore the aim of the grievance procedure is to ensure that there is a proper mechanism in place that is used by the management to look at the issues that pertains to employees in order to ensure that there is constructive resolving of the complains at they arises. (Dana 2001, p. 231) Contemporary view of

Bubbles on the South Sea Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Bubbles on the South Sea - Essay Example This is a significant drop in the total value of a market, almost undoubtedly to the popping of a bubble, creating a situation wherein the majority of investors are trying to flee the market at the same time and consequently incurring massive losses. And terribly affects everyone. The inevitable crash came and the strain proved too much to many joint stock companies. The immediate cause was the activities of the South Sea Company. It had been formed to engage in trading in the South Seas, but it also has engaged in the funding of the national debt in return for monopolistic privileges. The bad repute of this joint-stock companies had led to the passage of the Bubble Act for the regulation of companies in the main attempt to prevent panic. Bubble Act declared that only companies formed by charter or by a private act of parliament were legal. The South Sea Company was reasonably successful. It was chartered by the government for trade in South America and the South Sea. The relationship between the government and the company created confidence and high expectations. In the history, they were given the monopoly of trading in the Pacific Ocean and along the coast of South America, made an offer to the government to pay off the whole National Debt and to buy up the irredeemable annuities, according to Melville amounting of â€Å"â‚ ¤800,000 a year, provided the different public securities were consolidated into one fund in their hands and the government gave the company certain exclusive commercial privileges†. In spite of the limited privileges conceded to it in the Asiento by Spain, been highly successful in the slave trade. This means according to (Colliers Encyclopedia) â€Å"that they have the right for 30 years to supply Spanish-America colonies with 4,800 slaves annually and to send to Porto Bello and Vera Cruz a trading ship of 500 tons a year†.  

Jason Reitman and his Works Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Jason Reitman and his Works - Essay Example All three movies have some excellent art work and the various aspects discussed within this paper are the lighting, mise en scene, genre, acting and sound and editing. With every new movie, Reitman has shown considerable improvement, with ‘Juno’, out of the three, being the best, in my opinion, in these regards. However, the acting trophy goes to George Clooney in ‘Up in the Air’ for delivering a very powerful piece on corporate America. All three movies have America as a common backdrop for their stories. â€Å"Juno† has a very basic story line as well as concept attached to the tale; it is about a young girl trying to explore the nooks and crannies of intimacy and relationships without understanding the implications that might arise along with the same. The film has been directed in a very concise manner making use of pencil stylized ‘rotoscoped’ images right from the credits in the beginning, making use of animation in order to help th e audience understand the maturity level of the girl and the kind of colourful life that she always wanted to live for herself. This entire sequence took a period of seven to eight months to be mastered as each and every shot that follows Juno on her way to the medical pharmacy was taken in short screenings. The set design is incredible, assisting in providing the film with a touch of wonder. (Chris) Full of sarcasm, Juno helps to put an indie spin on the movie and gives a very intense performance with her dominating nature and need to control everything that might not even be in her reach. However, she understands where she went wrong by getting pregnant but decides to bring about a change in a couple’s life with the help of her baby who she is willing to give up in order to make someone else happy. There was a vast amount of dramatisation in the film played by the other characters, namely Juno’s parents which helped to calm the situation by making her understand what she had gone through, and helping her come out with a solution rather than screaming at her and making her feel the pain of the implications and consequences that she was already suffering. The characters in the film were, thus, portrayed excellently, with the young actors doing their best to get the message out to young America regarding teenage pregnancies. The entire design of the film is based on the four seasons of the year and the film has, thus, been divided into four aspects with different materials used to give the picture of the various seasons that passed by. For example, the use of fake flora and flowers were made in order to depict spring taking place. Fans were used in order to blow leaves and flowers around in order to show autumn and the shedding of leaves and trees. The use of fake cherry blossom trees were also made to make the set look more real. Different colours were also employed wisely by the director as he tried to use each colour to signify the weather on t he outside. The lighting was, thus, very high key in most places, giving off a myriad of colours, or a very warm feel to the entire movie. On the other hand, the film ‘‘Up in the Air’’ has a very gloomy feeling to it; the film revolves around a question of how much an individual’s life weighs and it reaches out to a large audience because it is centred around the

Answer questions'' toenails'' Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Answer questions'' toenails'' - Essay Example The narrator was pointing out the need of young doctors to take a break and refresh themselves. He observed that due to the high level of energy of young doctors, the work really hard and continuously. In this case most are burnt out early leading to giving up or hating the profession that they worked hard for. He even explained that a person should know the importance of his or her own self like a priest, it is important to nourish his faith so that he can help others strengthen theirs. The narrator had special nicknames to every member of the library regulars and Neckerchief became his friend. One day when he noticed that Neckerchief is wincing as he walks, he discovered that he has toenail problem. He then decided to get the toenail cutters from the hospital, bring it to the library and cut his friend’s toenails. This act revealed that even during breaks, the narrator cannot put his vocation on pause. His dedication to the need of patients or people can be observed in his every action. In terms of the conversation with the nurse, it can be presumed that they have a friendship that can be based on working together a long time. Also, the nurse can be older than the narrator since a parental care even while teasing and joking can be observed. The climax is the part wherein Neckerchief felt relief due to the fact that he can walk better and with less pain after his toenails were cut. This led to the decision of the narrator to help all the people in his â€Å"library group.† The plot of the short story revolves around the doctor who recognizes the need to take a break from work to be able to refresh himself in order to fully and optimally help his patients by going to a library and fulfill his love for reading. In the process though, he still was able to help more people by being a person who really cares about his patients, and other people in need of assistance. The theme represents the

Brown Vs The Board Of Education Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Brown Vs The Board Of Education - Essay Example The deciding factors in this case not only concerned children and their education but was also influenced by the fact that there was a human tendency to prejudge and discriminate against others based on their ethnic or religious culture as well as their physical characteristics. The impact of the decision in this case was felt in many social situations and was not limited to education and children. Although Brown v Board of Education is widely recognised for the way that segregation in schools was overruled this was not the first legal challenge on such a policy. In 1849 the case of Roberts v City of Boston was brought by African Americans were racial segregation had been mandated in certain schools. Social reform and the Civil Rights Movement were a direct result of the Brown case and the notion of democracy was enforced as pertaining to all individuals. Although the decision in Brown was given in 1954 it was a further ten years before the ruling was applied in the Deep South. The i mpact of this delay is that male workers who finished their education before segregation was stopped were less well educated then those whose education occurred after desegregation. Although Brown is largely responsible for the abolition of racial disparities in schools these had already started to disappear twenty years before this case . Large scale desegregation in the Deep South did not take place until ten years after the decision in Brown and was part of the U S commission on Civil Rights 1967 .

SBU Situational Analysis Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

SBU Situational Analysis - Case Study Example It is important to note that RamenPlay was founded also by the Japanese company Sanpou Co. Ltd. Its founder Yukihiro Kaneko has set a clear vision and strategy towards development of the brand, placing customers on the first place, and striving to provide â€Å"best ramen to the beloved customers† (RamenPlay 2014). In order to implement its strategy of elevating and enhancing customer’s dining experience, the company employs Sanpou’s Japanese master chefs who have more than 40 years of culinary expertise. These McCoys are recognized to be the best in their field of expertise and it significantly helps the company to gain competitive advantage (RamenPlay 2014). Thus, collaboration with Japan’s Sanpou Co Ltd enabled the company to differentiate its brand among the competitors by offering authentic Japanese cuisine (Breadtalk Group Ltd - Annual Report, 2012). The company has generated profit of $4.97 on every $100 spent on asset. According to experts it is normal achievement comparing to the sector average (Macroaxis 2014). In order to achieve good financial results the company has ensured effective supplying and focused on providing best quality and customer service (RamenPlay 2014). Continuous improvement and innovativeness combined with guaranteed freshness and top quality of the ingredients makes the company successful and profitable. The company continues to open new RamenPlat outlets, but offers new design where the focus is made on rich heritage and culture associated with Sanpou brand. This emphasis on Japanese authenticity and identity is a pillar of company’s strategy. Thus, for example, in 2013, the company has modernized menu of RamenPlay and refreshed the interior dà ©cor. Also, the company’s management has introduced a new business cost model which is expected to improve firm’s productivity (Breadtalk Group Ltd - Annual Report, 2012). Political: There is a strong

MSc in Construction Law and Dispute Resolution Essay

MSc in Construction Law and Dispute Resolution - Essay Example Recent years have registered a growing trend of alternative dispute-resolution methods, for instance, mediation, adjudication, conciliation, and various other hybrid arrangements1. This can be attributed to the drawbacks associated with arbitration and litigation, namely, the upsurge in costs, deferrals and hostile relationships between parties. Unfortunately, during the last decade superfluous and increasingly complicated stipulations were incorporated in construction contracts. In general, this involved the addition of numerous alternative dispute resolution methodologies and arbitration divided into redundant tiers2. These apparently more economic and swift alternative dispute resolution techniques only rendered the process more ineffective instead of the other way round. Mediation plays an integral role in determining the conditions of contracts. The exercise of Alternative Dispute Resolution has gained widespread prominence for working out differences in every sphere of life. Du ring recent years legal systems have increasingly adopted restorative justice practices3, this implies that Alternative dispute resolution is even employed for dealing with criminal cases. ... 2. Dispute Resolution Methods Dispute resolution method potentially ensues in the following three outcomes, namely, an agreement (negotiation), compromise (conciliation) or judgment (court or arbitration rulings). The mediation outcome falls under the agreement and cannot legally bind parties to abide by the mediation outcome unlike arbitration or court proceedings5. But to be an ideal solution, the agreement should meet the interests of all participant parties. 3. Categorization Of Mediation Outcome Arbitration comprises a ruling given by a neutral, mutually nominated arbitrator. However, mediation outcome can be classified as a contract6. By taking into account elements that validate a contract, we can notice that in a mediation outcome, the opposing parties exchange informed offers and acceptances in order to determine an outcome. Moreover, consideration and intention to enter into a legal relationship exists so it can be concluded that it is simply not a concurrence of offers and acceptances. Therefore, the mediation outcome meets the criteria of a contract and should not be confused for a judgment which is a legal determination imposed on parties regardless of their consent. 4. Discharging Mediation Outcome The creditor should normally expect a voluntary settlement as regards to the obligation as is the case in normal contracts. However, in the case where the debtor continues to defer the obligation, the outcome will vary according to the commencement of the mediation process. Normally, two hypothetical circumstances exist: 4.1 Parties choose Mediation over Litigation As mentioned before, a mediation outcome is simply a contract; hence, the creditor can utilize the same remedies as are available to a contractor.  

Building Performance Management through Employee Participation Essay - 1

Building Performance Management through Employee Participation - Essay Example To ensure the employees are motivated and committed to achieving organizational goals and consequently success or effectiveness, performance management is crucial. Most people use the terms performance management and performance appraisal interchangeably but performance appraisal is just part of performance management aimed at ensuring that employees perform their jobs up to the expected standards. Since performance management involves ensuring the right employee behavior, employees’ participation in the process is key to effectiveness. Failure to involve employees in making decisions in issues that affect them may lead to negative results as illustrated in the Jewelers Mutual Insurance Company (JMI). These include poor job attitudes, reduced motivation, and reduced effort on the job (Mathis and Jackson 354). Employee participation is considered crucial in â€Å"determining whether specific performance management methods, procedures and requirements will be accepted and that they work effectively to support performance improvement† (OPM.gov). Employee dissatisfaction is as a result of not engaging employees in the process. Employees have different personalities and thus different opinions and perceptions. As such, seeking their opinion in issues that affect them ensures acceptability and commitment (Roberts 89). Consider JMI which a performance management in place but employees were dissatisfied with the way goal-directed behavior was being encouraged. If the organization had involved the employees in deciding on the goals to be accomplished and the expected performance standards, the employees would have been comfortable with the process since they are already aware of what is expected of them. Besides, Roberts asserts that if the employees are involved in setting standards and performance measures, they cannot perceive the process to be unfair (93). As such employee participation in the process leads to increased reliability, fairness and validi ty. He also asserts that since employees’ gain ownership of the process, they are committed to ensuring its success (89). Employee participation in designing the rating form makes it acceptable to the ratees hence minimizing conflicts between management and employees. After engaging employees in the performance management process, JMI was able to get commitment and support from employees and improved performance. This was through improvements to the system, that is, their views were incorporated during the redesigning process thus creating a system acceptable to all and which linked performance management to other human resource activities. This case is thus a good example of how employee participation enhances greater support for the system. The experience of JMI is also a lesson to other organizations on how performance management systems can be improved. One of the ways to improve the system is through continuous feedback. Some organizations hold review meetings annually t hus do not give employees frequent feedback. This is detrimental to the organization since an employee is unable to understand whether he or she is accomplishing what he/she set out to accomplish or make amendments and move in the right direction. As a result, the performance may not improve. For Roberts, job satisfaction and performance can be enhanced by use of a â€Å"specific, timely and behavioral feedback by a credible source† (93). Frequent feedback also allows redefining of goals and

