Life Cycle Assessment, which is abbreviated as LCA is a tool to assess the impacts caused by the environment and the resources used throughout the life cycle of the product. The life cycle starts from the acquisition of the raw materials, production process, use of the product, and finally its disposal. ISO defines Life Cycle Assessment as a collection and assessment of the efforts, products and the probable ecological impacts of a product system throughout its Lifecycle. Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a tool developed to evaluate the products development processes as systems apply to the evaluation and analysis of environmental performance. In 1969, The Coca-Cola Company moved from glass bottles and introduced plastic bottles. They studied the environmental impacts of its packaging forming today’s LCA methodology. Four Stages of Life Cycle Assessment The four phases of LCA include scope definition and goal setting, life cycle inventory analysis, impact assessment Continue reading
Global Business Environment
Tips for Effective Management in a Global Enterprise
The most critical issue in the contemporary world is how to manage organizations effectively in the wake of the rapid global changes. In global enterprises, technology is changing at a remarkably fast rate and this trend calls for the management to redesign its organization to remain relevant. Competition is increasing in global enterprises as organizations aim at gaining competitive advantage over others. Different enterprises should change their manner of management in order to respond quickly to global changes. The organization needs to change its processes, structures, systems, and personnel from the inflexible modes to ones that can adapt quickly to global changes. The transformation of the organization is a crucial step to effective management and remaining on the lead in the global world. Effective management in a global enterprise involves the use of new management philosophies. The management philosophies start with the top management in the organization. The managers should apply Continue reading
Multinational Corporations and Home Country Relations
Public attitudes toward Multinational Corporations (MNCs) are biased by a nation’s position as a home or host country. Historically, home countries have perceived MNC activities as desirable extensions of their domestic business systems. Conversely host countries have viewed MNCs as agents of foreign influenced and exploitation. This historic dichotomy is now shot through with conflicting perceptions of the MNCs. Different segments of society, such as labor, investors, consumers, traders, and farmers, see their interests affected in different ways. As a result, a multi-sided controversy about the societal merits and demerits of MNCs has grown in both host and home countries. The most aggressive challenge to the traditionally supportive home country policies towards MNCs has come from organized labor. Labor Conflict Multi-nationalization has created for management new mobility and flexibility that have greatly enhanced its bargaining power vis-Ã -vis labor. Since the sourcing base of the multinational firm knows no national boundaries Continue reading
Unemployment – Meaning, Causes and Effects
The economists describe unemployment as a condition of jobless within an economy. Unemployment is lack of utilization of resources and it eats up the production of the economy. It can be concluded that unemployment is inversely related to productivity of the economy. Unemployment generally defined as the number of persons (It is the percentage of labor force depends on the population of the country) who are willing to work for the current wage rates in society but not employed currently. Unemployment reduces the long run growth potential of the economy. When the situation arises where there are more other resources for the production and no man power leads to wastage of economic resources and lost output of goods and services and this has a great impact on government expenditure directly. High unemployment causes less consumption of goods and services and less tax payments results in higher government borrowing requirements. The Continue reading
Syndicated Euro Credits
History of Syndicated Euro Credits Syndicated Euro Credits are in existence since the late 1960s. The first syndicate was organized by Bankers Trust in an effort to arrange a large credit for Austria. During the early seventies, Euromarkets saw the demand for Euro credits increasing from non-traditional and hitherto untested borrowers. The period after first oil crisis was marked by a boom phase. To cope with the increasing demand for funds, lenders expanded their business without undertaking due credit appraisal of their clients or the countries thus financed. Further, the European banks had short-term deposits while bulk of borrowers required long-term deposits. These landings were at fixed rates thus exposing these banks to interest rate risks. The banks evolved the concept of lending funds for medium longterm i.e. 7-15 years on a variable interest rate basis linked to the Interbank Rate (LIBOR). Revision of rates would take place every 3-6 Continue reading
Relevance of Ethics in the Age of Technology
Unprecedented in its speed and scope, scientific and technological progress is one of the most obvious realities of the modern time. Technology enormously increases the productivity of social labor, expanding the scale of production. It has achieved incomparable results in mastering the forces of nature. Moreover, technology has become the basis of the complex mechanism of the modern development. A country that fails to provide a sufficiently high rate of scientific and technological progress and incorporate its results in various areas of public life is condemned to be a underdeveloped and dependent state with a subordinate position in the world. In the recent past, it was common to praise the scientific and technological progress wildly as the sole source of the overall progress of the humankind. It is the view of the scientism, especially the natural sciences, as a superior and absolute social value. However, the rapid development of science Continue reading