...725 Book Reviews The New Silk Road: How a Rising Arab World is Turning Away from the West and Rediscovering China BEN SIMPFENDORFER Basingstoke, Hampshire, and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009 201 pp. $42.00 ISBN 978-0-230-58026 doi:10.1017/S030574101000072X The New Silk Road is an insightful, concise (173 pages of text), and thoroughly readable book. The focus is not on energy investments and flows or on government policy, but on business and cultural strands of the Sino-Arab relationship. As a China economist for both JP Morgan and RBS in Hong Kong, and with years of residence in the Arab world, Simpfendorfer has written a book which is rich in detail and cogent in diverse interesting arguments. It is a pleasure to read. The thesis is that we are witnessing the re-emergence of an old but long-lapsed economic and cultural relationship between China and the Arab world. Prior to about 1600 the “silk road” was a major axis of the global economy. Now it is reviving and that revival is an important part of the “global re-balancing” that is underway. Global re-balancing is defined to mean a diminution of the relative economic and cultural role of the West (Europe and the US) and growth of non-Western areas, like China and the Arab lands. The major manifestation of Arab rise, according to Simpfendorfer, has been the massive transfer of wealth to Arab oil producers in the 2000s as oil prices rose due, in large part, to increased demand by China and India. Simpfendorfer believes...
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...Broadland Test, Assembly Test, Semiconductor Test and Vehicle Diagnostic Solutions. Although Teradyne’s headquarters are located in Boston, its divisions are headquartered in Illinois and North Reading, in U.S.A., and Manchester in UK. Over the years the importance of Asia in the electronics industry grew amazingly, especially China, which dominated the industry’s growth at greater than 20 percent of sales in the 2002-2005. While Europe and the Americas were expected to grow 3 percent per year from 2005-2008, it was expected that China would grow 12 percent per year during the same period – China’s importance in the market was expected to grow from less than a tenth in 2002 to over a third in 2008. As a result of this incredible growth, Teradyne built a facility in Shanghai. However, despite the industry’s growth in the Chinese territory, in late 2003 the Teradyne’s market share in China was only one third of what it was in Europe and North America. Jeff Hotchkiss, president of Teradyne’s Assembly Test Division, was sent to Shanghai to find and solve the problem. I. Recognizing the Problem There are several problems in Teradyne’s business in China: - Because local expertise was so difficult to find in the previous years, the Chinese Operation was overseen by parent company nationals (PNC’s). However, these English-speaking Americans expatriates, aside from increasing Teradyne’s overseas costs enormously, had little direct contact with costumers. They did not understand...
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...4700 ft high Glass Sky Walk in Tianmen Mountain in Zhangjiajie Hunan, China 中國湖南省 張家界天門山玻璃棧道 China’s newest tourist spot is a glass-bottomed walkway around the cliff face of the Tianmen Mountain, 7 ft above sea level, at Zhangjiajie, Hunan Province (自動翻頁) 張家界天門山國家森林公園新建的玻璃棧道正式對遊客 開放。玻璃棧道于天門山頂西線，長60米，最高處海 拔1430米。所有上橋的遊客均被要求穿上鞋套，以保 持玻璃橋面潔凈。玻璃棧道是張家界天門山景區繼懸于 峭壁之上的鬼谷棧道、憑空伸出的玻璃眺望臺、橫跨峽 谷的木質吊橋後打造的又一試膽新景點。 China's newest tourist attraction ... a glass-bottomed walkway around a cliff face. Brave tourists looking to test their nerves have flocked to China to walk across this dazzling glass bridge suspended from a cliff face. The oriental Sky Walk is situated 4,700ft above sea level on the side of the Tianmen Mountain in Zhangjiajie, China. In order to keep the glass path clean, tourists are asked to put on shoe covers before walking. 玻璃棧道已於2011年10月1日起正式對遊客開放 （Opened to Public since October 1, 2011） Dazzling: A glass path suspended on a cliff face has been built on the side of the Tianmen Mountain in Zhangjiajie, Hunan, China (天門山玻璃棧道建在山 頂西線雲夢仙頂至倚虹 關之間)所有上橋的遊客 均被要求穿上鞋套，以 保持玻璃橋面潔凈。 玻璃棧道是張家界天門山景區繼懸于峭壁之上的鬼谷棧道、 The 200ft long bridge joins the west cliff at the Yunmeng Fairy Summit, the summit of Tianmen Mountain and Zhangjiajie. The pathway, built earlier in the summer echoes the glass-bottomed walkway at the Grand Canyon in the U.S. The 70ft bridge is 4,000ft above the natural wonder and allows tourists to look through 2.5in of crystalclear glass to the Canyon floor below...