Cost and Benefits of Hybrid Cars Essay Example for Free

Cost and Benefits of Hybrid Cars Essay Have you pulled your car up to the gas pump lately and been shocked by the high prices of gasoline? The Auto industry has the technology necessary to address this concern. . It’s the hybrid car. Today, there are many different models out there in the market and most major manufacturers are involved in developing them. Hybrid cars will save the drivers a lot of money. The purpose of this paper is to identify the costs and show the benefits of this awesome vehicle. Identifying Costs. This section is designed to compare and contrast all the costs that we will see in the decision of purchasing a new hybrid car. It’ll include all monetary costs and all non-monetary costs. I will be comparing the costs of buying a new hybrid to other regular non-hybrid vehicles in order to better see the differences. A. Gasoline Car Loan People are obsessed with spending less money on gas. Websites have even been created to help the penny-pinching consumer find the cheapest option close to home. Hybrid cars get really good MPG (miles per gallon). In my opinion, the best way to find out if switching over to a new hybrid car is a good idea is to compare the prices and costs. I’ll use my own car as an example, if I were to replace my paid-off 1999 Honda Accord, which only gets 25 mpg, with something more economical; I would consider a Toyota Prius or a Corolla. The following chart shows how much money I would save if I made the change. |2012 Auto |Miles per Gallon (MPG)|Monthly Gas |Sticker Price |Monthly Payment |Net Monthly | | | |Savings | | |Savings | |Toyota Prius |55 |$ 70. 71 |$21,275. 00 |$386. 56 |$(315. 85) | |Toyota Corolla |36 |$ 34. 72 |$14,005. 00 |$227. 83 |$(193. 10) | The table above, shows us how much more it is to save if purchasing a Prius over a Corolla (Hensley 2011). On the other hand we can see that the sticker price of a Toyota Prius is more expensive than the Corolla. The monthly payment above is calculated at a 5. 5% APR. However in the long run we will be saving so much more if we chose the Prius, because the money that we are saving on gas every month could be used to pay off the difference in the Sticker Price. With gas prices skyrocketing again like they did in 2008, this will be the best decision to make. The following chart will give us more insight on gas prices (Hensley 2011). [pic] B. Taxes Even though the final selling price is including taxes, there are many things to note about tax credits per hybrid car. There is no set tax credit, and it depends on what vehicle you buy, so remember not to only take into account the miles per gallon and price, but also the varying tax break incentives. The list of IRS-certified vehicles is not always the same; automakers keep producing hybrids that are qualified and adding them to the list, we need to make sure we look at the updated data. Also, another thing about hybrid tax credit is that they are reduced every year and eventually is eliminated, so make sure to check out the phase out dates that are determined by different manufacturers. Credit amounts begin to phase out for a given manufacturer once it has sold over 60,000 eligible vehicles. It is all depending on the year, for example if we go back to 2005, you can save anywhere from $500 all the way up to about $3,400 (Fuel Economy. gov). Sometimes, it can be a guessing game, but remember, we will be saving something and it adds up! Vehicles purchased after December 31, 2010 are not eligible for this credit (Fuel Economy. gov). C. Registration Fees and Other Monetary Costs The registration fee is the amount charged by the state to register a new car, assign a title (legal proof of ownership) and cover the cost of license plates. The dealer provides this service for you; saving you a trip to the DMV or registry but the money goes to the state. There are other fees that need to be paid when buying a new car such as: doc fees, taxing the trade-in, taxing rebates and dealer fees. However; when buying a Prius those fees will be the same as buying a regular car so further explanation is not necessary (Karim, Layton). D. Non-monetary costs The time it takes to go buy a car would be one non-monetary cost. Let’s say I was going to go buy today. Since I work 40-hours a week and get paid $9. 00/hr, I would have to get at least 10 hours, 5 hours off of work and 5 hours off my personal time. I could use this time to go to the dealership pick out the car and do all the loans and transactions necessary. Filling out all that paper work can take a lot of time, and since I am a college student I need time for school as well. Therefore my Non-monetary cost is 10 hours of my time from my work-time/personal time. Another cost would be the amount of gas that it takes to drive to the dealership and the time it takes me to travel there. If someone is accompanying me and helping me decide which car I want, I am also using their time which could be almost as much as my time. Benefits 1. Savings at the Pump All Hybrids get a better fuel economy than their counterparts. 2. Lower Insurance Rates Insurance rates can depend on many things such as your driving record, your age, and it can also depend on the model car you drive. Driving a Prius will lower your insurance rate from 5-10%! 3. Government Assistance The Federal Tax credit was also a great benefit although they stopped giving it at the end of 2010(Fuel Economy.gov). 4. Lower Emissions A fact that should be considered is that 97% of all vehicles in the U. S are dependent on Oil. Also with lower emissions it’ll help less Carbon Monoxide adding to Global Warming. In fact, Regular vehicles create 1/3 of the greenhouse effect (Karim, Layton). The key thing here is that the amount of pollution allowed does not depend on the mileage your car gets. But a car that burns twice as much gas to go a mile will generate approximately twice as much pollution. That pollution will have to be removed by the emissions control equipment on the car. So decreasing the fuel consumption of the car is one of the surest ways to decrease emissions (Karim, Layton). 5. Special Car-Pool Lanes In some states if you own a hybrid car, you are allowed to use a special car-pool lane regardless how many people are in the vehicle. After identifying all the monetary and non-monetary costs. We can see that the Sticker price is more expensive than purchasing a regular vehicle. However, in the long run with the gas mileage we will be receiving from this awesome hybrid technology it will payoff for everything that we’ve spent. It’s sort of an investment. If we add all the benefits, we can see that we are not only benefiting ourselves when we purchase a hybrid but we are helping the environment and our world (Fuel Economy. gov). More people are buying more hybrid cars everyday, the sales of hybrid cars increased 141% from 2004-2005 (Karim, Layton). In conclusion, I recommend everyone that if they are looking to buy a new vehicle, hybrid is the way to go. All the benefits we receive from it are totally worth it, and although the cost might be somewhat high in comparison to other cars, it’s worth it. Not only will we be saving gas driving to work, school and other places, but also we won’t take into as much consideration the price of gas next time we stop at the gas station! References Fuel Economy. gov. (n. d. ). Retrieved from http://www. fueleconomy. gov/feg/hybrid_sbs_cars. shtml Hensley, R. , Knupfer, S. M. , Krieger, A. (2011). The fast lane to the adoption of electric cars. Mckinsey Quarterly, (1), 10-14. Nice, Karim, and Julia Layton. How Hybrid Cars Work 20 July 2000. HowStuffWorks. com. 04 April 2012.

Carrefour A French Multinational Retailer Marketing Essay

Carrefour A French Multinational Retailer Marketing Essay Introduction Carrefour, a French multinational retailer, was establised by the Fournier and Defforey families as a supermarket in 1959. In 1963, new concept hypermarket, was discovered and invested. Since then, Carrefour owned up to 5,200 stores worldwide, reaching out to 26 countires and region (refer to appendix A). In particular, for Asia, Carrefour have invested in China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia, India as well as Singapore with approximately 361 hypermarkets, 17 supermarkets and 2 other formats of stores (refer to appendix B). Opening its first store in 1997, Carrefour was the first to introduce hypermarket concept in Singapore, where everything can be purchased under one roof (aisaone business 2012; Krishnan 2012). Oxford dictionaries (online) defines hypermarket as a very large self-service store with a wide range of goods and a large carpark typically situated outside a town. Carrefour had two stores in Singapore; Suntec City and Plaza Singapura. Subsequently, in 2000, Giant, a major hypermarket retailer, joined the market, competing with Carrefour. As a result, Carrefour was not progressing well. Reported by numerous news (refer to appendix C), in a press release on 28 August 2011, Carrefour announced the decision to close its two stores in Singapore by the end of 2012. This decision was reached because Carrefour realized that there is no expansion and growth prospect in Singapore that brings them to a leadership position in the long term. Marketing Problem Segmentation/ Customer Research For 15 years, Carrefour has been providing consumers with one-stop service but it did not turn out as expected. Concluded by Krishnan (2012), Carrefour came in with the mind-set that consumers in Singapore would avoid frequent shopping and hence, would buy as much as possible within a trip. Unfortunately, this prediction was not accurate as this behaviour was not seen popular in Singapore. In addition, both Carrefours outlet was located in central hub which in customer perspective brings significant inconvenience such as high travelling cost and traffic congestion. Moreover, Carrefour does not offer unique products that appeal to consumers, enticing them to choose Carrefour over other retailers and local grocery shops (Krishnan 2012). As a result, Carrefour was observed to be targeting at the wrong country and customer segment, facing huge hurdle in attracting consumers with their one-stop shopping proposition, location and products offered. Sales and Distribution Research Being a hypermarket that offers a wide range of food items and non-food items such as appliances and clothing, Carrefour is in a direct competition position with grocery retailer, supermarket such as NTUC FairPrice (Ng 2012) as well as appliances chains such as Best Denki (Krishnan, 2012), which might eventually affect their sales. On top of these competitors, Giant, a hypermarket open by Dairy Farm Group, is their major competitor. Reported by Krishnan (2012), Giant offers consumer lower price, compensating and outweighing travelling cost. Giant is also able to control consumers behaviour as products sold seems to be more appealing to broader segment of market. Hence, with these competitors at hand, Carrefour did not operate as well as expected. Looking at Carrefours 2011 sales report, illustrated in the pie chart below, the highest contributor of 43.2% is France. Aisa, has the lowest contribution of merely 9% which is approximately à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬73 Million (with the closure of Malaysia and Thailand stores). Source: http://www.carrefour.com/cdc/finance/key-figures/our-key-figures-/key-figures-folder/breakdown-sales.html In addition, reported by TODAY news (2012), in 2009, Aisa has accounted for 7.9% of Carrefours total sales of à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬85.9 billion, with Singapore contributing only à ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬85 Million (TODAY/CNA 2012). Comparing it with 2011 annual report, sales revenue in Singapore have decreased. Therefore, the failed in Carrefour may be due to its strong competition in Singapore with its direct and indirect competititors. Objectives The main purpose of this research proposal is to investigate the perception of consuerms towards Carrefour against their competitors in Singapore. The objectives of the research proposal are as follows: To evaluate Carrefours performance in comparision to its competitors To examine factors influencing consumers behaviour in patronizing its preferred hypermarket/supermarket retailer To ascertain what kind (demographic, geographic, psychographic, behavioural) of consumer frequent Carrefour To investigate the degree of brand loyalty consumer have towards Carrefour Research Design Research Question With the aim of achieving the objectives set, research questions have to be formulated. The following are some example pertaining to the research proposal. Which of the supermarket respondent most frequent? In selecting a supermarket, what are the factors that respondent consider most? Rate the level of awareness respondent have towards Carrefour (1 being the most and 7 being the least) How frequent do respondent shop at any of Carrefours outlet? What are the prominent difference between Carrefour and other supermarket? Research Method Aliaga and Gunderson (2000) quoted from Muijs (2011, p.1) defines quantitative research as a method that explains the phenomena of collecting numerical data that are analysed using some mathematically based methods, in particular statistics. The researcher will thus be adopting a quantitative approach, employing primary research personal survey method, focusing on the phenomenon of consumers decision for patronizing a supermarket; their intentions, behaviour and attitude (A study on factors considered by consumers for patronizing a retail outlet 2010) and gather information on consumer awareness towards Carrefour compared to its competitiors. Personal Survey Malhotra and Birks (2007, p.265) and Malhotra (2010, p.211) defines survey as a method that gathers information based upon questioning respondents a variety of questions regarding their behaviour, intentions, attitudes, awareness, motivations and demographic and lifestyle characteristics. Most researcher noticed that survey is simple to administer and hence is a popular quantitative measure amongst all. Although it is argued that survey can be uncontrollable as respondents may be unable or unwilling to provide accurate responds (especially to motives or sensitive questions), it is recognised that due to the limited alternatives available, data collected will be consistent across and variability of results will be reduced (Malhotra 2010; Malhotra and Birks 2007; insights from decision point 2012). Rea and Parker (2012) further argues that commercial enterprises often use surveys to formulate market strategies for the potential widespread use, performance of new and existing products as well as finding out their market value. These aligns to the researchers aim and objective, to gather information on factors that affects consumer patronage behaviour as well as perception of consumer towards Carrefour. Furthermore, due to the surveys fixed-response alternative questions nature and consistent data gathered, coding, analysing and interpreting of survey results are relatively simplier for researchers compared to observation or experiment method. Appendix D shows a diverse survey techniques, and compares them against numerous factors, shown on appendix E. Personal interviwing street survey, occurs when respondents are intercepted while shopping or walking on the street (Malhotra and Birks 2007). Personal survey technique is a method to collect relevant data from target group and evaluation becomes easier (A study on factors considered by consumers for patronizing a retail outlet 2010), generalising the entire target population from a small amount of data gathered (Rea Parker 2012). Additionally, personal survey allows the researcher control the environment, to source for potential surveyee personally, collecting data from the right target segment (Gibran 2010; Rea Parker 2012). Moreover, response rate in persoanl survey can be significantly high as compared to other methods such as mail survey and speed of collecting data is also moderately high. Due to the characteristics of personal survey in appendix E, personal survey will be conducted by the researcher on consumers who patronize any supermarket or hypermarket in Singpaore to collect valuable data on their patronizing behaviour and their level of awareness towards Carrefour against their competitors. Formulate a plan Gibran (2010) suggested that, survey techniques includes selecting respondents randomly from the studied population in an unbiased mannar and having a standardized questionnaire for all respondents. However, Rea and Parker (2012) claims that physical characteristics of surveyee such as attire, cleanliness, manners etcetera is important when selecting respondent. On top of that, sample survey, where data will only be collected from a fraction of the studied population (Statistics Canada 2003, p.2; Rea Parker 2012), will be exploited by the researcher. It is noted that sample survey provides a economical and quicker way of obtaining sufficient information in the field. Hence, in this research, studied population refers to a representative number of consumers, particularly middle-aged women, who patronize any supermarket in any given time. As mentioned, there are two different issues. To attain the objectives, the questionnaire will be targetting at these two issues seperately where specific questions will be asked sequentially. First part of the questionnaire will focus on the factors affecting consumer partonage behaviour while the second part on consumers awareness towards Carrefour. Structured questionnaire, the degree of having a standardisation on data collection (Malhotra and Birks 2007), will be executed by the researcher in a formal and prearranged order,thus having a direct collection process. Although unstructured questions allows respondent to best express their attitudes and opinions towards the topic discussed (Malhotra 2010, p. 343), it will not be address as this is a quantitative research. Hence, the questionnaire will only contain structured questions. Most questions in the questionnaire will be in a likert scale (nominal scale) and respondents will be required to rate them accordingly base on their attitudes and behaviour. Rea and Parker (2012) recommends that sample size must be selected in an appropriate microcosm of the working population. They further concludes that larger samples yield higher degree of accurancy than smaller samples and hence researcher have to weigh the degree of accurancy with time and cost available. Analyze Data Before collating the results through computer-assisted programme, coding will be employed to facilitate capturing of data. This means that researcher will be allocating numerical values to every possible result of each question, giving it meaning (Malhotra 2010; Malhotra Birks 2007). Structured questions will be coded before the fieldwork is performed, while for unstructured questions, responses will be coded after the fieldwork (Statistics Canada 2003; Malhotra 2010, p.455). After which, coded values will be stored into the computer to analyse the questionnaires. As explained by Statistics Canada (2003, p.3), computer-assisted programme enables researcher to directly enter questionnaires into the computer and data will be captured and transform into readable format. Another benefit to computer-assisted programme is that inconsistent and invalid data will be identified instantly for researcher, providing a user-friendly and convenient form of identifying invalid data. The computer-assisted programme used will be SPSS, where data will be analysed into tabular or graphical form (Rea Parker 2012), making comparisons and interpret results for statistical analysis that will be reflected in the research proposal. As this research is about consumers behaviour towards patronizing, the research requires multivariate statistical technique where there are two or more measurements of each element and the variables are analysed simultaneously (Malhotra 2010, p.466). As mentioned, this research involves understanding the patronage behaviour. Hence, responses of the factors that affect respondents behaviour are dependent on each other. For example, respondent patronage behaviour will depend on the location, price, products offered etc. As such, referring to appendix F, a classification of multivariate techniques, the researcher is able to evaluate results with several methods such as cross-tabulation. Conclusion In summary, with the intention of discover the factors to consumer behaviour as well as establishing Carrefours market position in Singapore, the researcher have decided to employ personal survey method. Survey results will be analysed through coding followed by SPSS thereafter by the researcher to interpret these surveys into readable tables and graphs. Limitation Survey may seem to be the best suitable method for this research but it is time-consuming. As mentioned, this research is base on sample survey, which implies that it will not be 100% accurate as not everyone in the studied population is surveyed. Expected contribution With the mentioned objectives, and the methods used to meet these objectives, the researcher believes that this research will be able to contribute to Carrefour in analysing the reasons to their failure in Singapore, thus making improvements in other countries. This research can also set Carrefours management to react fast to changes in other international market, expending their market and prospects.

