Professional Meeting ECOBUILT 2012 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Professional Meeting ECOBUILT 2012 - Essay Example Speakers’ details At the conference, there were twelve speakers. The speakers were Kevin McCloud, Christine Whitehead, Jack Dromey Mp, David Ireland, Ian Marchant, Keith Bugden, Munish Datta, David Fisk, Tony Juniper, Gaynor Harnell, and Rt Hon Michael Meacher. Most of the speakers work in the ministries that deal with energy conservation and construction. Some of them are engineers and authors who are knowledgeable about the issues of construction and energy. Summary of main address â€Å"Solving the housing crisis: towards a sustainable housing strategy† (Ecobuild 2012). The speakers said that addressing the housing issues is the first way to attain a sustainable housing. They said that some years back, approximately 185,000 new houses were built and this number was considered not enough at that time in the UK. The number of houses being build has reduced because the state eliminated The Regional Spatial plan and their linked house building aims. This has resulted to a high house demand, and about 4.5 million individuals are still waiting for new houses. Additionally house scarcity has resulted into many people living in slums, and the number of the people living in these areas is approximately 2.5 million. The speakers then asked the audience what they thought would happen if Britain is turned into a â€Å"nation of house builders†, and a nation that tackles the housing problems at the same time (Ecobuild 2012). â€Å"From megawatts to negawatts: taking the energy out of buildings in use† (Ecobuild 2012) The speakers said that the increased population and the high demand for houses lead to the high number of buildings under construction. This implies that, additional energy is necessary at the construction sites. They also mentioned that, there has been the augmentation of carbon production at the construction sites, in addition to the high usage, of energy. Therefore, they spoke about reducing the amount of energy from megawatts to negawatts by lowering the energy used buildings. They said that the country is now focusing on how new buildings that are of high efficiency as far as energy is concerned can be built. Additionally, they said that the reduction of energy utilization would also lead to the lowering of carbon production. The effects of carbon are evident currently in the built environment because of the present stock and the reduction of the power use should begin by concentrating on the existing ones. The audience was then asked to suggest how homes and those buildings that are not domestic could utilize less energy. The queries to the audience centered on the economic-regulatory and social problems linked with the energy consumption. The speakers further asked them how they think more energy efficient structures can be built (Ecobuild 2012). â€Å"Making renewable generation happen: getting the scale right† (Ecobuild 2012) The speakers also mentioned that one way to deal with the energy co nsumption issue in construction is to put into practice the renewable energy production. She said that among the objectives of UK, is to achieve its EU Renewable Directive goals, which entails the upgrading of a seven fold before the year 2020. Additionally, the UK intents to upgrade its financial system, manage consumer issues regarding the augmenting costs of energy, and creating an environment, which encourages the increase of investments by the private sectors. However, what is not clear is

Operational IT services Case Study Research Paper

Operational IT services Case Study - Research Paper Example The organization chart is given in Appendix 1. .The important business activities include Sales, Pricing, Marketing, Booking, Reservations, Tour Packaging, Collection, Payment, Invoicing and Billing. People they mostly deal with are Clients, Suppliers, and Tour Agents. They also use MYOB Accounts Package to keep their daily accounts and intend to interlink it with the new Travel and Booking System TABS. Figure 1 depicts the department, people and software currently used by the Red Sky Company Wilson Consulting Services (WCS) is the company who is developing Travel and Booking System (TABS) for Red Sky Travel. They have all the necessary technical and servicing staff for developing and deploying the TABS. The technical staff of Wilson Consulting Services includes Project Managers, Analysts, Programmers, Testers, Technical Writers, Service Desk Manager, and Service staff. Red Sky Travel staff that is going to use the software will be oriented by the Wilson Consulting Services. A deal is also made for accessing VMware Service Manager 9 range of software which will provide support for any ITIL process that is implemented. A fee will be charged for support of ITIL process. The system is expected to become live in 12 weeks time and it is expected to automate important data of travel business and its interfacing and linking with other application program such as MYOB Account Right Premier Package and VMware Service Manager 9 range of software. The services in information technology are managed through a set of processes called ITSM which stands for Information Technology Service Management. Figure 2 depicts complete flow of services in ITSM Methodology. (ITSM Consulting Services)[1] ITSM methodology starts with the customers or business end-users who give their needs or requirements such as business strategy, service planning, organization planning and Technology planning through the Requirement Definition Process. Once the requirements are defined

Investigating children and their childhoods (babies with senorineural Literature review

Investigating children and their childhoods (babies with senorineural hearing loss and developent under 6months) - Literature review Example Shulman Brian and Capone Nina concluded that nearly all persons affected with senorineural hearing loss usually experience some degree of speech clarity problems and the severity of the loss does not indicate the clarity of the speech (2009, p.116). Congenital hearing loss is seen in newborn babies in most circumstances either by inheritance or by abnormal development in the foetal stages of a child. A comprehensive research done by Valente, Hosford-Dunn and Roesser found that three out of a thousand children born have birth defects that results in hearing loss; sixty per cent of these being inherited, and seventy per cent of the inherited defects are nonsyndromic while fifteen to thirty per cent being syndromic (2008, p.251). One of the most common causes of sensorineural hearing loss amongst children is congenital cytomegalovirus, although majority of children affected by this virus have normal hearing. There are indicators present in newborn children that can be used to predict va lues necessary for the development of loss of hearing with congenital cytomegalovirus infection. ... Congenital hearing loss may also happen after the birth of a child, which is caused by trauma, Meniere’s disease, age-related loss of hearing – presbycusis, and exposure to noise causing machines such as firearms. In order to be able to manage hearing loss, it is advisable to detect senorineural hearing loss at an early stage by the use of high-risk registry. Screening procedures that are conducted in hospitals has great importance in determining audio sensitivity. A child begins learning about language in the womb and staying a minute without sound affects the speech and language development of an infant. Most important domains in the development of a child are speech and language acquisition. A child who has lost speech after acquiring language is able to communicate orally than a deaf child. Early identification of hearing loss enables a child to have high language quotient for development of language as compared to a child who is identified at a later age. From the journal written by Iyer and Oller, there is an interpretive advantage in maturation of children (2008, p.120), as children with similar age are supposed to be alike in several aspects of maturity except when affected with factors such as canonical babbling. However, with a difference in other factors such as hearing, children experience difference in maturation. The explanations for late maturity in children with the onset of canonical babbling in infants with typical hearing are the fact that there are more syllables produced per utterance in sessions of canonicals than when in canonical precessions. The fact that utterances respond to breath, infants with typical hearing problem, who start producing canonical