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...percent to adopt. #4 Important Note: Public government data on rural China are limited. To compensate, I have adapted and extrapolated public data on urban China that is available. As critical factors for automobile adoption I have used: per capita income, paved road infrastructure, demographics, lifestyle and values. The sources for the data are the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and University of Virginia. Basis for Adoption Curves: (1) According to the IMF, as shown in the graph, probability of a household owning an automobile is 0% before reaching per capita income over $5,000 USD. (2) After $11,000 USD in per capita income, the ability of a household to acquire an automobile reaches 100%. (3) According to the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2012 China’s rural disposable income was only $1,306 USD (7,917 Yuan) and China’s urban income was $4,051 USD (24,565 Yuan). We can appreciate how rural disposable income is 40% less than urban disposable income. Using this relation, we can adjust the income levels and adoption curve in rural China. (4) According to the Chicago Journal, about 61% of intra-village roads in rural China are paved and automobile ready. This is a ratio of 2:3 or 61:100 (rural:urban) compared to the 100% level of intra-city, paved roads in urban China. As paved roads predetermine automobile adoption, we can deduce that adoption in rural China will be 1/3 slower than in urban China (visible when comparing both curves). (5) Lastly, since lifestyles and...
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...government never learned this lesson. We are 19 trillion dollars in debt and there is an abundant amount of programs and organizations that could use major tune ups here in America with that money (Boccia). Putting our money in the right places is what will truly make America great again. We already put enough into the military budget; the United States should focus on other government programs like health care, infrastructure, and education. There is absolutely no reason to increase the military budget when our military is already the biggest military in the world and the military budget is already bigger than the budgets of other countries. The amount we spend on the military is more than that spent in China, France, Russia, and the United Kingdom combined, “For every dollar China spends on its military, the U.S. spends $2.77” (U.S. Military Spending vs. The World). The worldwide military spending in 2015 totaled out to be $1.6 trillion and the U.S. occupied 37% of that total (U.S. Military Spending vs. The World). Our navy is so massive that we have three times that amount of aircraft carriers than any other countries in the world. Our aircraft carriers make other countries aircraft carriers look like peanuts. We also dominate when it comes to manpower with over 300,000 active personnel. We have the biggest air force in the world as well. We have a little over 300,000 active and reserve airmen in our air force as well as 3,318 aircraft in our arsenal (DoD Personnel, Workforce...
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...electricity, making traditional forms of teaching, like chalk and chalk board, the main form of learning for schools, and universities. The goal of founder and CEO, of Perfect Chalk, Jean Bosco Mugabe is to be able to provide affordable, high quality and locally made chalk to school in the greater Rwanda region. Jeans’ vision is to expand his business to the outer limits of Rwanda, and possibly into other parts of Africa. However, The Perfect Chalk Factory is currently suffering from limited growth opportunities due to the inability to efficiently transport products outside of a certain radius of operation. The reason for this limitation is the quality of vehicles available to the company, high transportation costs and the condition of the roads outside of the city. The question that is being presented is whether there are better forms of product transportation available to the Perfect Chalk Factory, or are they forced to limit the reach of their business to their current area of operation. Lowering the Cost of Transportation of Eastern Africa Teravaninthorn, and Raballand (2008) did a review of the main international corridors of Africa where they measured the costs, and the problems associated with the trucking industries of each region. The study was carried out in three phases. Phase one consisted of distributing a trucking survey, in which the researchers were hoping to understand the basic operations of trucking services. Phase two...
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...Road characteristics: road categories, road surfacing. Other road enginering structures. Lecturer I. Piščikienė Vilnius 2013 Introduction Content World bridges…………………………………………………………………………………………………..4 World longest tunnels………………………………………………………………………………………6 Types of roads………………………………………………………………………………………………….7 Roads surfacing……………………………………………………………………………………………….10 Conclusions……………………………………………………………………………………………………..13 List of sources………………………………………………………………………………………………….14 World bridges The world’s longest bridge is the Danyang-Kunsgan Grand Bridge(1) in China, part of the Beijing-Shanghai High-Speed Railway. The bridge, which opened in June 2011, spans 165 kilometres. This bridge constructed in just 4 years, employing 10.000 workers, at a cost of about 8.5 million dollars. It crosses low rice paddies, part of the Yangtze River Delta, with just a few miles of the bridge actually crossing the open water of Yangcheng Lake in Suzhou. The bridge averages about 31 meters off the ground. 1.Danyang-Kunsgan Grand Bridge The sidu river bridge(2) is the tallest bridge in the world, standing around 1.500 ft tall. The are exactly 1.550 feet from the bottom of the bridge to the valley floor. It is located at the border of Yichang and En’shi in the Hubei province. It is 1365 meters across. This bridge connects Shanghai on the...