Literature Review on Pakistans Food Security

Literature Review on Pakistans Food Security ANALYTICAL FRAMEWORK Food security is elucidated by the IFAD/FAO as the year-round access to the amount and variety of safe foods required by all household members in order to lead active and healthy lives, without undue risk of losing such access. No country anywhere in the world is food secure on this definition. It represents therefore an ideal. To make the definition operational, four dimensions are considered namely Food Availability, Food Access, Food Utilisation and Stability of Access. These are briefly explained as follows: 1. Food Availability: The availability of sufficient quantities of food of appropriate qualities, supplied through domestic production or imports (including food aid). This is often confused with food security but should properly be seen as only a part, albeit an important part of food security. The question is not only whether food is available in a country but whether it is available in the right place at the right time and there must be a mechanism for ensuring that food of the right quality is made available. 2. Food Access: Access by individuals to adequate resources (entitlements) to acquire appropriate foods for a nutritious diet. These resources need not be exclusively monetary but may also include traditional rights e.g. to a share of common resources. Entitlements are defined as the set of all those commodity bundles over which a person can establish command given the legal, political, economic and social arrangements of the community in which he or she lives. 3. Food Utilization: Utilization of food through adequate diet, clean water, sanitation, and health care. This brings out the importance of non-food inputs in food security. It is not enough that someone is getting what appears to be an adequate quantity of food if that person is unable to make use of the food because he or she is always falling sick. 4. Stability of Access: Are individuals at high risk of losing their access to food? An example of this situation would be a landless agricultural laborer who was almost wholly dependent on agricultural wages in a region of erratic rainfall. Such a person is at high risk of not being able to find work in a situation of general crop failure and thus going hungry, i.e. is vulnerable. The objective of the thesis would be to analyze the institutional, production, market and policy aspects of the aforementioned four specific factors underlying food insecurity in Pakistan. This shall be gauged by analyzing secure access, production and utilization of three key staples; wheat, rice and sugar. There is considerable evidence that indicates the need to route policy focus to take the shape of revisionary responses to institutional framework, production, market dynamics and existing policy framework; all geared towards actualizing yield potentials and enhancing food security in the context of factors outlined above. What makes it even more pertinent is the impending food crisis keeping in view the increasing population and various institutional constraints underlying the retarded growth in production e.g water shortages, soil degradation, absence of proper agriculture research, improper agricultural practices etc. The four key aspects defined above i.e. Food availability, Food Access, Food Utilisation and Stability of Access shall be analyzed in terms of their current standing as well as the potential areas of improvement to realize the stipulated objectives. The stated framework is illustrated in the table as under: FOOD AVAILABILITY Review of Land holdings Cropping Patterns and relative prices for each crop. Profits and Losses per acre for each crop for each size class of farm Total area of cultivable land including land currently being utilized and cultivable waste. Water Utilisation Seeds, Fertilisers and GM food technology as a yield enhancement technique Productivity Enhancement of major crops Availability of credit for farmers for investments geared towards productivity enhancement FOOD ACCESS Identification and Targeting of the Food Insecure People Enhancing Productivity of small farmers for poverty alleviation and foster agricultural growth Diversification of On-farm and Off-farm income generation activities Stabilization of input and output process Encouragement of small scale enterprises STABILITY Inter-regional Inequality Urban Rural Disparity Distribution of land and Access to inputs and resources Skill Development for broad based development UTILISATION Improving nutritional aspects of food Balanced dietary consumption Promotion of household food production e.g. vegetables and pulses production, poultry and rearing of small ruminants POLICIES AND INSTITUTIONAL IMPERATIVES Removing Policy Distortions Provision and enhancement of rural infrastructure Institutional Structure for accelerated agricultural growth with equity. Credit and Rural Finance Human Resource Development Research and Extension Support Services In addition, the modus operandi for addressing the questions specified above would be through: †¢ A review and research the production, availability and consumption of essential food commodities †¢ A review of existing food procurement and storage facilities and identify areas of potential improvement †¢ Identification of the constraints in production, yield as well as the prices of essential food commodities e.g. wheat, sugar and rice. †¢ Identifying areas and scope of improved physical inputs geared towards improving the state of agriculture. †¢ Appraising the effectiveness of the Social Safety nets like BISP, Punjab Food Support Scheme in improving food security and how modifications in these programs towards targeting can be brought about to reduce fiscal and economic costs and losses for non target beneficiaries. †¢ Institutional and policy imperatives for enhanced and sustainable agricultural growth through a normative analysis of the following: o Agriculture and Crop Research Facilities o Social Mobilization o Vertical Integrations and Marketing systems o Enforcement Mechanisms in place to keep track of the regulatory endeavors. LITERATURE REVIEW Agriculture is considered the mainstay of Pakistans economy. According to the Economic Survey of Pakistan 2008-09, there are major hindrances in the GDP growth rate in case of Pakistan, which the report asserts could not hold at 2007-2008 level. Agriculture, the major source of employment and income in the rural areas is expected to grow at 4.7 percent as against Services sector growing at the rate of 3.6 percent during 2008-2009. About 70% per cent of the countrys rural population is directly or indirectly linked with agriculture for their livelihood. Whatever happens to agriculture is bound to affect the livelihood and consequently food security of the poor rural people. Decline of agriculture and shrinking livelihood opportunities have resulted in rising poverty in rural areas while also compounding the food insecurity in both rural and urban areas. Agriculture, thus assumes a critical role in the national economy, providing food to the fast growing population of the country. Pakistan is a country where food security situation in recent years has not been very encouraging. The demand for food in recent years, especially key staples like wheat and sugar have started to exceed the supply. This gap can be attributed to many possible causes. According to Ahmed and Siddiqui (1994), even when the supply situation is better, there are problems with the distribution amongst different segments of the society thus adversely affecting the nutrition. On the demand side, the food security problem has been complicated by an unprecedented increase in population. Since the existing rate of population growth of over 3 percent per annum is expected to continue for a reasonable period of time, the total fertility rate also remaining well above the so-called â€Å"replacement level†, improvement in health-care facilities, which have already resulted in a remarkable decline in infant and child mortality rates has also contributed towards the high population rate in Pak istan. Transitory and chronic food insecurity is caused mainly by poverty. (Tweeten, 1999) People with adequate buying power overcome the frictions of time (e.g., unpredictable, unstable harvests from year to year) and space (e.g., local food short- ages) to be food-secure. The conclusions of the aforementioned study further suggested a food security policy synthesis for poor, developing countries like Pakistan which are outlined as follows; Poverty is best alleviated through broad-based, sustainable economic development. The most effective and efficient means to economic development is to follow the standard model, illustrated by the figure as under, which assures an economic pie to divide among people and among functions, such as human resource development, infrastructure, family planning, a food safety net, and environmental protection. The standard model is not merely an ideal; it is applicable to any culture and provides a workable prescription for economic progress, ensuring buying power for self-reliance and food security. Eventually, in conjunction with family planning, it brings decreased population growth. Although no country has adopted every component, many countries have adopted enough components of the standard model to demonstrate its capacity for economic success. The central puzzle of why food-insecure countries like Pakistan, eschew the standard model when it can bring food security is explained by political failure. Terminating even the worst policies creates losers. If the losers are in positions of power and authority, they resist reform. Economic distortions provide economic rents for those in authority who bestow licenses and enforce regulations. Parastatals provide employment for friends and relatives of power brokers; hence, unfortunate public policy carries powerful momentum. Political failur e is inseparable from broader institutional failure. Food insecurity and economic stagnation are not the result of limited natural resources, environmental degradation, or ignorant people. Rather, they are the result of misguided public policies, which in turn are the product of weak institutions and corrupt governments serving special interests. Institutional change is required to adopt the standard model. Poorly structured, inadequate institutions often trace to cultural factors such as tolerance of the public for unrepresentative, corrupt, incompetent government. Government leaders often view their position as an opportunity for personal aggrandizement rather than to be a servant of the public interest. Socio-institutional changes, and hence standard model adoption, are blocked by cultural characteristics such as caste and ethnic animosities, which provide a fertile climate for governments not representing the public interest to play one group against another. Thus, the challenge of food security for our time, as argued by Tweeten (1999), is socio-institutional change. A study was conducted by the IFPRI in 1977 that emphasized on the intensity of the problem facing the Developing Market Economies (DMEs) in countering food deficits in the wake of increasing populations. The options to grapple this challenge were outlined as increasing domestic production, commercial imports, reducing the food consumption levels through pricing adjustments or rationing, and food aid. For a country like Pakistan, easily branded as a low income country, policy choices are limited. Much of the population is already below the minimum dietary and nutritional requirements. Commercial imports to cover up the food deficit may not be a plausible option because it deems imperative a huge foreign exchange outlay coupled with various alternative development expenditures seeking priority. The study concluded that in order to narrow the food gap, development efforts in such low income countries must emphasize on policies to increase and enhance production performance. Large increa ses in agricultural investments coupled with appropriate policies and effective programs will be central. The third critical dimension of food security, utilization, refers to actual metabolization of food by the body. Food that is available and accessible does not alleviate food insecurity if people do not utilize food properly because of inadequate nutrition education and food preparation, bad habits, eating disorders, or poor health, such as intestinal parasites from unsanitary water. Thus, food security is appropriately defined not just as access but as utilization by all people at all times of sufficient nutrients for a productive and healthy life. It follows that sanitation, education, and health care are important instruments for food security. Despite per capita world food supplies being more than adequate to provide food security to all, food or income transfers among nations cannot be the principal instrument to end food insecurity. One reason is because altruism is too limited and fickle to provide sufficient, reliable transfers. Heavy dependence on transfers could discourage local production and create an unhealthy dependency of poor nations and individuals on rich nations, agencies, and individuals. Massive food transfers would destroy incentives for local food producers. A nation must have a pie of purchasing power to divide and share among its food-insecure people. Because it is the poor who lack access to food, alleviating food insecurity means alleviating poverty. Most of the worlds poor, the 1.3 billion people with incomes of less than $1 per day (updated from World Bank 1990, p. 29), will have to escape poverty and food insecurity through economic growth. Economic growth largely was responsible for the 158 million reduction in numbers of undernourished people in East, South, and Southeast Asia from 1979-1981 to 1990-1992. In the mixed and underdeveloped economies of the Third World, the maintenance of minimum consumption levels for large segments of the population is a critical problem. Even in developing countries with a reasonably well-developed industrial