The early history of Eduction Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

The early history of Eduction - Essay Example This paved the way for determining how man could move ahead and thus acquire new ways and means through which he could be a part of the educated clan. As far as the private education domains are concerned, these have focused a great deal on how education is instilled within the society by means which are not run under the aegis of the government, rather by private entities and bodies who oversee that education is given to those who are ready to pay for it, and pay well. In entirety, education that is understood well is the education that is meant for everyone. If private education is expensive, it is because it was always like this and same will be the case in the coming times as well (Boyles, 2005). Hence gaining education is always a privilege and should always be thought as such because it helps solve the quandaries that are present within the societies and shape up the personalities of individuals on a consistent basis. Works Cited Boyles, Deron R. Schools or Markets? Commerciali sm, Privatization and School-Business Partnerships. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, NJ, 2005

All About Maps Essay Example for Free

All About Maps Essay What are maps? Maps are the world reduced to points, lines, and areas, using a variety of visual resources: size, shape, value, texture or pattern, colour, orientation, and shape. A thin line may mean something different from a thick one, and similarly, red lines from blue ones. How do maps represent reality? A photograph shows all objects in its view; a map is an abstraction of reality. The cartographer selects only the information that is essential to fulfil the purpose of the map, and that is suitable for its scale. Maps use symbols such as points, lines, area patterns and colours to convey information. Why are maps important? A map gives a miniature picture of a very large space. A map is a guide to a space you have not encountered before. Maps have distance, mountains, rivers, and shapes of places or destinations. With a map, one does not have to depend on local directions. For a small price, it is a direction finder and a dependable way to take a journey. What are atlases? An atlas is a collection of maps in book form. Atlases are made for different regions and areas, and are prepared for desk use or travel use. A travel atlas is usually packaged for easy use during a trip, often with spiral bindings so it can be folded flat, and with maps at a large zoom so that they can be easily consulted on the go. A desk atlas features sizes and bindings that are typical for reference books: usually a paperback or hardcover format. Lines of latitude These are imaginary lines that circle the world in an east-west direction. They tell you how far north or south a place is from the Equator. They are drawn parallel to the Equator. There are five main lines of latitude. They are the Equator, the Tropic of Cancer, the Tropic of Capricorn, the Arctic Circle and the Antarctic Circle. Lines of longitude Longitude is the angular distance, measured in degrees, east and west of the Prime Meridian, which is at 0o. These are imaginary lines that run across the Earth’s surface in a north-south direction, from the North Pole to the South Pole. Legends and symbols Since a map is a reduced representation of the real world, map symbols are used to represent real objects. Without symbols, we wouldnt have maps. Both shapes and colours can be used for symbols on maps. A small circle may mean a point of interest, with a brown circle meaning recreation, red circle meaning services, and green circle meaning rest stop. Colours may cover larger areas of a map, such as green representing forested land and blue representing waterways. To ensure that a person can correctly read a map, a Map Le

Effect of Brexit on the Financial Markets

Effect of Brexit on the Financial Markets What are financial markets? Financial markets are an open and regulated system where companies can raise large amounts of capital through bonds and stock markets, or offset their risk by investing in commodities, foreign exchange futures contracts or other derivatives. Due to the size of financial markets, they are highly liquid, meaning businesses can easily and quickly generate cash by selling their assets. Since financial markets are public and work under a lot of regulations, there is a lot of information transparency and prices of everything traded reflects this. (Source: â€Å"Six Basic Functions of Financial Markets†, Iowa State University, March 5, 2012.)   What is the European Union and what is Brexit? The European Union, like the name suggests is a political and economic union of 28 countries within Europe. The UK became part of the EU in 1973 and had to pay a membership fee every year The creation of the European union was to firstly bring countries together after the 2nd world war had left many economically and politically disabled or struggling. This economic cooperation would become the world’s biggest single market and it still is today. (European Union European Commission, 2017) Even though the UK has benefited a lot from being in a single market, there were many who thought that Britain would be better off on its own; and for this reason the government decided to have a referendum after which on the 23 of June 2016, Britain exited the Single market, giving back it’s seat in the European Parliament and all the benefits that came with it. How can financial markets affect economic performance? Demirgà ¼Ãƒ §-Kunt and Levine in their 2001 book, ‘Financial Structure and Economic Growth’ said there is a strong connection between financial markets development and economic growth. The way in which this happens is that a well-functioning financial market will efficiently direct the flow of savings and investments in an economy as such to enable businesses to accumulate capital and goods and services to be produced. A well-established financial market alongside a wide range of financial products will benefit borrowers and lenders and therefore the economy as a whole. Another benefit of an efficient financial market is that by providing a range of financial options at varying risk levels and pricing structures, borrowers and lenders can be closely matched for their individual needs. This allows investors to determine and calculate their cost of financing by looking at their returns on their investments and then choosing the best financing and investment choice for their requirements. The European Union created a single banking market with a single currency and therefore created Europe-wide financial markets which made investing and borrowing euro-denominated stocks, bonds and derivatives easy for all EU countries that are part of the Euro by eliminating exchange rate risks. By doing so, products and services that were previously only available on a country by country basis were now available to a wider market, creating better competition which in turn makes markets more efficient and prices lower for individuals.   