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Future Problems (future + problem)
Selected AbstractsCurrent and Future Problems of Capital Accumulation in the Chinese Pension SystemINTERNATIONAL SOCIAL SECURITY REVIEW, Issue 4 2000Zhang Jinchang The decree establishing a uniform system of basic pensions for employees in municipal and private enterprises, published by the State Council on 16 July 1997, reflects the Chinese Government's ultimate choice in favour of a partly private funded scheme to cover future pension needs. This article examines the reasons which led to this choice and asks how easy or otherwise it will be to find the capital to finance it. The authors believe that the partly private scheme is more advantageous than other methods and is right for China. Many issues, however, remain the focus of lively debate. In particular, a realistic coordination of individual and group accumulation is needed in order to avoid shortfalls in capital formation and the dangers of inadequate benefit provision. To safeguard the subsistence needs of former workers in state-owned enterprises, a system of equalization at national level is needed, and problems continue over how future pension insurance funds should best be managed. [source] The impacts of non-native species on UK biodiversity and the effectiveness of controlJOURNAL OF APPLIED ECOLOGY, Issue 5 2000Sarah J. Manchester 1.,The introduction of non-native species continues to cause ecological concern globally, but there have been no published reviews of their effects in the UK. Impacts in the UK are therefore reviewed, along with current legislation and guidelines relating to the introduction and control of such species. 2.,A large number of non-native species have been introduced to the UK, both deliberately and accidentally, but only a small number of introduced non-native species have established and caused detrimental ecological impacts. However, general declines in UK biodiversity, and the potential effects of future climate change, may increase the susceptibility of ecosystems to invasions. 3.,Detrimental impacts of non-native species on native biota have occurred through competition, predation, herbivory, habitat alteration, disease and genetic effects (i.e. hybridization). There are potential effects on genetic biodiversity as well as species biodiversity. 4.,Several high profile examples highlight the technical difficulties, and financial implications, of removing an introduced species once it is established. Few UK control or eradication programmes have been successful. 5.,Control might be more feasible if ,problem' species could be identified at an earlier stage of establishment. However, the poor success of attempts to characterize invasive species and predict which will have negative impacts highlight the individual and unpredictable nature of invasions. The difficulties of making general predictions suggest that every proposed species introduction should be subject to rigorous ecological characterization and risk assessment prior to introduction. 6.,The plethora of UK legislation and guidelines developed to reduce impacts of non-native species only go part of the way towards ameliorating impact. Many species already established in the wild might cause future problems. Illegal releases and escapes of non-native species may augment feral populations or establish new colonies. While regulation of imports and releases is important, further enforcement of existing legislation and action against unlicensed releases is necessary. [source] Problem management maturity within corrective maintenanceJOURNAL OF SOFTWARE MAINTENANCE AND EVOLUTION: RESEARCH AND PRACTICE, Issue 3 2002Mira Kajko-Mattsson Abstract CM: Problem Management is a first detailed descriptive problem management process model to be utilized within corrective maintenance. It is the result of a long-term empirical study of industrial corrective maintenance processes. It has been developed at ABB and evaluated for its industrial relevance within 17 non-ABB organizations. Playing the role of a descriptive model, CM: Problem Management specifies what a problem management process should look like. It also structures it into three maturity levels, Initial, Defined, and Optimal, where each level offers a different grainedness of process visibility. In this paper, we present the CM levels of problem management process maturity within corrective maintenance and match them against the industrial state of practice. Our goal is to establish the current status of problem management maturity using CM: Problem Management as an evaluation model. Our evaluation results show that the industrial processes today suffice to attend to software problems within corrective maintenance. Very few of them, however, do learn from the past in order to prevent future problems and to improve development or maintenance processes. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Survey: Difficult arbitration E-discovery process questions suggest increasingly complex future problems on costs, scopeALTERNATIVES TO THE HIGH COST OF LITIGATION, Issue 9 2009Deborah Rothman The second of two parts on the lessons learned from a survey of arbitrators about E-discovery issues, by Deborah Rothman, of Los Angeles, and Thomas J. Brewer, of Seattle. [source] Pathological and molecular biological aspects of the renal epithelial neoplasms, up-to-datePATHOLOGY INTERNATIONAL, Issue 6 2004Yoji Nagashima Renal neoplasms are not necessarily high in frequency, but they are characteristic in their heterogeneity and occasional association with systemic familial tumor syndromes and phacomatoses (e.g. clear cell renal cell carcinoma and von Hippel-Lindau disease, Wilms tumor and aniridia, genitourinary malformation and mental retardation (so-called, WAGR syndrome), and angiomyolipoma and tuberous sclerosis). Physicians and pathologists should take note of these syndromes and associated renal neoplasms because they have provided important clues to elucidate the mechanism of tumorigenesis concerning cancer-suppressor genes. This review aims to present recent classification of renal parenchymal neoplasms based on their molecular biological characteristics, and future problems yet to be clarified. [source] Vladimir Putin on Raising Russia's Birth RatePOPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW, Issue 2 2006Article first published online: 26 JUN 200 The total fertility rate in what is now the Russian Federation has been below replacement level during much of the last 40 years. By the late 1990s it was barely above 1.2 children per woman. There may have been some recovery since: the United Nations estimate for 2000,05 is 1.33. Other reports set the 2004 rate at 1.17. Countries elsewhere in Europe have fertility levels that are equally low or even lower, but the Russian demographic predicament is aggravated by mortality that is exceptionally high by modern standards. Thus, despite large-scale net immigration (mostly due to return of ethnic Russians from other republics of the former Soviet Union), the population in the last decade-and-a-half has been shrinking: of late by some 700,000 persons per year. The United Nations medium estimate assumes a steady recovery of the total fertility rate to reach a level of 1.85 by 2050 and a considerable improvement in survival rates during that period,notably an increase in male life expectancy at birth of more than ten years. It also assumes further modest net immigration at a steady rate, amounting to a total of somewhat over 2 million by midcentury. Under these stipulations the projected population of Russia in 2050 would be 112 million,some 31 million below its present size. By that time, 23 percent of the population would be aged 65 and older. The government's concern with the demographic situation of the country and its intent to improve it have been manifest in various official statements, notably in the annual State of the Nation Address given by the president to the Federal Assembly (or State Duma). Formerly a subordinate theme (see the Documents item in the June 2005 issue of PDR), the issue constituted the centerpiece of the 2006 Address, delivered on 10 May in the Kremlin by President Vladimir Putin. Policies regarding health and mortality were given short shrift in the speech,road safety, bootleg alcohol, and cardiovascular diseases being singled out as areas of special concern. The president's remarks on immigration are of greater interest: immigration of skilled persons is to be encouraged. They must be educated and law-abiding and must treat the country's culture and national tradition with respect. The main focus of the address, however, was on the birth rate and policies to be introduced to raise it. (The need for an "effective demographic policy" as seen from the Kremlin was of course also voiced in the later stages of the Soviet era. See, for example, the excerpts from the addresses delivered by then Party Chairman Leonid Brezhnev and Premier Nikolai Tikhonov to the 26th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in February 1981 that appear in the Documents item in the June 1981 issue of PDR.) In detail and specificity, and also in terms of the economic cost of the measures envisaged, Putin's speech is without parallel in addressing population policy matters by a head of state in Europe. The demo graphically relevant portion of the address is reproduced below in the English translation provided by the website of the president's office «http://www.kremlin.ru/eng». Calling Russia's demographic situation "the most acute problem facing our country today," Putin terms its causes as "well known," but lists only economic factors, presumably because these, at least in principle, lend themselves to remedial measures that the Russian government, its coffers now swollen with petrodollars, should be able to provide. His starkly economic interpretation of the problem of low fertility (in Russia apparently taking the form of convergence to a single-child pattern) may be overly optimistic. Causes of electing to have only one child may lie deeper than those Putin names: low incomes, inadequate housing, poor-quality health care and inadequate educational opportunities for children, and even lack of food. Putin's proposed policies to attack these problems in part consist of a major upgrading of existing child care benefits: to 1,500 roubles a month for the first child and 3,000 roubles for the second. The latter amount is roughly equivalent to US$113, a significant sum given Russian income levels. Maternity leave for 18 months at 40 percent of the mother's previous wage (subject to a ceiling) and compensation for the cost of preschool childcare round out the basic package proposed. Benefits are to be parity-dependent, highlighting the pronatalist intent of the measures. Thus the child benefit for the second child is to be twice as large as for the first, and payment for preschool childcare is to cover 20 percent of parental costs for the first, 50 percent for the second, and 70 percent for the third child. Putin mentions "young families" as recipients, but the payments are clearly directed to mothers. (Even the usually obligatory reference to western European,style paternity leave is missing.) The most innovative element of the proposed measures, however, is support for women who have a second birth. The state should provide such women (not the child, as called for in some European precedents) "with an initial maternity capital that will raise their social status and help resolve future problems." Citing expert opinion, Putin says that such support "should total at least 250,000 roubles [about $9,300] indexed to annual inflation." Evidently assuming, optimistically, that there will be many takers, Putin says that carrying out all these plans will require not only a lot of work but also "an immense amount of money." The measures are to be launched starting January 2007. [source] New paradigms for the future: keynote perspectives from The R&D Management Conference 2008R & D MANAGEMENT, Issue 1 2010Flavia Leung The R&D Management Conference 2008 theme of ,emerging and new approaches to R&D management' sought to draw out how R&D-based organizations today are changing the way they manage (in terms of novel approaches, techniques, models and tools) in face of the challenges and opportunities presented in the current environment. Six keynote presentations by executives, representing both the public and private sectors, elaborated on the following subjects reflecting their experiences on the theme: hyperconnectivity and changing R&D tenets, accelerating discoveries in human health via open access public-private partnerships, role of government in bridging the innovation gap, building sustainability and innovation in a traditional resource sector, R&D management in the aerospace sector, and leveraging diversity to build a culture of innovation. Their presentations highlighted amongst other things , global trends that are affecting how R&D organizations are operating, economic imperatives driving change in business models, working through partnerships within an open innovation environment, and leveraging the diversity presented by an increasingly globalized R&D workforce for success. Within these presentations are also challenges to researchers to generate new thinking to address current and future problems presented by the R&D environment. The keynote perspectives are summarized in this paper. [source] Histologic Findings from Positive Crossmatch or ABO-Incompatible Renal Allografts: Accomodation or Chronic Allograft Injury?AMERICAN JOURNAL OF TRANSPLANTATION, Issue 8 2006B. Sis In human and primate studies, the presence of circulating antibody and C4d staining is associated with a variety of clinical phenotypes ranging from minimal to fulminant. But even when the clinical findings are minimal the time dependency of some of these phenotypes should invite caution before predicting the risk of future problems in an organ with C4d and circulating donor-specific antibody. See also articles by Haas et al on page 1829, Colvin et al on page 1790, Gloor et al in this issue on page 1841, and the minireview by Soleimani et al in this issue on page 1781. [source] Window of Opportunity Opens: Asian and American Views of the International Economic ArchitectureASIAN ECONOMIC POLICY REVIEW, Issue 2 2009Wendy DOBSON F02; F13; F33; F55; F59 This paper compares US and Asian views of the international economic architecture including Asia's evolving regional institutions. Lessons from the global financial crisis are used to assess reforms of the financial institutions better to prevent and manage future crises. While G-20 leaders have increased the resources of the International Monetary Fund, much work remains to restore its legitimacy and independence and to define clearly the Financial Stability Board's mandate to strengthen financial oversight and regulation. The paper critiques proposals for a global super-regulator and concludes that while the global architecture is important, the tests of its success will be fewer government actions to self-insure and the willingness to heed warnings of future problems and take timely corrective actions. [source] Wellness and Impairment: Moving Beyond Noble Us and Troubled ThemCLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY: SCIENCE AND PRACTICE, Issue 1 2009Glenn E. Good Psychologists tend to view wellness and impairment in dangerous dualities. In actuality, our level of functioning varies continuously due to multiple factors. We examine factors influencing psychologists' level of functioning, and offer recommendations for individuals and the profession. In addition, we explore topics too often considered taboo in discussions of psychologist impairment, such as depression and suicide, with the hope that such discussions can help prevent future problems. In sum, wellness and impairment should not be viewed as an "Us and Them" issue, but rather as an "Us and When" issue. [source] Supple Praxis: A Paralogical Strategy for ProblemsCOMMUNICATION THEORY, Issue 3 2010Dan H. DeGooyer Jr. Based on Lyotard's (1984) paralogy, I provide a paralogical approach to problems in which participants identify and describe grammars of problems as a means to engage them. I provide paralogical grammars of extant problems and their solutions (i.e., performative, reliable, accidental, and wicked) to articulate how they move from more to less easily solved, with an increasing degree of complexity and stake. I offer paralogical action steps to enact a supple praxis as demonstrated through a discussion of hellish problems, a fifth problem type. Participants paralogically address incommensurability as they solve their current problem, so that they may face their next incommensurable problem. Practitioners using a paralogical approach thus both adeptly solve current problems and prepare for unknown future problems. La praxis souple : une stratégie paralogique face aux problèmes Dan H. DeGooyer, Jr. À partir de la paralogie de Lyotard (1984), je développe une approche paralogique pour affronter les problèmes, approche par laquelle les participants identifient et décrivent des grammaires de problèmes comme moyen d'y faire face. J'offre des grammaires paralogiques de problèmes existants (performatifs, fiables, accidentels et pernicieux) et leurs solutions, afin d'exprimer clairement les manières dont ces problèmes sont de plus en plus difficiles à résoudre, alors que leur degré de complexité et d'importance augmente. Je présente des étapes d'action paralogique afin de mettre en actes une praxis souple, telle que démontrée dans une discussion des problèmes infernaux, un cinquième type de problèmes. Les participants traitent de manière paralogique de l'incommensurabilité quand ils résolvent leur problème actuel, de manière à ce qu'ils affrontent le problème incommensurable suivant. Ainsi, les intervenants qui utilisent une approche paralogique résolvent de façon experte leurs problèmes actuels et se préparent également pour les problèmes futurs qui leur sont encore inconnus. Weiche Praxis: Eine paralogische Strategie für Probleme Dan H. DeGooyer, Jr. Basierend auf der Paralogie von Lyotard (1984) diskutiere ich einen paralogischen Ansatz für Probleme, die Teilnehmer erkennen und deren Grammatik sie beschreiben als ein Mittel, mit diesen Problemen umzugehen. Ich bestimme die paralogische Grammatiken von bestehenden Problemen und ihren Lösungen (z.B. performative, reliable, unbeabsichtigte und boshafte) um auszudrücken, wie sie diese im Feld zwischen mehr oder weniger leicht zu lösen und einem zunehmenden Grad an Komplexität und Einsatz bewegen. Ich biete paralogische Handlungsschritte, um Möglichkeiten einer weichen Praxis darzustellen, wie sie in der Diskussion um infernale Probleme, einem Typ 5-Problem, vorkommen. Die Teilnehmer befassen sich paralogisch mit der Unmessbarkeit während sie ihre aktuellen Probleme lösen, so dass sie ihr nächstes unmessbares Problem angehen können. Praktiker, die einen paralogischen Ansatz verfolgen, lösen also aktuelle Probleme und bereiten sich für unbekannte Probleme in der Zukunft vor. La Práctica Flexible: Una Estrategia Para-lógica para los Problemas Dan H. DeGooyer, Jr. Emmanuel College, University of Iowa, 312 Administrative Building, Boston, MA O2115, USA Resumen Basado en la para-logia de Lyotard (1984), proveo de una aproximación para-lógica a los problemas en la cual los participantes se identifican y describen las gramáticas de los problemas como un medio para comprometerse con ellos. Proveo de una gramática para-lógica de problemas existentes y sus soluciones (a saber, de performancia creíble, accidental, y malintencionado) que articula cómo ellos mueven de más a menos fácilmente solucionados, con un incremento en el grado de complejidad e interés. Ofrezco los pasos de la acción para-lógica una práctica flexible demostrada a través de una discusión de problemas infernales, un quinto tipo de problema. Los participantes trataron para-lógicamente la inconmensurabilidad al resolver el problema corriente, de manera tal que puedan enfrentar el problema inconmensurable siguiente. Los practicantes usando el enfoque para-lógico resolvieron así en forma experta los problemas y se prepararon para los problemas futuros inciertos. [source] | ||||||||||||||||