base, such as India, glaring nutrition gaps exist (Knudsen and Scandizzo 1979) and critical shortages can and do arise in basic consumption areas such as food, fuel, and clothing (Sharma and Roy 1979). Such shortfalls have serious economic, social, and political consequences (Burki and Haq 1981). Therefore, governments in developing countries usually attempt a macro management of selected consumption items. A fairly complex set of direct and indirect policies are used to influence the production, distribution, and prices of such items (Ahmed 1979, Dholakia and Khorana 1979, Kaynak 1980, Sorensen 1978). The formulation and implementation of such policies can be viewed as a macro-marketing management process [Zif 1980]. For essential consumption ite ms, this process entails: i. Identification of key consumption items (products) and target groups (markets), ii. Development and evaluation of intervention methods (macro marketing strategies), iii. Creation of delivery or communication systems (channels) to reach the target groups or other intervention points, and iv. Monitoring and control of the consumption- oriented programs (macromarketing control system). In discussing the rationale for Macromanagement System for Essential Consumption Items (referred herein as MSECI), two interrelated questions arise i.e. why do these systems come into existence and what are the goals of these systems. In analyzing why the government intervenes in the distributive trade for essential consumption items, Sorenson (1978) cites four reasons, which are presented below in an elaborated version: i. Under conditions of scarcity (a typical feature in underdeveloped countries), the unfettered operation of the market mechanism is politically unacceptable. Price increases and shortages resulting from unfettered private trade would be politically too risky for the government in power. ii. Distributive trade typically has a poor reach in the rural areas. In periods of shortages, rural distribution deteriorates even further, making government intervention a necessity. iii. The market mechanism is imperfect in terms of prices, information, and market clearing. During periods of shortages, these imperfections become magnified, inviting government regulation. iv. Profits and surpluses from private trade in developing countries usually do not flow into productive investments. Instead, they flow into private consumption and investment such as clothing, jewelry, gold, houses, dowries, and so on. Hence, profits from shortages do not help alleviate the major cause of shortages, i.e. low le vels of production. In fact, some of the surpluses may even accentuate shortages by becoming working capital for increased hoarding of goods. Government often intervenes to reduce the profits going into such unproductive uses. The experience of India as put forth by Dholakia and Khurana (1979) and other Third World countries points out a few other reasons for the emergence and growth of macro management systems in the distributive trade sector. Some of these are: i. Distributive trades absorb a lot of people and provide a low-cost employment outlet in developing countries. Governments often intervene to further some employment goals in addition to the distributional goals. In India, for example, the government often preferentially awards licenses to operate Fair Price Shops to those groups considered to be politically important unemployed college graduates, retired army personnel, widows of servicemen, etc. ii. Government intervention in distributive trades is often a consequence of agricultural price support programs. Once the government becomes a procurer and storer of large quantities of farm products, it needs a distribution method for these products. An MSECI is created as a result. Once an MSECI is created, the reverse logic often takes over. For example, to support an extensive public distribution system in a southern state of India, the state government resorts to mandatory procurement of some percentage of farms output [George 1979]. iii. In a manner similar to agricultural policy, the industrial policy of developing countries also leads to governmental intervention in distributive trade. To support small-scale, infant, or weak industries, the government sometimes assists in the marketing of the products of such industries by procuring their products and distributing them through state-controlled or subsidized channels [Bhandari 1979]. In Morocco, for example, the government subsidized the introductory advertising efforts of a baby food considered to be important in meeting that countrys nutritional goals [Vitale and Cavusgil 1981]. These last three points illustrate how consumption- and distribution- oriented policies get intertwined with policies related to employment, agriculture, industry, and other sectors. The rationale and rationality of MSECIs must therefore be studied in the context of other related sectoral policies [Gustafsson and Richardson 1979]. While the above discussion throws some light on why MSECIs come into existence, it does not fully illustrate the range of goals that MSECIs may serve. According to Gustafsson and Richardson (1979), where there is a complex polity, not only are there multiple actors in the policymaking process but each actor sometimes has multiple goals. Politicians, for example, are interested in: a) Solving problems, where it is feasible to do so and ideologically acceptable to the politician b) Agenda management, that is, getting problematic and intractable items off the political agenda, often by formulating do-nothing placebo policies, and c) Creating consensus, especially when the issue is frankly fractious. In the context of an MSECI, purely placebo or consensus-making policies are unlikely to exist. This is because breadbasket issues are involved and simply managing the agenda or creating a consensus (without solving the problem) is politically too risky. As a part of the problem-solving strategy, however, policymakers may make some efforts to manage agendas or create consensus. Policies geared towards essential consumption items are therefore likely to have some symbolic, rhetorical, or bargaining content (Lapps, Collins, and Kinley 1980). With reference to the rationale and goals of MSECIs, the following conclusions can be made: a) MSECIs usually emerge in developing countries to serve short-term, volatile political problems caused by scarcity. Later, these systems may be further developed to embrace other economic goals. In fact, appropriately used, MSECIs could play an important role in balanced development (United Nations 1977). b) As the complexity of an MSECI increases, consumption and distribution-related policies become entwined with several other sectoral policies in developing countries. c) Analysis of MSECIs should be conducted with sensitivity to the goals stated and implicit of the different actors in the consumptive and distributive policy process. According to Hussain et al, the production instability and food insecurity in are interrelated. Most of the rain-fed agriculture of the country is experiencing erratic production. The production instability index (coefficient of variation) is 29% in the Pakistan (Anonymous). Most variation is attributed to crop yields. The productivity per unit of resource especially water, is low. The declining resource productivity is due to increased water logging and salinity, nutrient depletion, deforestation and devegetation and increased pest complex. Looming water scarcity and competition for the same water from non agricultural sectors necessitates improving crop productivity to ensure adequate food for the nation with the equivalent or less water than is presently available for agriculture. This can be obtained because available information shows that there is a wide gap between actual and attainable crop water productivity, especially in the arid and semi-arid environments. Quantifying cro p water output reveals gaps in information regarding pre-eminent ways to increase crop water productivity. Cropping systems need to be inherently flexible to take advantage of economic opportunities and/or adapt to environmental realities. A dynamic cropping systems concept characterized by a management approach whereby crop sequencing decisions are made on an annual basis has been proposed to improve the adaptability of cropping practices to externalities. STATE OF AGRICULTURE IN PAKISTAN Despite a structural shift towards industrialization, agriculture continues to be the biggest sector of the economy. It contributes 21.8% of the GDP, employs 44.7 % of the workforce and is a major source of foreign exchange earnings . About 68% of the population lives in rural Pakistan and depends upon agriculture for their sustenance. Given its wide-spanning forward and backward linkages, in particular with the Industrial sector, agriculture has assumed an added significance especially in the context of the prevalent global food crunch and food security. According to the Economic Survey of Pakistan 2008-09, no economic reforms will be successful in the absence of a sustained and broad based agricultural development which is critical for raising living standards, alleviating poverty assuring food security, generating a buoyant market for industrial expansion an making a substantial contribution to the national economic growth. The utilization of agricultural land in Pakistan is illustrated by the table as under. The total area reported in the table includes the total physical area of the villages. Forest area refers to the area of any land administered as forest under any legal enactment dealing with forests. Any cultivated area which may exist within such a forest is shown under the heading of cultivated area. Culturable waste is that uncultivated farm area which, although fit for cultivation, has been left uncropped during the year under consideration as well as the one preceding. Cultivated area is the area which was sown at least during the year under reference or during the preceding year. This includes the net sown area as well as the current fallow. The current fallow is the area that is ploughed but not cropped. With these definitions in context, a review of the agricultural land holdings of Pakistan is presented as under: (Million hectares) Table: (Source: MINFAL) An analysis of the land utilization statistics indicate that the total area under cultivation has registered a gradual increase during the period specified i.e. 1990-2008. The uncultivable land is being brought under cultivation and the total cropped area has also been increasing, though not very significantly. Given the importance of agriculture in the national economy, the policy focus has essentially been on agriculture even though the need for a structural shift towards industries and manufacturing gained importance post 1990s. If we look at the historical statistics of the Pakistan economy, we can see how the performance of agriculture coincided with the GDP growth. Table below illustrates the performance and average annual growth rates of the Agriculture and the GDP for the period 1960-2009. AVERAGE ANNUAL GROWTH RATES 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000-2009 GDP 6.8 4.8 6.5 4.6 5 Agriculture 5.1 2.4 5.4 4.4 3.0 Table Broadly speaking the growth rate of agriculture across the periods specified in Table 1 was fairly good but the yearly growth rates during the same periods were erratic. The growth of agriculture was particularly low in the periods of 1998-99 at 1.9%, 2000-01 at -2.2%, 2001-02 at 0.1% and 2007-08 at 1.1%. Considering the current decade, agriculture has grown at an average rate of 3.32% per annum. Of this, the growth performance over the last seven years has been of a volatile nature ranging from 1.1% to 6.5% at the highest. See table below, AGRICULTURE GROWTH (%) Year Agriculture Major Crops Minor Crops 2002-3 4.1 6.8 1.9 2003-4 2.4 1.7 3.9 2004-5 6.5 17.7 1.5 2005-6 6.3 -3.9 0.4 2006-7 4.1 7.7 -1.3 2007-8 1.1 -6.4 10.9 2008-9 4.7 7.7 3.6 Table 2 Federal Board of Statistics, Government of Pakistan(2009) This volatility can be primarily attributed to the crop sector which has been a subject of various pest attacks, irregular raining patterns, adulterated pesticides etc. There are two principal crop seasons in Pakistan, Kharif and Rabi. The sowing season of the former begins in April-June and the harvesting occurs in October/ December while the latters begins in October/December and ends in April/ May. Major crops of the Kharif season include Sugarcane, rice, cotton and maize and those of the Rabi season include wheat, gram and lentils. As per the statistics of the MINFAL , the major crops such as wheat, rice, cotton and sugarcane amount to about 89.1% of the value added in the major crops, and this amounts to about 33.4% of value added in the overall agriculture. The production statistics of the major crops of both the seasons are given in the table as under: PRODUCTION OF MAJOR CROPS (000 TONS) YEAR COTTON (000 BALES) SUGARCANE RICE MAIZE WHEAT 2003-4 10048 53419 4848 1897 19500 2004-5 14265 47244 5025 2797 21612 2005-6 13019 44666 5547 3110 21277 2006-7 12856 54742 5438 3088 23295 2007-8 11655 63920 5563 3605 20959 2008-9 11819 50045 6852 4036 23421 MINFAL Pakistans agricultural production is closely linked with the supply of irrigation water. The supply of irrigation water has been strained as indicated by Table 3 as under: Actual Surface Water Availability (Million Acre Feet) Period Kharif Rabi Total % Change over Average Average System Usage 67.1 36.4 103.5 2002-3 62.8 25 87.8 -15.2 2003-4 65.9 31.5 97.4 -5.9 2004-5 59.1 23.1 82.2 -20.6 2005-6 70.8 30.1 100.9 -2.5 2006-7 63.1 31.2 94.3 -8.9 2007-8 70.8 27.9 98.7 -46 2008-9 66.9 24.9 91.8 -11.3 Table 3: (IRSA) As shown in the table, against the normal surface water availability at canal heads of 103.5 MAF, the overall water availability for both the crop seasons has been less in the range of -2.5% to 20.6%. If the water availability for the respective seasons is analyzed one can conclude that the Rabi season faced a greater dearth of the water supply as compared to the Kharif season.