This is called the ‘Single-Passport’ system, whereby any business set up in one-member state may provide its services to the rest without further authorisation requirements (European Commission 2016) Not only does euro-based financial markets benefit the Eurozone, it also attracts international investors to invest here and benefit from the competitive market, (Mishkin, 2012) and by being part of the ‘single-passport, Non-European companies can set up their head office in London, and have access to all the benefits of the Single Market. UK financial market relationship with the EU Professor Nick Bloom of Stanford University said: â€Å"The single European market increased competition and forced British firms to increase the level of innovation.† London is one of the biggest financial hubs of the world and hosts the largest number of banks and commercial insurance companies. According to (Belke A. et all) around 6 trillion euros, which is equivalent to 37% of Europe’s financial assets are managed in London, which is twice the amount of the nearest rival Paris. London also dominates Europe’s 5.2 trillion-euro investment banking industry. What this means is that major investments happing in some of Europe’s biggest cities are financed by companies operating within London. This is why, (Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England), said: â€Å"Europe relies heavily on London’s debt and equity markets.† When it comes to foreign exchange markets, the UK is way ahead of its European counterparts with an impressive almost 40% share of the worlds foreign exchange and derivatives handling. According to the (City of London Corporation) each year, $869 trillion worth of Euro, Yen and Dollars are traded from London. This is higher than all the Euro-Zone countries combined. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/britain-europe-cost/ London currently accounts for 70% of the Euro Sovereign debt trades, meaning that the EU countries cannot shut outlondons capital markets as this would be suicide. (Rueters) According to Reuters (Kai Pfaffenbach) Frankfurt is desperately trying win over businesses to relocate to their city from London. To help in this, the European Central Bank started the â€Å"Capital Markets Union† project in 2015, where they want Euro-zone financial markets to provide improved fund raising for companies by replicating Britain’s financial services and become more efficient in the stocks, bonds and other securities markets. How Brexit is affecting Financial Markets: https://www.ft.com/content/0260242c-370b-11e6-9a05-82a9b15a8ee7The question of how Brexit will affect the UK economy is very uncertain. The sterling fell to a 31 year low, stock markets fell and foreign direct investment has frozen. All these things point towards the short-term impact of Brexit to be very serious. The real question is, what will the long term effects be, and how will markets react to cope with such uncertainty about the future. The institutional framework of the EU and the euro has created dependencies amongst countries. For this reason, Brexit will have affects in not just UK financial markets, but financial markets across the globe. According to (Gordon and Shapiro 1956) the dividend discount model, expectations about future effects on financial markets will have an effect on stocks and other financial variables now. From the graph above, we can see that when the news of Brexit was announced and the UK markets became uncertain about the UK’s future in the single market, the pound fell to its lowest price in 31 years. Because of Brexit and Policy uncertainty, markets adopt a ‘wait-and-see’ attitude towards investment decisions.   If London is no longer part of the single market, it loses its attractiveness as a foreign direct investment hub and a gateway to the European financial markets. According to the financial times, almost half of the FDI coming to the UK comes from the EU and after Brexit, this investment will significantly decrease due to increased trade costs and tariffs. The Office of National Statistics (ONS) tells us that FDI has been about 5% of UK GDP between 1999 and 2015. The analysis from the financial times estimates the decrease in FDI would be 22%. The impact of Brexit on the UK financial sector can be broken down in to 3 things: What agreement can the UK make with the EU in its post-Brexit negotiations. The extent to which financial sector businesses move their operations from the UK to a Eurozone country before any negotiation agreements are made.How well the UK financial sector can survive based on its global position and relationship. Until a deal is made with the EU, we cannot predict how the market will end up like, but we can hypothesise certain outcomes like the following: Currently, the UK is still part of the EU, and hence has passporting rights. Once these rights are gone, UK firms will have to have state level authorisations from EU countries to perform activities. This will depend upon whether the regulators in those countries will allow UK financial markets to sill operate within their borders. The best outcome would be if the UK retains their passporting rights through either a negotiation or remaining a part of the EEA. Johnathon ford writes in the financial times that another option that UK based companies may have is to open up subsidiaries in different EU countries, that way giving them access to customers within those markets. This is however costly and inefficient. Alternatively, UK firms could take advantage of Third Country Regime (TCR) access provisions. What this means is that companies that were incorporated outside the EU can still do business on a cross-border basis if they wish to do so without having an establishment within that EU country, however EU law will require that the regulations and legal structure they follow complies with EU. Reuters business news tells us that Standard Chartered (Stan.L) and JPMorgan (JPM.N) were the latest global banks that have outlined plans for European operations after Brexit. Goldman Sachs Lloyd Blankfein said that â€Å"London’s growth as a financial centre could stall as a result of upheaval caused by Brexit.