Search results

Billions of entrepreneurs at the Base of the Pyramid (BoP) operate as small-scale producers within multi-tiered supply chain networks. Unfortunately, a majority of these entrepreneurs are simply unable to derive sufficient value from the network and are vulnerable to disasters and poverty. The purpose of this paper is to develop a typology that examines dynamic and triadic power relationships in order to create value chains for BoP producers.

This paper builds upon the available literature and a relevant historical case study to develop a typology. The validity of the typology is ascertained by examining and comparing two current BoP silk weaver communities in India.

The typology captures essential environmental variables and relates them to mediated and non-mediated forms of power which, in turn, shape the value derived from the supply chain network.

The typology provides specific recommendations for BoP producers, such as the formation of cooperatives, engaging in political unionization and ensuring that their social networks expand beyond local communities.

The typology brings together structuration theory and power and provides a framework for understanding supply value. This typology is generalizable to dynamic multi-tiered supply chain networks.

JOHN SMITH'S assertion that librarianship is ‘getting the right book to the right reader at the right time’ (NLW, July), and Maurice Line's declaration that ‘the sole aim of librarianship is to serve users’ (NLW, September) are, like many truisms, well worth pondering over.

In this study we examine how resource-constrained organizations can maneuver for competitive advantage in highly institutionalized fields. Unlike studies of institutional entrepreneurship, we investigate competitive maneuvering by an organization that is unable to alter either the regulative or normative institutions that characterize its field. Using the “Moneyball” phenomenon and recent changes in Major League Baseball as the basis for an intensive case study of entrepreneurial actions taken by the Oakland A’s, we found that the A’s were able to maneuver for advantage by using bricolage and refusing to enact baseball’s cognitive institutions, and that they continued succeeding despite ongoing resource constraints and rapid copying of their actions by other teams. These results contribute to our understanding of competitive maneuvering and change in institutionalized fields. Our findings expand the positioning of bricolage beyond its prior characterization as a tool used primarily by peripheral organizations in less institutionalized fields; our study suggests that bricolage may aid resource constrained participants (including the majority of entrepreneurial firms) to survive in a wider range of circumstances than previously believed.

Healthcare is both the largest (17 + percent) and the most rapidly growing (three plus times the consumer product index (measure of inflation) and half a percent of gross domestic product each year) segment of the US economy. The purpose of this paper is to focus on outcome successes that illustrate application of a previously reported health equation. The health equation allows an organized and more transparent assessment of healthcare outcomes.

The approach includes “end use/least cost” techniques that identifies healthful care as a big unmet need (BUN) and equally attractive business opportunity in identifying health promotion that improves outcome at lower net costs.

Opportunity exists to reduce costs while also reducing adverse events, healthcare morbidity and morality. Transparency is essential to find what works more effectively to yield desired outcomes. Metrics and measures, particularly more precise tools to assess true outcome in promoting health or managing ill health, are given priority as they allow quantified and, often econometric, outcome opportunities in the midst of current uncertainties.

This paper is for consumers and businesses, managers and administrators, professionals and allied health professionals. The successes described herein illustrate fundamental opportunities driving change and innovation within healthcare and in our society.

Attention is called to opportunity areas that can fund out of savings the transition from the authors' current “sickness care” system to a healthful care, proactive prevention approach to delivering care. Novel application of transparency and end use/least cost can help guide choices to achieve healthier outcomes.

Since anthropometric dimensions vary during a lifetime, it is difficult to provide adequate sizing for all, especially growing, children. This paper aims to review children's sizing provision for girls aged 4‐8 years among four UK retailers (Adams, Debenhams, Marks & Spencer and Mothercare), an area of limited research.

Two research strategies were utilised: observational visits to retail stores (on sizing systems and environment) and face‐to‐face interviews with ten parents and five childrenswear garment technologists (on sizing of children's garments and fit issues).

UK retailers utilised various numerical size coding systems based on height, age and weight. Next, Asda George and Adams were the favourite shopping stores for children's wear. Parents were co‐shoppers with their children. While parents' key criteria for purchase were durability, fit, quality, price and washability, children's choice was based on colour, fashion and peer influence. Variation in sizing designation caused confusion. Parents have suggested varying lengths as a solution to accommodating different sizes; preferring a common system with age as key size code. Sizing inconsistency between brands and incomprehensible size codes are major factors in the creation of customer dissatisfaction with children's clothing. Providing ambient facilities for co‐shopping is vital.

The children's fashion sector is important to children, parents and retailers. Parents are co‐shoppers with their children and have key criteria for selecting to shop in a store. Marketers should be aware of core needs: sizing provision, shopping environment and the dynamics of co‐shopping. Sizing systems should be relevant to avoid dissatisfaction and confusion. More research is needed focusing on larger and other samples; target markets and psychological needs for shopping.

The area of children's shopping for clothing in the UK has a limited literature. Key issues revolve around garment sizing, garment fit, co‐shopping and consumer satisfaction. This study contributes to filling the gap in knowledge.

Manufacturers show a growing tendency to remove the skin from all fruits and vegetables before drying. Because of custom or the type of skin, some kinds, notably prunes and apricots, however, are rarely peeled. Peeling may be done by hand or by specially designed machines. Many types of knives, with straight, curved or guarded blades, and hand‐operated cutting machines are obtainable for peeling, trimming, coring and otherwise preparing the material to be dried. Machines for peeling and coring both apples and pears in one operation are available. Friction or rotary mechanical peelers are particularly well suited for handling roots and tubers. All peelers of this type depend upon the rasping effect of rough surfaces of cement, corundum, etc., forming some part of the lining of the peeler, when the product is rotated rapidly within the cylinder by a moving bottom. The material is introduced at the top and discharged by a side door. These machines are usually equipped with water sprays, which wash off the dirt and the particles of skin removed by the peeler. Other types make use of an open flame which chars the skin so that it can be brushed or washed off. Several types of lye peelers are available. All depend upon immersion in or spraying with hot (190°–200° F.) lye solution. The length of treatment must be determined for each batch of fruit. It should be long enough to permit the ready removal of skin by water sprays or by rubbing, but must not injure the flesh of the product being peeled. Following the peeling, the fruit or vegetable must be inspected and all remaining skin removed with trimming knives, especially adapted to different products. Lye is used to check the skins of prunes and grapes in order to facilitate drying. The fruit is in contact with the hot lye solution long enough to break the skin by many minute fissures or checks, but not long enough to loosen it. The concentration and temperature of the lye bath are similar to those for lye peeling. After the lye treatment the fruit is carefully washed to remove all traces of the lye bath before further processing. Fruits are sliced, cubed, shredded, or left whole. Vegetables are sliced, cubed, shredded, or chipped. The cutting is done by hand or by some one of the numerous machines on the market. Some of the machines consist essentially of rotating knives or cutting surfaces operated by hand or by power. In others the cutting surfaces are stationary and the product is forced against the blades. Special machines for cutting beans are made. In the most satisfactory type of cubing machine the slices are cut, carried to a die, and forced through by a plunger. Manufacturers find it desirable to pit or seed stone fruits, as pitted or seeded fruits dry more rapidly and sell more readily than those from which the pits or seeds are not removed. Machines for pitting, seeding and paring most fruits are for sale by food‐machinery manufacturers, but the greater part of dried fruits are pitted by hand. After the raw material is prepared in the desired form, no time should elapse before traying and subsequent treatments preliminary to its being placed in the drier. No definite rule can be given for determining the quantity of material to be placed on a unit area of tray surface. Experience will soon show the operators how much will insure even, rapid drying. Many of the larger fruits must be trayed only one layer deep. Overloading trays must be avoided. Trays should be light but capable of withstanding strain, and they should permit a maximum exposure of the materials. Trays of the type most often seen have a spreading surface formed either of wire screen or wooden slats held firmly in a narrow but rigid wooden or metal frame. Many of the trays now in use have been employed in sun or other drying. If new trays are made, the one‐man tray, about 2½ to 3 feet square, will be found to be the most convenient. Wooden‐slat trays can be more cheaply constructed than wire‐screen trays, but they have a high rate of upkeep. These trays, however, are not affected by sulphur fumes or fruit acids, for which reason they are preferred for most fruits. The trucks for conveying loaded trays are of two general types. In one a skeleton frame is provided with cleats, upon which the trays rest. The cleats are from 2 to 4 inches from centre to centre above one another. These trucks are made of various combinations of wood or angle iron. The other, which may be called the stack type, has a low floor supported by wheels 3 to 5 inches in diameter. The trays are piled or stacked one above the other, and the desired space between them is maintained by the raised sides of the trays. Various alterations may be made for convenience in handling and loading. The original method of preparing fruits and vegetables for drying consisted in washing, peeling when desirable, cutting, and traying. By this method most dark‐coloured materials made fairly presentable dried foods, but light‐coloured fruits and vegetables did not. The attempt to overcome this difficulty led to the introduction of blanching, or processing, and sulphuring. The blanching, or processing, agent is usually steam or hot water, which helps the product to retain its natural colour. In the steam treatment the material is subjected to live steam for the required period. In blanching by hot water, the temperature is maintained at 190° F. to the boiling point, depending on the material being treated. As a rule, steam blanching is preferred to blanching in liquid, because the loss of soluble constituents of the food is less, a better flavoured product results, and the use of steam is ordinarily more convenient. Light‐coloured fruits (apricots, peaches, pears, and at times grapes and figs) are sulphured in order to prevent discolouration during and after drying and to facilitate drying. Sulphuring plasmolyzes the cells and makes permeable the semipermeable cell membrane, thus facilitating the diffusion of water from the interior to the surface. When the general plan of operation makes it desirable, the fruit on trays is sulphured in an enclosed chamber, provided with an entrance for the sulphur gas and an exit for a draught. The chamber is usually large enough to hold one to two loaded trucks. Preferably the sulphur is burned in shallow pans stacked one above the other in zigzag formation. This method gives a large quantity of sulphur dioxide in a comparatively short time. Sometimes a sulphur stove is placed outside the chamber and the sulphur fumes are carried into the chamber by flues. Sulphuring should always be as light as possible to accomplish the desired results. The type of equipment best adapted to any particular use depends upon several factors. If the products are to be dried for home or farm use, then the equipment should be as simple as possible. If the dried material is to be prepared in large quantities for sale to the public, then the type of equipment will depend to a great extent upon the nature of the product desired. To meet these needs many devices have been originated and patented, so that all phases of drying are well covered. Materials can be dried more rapidly and at lower temperatures in vacuum than at atmospheric pressure. Such foods as are extremely susceptible to damage by heat are more safely dried in vacuum. However, vacuum driers are seldom used in large‐scale operations on the usual commercial grades of dehydrated fruits and vegetables. The apparatus is too expensive and usually the advantages gained are not sufficient to compensate for the added cost of equipment and operation. Enzymes are not inactivated by evaporation alone, and it will be found desirable in many cases to inactivate them by blanching or by other means if vacuum drying is used.

The first of a series of lectures arranged by the Wine Trade Club for the present session was given on March 8th, at Vintners Hall, London, when Mr. R. H. Monier‐Williams, B.A., read a paper on “ Legal Matters in the Wine and Spirit Trade ”. Capt. F. H. T. Ree, R.N. (Rtd.), occupied the chair, and in opening the proceedings said that probably most of those present were aware of the fact that Mr. Monier‐Williams was the greatest authority on the problems which beset their trade and he had steered them very successfully through more troubles than he cared to remember. In the course of his address Mr. Monier‐Williams referred to the question of misdescription of an article, and more particularly in relation to wine labels. The Merchandise Marks Act provided that every person who applied any false trade description to goods should be guilty of an offence unless he proved that he acted without intent to defraud. The most usual way in which a trade description was falsely applied was on a label, but the delivery of an invoice containing a false trade description of goods was an “ application ” of that description, and a retailer who gave such an invoice was, prima facie, guilty of an offence under the Act. To establish the defence that he acted without intent to defraud, the defendant must satisfy the Court that he did not know that the trade description which he applied to the goods was false, because he was mistaken as to what the goods really were. For instance, a wine merchant bought, in all good faith, several dozen bottles of wine labelled “ sherry”. It was invoiced to his customers as “ sherry ”, to which it was found to bear no resemblance except possibly in colour. The wine merchant was entitled to be acquitted, but he must have acted in good faith. If the prosecution proved that the merchant knew or must have known perfectly well that the stuff was not sherry, or that he applied the description without caring whether it was true or false he should be convicted. In answering charges a defendant would establish a defence if he proved that he was mistaken as to what the goods were and did not know, therefore, that the trade description was false. Nevertheless, his defence would fail unless he could establish certain matters laid down in the Act, namely that, having taken all reasonable precautions against committing an offence, he had at the time no reason to suspect the genuineness of the trade description, and that, on demand made by or on behalf of the prosecution, he gave all the information in his power with respect to the persons from whom he obtained the goods.

In the last ten years, feminists in and out of the universities have developed a power‐ful critique of pornography as “the ideology of rape” and the “ideological justifica‐tion for male dominance”. This article is a sociological analysis of the feminist social movement which has grown up around the issues of male violence and male culture.

Very much more might be done to improve the quality of our food supplies by the great organisations that exist for the avowed object of furthering the interests of traders in foodstuffs. It is no exaggeration to say that these organisations claim, and rightly claim, to speak in the aggregate on behalf of great commercial interests involving the means of livelihood of thousands of people and the most profitable disposal of millions of money. The information that they possess as to certain trade methods and requirements is necessarily unique. Apart from the commercial knowledge they possess, these organisations have funds at their command which enable them to obtain the best professional opinions on any subjects connected with the trades they represent. Their members are frequently to be found occupying positions of responsibility as the elected representatives of their fellow‐citizens on municipal councils and other public bodies, where the administration of the Food Laws and prosecutions under the Food and Drugs Acts are often under discussion. Such organisations, then, are in a position to afford an unlimited amount of valuable help by assisting to put down fraud in connection with our food supply. The dosing of foods with harmful drugs is, of course, only a part of a very much larger subject. It is, however, typical. Assuming the danger to public health that arises from the treatment of foods with harmful preservatives, the continued use of such substances cannot but be in the long run as harmful to the best interests of the traders as it is actually dangerous to public health. The trade organisations to which reference has been made might very well extend their sphere of usefulness by making it their business to seriously consider this and similar questions in the interests of public health, as well as in their own best interests. It is surely not open to doubt that a great organisation, numbering hundreds, and perhaps thousands of members, has such a membership because individual traders find it to their interest, as do people in all walks of life, to act more or less in common for the general advantage ; and, further, that it would not be to the benefit of individual members that their connection with the organisation should terminate owing to their own wrong‐doing. The executives of such trade organisations hold a sufficiently strong position to enable them to bring strong pressure to bear on those who are acting in a way that is contrary to the interests of the public generally, and of honest traders in particular, by adulterating or misbranding the food products that they gain their living by selling. It should also be plain that such trade organisations could go a long way towards solving many of the very vexed questions that arise whenever food standards and limits, for example, form the subject of discussion. These problems are not easy to deal with. The difficulties in connection with them are many and great; but such problems, however difficult of solution, are still not insoluble, and an important step towards their solution would be taken if co‐operation between those who are acting in the interests of hygienic science and those who are acting in the interests of trade could be brought about. If this could be accomplished the unedifying spectacle of alleged trade interests and the demands of public health being brought, as is so often the case, into sharp conflict, would be less frequent, and there can be no doubt that general benefit would result.

What is it about academia anyway? We profess to hate it, spend endless amounts of time complaining about it, and yet we in academia will do practically anything to stay. The pay may be low, job security elusive, and in the end, it's not the glamorous work we envisioned it would be. Yet, it still holds fascination and interest for us. This is an article about American academic fiction. By academic fiction, I mean novels whosemain characters are professors, college students, and those individuals associated with academia. These works reveal many truths about the higher education experience not readily available elsewhere. We learn about ourselves and the university community in which we work.