Cyrano De Bergerac Essay examples -- Cyrano De Bergerac Essays

Cyrano De Bergerac The story begins at the Hotel de Bourgogne in the year 1640. Christian de Neuvillette attends the theater with a man called Ligniere in hopes that this man can identify the woman he has fallen in love with. Ligniere identifies the beautiful lady as Roxane, cousin to Cyrano de Bergerac. Christian also finds out from Ligniere that Count de Guiche is in love with her as well. Ligniere told Christian that he made a song that told of de Guiche’s scheme to get Roxane and that de Guiche probably hated him for it. Ligniere leaves and heads out to a tavern while Cristian stares up at Roxane. In the mean time, a thief had been approaching Christian to make an attempt at stealing from him. When Christian reaches into his pocket he finds a hand. The thief makes a deal with Christian and tells him that Ligniere was going to die that night because he insulted a powerful person with a song. The thief told Christian that a hundred men were posted. Chrisian rushes off to every tavern in tow n to leave a message for his friend. Ragueneau, a baker, watches for Cyrano. Cyrano had told Montfleury not to appear onstage for a month, yet Montfleury appeared onstage anyway. Cyrano shows up and interrupts the play. He forces Montfleury to leave the stage and in the process of doing so he insults forty-eight people. Valvert insults Cyrano by making a remark about his nose so they duel. While dueling, Cyrano recites a ballade he created and wins the duel. Everyone was delighted and congratulated him. Cyrano confides with his friend Le Bret that he is in love with his cousin Roxane. Le Bret advises Cyrano that he should tell Roxane his feelings because there was no better time than now to tell her his feelings after she witness... ... come with him quickly because Cyrano was unconscious with a gash in his head. Roxane waited for Cyrano outside while she embroidered. Cyrano was late for the first time then. He acted as if nothing was wrong with him, but sister Marthe saw something was wrong with him. He told her not to tell Roxane, though. Cyrano asked Roxane if he could read the letter that Christian had on him when he died. Roxane gave him the letter and he began reading aloud. Roxane realized that Cyrano wrote that letter. She confronted him and he denied it but she knew the truth. Le Bret and Ragueneau show up looking for Cyrano. They find him there and tell Roxane what happened. Cyrano becomes seized by some mania and goes on about how lies, compromise, prejudice, stupidity, and cowardice have robbed him of glory and love but the one thing they could never touch was his white plume.

The Benefits of Local Farming Essays -- Food Science

It used to be that fine dining establishments featured imported ingredients on the menu. These days, many chefs in high quality restaurants take pride in featuring locally grown, seasonal items. Even some large chain grocery stores now offer meat and produce from local farms. While most Americans probably would not feel the need to be as close to their meat as Makenna Goodman describes in â€Å"Ever Wonder if You Could Kill What You Eat? We Did the Other Night†, there is growing support for Goodman’s ideas that being closer to the food results in better food quality (246). Many Americans seem to concur, as they are now willing to pay more for locally grown and organically raised food. Having seen countless local farms plowed under to become housing developments or shopping malls, and having dealt with several epidemics of tainted food, Americans are more conscious of the ‘support your local farmer’ movement. If this new ‘food fashion’ cont inues to grow in popularity, it will help strengthen local farms that in past years have suffered at the expense of large commercial farming enterprises. According to Michael Pollan federal policy has promoted industrial agriculture, or agribusiness, since the Nixon era in the belief that keeping food costs low by obtaining maximum production of commodity crops (corn, soybeans, wheat, and rice) was in the best interest of the national political agenda (186). In â€Å"Farmer in Chief†, Pollan asks President Obama to change federal policy and instead promote local farming, asserting that how Americans grow, process, and eat food impacts the health care crisis, energy independence, and climate change (187). Goodman, Pollan, and others agree that more local, small-scale, farming will be better for th... ...ge.html?res=9500EEDC143EF936A15757C0A9619C8B63>. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 7 Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). EPA, 17 Jan. 2012. Web. 07 May 2012. . Goodman, Makenna. â€Å"Ever Wonder if You Could Kill What You Eat? We Did the Other Night.† Acting out Culture: Reading and Writing. Ed. James S. Miller. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 246-248. Print. Pollan, Michael. â€Å"Farmer in Chief.† Acting out Culture: Reading and Writing. Ed. James S. Miller. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 186-203. Print. Sustainable Table. GRACE Communications Foundation. Web. 07 May 2012. . United States Department of Agriculture. Agricultural Marketing Service. USDA, 2012. Web. 07 May. 2012. .

Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief Essay -- mytholog

My original thought when comparing Percy Jackson and the Olympians: the Lightning Thief the movie and Classical mythology was that there would be many more references to the myth of Perceus than any other myth throughout the movie in its entirety. That’s where I was wrong. After watching the movie again and researching the different hero myths my opinion has changed. My new thoughts are that the movie is not influenced by the myth of Perceus any more than other hero myths. The movie ties together many different heroes’ stories and mixes them together to make a wonderful story about a young boy. The movie was based on a book series written by Rick Riordan. Percy Jackson and the Olympians: the Lightning Thief the movie is about a young boy who has just discovered that he is a demi-god Percy Jackson. His father is Poseidon and his mother has been keeping it from him for many years. There is a lightning bolt that is stolen from Zeus on Mt. Olympus and Zeus believes that Percy has stolen it and demands its return by the summer solstice. In the mean time Percy gets attacked by multiple magical and mythological beings. There is a camp that demi-gods are safe from these things which is where Percy’s mother and his protector, Grover, take him to. This is where Percy’s journey begins. After a few days of being at the camp he realizes what he has to do. His mother was taken by Hades to the underworld and Percy has to save her all while trying to prove to Zeus that he did not steal the Lighting bolt. This is the true start to Percy’s quest. He made a few friends in the camp and they agreed to go on this journey with him. Those accompanying him were his protector Grover and Athena’s daughter Annabeth. They also get some helpful tools fro... ...but they also believe that it is influenced by current day books such as Harry Potter more than Greek myth. Even though the movie and book may be influenced by these pop culture books that is to say that those books are not influenced by Greek myth. There are influences of mythology all through the world and most things in the world are influenced by mythology in some way. References "Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief." IMDb. IMDb.com, n.d. Web. 27 Nov. 2013. . Siegel, Dr. Janice. "Dr. J's Illustrated Lectures." Dr. J's Illustrated Lectures. Dr. Janice Siegel, 26 Nov. 2005. Web. 30 Nov. 2013. . "Camp Half-Blood Wiki." Wikia. Wiki, n.d. Web. 5 Dec. 2013. .