† So, because of Brexit and the uncertainty of what the future holds for UK’s financial markets; UK based financial firms especially those in London are looking to move their operations into the EU market to benefit from the single market. Another financial market area that will be affected by Brexit is that of selling of derivatives for companies to buy protection or lower their risk portfolio against changes the US dollar and or spikes in the price of oil. As a result of tighter financial regulations on banks, some will opt out of providing this service and those who do will offer a smaller variety of products at a higher price. Ultimately, this is bad for markets as they are not getting the best deal they can. London also dominates the euro derivatives market. EU policymakers have not liked this for a while and want to shift this to a Eurozone country after Brexit. This will in turn increase the price of trading for corporations that deal in multiple currencies as they will have to go through several clearing houses. Bankers are unsure how much extra it will cost a European company to borrow without direct access to London, however, the association for financial markets said customers are being overly optimistic if they think that lending agents will bear the burden or grunt of this. They will push the increased cost of borrowing onto the consumer, which will ultimately make them less competitive in the market. Ernst and Young say in their research paper that they surveyed major corporates including Airbus and Volkswagen and found that these companies were really worried about rising costs of funding as a result of Brexit. London has dominated the financial centre for decades and has built its reputation on the service it provides. It would be very difficult to replicate this market. This has been due to its vast talent pool, widespread use of the English language and the UK legal system and the vast amount of money going through the UK through these financial markets. Another great strength of the UK is its over-the-counter derivatives market. Corporations often use swaps to protect themselves against adverse interest rates and currency moves. Over-the-counter derivatives have to go through clearing houses who are sort of the middle man who make sure neither party defaults on their payments. Even though the UK is not part of the Euro single currency, it still manages  ¾ of all euro-denominated swaps. As the UK decides to leave the EU, this creates a problem, because now most of these swaps won’t be clearing through the bloc. Germany and France have already said that they want the euro-denominated derivatives to be cleat=red through the EU; however LSE has argued that doing so would cost London thousands of jobs. According to a private report by EY, this estimate loss of jobs could be around 83,000 by 2024. The EU needs London’s money, says Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England. He calls Britain â€Å"Europe’s investment banker† and says half of all the debt and equity issued by the EU involves financial institutions in Britain. What impact would Brexit have on the way in which banks are regulated in the UK? There are three pillars in the UK banking regulations: The capital requirements directive IV and the capital requirements regulation.The banking act of 2009 Bank Resolution and Recovery Directive (BRRD) Since the BRRD and CRD IV were EU legislations, the UK has to decide after Brexit how much they want to keep. CRD IV implements the requirements of Basel III, which the UK would still be committed to after Brexit. Brexit will likely have an effect on the legislation application of the EEA branches and subsidiaries. What  Ã‚  impact would Brexit have on the UK insurance industry? The London market currently has access to over 500 million customers through the EU and a substantial amount of insurance and reinsurance is distributed into and out of the UK. For the UK to continue to have access to these customers, they have to negotiate bilateral treaties to ensure member states allow them passport into the EU. The prudential regulation authority (PRA) has been very involved in negotiating the solvency II directive which was based on the risk-based regime of the UK. What  Ã‚  impact would Brexit have on the UK funds industry? Currently most UK based fund managers already use Irish or Luxembourg UCITS and alternative investment funds (AIF) platforms for Pan-European distribution of funds therefore Brexit will likely not have much effect on this sector of the financial market. The problem the UK asset management industry will face is the risk of changes to rules enabling MIFID investment firms, AIFMS and UCITS management firms to choose UK based investment managers. Currently, the administration is deemed sufficient for EU firms to contract asset management jobs to the UK managers. Another drawback may be that EU member states may put obstacles in front in the form of tax regimes that make it less attractive for EU firms to hire UK investment managers. Corporate tax: The EU previously set the legal requirements for corporate tax in the UK. Since we will no longer be a part of the EU, these regulations will be revised by HMRC and new draft regulations will be put in place. Currently businesses that have offices within and outside the UK enjoy a 0% rate of withholding tax. This may no longer be the case and companies will look for ways to save themselves from varying taxations in different countries, or changing their place of business to protect themselves from higher or double taxation. VAT VAT was a European Union Concept and now that the UK government is responsible for this, they may decide to change the rates at which this is charged or what products VAT will be charged on. Accounting law At the moment, there is a significant EU accounting and company law legislations that may come under review after Brexit. These include, directive 2013/34/EU about annual financial statements, consolidated financial statements and reports. Directive 2009/101/EC about the disclosure of company documents and company obligations. Directive 2012/30/EU on the formation of public limited companies. Directive 89/666/EEC on disclosure requirements for foreign branches of companies. Global Impact of Brexit There is no roadmap to follow or analogy to invoke as a guide or pattern for how the Brexit vote will reverberate in the months and years to come. However, a few immediate consequences seem highly likely: †¢Ã‚  The flight to safety away from the epicenter of this British-EU divorce will push capital away from the region and toward key safe-haven markets including the U.S.—especially Treasuries—and to Japan. This will further lower market interest rates and raise relative currency values. †¢Ã‚  A higher U.S. dollar and Japanese yen are negative to both economies’ export sectors. In the case of Japan, this is particularly unhelpful to its efforts to reinflate and reinvigorate the economy after decades of deflation. †¢Ã‚  The higher U.S. dollar also triggers additional pressure on China to float the yuan lower, as it is caught in the divergence between its two largest export markets—the EU and the U.S.. †¢Ã‚  For the U.S., the negative impact on exports is relatively small compared with trends in domestic demand, but the deflationary pressure on tradable goods will widen the divergence between reasonably strong inflation in the services sector vs. reasonably strong deflation in the goods sector. †¢Ã‚  The European Central Bank will be compelled to raise its level of intervention yet again, as risk premiums across the region rise. Among the larger Eurozone members, Italy is in a particularly vulnerable position—now made more vulnerable. Each blow to members of the Eurozone periphery also further make Germany’s outperformance in the Eurozone even more unsustainable. The nature of the UK’s eventual exit agreement with the EU is crucial, and hangs over a multitude of markets. CEP BREXIT ANALYSIS Life after Brexit: What are the UK’s options outside the European Union? It is highly uncertain what the UK’s future would look like outside the European Union (EU), which makes ‘Brexit’ a leap into the unknown. This report reviews the advantages and drawbacks of the most likely options. After Brexit, the EU would continue to be the world’s largest market and the UK’s biggest trading partner. A key