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...BOON OR A BANE Shantanu Kumar Final Year, IRMA, Ahmedabad Page |2 Executive Summary “Infrastructure” has almost been a go-to word for anyone who is discussing about the ways of sustaining India’s economic growth, and with good reason. A casual look at the growth figures of the individual states shows the existence of a direct relationship between the quality of infrastructure and the performance of the state. The states with the best infrastructure attract businesses which creates employment which in turn helps their economy grow. This paper looks at the current scenario in some of the most important sectors and tries to compare it with countries which are widely known to be on the same economic trajectory, viz. Brazil, Russia, China and Mexico. The paper finds that although the progress has been slow, the government has made an attempt to kick start the investment in infrastructure either itself as in creation and maintenance of schools under “Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan” or through the PPP model as done in several highway projects. The issues arising due to poor infrastructure set India’s annual GDP growth back by as much as 1.5% - 2%. This paper shows that the government funding has remained almost constant in most sectors and their increase is unlikely owing to the high fiscal deficit. Hence it is the private investment which will have to fund the infrastructure projects. The government of India recognises this and the design of the twelfth five year plan seeks to foster...
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...land as aerial, is the key to access enterprises, markets, or services. Though fluent transportation is not a simple task. With the combination of our underdeveloped roads and airports our rough topography and climate make it one of the worst countries in the world for travelling. On one hand the mountains ensure that the rainfall can not reach some valleys while on the other hand rainclouds can remain on one place for a long time and thereby provide enormous amounts of rain .In addition Bhutan has to do with a mix of various climates and geographical differences. This dividing the country in two great parts. A southern half with Himalayan subtropical broadleaf forests and savannas which has a warm China climate and the northern half which mainly consists of mountains and perpetual snow. Our roads are the dominant mode of transportation for our inhabitants. All of our Bhutanese households have to travel over our roads, but almost 21% of these have to walk one to four hours to reach the nearest all-season road, and another 21 percent even have to spend more than half a day. And when they reach these roads they have to face dangerous conditions in weather and infrastructure. The fatality rate in Bhutan is quite significant . Per 10,000 vehicles 21 deaths were reported in 2006. Because of our dangerous roads, domestic transport has become a financial and social freight of our inhabitants. As a consequence of poor rural access, people in rural areas become isolated. This being...
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...mobility of transportation planning. It occurs the planning for land development in the future and propose of road network in range of the district. For example in the local plan and state plan has derive the development for the road linkages and network toward making the land use based on the access way. In state and local plan land use planning has showed that normally the highly and high development access way may produce the main land use such as commercial, housing and administration especially in the middle of the city. Beside that in the area were has low development of traffic and access way may produce the micro land use such as industry and agriculture. The interrelationships between transportation and land use remain contentious despite extensive research. In particular, the influence of transportation system performance on land use development, although recognized as a lagged relationship. In addition, the land use been influenced because of certain problem that need to be overcome especially on traffic congestion. In response, communities are beginning to implement new approaches to transportation planning, such as better coordinating land use and transportation; increasing the availability of high quality transit service; creating redundancy, resiliency and connectivity within their road networks; and ensuring connectivity between pedestrian, bike, transit, and road facilities. In short, they are coupling a multi-modal approach to transportation with supportive development...
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...vehicular movement and traffic jam. There are different types of vehicular namely, car, bus, jeep, truck, minibus, microbus, auto-rickshaw, tempo, mini-truck, motorcycles and innumerable numbers of rickshaws. There are many reasons behind traffic jam in Bangladesh. Among them some major factors are as follows: • Undisciplined traffic signal in the road. • Indiscipline among the road user. • Might is right, everybody are free to park their vehicle on Road. • No knowledge of traffic rules which encourage violating the rules. • Enforcement of rules by dishonest persons who are busy in collection of illegal money from traffic rules violators. • Heavy numbers of vehicle on roads. Time is the most valuable things in the twenty first centaury no doubt. And traffic jam is killing the most productive time of the people of Dhaka city. Time is going on and on and we are lagging behind. The world is becoming speedy where as we are becoming slower. To reduce traffic jam we can take steps such as: • Have a good public transport system so people would use it • Ban rickshaw from the main roads of Dhaka • Good traffic system • Good lane system • Traffic police should do their duty properly • Use zebra cross and...
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...Every day I ride to whitefield, and yes its very very tiring. But what choice do I have. Going by bus is not an option- it takes double the time and is extremely boring. So riding is the best option. But it still takes an hour. But after going riding for about 2 weeks I started finding ways to make my journey shorter. I go through gullies, riding on the footpath on some occasions and occasionally during extreme jams. I also squeeze between cars and change lanes to make maximum use of the little pockets of free road. Contrary to being indisciplined, I think it makes sense that some of us do this. It reduces the load on the already clogged road. When a few people do this, it reduces the jams and makes maximum use of the resources. Occasionally the odd amateur creates a bigger jam. But thats just a learning experience. Soon he finds ways to get home faster without delaying himself or others. I know this is not the ideal thing to do. But I am not riding on ideal roads. I guess this applies to India as well. The resources are never adequate. So people start finding shortcuts to work around that and the system. Making most use of our precious resources is what has kept us growing. India cannot be compared to the west were resources are in abundance. Here people need to be more innovative, creative and have to really think out of the box. And this happens at the lowest levels- from rural India to small traders and businesses. Now back to whitefield, if everybody maintained...
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...Nuckols ID:24404996 WRITING STYLE USED: APA Two Roads, One Choice Jamie Nuckols Liberty University Online Robert Frost (1874-1963) The Road Not Taken - 1920 1. Possible Themes a. Goes own way b. Commitment- stays on path chosen c. Reflection on life with regret 2. Literal Setting a. Time of year- autumn b. In the woods c. Two roads d. evening 3. Mood of Poem a. Undergrowth, Black, Sigh, Difference. Suggests Sadness? b. Doubted- suggests regret? 4. Literary Devices to communicate theme a. Two Roads- One Traveler b. Long I stood c. Kept the first for another day d. I took the one less traveled by Working Thesis Statement The Poem “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost can be interpreted literally and figuratively. Through Frost’s use of theme, setting, mood and literary devices he sets the stage for the age old dilemma of making decisions in a crisis. Two Roads, One Choice Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” addresses the age old dilemma of making the correct choice and regretting the choice made. A man observes two roads in a wood and through much deliberation chooses the one he thinks has been less worn. The poem can be interpreted literally and figuratively. Through Frost’s use of theme, setting and literary devices he sets the stage for the age old dilemma of making decisions in a crisis. The title of the poem, “The Road Not Taken,” causes readers to begin thinking before they...
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...has intended their work to mean. You have to look close and pay attention to be able to visualize the symbolism in each of these literary pieces. In Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken”, and Jean Rhys’ short story “I Used to Live Here Once”, the consistent theme between the two would be; no matter who you are, you are the only one who chooses the road you take for your life’s journey. In other words, you choose your own destiny. And although they took different ways to say it, both Rhys and Frost use imagery, tone, and symbolism frequently to enhance the telling of their literary works. There are many people who travel a distance in life to find the path they should take or to remember the path they once took. In the poem “The Road Not Taken”, and the short story "I Used to Live Here Once", there are many similarities and differences. The authors’ use of describing a path helps them personify life’s journeys and self-reflection. Robert Frost uses imagery to describe two different journeys in life that could have been taken. “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth.” (Clugston, 2010) As Frost writes in this first paragraph, he expresses the two journeys as a road diverged in a yellow...
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...has bought some land right in the middle of Wimberley. I’m in the camp of being up in arms over it. I’m usually a proponent of change, but in this case, I’m not. Wimberley had an Ace Hardware that was right in the middle of town. It caught on fire and burnt down about 6 months ago. They are rebuilding but the building now is a lot bigger than the previous one. That being said, I don’t feel there needs to be another big building right behind it, right in the middle of town. It will completely change the landscape of the town. People come to Wimberley for the tourist experience. Not for the big town experience. They can stay home for that. There are two roads on either side of the land where they want to build. They are two lane roads. The town put in really nice sidewalks a few years ago. Where are they going to expand the roads to accommodate the amount of traffic that will be coming? They have Market Days on the first Saturday of the month. That day is a good indication of the amount of traffic we will get on a daily basis. The camp that is happy about HEB coming thinks that it will be competition for Brookshire Bros. and then BB will have to lower their prices. I’ve even heard some people say that hopefully it will put Brookshire Brothers out of business. These people can’t see the big picture. Let me ask a question. Who is HEB’s biggest competitor? Walmart. What does Walmart like to do? Come into small towns and take over big empty buildings. Then what happens? They start...
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