Commercial Vehicle Market in India

2010 Commercial Vehicle Market in India-Industry Report Commercial Vehicle Market in India-Industry Report Table of Contents Executive Summary3 Usage Segment6 Market share & Competition Situation8 Key Opportunities14 Key Success factors15 Financial Analysis17 Regulatory Advantage & legal frameworks22 Recent Mergers & Acquisitions26 Industry SWOT27 Market forecast with Macroeconomic assumptions28 PEST Analysis30 Annexure32 List of Industry Associations32 Executive SummaryIndia being the second most populated and seventh largest nation in the world provides a vast and untapped market for automobile giants. The de-licensing in 1991 provided the well-deserved growth essentials, which attracted international automobile majors to set up their production facilities in the country to take advantage of various facilities available. According to my research, the economic slowdown has had moderate negative effects on commercial vehicle market. The slowdown of commercial activities i n infrastructure, construction, manufacturing and other sectors resulted in sluggish demand for commercial vehicles.However, in 2009-10, the commercial vehicle segment regained its growth momentum, both in terms of production and sales, on the strong fundamentals of recuperating demand from almost all prominent sectors. Especially, passenger carriers registered notable sales momentum and boosted the overall commercial vehicle development outlook. In coming years, rapid expansion of cities to suburban areas will also create more demand for mass transportation vehicles in the country. It is expected that a major part of India will be well connected by 2013-14, which will fuel the demand for commercial passenger carriers in the country.Keeping this in mind, we have projected the sales of commercial passenger carriers to register nearly 13% CAGR between 2010-11 and 2013-14. On utility vehicle front, the country posted one of the fastest year-on-year production growths in 2009-10. In 200 8-09, manufacturers were forced to halt their production capacity amid falling domestic and export demand for utility vehicles. Consequently, the production saw a massive 11% drop in the same year. With recovering vehicle demand from schools, corporates and public sector organizations, the production grew strongly at the rate of 24. % in 2009-10. We anticipate this trend to continue in coming years also, thus enabling the country to become a dominant utility vehicle player in global arena. This report is an outcome of extensive research and objective analysis on Utility Vehicle, Multipurpose Vehicle and Commercial Vehicle markets in India. The report provides detailed data and statistics on production, sales and export trends for each of the abovementioned market segment. It studies all the past and present trends prevailing in the market to give the future market outlook.Industry in India ———————————â€⠀Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€- KEY POINTS 1. ————————————————- Automobile production and sales went up in 2007-08 as compared to 2002-03. 2. ————————————————- They reached a peak in 2009-10 3. ————————————————- Sales of commercial vehicles are growing day by day due to the growing construction industry and commercial developments and many other conditions such as growing urbanization. ———————————————— ————————————————- KEY POINT S 4. ————————————————- Automobile production and sales went up in 2007-08 as compared to 2002-03. 5. ————————————————- They reached a peak in 2009-10 6. ————————————————- Sales of commercial vehicles are growing day by day due to the growing construction industry and commercial developments and many other conditions such as growing urbanization. ———————————————— High economic growth of India has worked wonders for most of its industries. With advantages like low labor costs, easy availability of raw materials and well qualified employees, Indi a has established many industries thereby marking the beginning of an era of rapid industrialization. This has led to the increase in employment rate and income levels, giving rise to a more affluent middle class in the country, which serves as an active consumer base for most of the industries, including the automobile industry.India opened its automobile industry to global players with the de-licensing of the industry in 1991. As a result, automobile production and sales went up strongly in 2007-08 from 2002-03 levels. Even amid global economic slowdown, the industry was able to sustain its positive growth momentum. Moreover, in 2009-10 automobile production and sales surged phenomenally and India emerged as a potential competitor of the largest automobile markets such as China and Japan. Sales of commercial vehicles, particularly light commercial goods carriers are touching new heights, both in domestic and export markets.The growing construction industry and commercial developme nts have opened new vistas for light commercial goods carriers. But medium and heavy commercial vehicles will also see high demand in the domestic market due to infrastructure development like hydro power projects, port development and mining industry. Commercial passenger vehicles will also hit the peak due to increasing urbanization and growing need to commute from rural and sub-urban areas to industrial areas for work. All these are creating suitable conditions for India to emerge as an automobile production hub in the future.The sectors which have major contribution in LCV sales in the country are expected to see sustained capital expenditure in coming years. For instance, the organized retail sector which is growing at an annual pace of 30% is highly untapped and the players are planning to aggressively increase their presence in Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities. This will further boost the demand of commercial vehicles as they are largely deployed in redistribution of consumption good s. Usage Segment * Transport operators: This segment includes all fleet operators and owner-operators.There are around 200,000 road transport operators in India. However, most of them are small owner-driven firms. Road freight transportation is highly fragmented with the truck operators owning less than five trucks estimated to account for over 75% of the truck fleet. It is estimated that 77% of truck fleet is under operators who own 5 trucks or less; 10% belonged to those with 6-10 trucks; 4% belonged to those with 11-15 trucks; 3% belonged to those with 16-20 trucks; and only 4% of fleet belonged to those with more than 20 trucks. Thus, the industry is characterised by intense competition.The high competition is the result of relatively lower capital requirement, ease of obtaining driving licenses and permits. The small operators are involved mainly in the physical movement of goods and depend on brokers and other fleet operators who in turn depend on the booking agents for obtain ing business. These operators do not have the geographical reach and necessary infrastructure to tap business on a continuous basis, and thus rely on brokers. Fleet operators are the medium and large, organised-sector players in the transportation industry. The arge fleet operators are small in number, and generally operate throughout the country. These fleet operators primarily work on a hub and spoke model. The hub and spoke distribution system enables optimisation of costs and higher revenues for the transport companies/ fleet operators. These transport companies generally have formal contracts with the users, which is very rare in the case of small operators. Some larger fleet operators have ventured into offering value-added services such as courier and express cargo business and providing third party logistic services. Companies: This segment accounts for a small proportion of CV sales. Some companies located in industrial areas use these vehicles primarily for employee and ma terial transportation while a few companies use them for secondary distribution of the goods from warehouses to distributors, such as wholesalers and retailers. * Government organisations: The vehicle purchases made by municipal authorities, State transport undertakings, and various other Government departments primarily include LCVs and special application vehicles. Private bus operators: There has been a significant increase in the number of private bus operators in the country as State transport undertakings have proved inadequate in meeting the increasing demand for transportation. These vehicles are used as passenger carriers or chartered buses. ————————————————- ————————————————- Key points ————————â⠂¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€- ————————————————- Key points ————————————————- Zzzzzzzzzz ————————————————- Yyyyyyyyyyyyyy ———————————————— Key points ————————————————- Zzzzzzzzzz ————————————————- Yyyyyyyyyyyyyy ——————————à ¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€- Key points Market Structure & Segmentation ————————————————- Enter key points: ————————————————- Enter key points: The commercial vehicle market can be divided into four segments: 1. Segment A-High performance and image sensitive- The consumers in segment A are brand conscious and are willing to pay any price for that brand.But, they usually don’t compromise on quality. However, that doesn’t means they are loyal to one brand. To target such type of consumers, companies have to concentrate on performance as the main criteria. 2. Segment B-Balanced perspective-The consumers in segment B are the most difficult ones to please. They want both price and performance rolled into one product. To target suc h type of consumers, companies have to concentrate on delivering high performance at the best prices. Hence, they have to keep their operating costs to a minimum. 3. Segment C-ROI and quick payback period sensitive- .Segment D-Extremely price sensitive-The consumers in segment D want a product at an economical price and for this, they are ready to compromise on performance if they are offered a good price. To target such type of consumers, companies have to design products keeping costs at a minimum even if that means a medium or low performance but the main criteria is that price should be the best in the industry. Market share & Competition Situation The following are the main players in the Production of Commercial Vehicles in India; * Ashok Leyland Ltd. * Hindustan Motors Ltd. * Telco Force motors Ltd. ( Previously known as Bajaj Tempo Ltd) * Eicher Motors Ltd. * Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. * Swaraj Mazda Ltd. * Tata Motors * Ashok Leyland Ashok Leyland Ashok Leyland is one of the biggest players in the Production of Commercial Vehicles in India. Ashok Leyland is one of the oldest automotive company of India. It was set up in 1948 in Madras (now called Chennai) to assemble Austin cars. However, the company's future changed after British Leyland made equity participation. Hence the company became Ashok Leyland in 1955 and started the Production of Commercial Vehicles.They offer a wide range of in Heavy and Light Commercial Vehicles varying from buses, trucks, engines to special application vehicles. They were the first company in the history of Indian to win the ISO 9002 Certification in 1993. Again it became the first Indian company to receive ISO/TS 16949 Corporate Certification. Their global ambition is very simple, it is; Global Standards, Global Markets. Hindustan Motors Ltd Hindustan Motors Ltd is one of the oldest car manufacturing company of India. It was founded in 1942. It manufactures a wide range of vehicles from cars to trucks to school bu ses to trekker to porter.However, it is more popular for one of its particular car model called the Ambassador. But, at the same time it does manufacture a lot of Commercial Vehicles as well. It was one of the leading players in cars till the early 80's but could not maintain its position after globalization came into effect and the markets were opened. It has its manufacturing plants in Uttarpara- West Bengal, Pithampur- Madhya Pradesh, Thiruvallur- Tamil Nadu and Hosur- Tamil Nadu. Telco Telco deals with Heavy Commercial Vehicles, Light Commercial Vehicles, Multi-Utility Vehicles etc.Telco was set up in 1945 to manufacture steam locomotives. Now it's the largest private sector company in Commercial Vehicle manufacturing. The four manufacturing plants of Telco are located in Jamshedpur in Jharkand, Pimpri and Chinchwad in Pune ( Maharashtra) and Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh. It has a market share of 31. 2% in Multi Utility Vehicle Segment. Force motors Ltd. (Previously known as Bajaj T empo Ltd) Force motors Ltd. (Previously known as Bajaj Tempo Ltd) is a promising company in the Commercial Vehicle segment. The company is now working on the project of introducing state-of-the-art range of trucks.The company has different technological collaboration with many international giants. Hence, it has an upper edge with new and modern technology. They are also working on eco friendly CNG bus engines. They are the only company to have a full range of Commercial Load carrying vehicles. Eicher Motors Ltd. Eicher Motors Ltd. deals with the manufacturing of Commercial Vehicles. They mainly deal with buses, trucks and chassis. These products comply with all the specifications of BS II norms. Its CNG Technology is also known to be the very best in the market. Mahindra ;amp; Mahindra Ltd.Mahindra ;amp; Mahindra Ltd. has a hugh Indian market with Multi Utility Vehicles. It was originally set up in 1945 to cater to general purpose utility vehicles. However, today it is one of the t op five manufacturers of tractors in the world. Swaraj Mazda Ltd. Swaraj Mazda Ltd. deals with the manufacturing of Light Commercial Vehicles. They mostly manufacture buses, trucks, police personnel carrier, ambulance, water tankers and special vehicles. The company was formed in 1983 and production started from 1985. Tata Motors Tata Motors is one of the most important fore runners of the Indian automobile industry.They believe in focus and state-of-the-art facilities. They probably have the best infrastructure required for the assurance of manufacturing quality vehicles. They deal with M;amp;H Commercial Vehicles, Intermediate Commercial Vehicles, Light Commercial Vehicles, Small Commercial Vehicles, Utility Vehicles Etc. In the Commercial Vehicles segment, they mostly manufacture buses and trucks. They even have a good range of passenger vehicles as well. Market Share of Major Players: The Commercial Vehicle Market is divided into following categories: 1. Light Commercial Vehicle s 2. Heavy Commercial Vehicles 3.Medium Commercial Vehicles Table 1-Market share of different players in commercial vehicle industry Type of Vehicle| TATA| Ashok Leyland| Mahindra| Eicher Motors| Force Motors| Swaraj Mazda| HindustanMotors| Volvo| Tatra| Trucks| 64%| 24%| -| 8%| -| 3%| -| ;lt;1%| ;lt;1%| Buses| 40%| 30%| 7%| 5%| 10%| 6%| 1%| 1%| -| Temposand Lorries| 59%| ;lt;1%| 32%| 4%| 3%| 3%| ;lt;1%| -| -| In the MHCV goods carrier segment, TML is the market leader with a 68% share in 9MFY2010, which represents a sharp increase from 63% in FY2008. While new players have entered the MHCV segment, some of them have limited their presence to niche segments—e. . VIL in the higher tonnage RV and HT segment; Tatra in the higher tonnage RV segment. Although the competitive intensity has increased with the entry of new players, TML and ALL continue to dominate on account of established product performance, strong brands and customer support, wide servicing network and availabilit y of spares (ease of servicing). Although TML and ALL dominate nearly all sub-segments in MHCV goods carriers market, EML has a strong presence in the 7. 5-12 tonnes segment, with a market share of 39% in 9MFY2010. However, while EML’s market share in the 7. -12 tonnes segment has declined from 53% in FY2003, TML’s market share has increased from 27% to 47% in 9MFY2010. ————————————————- Enter key points ————————————————- Enter key points Key Drivers 1. Strong economic growth- A revival of economic reforms and better economic policy in first decade of the 21st century accelerated India's economic growth rate. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in India expanded at an annual rate of 8. 80 percent in the last reported quarter. From 2004 until 2010, Indi a's average quarterly GDP Growth was 8. 37 percent reaching an historical high of 10. 0 percent in September of 2006 and a record low of 5. 50 percent in December of 2004. The economy has posted an average growth rate of more than 7% in the decade since 1997, reducing poverty by about 10 percentage points. In recent years, Indian cities have continued to liberalize business regulations. By 2008, India had established itself as the world's second-fastest growing major economy. Economists predict that by 2020, India will be among the leading economies of the world. According to the BRIC report, published by Goldman Sachs, India will be the second largest economy after China by 2043. . Robust industrial growth -The industrial sector is one of the main sectors that contribute to the Indian GDP. The country ranks fourteenth in the factory output in the world. The industrial sector is made up of manufacturing, mining and quarrying, and electricity, water supply, and gas sectors. The indus trial sector accounts for around 27. 6% of the India GDP and it employs over 17% of the total workforce in the country. 3. Low interest rates –Although the interest rate has been a little high this year, it has been around 6. 0% on an average for the past 5 years which has boosted trade. 4. Road and Infrastructure development -The most distinct part of India’s physical infrastructure development in recent years is the development of road network across the country; per sq. km. of surface area in India is now endowed with one km of roadways. India has one of the largest road networks in the world, aggregating to 3. 34 million km. The country’s road network consists of Expressways, National Highways, State Highways, Major District Roads, Other District Roads and Village Roads.The road network, as on December 2007, comprises 66,590 km of National Highways, 128,000 km of State Highways, 470,000 km of Major District Roads and about 2. 