question is what would happen to the three million EU citizens living in the UK and the two million UK citizens living in the EU? There are economic benefits from European integration, but obtaining these benefits comes at the political cost of giving up some sovereignty. Inside or outside the EU, this trade-off is inescapable. One option is ‘doing a Norway’ and joining the European Economic Area. This would minimise the trade costs of Brexit, but it would mean paying about 83% as much into the EU budget as the UK currently does. It would also require keeping current EU regulations (without having a seat at the tab le when the rules are decided). Another option is ‘doing a Switzerland’ and negotiating bilateral deals with the EU. Switzerland still faces regulation without representation and pays about 40% as much as the UK to be part of the single market in goods. But the Swiss have no agreement with the EU on free trade in services, an area where the UK is a major exporter. A further option is going it alone as a member of the World Trade Organization. This would give the UK more sovereignty at the price of less trade and a bigger fall in income, even if the UK were to abolish tariffs completely. Brexit would allow the UK to negotiate its own trade deals with non-EU countries. But as a small country, the UK would have less bargaining power than the EU. Canada’s trade deals with the United States show that losing this bargaining power could be costly for the UK. To make an informed decision on the merits of leaving the EU, voters need to know more about what the UK governme nt would do following Brexit. This is the first in a series of briefings analysing the economic costs and benefits of Brexit for the UK. Economists for Brexit: A Critique Professor Patrick Minford, one of the ‘Economists for Brexit’, argues that leaving the European Union (EU) will raise the UK’s welfare by 4% as a result of increased trade. His policy recommendation is that following a vote for Brexit, the UK should strike no new trade deals but instead unilaterally abolish all its import tariffs. Under this policy (‘Britain Alone’), he describes his model as predicting the ‘elimination’ of UK manufacturing and a big increase in wage inequality. These outcomes may be hard to sell to UK citizens as a desirable political option. Our analysis of the ‘Britain Alone’ policy predicts a 2.3% loss of welfare compared with staying in the EU. This is only 0.3 percentage points better than Brexit without unilaterally abolishing tariffs which would result in a 2.6% welfare loss. Minford’s results stem from assuming that small changes in trade costs have tremendously large effects on trade volumes: according to his model, the falls in tariffs become enormously magnified because each country purchases only from the lowest cost supplier. In reality, everyone does not simply buy from the cheapest supplier. Products are different when made by different countries and trade is affected by the distance between countries, their size, history and wealth (the ‘gravity relationship’). Trade costs are not just government-created trade barriers. Product differentiation and gravity is incorporated into modern trade models – these predict that after Brexit the UK will continue to trade more with the EU than other countries as it remains our geographically closest neighbour. Consequently, we will be worse off because we will face higher trade costs with the EU. Minford’s assumption that goods prices would fall by 10% comes from attributing all producer price differences between the EU and low-cost countries to EU trade barriers, ignoring differences in quality. Sin gle Market rules (for example, over product safety) facilitate trade between EU members as it creates a level playing field. Minford’s assumption that the Single Market merely diverts trade from non-EU countries is contradicted by the empirical evidence. Minford also overlooks the loss in services trade that would result from leaving the Single Market, such as ‘passporting’ privileges in financial services. Minford’s approach of ignoring empirical analysis of trade data seems predicated on the view that because statistical analysis is imperfect, it should all be completely ignored. But such statistical biases may reinforce rather than weaken the case for remaining in the EU. Theories need grounding in facts, not ideology. Bibliography https://fullfact.org/europe/our-eu-membership-fee-55-million/https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/britain-europe-cost/https://www.ft.com/content/0260242c-370b-11e6-9a05-82a9b15a8ee7https://www.ft.com/content/61221dd4-d8c4-11e6-944b-e7eb37a6aa8e?mhq5j=e5http://www.nortonrosefulbright.com/knowledge/publications/115128/mifid-ii-mifir-serieshttp://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-banks/banks-planning-to-move-9000-jobs-from-britain-because-of-brexit-idUKKBN184132http://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/ey-uk-eu-planning-for-uncertainty/$File/ey-uk-eu-planning-for-uncertainty.pdfhttps://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/britain-europe-cost/https://www.accountingweb.com/community/blogs/geoff-collings/the-effect-of-brexit-on-uk-accountinghttps://www.accountancyage.com/2016/07/21/what-brexit-means-for-accounting-employment-and-taxation-law/ http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2016/587384/IPOL_BRI(2016)587384_EN.pdfhttps://www.ceps.eu/system/files/WD% 20429%20AB%20et%20al%20Brexit%20Applied%20Economics.pdfhttp://www.frbsf.org/education/publications/doctor-econ/2005/january/financial-markets-economic-performance/https://www.ft.com/content/74708d46-c6ca-11e6-8f29-9445cac8966f Mishkin, F. (2012).  Introduction to Financial Markets. [online] Www2.econ.iastate.edu. Available at: http://www2.econ.iastate.edu/tesfatsi/finintro.htm#FMI [Accessed 10 Sep. 2017]. Effect of Brexit on the Financial Markets Effect of Brexit on the Financial Markets What are financial markets? Financial markets are an open and regulated system where companies can raise large amounts of capital through bonds and stock markets, or offset their risk by investing in commodities, foreign exchange futures contracts or other derivatives. Due to the size of financial markets, they are highly liquid, meaning businesses can easily and quickly generate cash by selling their assets. Since financial markets are public and work under a lot of regulations, there is a lot of information transparency and prices of everything traded reflects this. (Source: â€Å"Six Basic Functions of Financial Markets†, Iowa State University, March 5, 2012.)   What is the European Union and what is Brexit? The European Union, like the name suggests is a political and economic union of 28 countries within Europe. The UK became part of the EU in 1973 and had to pay a membership fee every year The creation of the European union was to firstly bring countries together after the 2nd world war had left many economically and politically disabled or struggling. This economic cooperation would become the world’s biggest single market and it still is today. (European Union European Commission, 2017) Even though the UK has benefited a lot from being in a single market, there were many who thought that Britain would be better off on its own; and for this reason the government decided to have a referendum after which on the 23 of June 2016, Britain exited the Single market, giving back it’s seat in the European Parliament and all the benefits that came with it. How can financial markets affect economic performance? Demirgà ¼Ãƒ §-Kunt and Levine in their 2001 book, ‘Financial Structure and Economic Growth’ said there is a strong connection between financial markets development and economic growth. The way in which this happens is that a well-functioning financial market will efficiently direct the flow of savings and investments in an economy as such to enable businesses to accumulate capital and goods and services to be produced. A well-established financial market alongside a wide range of financial products will benefit borrowers and lenders and therefore the economy as a whole. Another benefit of an efficient financial market is that by providing a range of financial options at varying risk levels and pricing structures, borrowers and lenders can be closely matched for their individual needs. This allows investors to determine and calculate their cost of financing by looking at their returns on their investments and then choosing the best financing and investment choice for their requirements. The European Union created a single banking market with a single currency and therefore created Europe-wide financial markets which made investing and borrowing euro-denominated stocks, bonds and derivatives easy for all EU countries that are part of the Euro by eliminating exchange rate risks. By doing so, products and services that were previously only available on a country by country basis were now available to a wider market, creating better competition which in turn makes markets more efficient and prices lower for individuals.   This is called the ‘Single-Passport’ system, whereby any business set up in one-member state may provide its services to the rest without further authorisation requirements (European Commission 2016) Not only does euro-based financial markets benefit the Eurozone, it also attracts international investors to invest here and benefit from the competitive market, (Mishkin, 2012) and by being part of the ‘single-passport, Non-European companies can set up their head office in London, and have access to all the benefits of the Single Market. UK financial market relationship with the EU Professor Nick Bloom of Stanford University said: â€Å"The single European market increased competition and forced British firms to increase the level of innovation.† London is one of the biggest financial hubs of the world and hosts the largest number of banks and commercial insurance companies. According to (Belke A. et all) around 6 trillion euros, which is equivalent to 37% of Europe’s financial assets are managed in London, which is twice the amount of the nearest rival Paris. London also dominates Europe’s 5.2 trillion-euro investment banking industry. What this means is that major investments happing in some of Europe’s biggest cities are financed by companies operating within London. This is why, (Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England), said: â€Å"Europe relies heavily on London’s debt and equity markets.† When it comes to foreign exchange markets, the UK is way ahead of its European counterparts with an impressive almost 40% share of the worlds foreign exchange and derivatives handling. According to the (City of London Corporation) each year, $869 trillion worth of Euro, Yen and Dollars are traded from London. This is higher than all the Euro-Zone countries combined. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/britain-europe-cost/ London currently accounts for 70% of the Euro Sovereign debt trades, meaning that the EU countries cannot shut outlondons capital markets as this would be suicide. (Rueters) According to Reuters (Kai Pfaffenbach) Frankfurt is desperately trying win over businesses to relocate to their city from London. To help in this, the European Central Bank started the â€Å"Capital Markets Union† project in 2015, where they want Euro-zone financial markets to provide improved fund raising for companies by replicating Britain’s financial services and become more efficient in the stocks, bonds and other securities markets. How Brexit is affecting Financial Markets: https://www.ft.com/content/0260242c-370b-11e6-9a05-82a9b15a8ee7The question of how Brexit will affect the UK economy is very uncertain. The sterling fell to a 31 year low, stock markets fell and foreign direct investment has frozen. All these things point towards the short-term impact of Brexit to be very serious. The real question is, what will the long term effects be, and how will markets react to cope with such uncertainty about the future. The institutional framework of the EU and the euro has created dependencies amongst countries. For this reason, Brexit will have affects in not just UK financial markets, but financial markets across the globe. According to (Gordon and Shapiro 1956) the dividend discount model, expectations about future effects on financial markets will have an effect on stocks and other financial variables now. From the graph above, we can see that when the news of Brexit was announced and the UK markets became uncertain about the UK’s future in the single market, the pound fell to its lowest price in 31 years. Because of Brexit and Policy uncertainty, markets adopt a ‘wait-and-see’ attitude towards investment decisions.   If London is no longer part of the single market, it loses its attractiveness as a foreign direct investment hub and a gateway to the European financial markets. According to the financial times, almost half of the FDI coming to the UK comes from the EU and after Brexit, this investment will significantly decrease due to increased trade costs and tariffs. The Office of National Statistics (ONS) tells us that FDI has been about 5% of UK GDP between 1999 and 2015. The analysis from the financial times estimates the decrease in FDI would be 22%. The impact of Brexit on the UK financial sector can be broken down in to 3 things: What agreement can the UK make with the EU in its post-Brexit negotiations. The extent to which financial sector businesses move their operations from the UK to a Eurozone country before any negotiation agreements are made.How well the UK financial sector can survive based on its global position and relationship. Until a deal is made with the EU, we cannot predict how the market will end up like, but we can hypothesise certain outcomes like the following: Currently, the UK is still part of the EU, and hence has passporting rights. Once these rights are gone, UK firms will have to have state level authorisations from EU countries to perform activities. This will depend upon whether the regulators in those countries will allow UK financial markets to sill operate within their borders. The best outcome would be if the UK retains their passporting rights through either a negotiation or remaining a part of the EEA. Johnathon ford writes in the financial times that another option that UK based companies may have is to open up subsidiaries in different EU countries, that way giving them access to customers within those markets. This is however costly and inefficient. Alternatively, UK firms could take advantage of Third Country Regime (TCR) access provisions. What this means is that companies that were incorporated outside the EU can still do business on a cross-border basis if they wish to do so without having an establishment within that EU country, however EU law will require that the regulations and legal structure they follow complies with EU. Reuters business news tells us that Standard Chartered (Stan.L) and JPMorgan (JPM.N) were the latest global banks that have outlined plans for European operations after Brexit. Goldman Sachs Lloyd Blankfein said that â€Å"London’s growth as a financial centre could stall as a result of upheaval caused by Brexit.† So, because of Brexit and the uncertainty of what the future holds for UK’s financial markets; UK based financial firms especially those in London are looking to move their operations into the EU market to benefit from the single market. Another financial market area that will be affected by Brexit is that of selling of derivatives for companies to buy protection or lower their risk portfolio against changes the US dollar and or spikes in the price of oil. As a result of tighter financial regulations on banks, some will opt out of providing this service and those who do will offer a smaller variety of products at a higher price. Ultimately, this is bad for markets as they are not getting the best deal they can. London also dominates the euro derivatives market. EU policymakers have not liked this for a while and want to shift this to a Eurozone country after Brexit. This will in turn increase the price of trading for corporations that deal in multiple currencies as they will have to go through several clearing houses. Bankers are unsure how much extra it will cost a European company to borrow without direct access to London, however, the association for financial markets said customers are being overly optimistic if they think that lending agents will bear the burden or grunt of this. They will push the increased cost of borrowing onto the consumer, which will ultimately make them less competitive in the market. Ernst and Young say in their research paper that they surveyed major corporates including Airbus and Volkswagen and found that these companies were really worried about rising costs of funding as a result of Brexit. London has dominated the financial centre for decades and has built its reputation on the service it provides. It would be very difficult to replicate this market. This has been due to its vast talent pool, widespread use of the English language and the UK legal system and the vast amount of money going through the UK through these financial markets. Another great strength of the UK is its over-the-counter derivatives market. Corporations often use swaps to protect themselves against adverse interest rates and currency moves. Over-the-counter derivatives have to go through clearing houses who are sort of the middle man who make sure neither party defaults on their payments. Even though the UK is not part of the Euro single currency, it still manages  ¾ of all euro-denominated swaps. As the UK decides to leave the EU, this creates a problem, because now most of these swaps won’t be clearing through the bloc. Germany and France have already said that they want the euro-denominated derivatives to be cleat=red through the EU; however LSE has argued that doing so would cost London thousands of jobs. According to a private report by EY, this estimate loss of jobs could be around 83,000 by 2024. The EU needs London’s money, says Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England. He calls Britain â€Å"Europe’s investment banker† and says half of all the debt and equity issued by the EU involves financial institutions in Britain. What impact would Brexit have on the way in which banks are regulated in the UK? There are three pillars in the UK banking regulations: The capital requirements directive IV and the capital requirements regulation.The banking act of 2009 Bank Resolution and Recovery Directive (BRRD) Since the BRRD and CRD IV were EU legislations, the UK has to decide after Brexit how much they want to keep. CRD IV implements the requirements of Basel III, which the UK would still be committed to after Brexit. Brexit will likely have an effect on the legislation application of the EEA branches and subsidiaries. What  Ã‚  impact would Brexit have on the UK insurance industry? The London market currently has access to over 500 million customers through the EU and a substantial amount of insurance and reinsurance is distributed into and out of the UK. For the UK to continue to have access to these customers, they have to negotiate bilateral treaties to ensure member states allow them passport into the EU. The prudential regulation authority (PRA) has been very involved in negotiating the solvency II directive which was based on the risk-based regime of the UK. What  Ã‚  impact would Brexit have on the UK funds industry? Currently most UK based fund managers already use Irish or Luxembourg UCITS and alternative investment funds (AIF) platforms for Pan-European distribution of funds therefore Brexit will likely not have much effect on this sector of the financial market. The problem the UK asset management industry will face is the risk of changes to rules enabling MIFID investment firms, AIFMS and UCITS management firms to choose UK based investment managers. Currently, the administration is deemed sufficient for EU firms to contract asset management jobs to the UK managers. Another drawback may be that EU member states may put obstacles in front in the form of tax regimes that make it less attractive for EU firms to hire UK investment managers. Corporate tax: The EU previously set the legal requirements for corporate tax in the UK. Since we will no longer be a part of the EU, these regulations will be revised by HMRC and new draft regulations will be put in place. Currently businesses that have offices within and outside the UK enjoy a 0% rate of withholding tax. This may no longer be the case and companies will look for ways to save themselves from varying taxations in different countries, or changing their place of business to protect themselves from higher or double taxation. VAT VAT was a European Union Concept and now that the UK government is responsible for this, they may decide to change the rates at which this is charged or what products VAT will be charged on. Accounting law At the moment, there is a significant EU accounting and company law legislations that may come under review after Brexit. These include, directive 2013/34/EU about annual financial statements, consolidated financial statements and reports. Directive 2009/101/EC about the disclosure of company documents and company obligations. Directive 2012/30/EU on the formation of public limited companies. Directive 89/666/EEC on disclosure requirements for foreign branches of companies. Global Impact of Brexit There is no roadmap to follow or analogy to invoke as a guide or pattern for how the Brexit vote will reverberate in the months and years to come. However, a few immediate consequences seem highly likely: †¢Ã‚  The flight to safety away from the epicenter of this British-EU divorce will push capital away from the region and toward key safe-haven markets including the U.S.—especially Treasuries—and to Japan. This will further lower market interest rates and raise relative currency values. †¢Ã‚  A higher U.S. dollar and Japanese yen are negative to both economies’ export sectors. In the case of Japan, this is particularly unhelpful to its efforts to reinflate and reinvigorate the economy after decades of deflation. †¢Ã‚  The higher U.S. dollar also triggers additional pressure on China to float the yuan lower, as it is caught in the divergence between its two largest export markets—the EU and the U.S.. †¢Ã‚  For the U.S., the negative impact on exports is relatively small compared with trends in domestic demand, but the deflationary pressure on tradable goods will widen the divergence between reasonably strong inflation in the services sector vs. reasonably strong deflation in the goods sector. †¢Ã‚  The European Central Bank will be compelled to raise its level of intervention yet again, as risk premiums across the region rise. Among the larger Eurozone members, Italy is in a particularly vulnerable position—now made more vulnerable. Each blow to members of the Eurozone periphery also further make Germany’s outperformance in the Eurozone even more unsustainable. The nature of the UK’s eventual exit agreement with the EU is crucial, and hangs over a multitude of markets. CEP BREXIT ANALYSIS Life after Brexit: What are the UK’s options outside the European Union? It is highly uncertain what the UK’s future would look like outside the European Union (EU), which makes ‘Brexit’ a leap into the unknown. This report reviews the advantages and drawbacks of the most likely options. After Brexit, the EU would continue to be the world’s largest market and the UK’s biggest trading partner. A key question is what would happen to the three million EU citizens living in the UK and the two million UK citizens living in the EU? There are economic benefits from European integration, but obtaining these benefits comes at the political cost of giving up some sovereignty. Inside or outside the EU, this trade-off is inescapable. One option is ‘doing a Norway’ and joining the European Economic Area. This would minimise the trade costs of Brexit, but it would mean paying about 83% as much into the EU budget as the UK currently does. It would also require keeping current EU regulations (without having a seat at the tab le when the rules are decided). Another option is ‘doing a Switzerland’ and negotiating bilateral deals with the EU. Switzerland still faces regulation without representation and pays about 40% as much as the UK to be part of the single market in goods. But the Swiss have no agreement with the EU on free trade in services, an area where the UK is a major exporter. A further option is going it alone as a member of the World Trade Organization. This would give the UK more sovereignty at the price of less trade and a bigger fall in income, even if the UK were to abolish tariffs completely. Brexit would allow the UK to negotiate its own trade deals with non-EU countries. But as a small country, the UK would have less bargaining power than the EU. Canada’s trade deals with the United States show that losing this bargaining power could be costly for the UK. To make an informed decision on the merits of leaving the EU, voters need to know more about what the UK governme nt would do following Brexit. This is the first in a series of briefings analysing the economic costs and benefits of Brexit for the UK. Economists for Brexit: A Critique Professor Patrick Minford, one of the ‘Economists for Brexit’, argues that leaving the European Union (EU) will raise the UK’s welfare by 4% as a result of increased trade. His policy recommendation is that following a vote for Brexit, the UK should strike no new trade deals but instead unilaterally abolish all its import tariffs. Under this policy (‘Britain Alone’), he describes his model as predicting the ‘elimination’ of UK manufacturing and a big increase in wage inequality. These outcomes may be hard to sell to UK citizens as a desirable political option. Our analysis of the ‘Britain Alone’ policy predicts a 2.3% loss of welfare compared with staying in the EU. This is only 0.3 percentage points better than Brexit without unilaterally abolishing tariffs which would result in a 2.6% welfare loss. Minford’s results stem from assuming that small changes in trade costs have tremendously large effects on trade volumes: according to his model, the falls in tariffs become enormously magnified because each country purchases only from the lowest cost supplier. In reality, everyone does not simply buy from the cheapest supplier. Products are different when made by different countries and trade is affected by the distance between countries, their size, history and wealth (the ‘gravity relationship’). Trade costs are not just government-created trade barriers. Product differentiation and gravity is incorporated into modern trade models – these predict that after Brexit the UK will continue to trade more with the EU than other countries as it remains our geographically closest neighbour. Consequently, we will be worse off because we will face higher trade costs with the EU. Minford’s assumption that goods prices would fall by 10% comes from attributing all producer price differences between the EU and low-cost countries to EU trade barriers, ignoring differences in quality. Sin gle Market rules (for example, over product safety) facilitate trade between EU members as it creates a level playing field. Minford’s assumption that the Single Market merely diverts trade from non-EU countries is contradicted by the empirical evidence. Minford also overlooks the loss in services trade that would result from leaving the Single Market, such as ‘passporting’ privileges in financial services. Minford’s approach of ignoring empirical analysis of trade data seems predicated on the view that because statistical analysis is imperfect, it should all be completely ignored. But such statistical biases may reinforce rather than weaken the case for remaining in the EU. Theories need grounding in facts, not ideology. Bibliography https://fullfact.org/europe/our-eu-membership-fee-55-million/https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/britain-europe-cost/https://www.ft.com/content/0260242c-370b-11e6-9a05-82a9b15a8ee7https://www.ft.com/content/61221dd4-d8c4-11e6-944b-e7eb37a6aa8e?mhq5j=e5http://www.nortonrosefulbright.com/knowledge/publications/115128/mifid-ii-mifir-serieshttp://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-britain-eu-banks/banks-planning-to-move-9000-jobs-from-britain-because-of-brexit-idUKKBN184132http://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/ey-uk-eu-planning-for-uncertainty/$File/ey-uk-eu-planning-for-uncertainty.pdfhttps://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/britain-europe-cost/https://www.accountingweb.com/community/blogs/geoff-collings/the-effect-of-brexit-on-uk-accountinghttps://www.accountancyage.com/2016/07/21/what-brexit-means-for-accounting-employment-and-taxation-law/ http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2016/587384/IPOL_BRI(2016)587384_EN.pdfhttps://www.ceps.eu/system/files/WD% 20429%20AB%20et%20al%20Brexit%20Applied%20Economics.pdfhttp://www.frbsf.org/education/publications/doctor-econ/2005/january/financial-markets-economic-performance/https://www.ft.com/content/74708d46-c6ca-11e6-8f29-9445cac8966f Mishkin, F. (2012).  Introduction to Financial Markets. [online] Www2.econ.iastate.edu. Available at: http://www2.econ.iastate.edu/tesfatsi/finintro.htm#FMI [Accessed 10 Sep. 2017].

Skin care products with whitening and lightening function

Skin care products with whitening and lightening function Skin care products with whitening and lightening function have been introduced to the Asian market over the past decades years and it recorded as the best-selling product categories in the Asian beauty industry (Ashikari, 2005). According to the study title The Quest for Beauty: Asias Fascination with Pale face (2009) stated the total whitening marketing is forecasted the market will be continuing to $18 billion and the rate of growth is around 12 per cent annually (Deirde, Helen, Mark, 2010, p. 26). In South East Asia, there are more than 62 skin lightening products were introduced in year 2008 (Deirde, et al., 2010, p27). Besides, the involvement of women in the workforce increases in their income and wealth. