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In response to a paper published in a previous issue of British Food Journal, it criticises the methodology of the previous research. Examines the earlier findings on the projected epidemic size of the new variant of Creutzfeldt‐Jakob Disease (vCJD) in humans. Argues that the earlier research is flawed and there exists no data which can provide adequate predictions for the extent of the vCJD epidemic.

The case presents a significant amount of information on the outbreak of COVID-19 and the expected impact on the economy. Although the case is necessarily concise, several links are given to the online articles and video material on which the case is based. This allows participants to deepen their knowledge of the virus and their understanding of its likely economic impact. To frame the discussion, several philosophies, ranging from Libertarianism to Marxism, are lightly expounded. Readers will need to consider divergent ideas; the sanctity of human life versus the monetary value of a life; the hysteria evoked by COVID-19 deaths versus the placid acceptance of an annual 66,000 deaths by another disease – TB; and the differential economic impact of the virus across extremes of inequality. Perhaps, the key issue relates to the skewness in the death rate: Should young people’s livelihood be sacrificed for a few old people about to die anyway? The case also illustrates the essence of a dilemma – a situation in which a difficult choice has to be made between two or more alternatives, especially ones that are equally undesirable.

In March 2020, South African President Cyril Ramaposa ordered a 21-day national “lockdown” to enable and enforce social distancing in an effort to slow the spread of the COVID-19. Many other countries had already taken similar steps, but in a country with 43,000 murders annually, South Africa’s response to only 11 COVID-19 deaths and 1,071 cases was both rapid and harsh. Schools, businesses, social areas and parks were closed. Medical emergencies, essential services and weekly grocery shopping were the only permissible activities. Two weeks after lockdown, there were 1,845 cases and 18 deaths, a far cry from the predicted 30,000 cases and 300 deaths, estimated on the basis of the three-day doubling rate at the start of lockdown. Many businesses, pulverised by closure, daily wage earners and those fearful of losing jobs were hopeful that the lockdown would not be extended. In a country with immense inequality, how would the masses under the age of 65 years, already in poverty and now with their lives pulled apart by an imported disease of the wealthy, respond to extended social and economic deprivation followed by bailouts for business?

MBA and Executive Education

Teaching Notes are available for educators only.

CSS: 11 Strategy.

The authors welcome the debate hosted by the British Food Journal on the likely size of the outbreak of New Variant CJD, if it is caused by eating BSE‐contaminated beef. We are pleased that there is a substantial measure of agreement between our estimates and those of Ferguson et al., for the most likely number of deaths, even if there is disagreement on the upper bound. We note that our low predictions for vCJD deaths based on vCJD data to the end of 1997 continue to be borne out by figures available at the time of writing, one year later.

This paper aims to explore the intersection of disability and accounting employment.

The paper uses oral history accounts of 12 disabled accountants. The authors investigate narrators' experiences of being disabled people and professional accountants, identify the barriers they encounter in professional employment, and how they (re)negotiate professional work.

The narrators' accounts are complex and diverse. The narratives record a discourse of success, offset by the consistent identification of social and environmental barriers relating to limited opportunities, resources, and support.

The paper develops the limited research on the relationship between disability and the accounting profession, expands the limited literature on disabled professionals' experience of work, provides voice for disabled accountants, adds to the limited oral histories available within accounting, and augments the accumulated literature considering the accounting profession and minorities.

The six member nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have witnessed a significant jump in the quality of education since only the 1970s—becoming sovereign because of boom in oil resources and petrodollar prevalence—to the extent that the level of their higher education system nearly fulfills all Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) standards. Among successful criteria undertaken by the most GCC universities are establishing partnerships with other foreign universities in developed countries and following international organizations’, such as UNESCO and the World Bank, recommendations by focusing on establishing knowledge economies in line with globalization. Looking into the GCC success stories, the focus of this research paper is Egypt, after the country’s last revolution on January 25, 2011. The Arab Republic of Egypt has a strategic location worldwide, is a vital peace keeper, especially in the Middle East and the Arab region, and has a rich oriental heritage: cultural, social, and traditional, in addition to its unique pharaonic history. Suggested selection of some tools of assessment would be elaborated in the Methodology section to assess the quality of national tertiary education. This chapter aimed at generally highlighting some aspects of evolution of national post-secondary system during the last two decades in an effort to come up with findings and recommendations to promote country’s higher education system. As in many other developing countries, in Egypt the university constitutes a social and political hope, and is one of the pillars of social mobility and economic development for the country. However, professional endeavors are repeatedly turned down in finding a suitable job or at least entering the labor market, resulting in a rise in unemployment rate. This is due to, on the one hand, the nature of the labor market, hence the fact that the supply of graduates exceeds the market demand for them, and on the other hand, the negatively affected quality of higher education, especially in the public sector, mainly being overloaded, which produces weak qualified potential employees. This—among other factors—contributes to the downfall of country’s economy. Many who graduate from a stronger private system encounter difficulties in either being classified as overqualified, and hence get refused and are unemployed, or are placed in a position that under evaluates their capabilities, and hence with time lose enthusiasm or escape (brain drain). In conclusion, conducting a comparison between Egypt’s private and public universities, as expected beforehand, would be in favor of the former because of having better facilities and qualified faculty, earning higher salaries, in addition to the use of advanced equipment and technology in academic research. Therefore, this research intended to expand in future the comparison to include other countries from the Middle East and North Africa region—similar to Egypt in its economic and social compositions—for mutual benefits of learning from the best practices and successful models.

Supply chain management is examined and why supplier quality improvement is sometimes more apparent in speech than in action. The concern is that to obtain the required higher quality the suppliers are simply “running faster” on the traditional treadmill. A guide to managing the supply chain is provided and recommendations made for future “best practice” in the light of existing processes.

The survey asked attenders at two day hospitals to rate how helpful they found different components of their therapeutic programme. One of the day hospitals was established for short‐term attendance, the other provided rehabilitation and support for long‐term attenders, who tended to be male and psychotic. The results revealed that the short‐term unit attenders rated talking to nurses as more helpful than any other activity, whilst long‐term users, in contrast, valued vocational placements and material resources. The survey was subsequently re‐administered in one unit and the results were shown to be statistically reliable. The findings are discussed with reference to how they have been used so far to improve the service in one of the day hospitals. It is concluded that the views of day attenders are an important factor in developing a quality community mental health service.

Walking and cycling have a long history in work itself and people travelling to and from work. Who walks and cycles, how they perform those journeys, the precise role that journey plays in the course of the working day and how it is valued are informed by social constructions of gender. Gendering of mobility has a long history and, in many countries, women continue to face challenges when they walk and they continue to be discouraged in more or less explicit ways from cycling. This exploratory chapter draws together literature on occupations, paid and unpaid, that involve walking and cycling as an integral part of collecting and delivering people and things. A wide variety of services are discussed in the literature but the research on the mode of travel for individual services – like food delivery, waste picking, rural health work, ‘mobility of care’ – is limited and there is little attention to gender. Further, any comparative studies tend to be between cities with similar economic status or cultural heritage. This chapter includes research from high, medium and low income countries not to universalise experiences but to identify common themes, and suggest avenues for further research. We argue the inequitable distribution of transport resources, the gendering of bicycling related skills and the masculinisation of public space are pervasive. However, they are also being challenged by women supporting each other, partners supporting wives and communities making opportunities available to all members.

The authors focus on using Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a lens through which to analyze the holistic welfare development of Black male student-athletes, namely their identity development and overall college and career readiness. The authors contend that if structured and delivered well with the appropriate supports, athletics can be more of a mobilizing mechanism for Black males versus an exploitive one. Specifically, athletic identity does not have to be exclusive, but rather one aspect of the student-athletes' multidimensional sense of self. To this end, the authors outline specific research, practice, and policy recommendations that address the unique challenges of Black male student-athletes in K-16.

The concept and practice of e-services has become essential in business transactions. Yet there are still many organizations that have not developed e-services optimally. This is especially relevant in the context of Indonesian Airline companies. Therefore, many airline customers in Indonesia are still in doubt about it, or even do not use it. To fill this gap, this study attempts to develop a model for e-services adoption and empirically examines the factors influencing the airlines customers in Indonesia in using e-services offered by the Indonesian airline companies. Taking six Indonesian airline companies as a case example, the study investigated the antecedents of e-services usage of Indonesian airlines. This study further examined the impacts of motivation on customers in using e-services in the Indonesian context. Another important aim of this study was to investigate how ages, experiences and geographical areas moderate effects of e-services usage.

The study adopts a positivist research paradigm with a two-phase sequential mixed method design involving qualitative and quantitative approaches. An initial research model was first developed based on an extensive literature review, by combining acceptance and use of information technology theories, expectancy theory and the inter-organizational system motivation models. A qualitative field study via semi-structured interviews was then conducted to explore the present state among 15 respondents. The results of the interviews were analysed using content analysis yielding the final model of e-services usage. Eighteen antecedent factors hypotheses and three moderating factors hypotheses and 52-item questionnaire were developed. A focus group discussion of five respondents and a pilot study of 59 respondents resulted in final version of the questionnaire.

In the second phase, the main survey was conducted nationally to collect the research data among Indonesian airline customers who had already used Indonesian airline e-services. A total of 819 valid questionnaires were obtained. The data was then analysed using a partial least square (PLS) based structural equation modelling (SEM) technique to produce the contributions of links in the e-services model (22% of all the variances in e-services usage, 37.8% in intention to use, 46.6% in motivation, 39.2% in outcome expectancy, and 37.7% in effort expectancy). Meanwhile, path coefficients and t-values demonstrated various different influences of antecedent factors towards e-services usage. Additionally, a multi-group analysis based on PLS is employed with mixed results. In the final findings, 14 hypotheses were supported and 7 hypotheses were not supported.

The major findings of this study have confirmed that motivation has the strongest contribution in e-services usage. In addition, motivation affects e-services usage both directly and indirectly through intention-to-use. This study provides contributions to the existing knowledge of e-services models, and practical applications of IT usage. Most importantly, an understanding of antecedents of e-services adoption will provide guidelines for stakeholders in developing better e-services and strategies in order to promote and encourage more customers to use e-services. Finally, the accomplishment of this study can be expanded through possible adaptations in other industries and other geographical contexts.