65 million km of other District and Rural Roads. The National Highways Development Project (NHDP), the largest highway project ever undertaken by the country, is being implemented by the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI). NHDP Phase I ;amp; II envisage 4/6 laning of about 14,279 km of National Highways, at a total estimated cost of Rs. 650 million (at 2004 prices).These two phases 109 comprise of Golden Quadrilateral (GQ), North-South and East-West Corridors, Port Connectivity and other projects. The Golden Quadrilateral (GQ-5,846 km) connects the four major cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata. The North-South and East-West Corridors (NS-EW-7,300 km) connect Srinagar in the North to Kanyakumari in the South, including spur from Salem to Kochi and Silchar in the East to Porbandar in the West. 5. Good Agricultural production -Today, India ranks second worldwide in farm output. Agriculture and allied sectors like forestry and logging accounted for 16. % of the GDP in 2007, employed 52% of the total workforce and despite a steady decline of its share in the GDP, is still the largest economic sector and plays a significant role in the overall socio-economic development of India. India is the largest producer in the world of fresh fruit, anise, fennel, badian, coriander, tropical fresh fruit, jute, pigeon peas, pulses, spices, millets, castor oil seed, sesame seeds, safflower seeds, lemons, limes, cow's milk, dry chillies and peppers, chick peas, cashew nuts, okra, ginger, turmeric guavas, mangoes, goat milk and buffalo milk and meat.It also has the world's largest cattle population (281 million). It is the second largest producer of cashews, cabbages, cotton seed and lint, fresh vegetables, garlic, egg plant, goat meat, silk, nutmeg. mace, cardamom, onions, wheat, rice, sugarcane, lentil, dry beans, groundnut, tea, green peas, cauliflowers, potatoes, pumpkins, squashes, gourds and inland fish. It is the third largest producer of tobacco, sorghum, rapeseed, coconuts, hen's eggs a nd tomatoes. India accounts for 10% of the world fruit production with first rank in the production of mangoes, papaya, banana and sapota. 6.Good replacement demand- There has been good replacement demand recently for commercial vehicles. Decisions about replacing vehicles are relatively complicated: people compare the transportation services they get from their present vehicle and the costs associated with running it, with the services they could get from another vehicle, given the costs of buying and selling vehicles and of running the new one. Replacement decisions are also affected by developments in the used-vehicle market: when people replace vehicles, they may buy either new or used, and they very often sell a vehicle on the used-vehicle market when they acquire another.Thus, although only production and sales of new vehicles affect the industry’s contribution to GDP, demand for new vehicles is influenced by prices, quantities, and qualities in the used-vehicle market. Key Challenges / Barriers 1. Increasing Competition and WTO Regime 2. Cyclicality of businesses 3. Increasing Customisation and Application Profileration-While the earlier paradigm aimed at meeting the needs of segments of consumers, the new paradigm treats every customer as unique.The development of technology has made it possible to address the needs of individual customers, the day may not be very far off when a customer wanting to buy a toilet soap may have to put his/her hand into a scanner which will sense the skin complexion and pop out a pouch of liquid soap that is ideally formulated to suit his/her skin. Also, innovation is more than creativity; it is the commercial realization of creativity. Consumers like what they have but also crave change. The word â€Å"New, Improved, Better† can influence the customer preference.Innovation is the life blood of Marketing. Creative ideas are valuable but the greater part is harnessing them to profitable productive change. 4. C ompetition from alternative modes- The alternative modes of transport are the telecom, air and port services. These services have grown exponentially as compared to the traditional commercial vehicle sector. Container port traffic has increased from less than a million in 1991 to about 5 million in 2005 with an annual growth rate of about 266 percent since 1991.Also, the increase in air freight and air transport has been around 15% whereas the increase in fixed line and mobile phone subscribers has been around 150% from 1991-2005. 5. Stiff Emission and other Regulatory Changes- The emission norms have become really strict these days. From the earlier emission norms of Euro 3 in metro cities and Euro 2 in rest of the country, the automobile companies have to ensure that the automobiles produced in or after 2009-10 adhere to Euro 4 in metro cities and Euro 3 in rest of the country. 6. Operating Cost Pressures 7.Increased Customer Awareness- In the 21st century, the customer has become very aware due to the various sources of information available to him. Now, it is very difficult to fool the customer as he can get the full information with the click of a button. Hence, companies have to keep the customer needs in mind while designing a product. 8. Accelerated Technology upgradation requirements and other change needs Key Opportunities Enter key points Enter key points †¢ Vibrant Indian Economy †¢ Automotive Industry showing double digit growth in all segments †¢ Growing engineering and IT capability for manufacturing Auto Component Industry :Culturally compatible-Quality, Experience and Values Key Success factors * Ability to enhance and vary product mix – A diverse and broad product mix enables a manufacturer to serve a wide variety of transportation solutions across different load levels. * Sales and distribution service network * Balance between outsourcing and in-house production * Quality: A company must have good quality product to ga in a customer trust. This would also help in building long term relationship with the consumer and also gain viral marketing. Environment: A company need to adapt to the surrounding environment and must act in a way to improve and sustain environment around it. ————————————————- Enter key points: ————————————————- 1 ————————————————- 2 ————————————————- 3 ————————————————- Enter key points: —————â⠂¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€- 1 ————————————————- 2 ————————————————- 3 Enter key pointsEnter key points Market Entry Strategy * Collaboration for Manufacturing Excellence and Process Design * Production Sharing in India & Europe for a Holistic Service Capability * Partnering for Global Requirements * Merger & Acquisition * Establish JV ————————————————- Enter key points: ————————————————- 1 ———————————à ¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€Ã¢â‚¬â€- 2 ————————————————- 3 ————————————————- Enter key points: ————————————————- 1 ———————————————— 2 ————————————————- 3 Financial Analysis Commercial Vehicles- Recent Trends During FY2004-07, CV sales volumes growth in the domestic market had been healthy led by buoyant economic activity, easy access to finance, entry of new truck financing companies, increased momentum in highway construction, b etter operating economics of new trucks, and a Supreme Court (SC) order prohibiting overloading of trucks. However, continued hardening of interest rates and a slowdown in economic activity has impacted CV sales volumes since FY2008.Since mid-2008, domestic CV sales volumes have declined significantly because of an economic slowdown, slowdown in index of industrial production (IIP), tighter credit conditions and constraints in the availability of vehicle finance from banks and non-banking finance companies (NBFCs). Though in-house vehicle financing of major manufacturers has increased, the additional credit flow was unable to fully offset the decrease in credit availability from outside sources. As compared with a year on year (yoy) growth of 9. 2% in Q1FY2009, domestic CV sales declined 1. 8% (yoy) during Q2FY2009, and by a sharp rate of 47. % (yoy) in Q3FY2009, and 35. 7% (yoy) in Q4FY2009. The rate of decline was lower at 12. 1% (yoy) in Q1FY2010 primarily because of 16% (yoy) gr owth in LCV segment. A significant proportion of trucks are purchased by small truck operators in the unorganised sector, who may have to pay a relatively higher rate of interest as compared with large-fleet operators, and are more vulnerable to interest rate fluctuations and slowdown in economic activity. Production: The Indian automobile sector, described as the sun rise sector, had been growing at a healthy double digit rate till 2006-07.However, it witnessed a downturn during the later half of 2007-08 and 2008-09 due to global economic slowdown. To tide over the situation, the Government of India took immediate remedial action and announced three stimulus packages. As a result of this, the overall position has improved since July, 2009 onwards. In the year 2008-09 the industry witnessed a modest growth in production at 2. 96% over 2007-08. In the year 2009-10 (April 2009 to December, 2009), passenger vehicle segment, two-wheeler segment, three-wheeler segment and commercial vehi cle segment have all recorded a growth of 24. 55%, 19. 0%, 16. 04% and 15. 10% respectively over the corresponding period last year (CLPY). The details of actual production of various automobile segments during the year 2006-07 to 2009-10 (upto December, 2009) are given below: ————————————————- [Type a quote from the document or the summary of an interesting point. You can position the text box anywhere in the document. Use the Text Box Tools tab to change the formatting of the pull quote text box. ] ————————————————- [Type a quote from the document or the summary of an interesting point.You can position the text box anywhere in the document. Use the Text Box Tools tab to change the formatting of the pull quote text box. ] Automobile Production Trends: Segment| 2 006-07| 2007-08| 2008-09| 2009-10| Passenger Vehicles| 1,545,223| 1,777,583| 1,838,593| 2,351,240| Commercial Vehicles| 519,282| 549,006| 416,870| 566,608| Three Wheelers| 556,126| 500,660| 497,020| 619,093| Two Wheelers| 8,466,666| 8,026,681| 8,419,792| 10,512,889| Total| 11,087,997| 10,853,930| 11,172,275| 14,049,830| Table 2-Automobile Production Trends Exports:The period from April-December 2009 saw growth in automobile exports sliding sharply to 10. 4% (yoy) with deceleration in almost all segments. Although CV exports declined 14. 6% (yoy) in 9MFY2010, the decline was lower than the decline of 28% (yoy) in FY2009. CVs and 3Ws segments recorded declines of 14. 6% (yoy) and 1. 9% (yoy) respectively during 9MFY2010. Although exports of 4Ws increased at a high rate of 30% (yoy) in 9MFY2010, this represented a decline from the high rate of 54% in FY2009. 2W export growth slid from 22. 5% (yoy) in FY2009 to 7. % (yoy) in 9MFY2010 attributable to a sharp decline in growth of motorcyc le exports. Although export growth has decelerated sharply in 9MFY2010, there has been a recovery in Q3FY2010 attributable partly to the base effect. The key reason for the decline in export growth was the fall in auto sales especially the CVs in the major destination markets of Asia, Africa, US, and Europe. Automobile Exports Trends Segment| 2006-07| 2007-08| 2008-09| 2009-10| Passenger Vehicles| 198,452| 218,401| 335,729| 446,146| Commercial Vehicles| 49,537| 58,994| 42,625| 45,007|Three Wheelers| 143,896| 141,225| 148,066| 173,282| Two Wheelers| 619,644| 819,713| 1,004,174| 1,140,184| Total| 1,011,529| 1,238,333| 1,530,594| 1,804,619| Table 3-Automobile Exports Trends Figure 1-Monthly Exports of Commercial Vehicles The exports of CVs which were growing till FY2008, registered a decline in early FY2009, though there was minor recovery in Q2FY2009, due to the growth in LCVs exports but that was also short-lived. The rate of decline was lower in Q2FY2010, and subsequently CV exports increased 50% (yoy) in Q3FY2010. However, this was largely due to the base effect.CVs segment was the worst hit by the economic downturn in the American and European countries, but the decline after peaking in Q3FY2009, has been showing some signs of recovery. Evidence for the US and Canada suggests that the sharp reduction in CV sales since mid-2008 has been magnified by the lack of access to credit, leading many firms to postpone their CV purchases. This implies that continued improvement in financial market conditions could provide an impetus to CV sales. Domestic Sales: Overall production growth declined from 0% (yoy) in Q2FY2009 to sharp declines of 50. % (yoy) in Q3FY2009, and 43. 5% (yoy) in Q4FY2009. However, production declined at a lower rate of 19. 5% (yoy) in Q1FY2010, because of recovery in LCV production. MHCV production continued to decline at a high, albeit lower rate through Q2FY2010. Overall CV production actually increased 4. 4% (yoy) in Q2FY2010, followed by an exceptionally high increase of 95. 4% (yoy) in Q3FY2010, albeit on a low base. Domestic MHCV sales increased at a 3-year CAGR of 10. 4% to 270,994 units during FY2008, followed by sharp declines thereafter till Q1FY2010. The less than 3. tonnes category is the largest segment, accounting for 84% of domestic goods LCV sales in 9MFY2010. This segment has reported very high growth rate during FY2005-08, primarily because of the superior price-performance ratio, and the launch of ACE by Tata Motors Ltd. (TML). The LCV segment is dominated by TML and the high growth in goods carrier segment during the last few years has been driven by the launch of Tata Motors’ 207DI (a 2-tonne pick-up vehicle), which enabled the company to strengthen its presence in this segment. During FY2006-07, growth was driven by the launch by TML of a mini-truck—the TATA ACE (with a GVW of 1. 5 tonnes). Since FY2006, the demand growth for this LCV goods carrier has been higher than other sub-segments , driven by the trend of increase in consumption of consumer goods and durables in smaller cities/towns and restrictions on goods movement by bigger vehicles in metros/bigger cities especially during daytime. The increasing popularity of the lower tonnage LCVs can be attributed to the increasing distribution of goods inside Indian towns and villages that need small vehicles because of disaggregated nature of freight generation and narrow roads.The increasing popularity of door-to-door service has contributed to the growth of LCVs in the recent past. As these vehicles have relatively lower acquisition costs, the fleet operators may prefer them to carry small cargo. The corporates not only look for speedy, reliable, door- to- door services, but also for a complete logistic solution that minimises the costs of transport, logistics and inventory. With the share of the high value consumer goods (which call for timely transportation and better handling) increasing, lower tonnage LCVs are expected to witness higher growth in the medium-term.Automobile Domestic Sales Trends Table 4 –Automobile Domestic Sales Trends Segment| 2006-07| 2007-08| 2008-09| 2009-10| Passenger Vehicles| 1,379,979| 1,549,882| 1,552,703| 1,949,776| Commercial Vehicles| 467,765| 490,494| 384,194| 531,395| Three Wheelers| 403,910| 360,781| 349,727| 440,368| Two Wheelers| 7,872,334| 7,249,278| 7,437,619| 9,371,231| Total| 10,123,988| 9,654,435| 9,724,243| 12,292,770| Figure 2-Monthly Domestic Sales of Commercial VehiclesRegulatory Advantage & legal frameworks In India the Rules and Regulations related to driving license, registration of motor vehicles, control of traffic, construction & maintenance of motor vehicles etc are governed by the Motor Vehicles Act 1988 (MVA) and the Central Motor Vehicles rules 1989 (CMVR). The Ministry of Shipping, Road Transport & Highways (MoSRT&H) acts as a nodal agency for formulation and implementation of various provisions of the Motor Vehi cle Act and CMVR.Figure 4 –Regulatory Framework of Indian Automobile Industry In order to involve all stake holders in regulation formulation, MoSRT&H has constituted two Committees to deliberate and advise Ministry on issues relating to Safety and Emission Regulations, namely – * CMVR- Technical Standing Committee (CMVR-TSC) * Standing Committee on Implementation of Emission Legislation (SCOE) CMVR- Technical Standing Committee (CMVR-TSC) – This Committee advises MoSRT&H on various technical aspects related to CMVR.This Committee has representatives from various organisations namely; Ministry of Heavy Industries & Public Enterprises (MoHI&PE)), MoSRT&H, Bureau Indian Standards (BIS), Testing Agencies such as Automotive Research of India (ARAI), Vehicle Research Development & Establishment (VRDE), Central Institute of Road Transport (CIRT), industry representatives from Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), Automotive Compone nt Manufacturers Association (ACMA) and Tractor Manufacturers Association (TMA) and representatives from State Transport Departments. Major functions the Committee are: To provide technical clarification and interpretation of the Central Motor Vehicles Rules having technical bearing, to MoRT&H, as and when so desired. * To recommend to the Government the International/ foreign standards which can be used in lieu of standard notified under the CMVR permit use of components/parts/assemblies complying with such standards. * To make recommendations on any other technical issues which have direct relevance in implementation of the Central Motor Vehicles Rules. * To make recommendations on the new safety standards of various components for notification and implementation under Central Motor Vehicles Rules. To make recommendations on lead time for implementation of such safety standards. * To recommend amendment of Central Motor Vehicles Rules having technical bearing keeping in view o f Changes in automobile technologies. CMVR-TSC is assisted by another Committee called the Automobile Industry Standards Committee (AISC) having members from various stakeholders in drafting the technical standards related to Safety. The major functions of the committee are as follows: * Preparation of new standards for automotive items related to safety. * To review and recommend amendments to the existing standards. Recommend adoption of such standards to CMVR Technical Standing Committee * Recommend commissioning of testing facilities at appropriate stages. * Recommend the necessary funding of such facilities to the CMVR Technical Standing Committee, and * Advise CMVR Technical Standing Committee on any other issues referred to it The National Standards for Automotive Industry are prepared by Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS). The standards formulated by AISC are also converted into Indian Standards by BIS. The standards formulated by both BIS and AISC are considered by CMVR-TSC f or implementation.Standing Committee on Implementation of Emission Legislation (SCOE) – This Committee deliberates the issues related to implementation of emission regulation. Major functions of this Committee are – * To discuss the future emission norms * To recommend norms for in-use vehicles to MoSRT&H * To finalise the test procedures and the implementation strategy for emission norms * Advise MoSRT&H on any issue relating to implementation of emission regulations. Based on the recommendations from CMVR-TSC and SCOE, MoSRT&H issues notification for necessary amendments / modifications in the in Central Motor Vehicle Rules.In addition, the other Ministries like Ministry of Environment & Forest (MoEF), Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas (MoPNG) and Ministry of Non-conventional Energy Sources are also involved in formulation of regulations relating to Emissions, Noise, Fuels and Alternative Fuel vehicles. Tax Structure 1. State VAT Rate and Classi fication of goods Uniform rate structure across the country helps in avoiding diversion of trade from one State to another, checks unhealthy competition and reduces tax evasion. It helps automobile industry to plan and commit long term investments.Basic rationale needs to be developed for generation of revenue from industrial products. This should be long term and the share of taxation in the total value of the ultimate customer needs to be defined. SIAM recommends such a policy in taxing goods and services under VAT. Total taxes from both Centre and State as proposed by SIAM not to exceed 25%. Considering Cenvat at 16%, Designated rate should not exceed 9%. The classification of goods should be aligned to central taxes to reduce litigation. Uniform classification across all States and central taxes would create favourable environment for growth of industry.No separate classification of Capital Goods 2. Multiple levies and Industrial input One of the stated objectives of VAT is to r educe multiple levies. Number of rates under VAT should be 0%, 4% & RNR in addition to 1% on precious metal and 20% on petroleum products. All other levies like Octroi, Entry Tax should be abolished. Inputs used in the manufacturing should be taxed at 4% against issue of declaration. There should not be any specific list of industrial input, as it will deprive the benefit to the industry using input other than the one mentioned in the list.Reduced rate on industrial input will avoid refund problem and avoid unnecessary interaction with the Department. Further when interstate transactions are zero rated, manufacturer selling predominantly in interstate ends up having huge input tax credit without set-off. Automobile manufacturers having one manufacturing facility in the country sells more than 80% of the production outside the Sate and forced to seek refund from the State Government for excess input tax credit. SIAM suggests VAT rate of 4% on all industrial input to mitigate the refund issue. 3. Set-off mechanismSet-off of tax paid should be allowed for all inputs including raw material, components, consumables, fuel and capital goods. Tax paid on services should be allowed to be set-off. Tax paid on capital goods should be allowed as set-off in full in the same year to avoid confusion and litigation later. 4. Interstate transactions All interstate transactions should be at zero rate. Further automobile manufacturers ‘Stock Transfer' goods by setting up huge facilities to strengthen distribution net work in order to reach the product to the customer at the earliest and at least cost.This mechanism should not be affected even under VAT. 5. Sales Tax Incentives Automobile manufacturers have made huge investments, which are in phases in unviable locations. These locational disadvantages are partially offset by fiscal incentives. Any detrimental variations or withdrawal will affect the viability of such investments. This may adversely impact the country's image as an attractive investment destination. It is heartening to note that all States have agreed in principle to honour all existing incentives under VAT SIAM suggests the following: Incentive| SIAM Suggestion|Input Tax Exemption| Refund Input Tax separately – adopt Maharashtra model| Output Tax Exemption| Continue exemption, Option to Defer output tax| Output Tax Deferral| Continue Deferment, refund input tax separately| Input Tax Exemption ;amp; Output Tax Exemption| Refund Input Tax separately,Option to Defer output tax| Input Tax Exemption ;amp; Output Tax Deferral| Refund Input Tax separately,Option to Defer output tax| Table 5-Tax Structure in Automobile Industry 6. Refunds Due to various reasons there is no alternative but to seek refund from the Government in case of excess credit.Given the state of finances, refunds will be difficult and uncertain while locking up working capital for industry. Refunds should be honoured within 15 days from the date of filing retu rns and credited to the assessee's account. Alternatively, VAT Entitlement Certificate on the lines of freely tradable DEPB may be considered Recent Mergers & Acquisitions 1. Merger of Ashok Leyland and IVECO,Italy 2. Merger of Eicher and Mitsubishi,Japan 3. Merger of M&M and Nissan Motor Company,Japan 4. Merger of Swaraj Mazda and Mazda Motor Company,Japan Industry SWOT Strengths: Automobile industry is an established and an evergreen industry. * India is the strongest player in the small car segment of the global automobile market. * Indian companies are the best cost innovators. * The automotive industry has long been known for its development and promulgation of the assembly-line. * Some of the greatest developments in the automotive supply chain lie in the development of Just-In-Time (JIT) inventory methods. * Through the use of advanced technologies, assembly line manufacturing, and JIT inventory management, the automotive industry has been able to achieve significant gains in productivityWeaknesses: * India is lacking in proper infrastructure. * This is slowing the pace of growth of auto industry. * Companies are not improving after sale services. Opportunities: * The automotive ecosystem is in the midst of significant change, with increasing challenges in consumer demands, technology development, and globalization. * While demand for incumbent technologies will remain strong, alternative power trains could capture more than 20 percent of the global market by 2020, depending upon boundary conditions such as fuel taxation and emissions regulation set by governments as well as oil price development. Storage is in the heart of the next generation of efforts for fuel economy. * More realistic scenario will emerge for technologies using Hydrogen as automotive fuel. * Intelligent use of NCES (Non conventional energy sources) for powering Public Transport. Threats: * Global Crisis * Companies not focussing on R&D are under great risk * High competi tion from foreign players * Lack of technology for Indian companies Market forecast with Macroeconomic assumptions Investments in future: The market is so large and diverse that a large number of players can be absorbed to accommodate buyer needs.The sector not only has global players looking to invest and expand but leading domestic companies are also pumping in huge sums into expanding operation. Some of the investments made by various companies or organisations are as follows: * Investment Planning Commission has set target of attracting foreign investment worth US$5 billion for the next five years (in automobile industry). * Rasandik Motors, a group company of Rasandik Engineering Industries India plans to set up a three-wheelers unit at Nanjangud in Mysore district of Karnataka. Work on the project was expected to commence by July 2010. An Indian automotive site called wheelsunplugged. com suggests that Daimler is planning to invest US$700 million-$1 billion to increase the cap acity of its planned truck assembly plant at the SIPCOT Industrial Park in Oragadam, near Chennai in Tamil Nadu. An initial capacity of 70,000 units a year is planned from a 1,000-acre site. * Mercedes-Benz plans to invest e700 million to increase the production capacity of its trucks in its manufacturing plant in Chennai. While the infrastructure is expected to address future expansion plans of the company, details of the time frame of investment were not disclosed.The German car maker is also on course to increase its headcount three-fold at its R&D centre in Bangalore by next year and will invest close to Rs. 450 crore on infrastructure and people-related costs. * Bharat Forge invested US$ 135 million in its Pune plant for increasing capacity to 240,000 tonnes. * Amtek Auto is expanding capacity of its casting unit to 70,000 tonnes per annum. * Rico Auto is investing Rs 350 million to expand its capacity. * Apollo Tyres plans to invest US$469. 58m to increase production capac ity in India and abroad. * Robert Bosch of Germany will invest U$201. 0 million in its subsidiaries over the next two years. * Ceat has inaugurated the Radial tyre greenfield project in Gujarat with an investment of Rs 7,000 million, which will create employment opportunities for 1,000 people. Demand forecast: Before looking at the forecast demand of automobiles, specially, commercial vehicles, let us look at the demand forecasting process used in automobile industry In forecasting the demand, we have used various statistical methods considering all the relevant demand drivers for each segment. Then, models were prepared considering an exhaustive list of variables such as: Macro-economic variables-GDP components, industrial production, inflation, interest rates, stock indices -Sector variables- model launches, vehicle price, inter-segment competition -Enablers/barriers- Finance availability, road connectivity Forecasts for 2010-11 Automobile Segments| 2010-2011 growth over 2009-10(% )| Passenger Cars| 12-13| Utility Vehicles| 13-14| Commercial vehicles(goods)| 19-20| ————————————————- Enter key points: ————————————————- 1 ————————————————- 2 ———————————————— 3 ————————————————- Enter key points: ————————————————- 1 ——————————— —————- 2 ————————————————- 3 Commercial vehicles(buses)| 4-5| Two wheelers| 9-10| Three wheelers(goods)| 5-6| Three wheelers(passengers)| 8-9| Table 6-Demand Forecast for 2010-11 Some of the key forecasts made with respect to growth of commercial vehice industry are: †¢ Expected demand in Passenger segment to grow at 6% CAGR in volume terms over the period FY05-FY10. Goods segment to show 4. 6% CAGR over the same period. †¢ Light Commercial Vehicles to grow at a rate of 20% YOY. †¢ Heavy Commercial vehicles to grow at a rate of 12% YOY. PEST Analysis Economic Scenario The fortunes of the CV industry are closely related to the general economic conditions prevailing in a country. The demand for transportation is directly proportional to the growth of the economy, mobility of population, and other related factors. In nearly al l countries, a close connection between growth in transport, goods traffic and economic growth can be observed.The effects are two-fold: * Increasing economic development causes more traffic. Increasing amounts of goods, greater transportation distances, enhanced division of labour (globalisation), new production technologies (e. g. just-in-time production), higher levels of commuter traffic, and an increase in business travel are producing a growth in goods transport and production-related passenger transport. The increase in the prosperity of private households, together with the reduction in the working week and the working life, produce an increase in holiday and leisure transport. The mobility of people and goods is a precondition for greater productivity and economic growth. The latter result from enhanced division of labour, faster structural change, the exploitation of new raw and other materials and greater competitiveness in international trade. POLITICAL SCENARIO: The gov ernment has taken many initiatives to promote foreign direct investment (FDI) in the industry; a few of them are given below: * Automatic approval for foreign equity investment up to 100 per cent of manufacture of automobiles and components is permitted. * The automobile industry has been delicensed. There are no restraints on import of components. Besides the above mentioned initiatives, the government has envisaged the Automotive Mission Plan 2016 to promote growth in the sector. It targets: * Emerging as the global favourite in the area of design and manufacture of automobiles and auto components. * Taking the output to US$ 145 billion, accounting for more than 10 per cent of the GDP. * Offering additional employment to 25 million people by 2016. ? TECHNOLOGICAL SCENARIO: Road Infrastructure Development 52000 + Kms Road development project taken up under NHAI * 5851 Kms of Golden Quadrilateral (93% completed) 7300 Kms of NSEW corridor (Phase I&II) –(11% completed) â₠¬â€œ Target Date – Dec’09 * 380 Kms of Port Connectivity (29% completed) – Target Date – Dec’12 * 46000 KM Length of Road Development- US $ 27Bn Project in progress – Completion by Dec’12 Port Infrastructure Development * Port Infrastructure upgradation projects ~ US $ 16 Bn. in progress * Upgradation of major ports through private sector involvement (13 projects are operational and 4 under implementation) * Development of container terminals (in 6 ports of total 15 million TEUs capacity) – Target Date – 2013-14 * Projects worth US$ 13. 3 billion proposed under National Maritime Development Programme (NMDP) –Target Date – 2013-14 * Additional port handling capacity of 530 MMTA in major ports Annexure List of Industry Associations The automobile industry like any other industry has a number of associations to look after its interests. They provide a greater bargaining power to the industry and act as a sourc e of bridge between the industry and the government. They help in formulating laws for the industry and help in getting technology from abroad.These associations enable the industry to lobby hard to get extra incentives in the Union budget in the form of reduced import duties etc. They also act as data banks and provide insightful researches into the industry and they also regularly conduct auto fairs and exhibitions. Some of the major automobile Manufacturers Association along with a brief description of their profiles is as follows: Society of Indian automobile Manufacturers ( SIAM)-This is the apex body of the automobile industry in the country representing nearly thirty eight vehicle and vehicular engine manufacturers in the country.It is an important channel of communication between with the Government and other national and international organizations. It works with all quarters of the industry and helps in formulating policies for the automobile industry. It also enhances com munication between all the stake holders of the industry and helps in technological up gradation though collaboration with foreign players. For more details of the organization log on to http://www. siamIndia. com/ The Automotive Component Manufacturers Association of India (ACMA)-This organization is the nodal agency for all the automobile component manufacturers in the country.They have nearly 500 hundred members and their supply form the majority of the components in the organized sector. Like SIAM, this association also helps in dissemination of information about the industry, enhances trade promotion, technological up gradation and quality enhancement thus playing an important role in the development of the industry. It also sends delegation to foreign countries and participates in international trade fairs and regularly publishes data about the sector. More information about the organization can be sought from http://www. acmainfo. om/ Federation of automobile Dealers Associat ion (FADA)-This association is the apex body of automobile dealers in India and it was established in 1964 to promote and protect the interests of the retail automobile market in the country. The four founder members of FADA which have played a key role in the formation of the association are as follows: †¢The automobile Dealers Association of Maharashtra, Mumbai †¢Motor Industries Association, Kolkata †¢Automobile Traders Association, Delhi †¢Motor Vehicles and Allied Industries Association , Chennai Click http://www. adaweb. com/ for more details. Motor and Equipments Manufacturers Association (MEMA)-This association as the name suggests represents the interest of the automobile equipment manufacturers by making the companies associated with this trade more profitable and efficient. It provides useful information about the industry, valuable market research, government representation and other valuable commercial services. The body was established in 1904 and s ince then they have provided valuable service to the light motor vehicle and the heavy industries.To know more click http://www. mema. org/index. php List of graphs and tables * Table 1-Market Share of Different Players in Automobile Sector * Table 2-Automobile Production Trends * Table 3-Automobile Domestic Sales Trends * Table 4-Automobile Exports Trends * Table 5-Tax Structure in the Automobile Industry * Table 6-Demand forecast for 2010-11 * Figure 1-Monthly Domestic Sales of Commercial Vehicles * Figure 2-Monthly Exports of Commercial Vehicles * Figure 3-Regulatory Framework of Automobile Industry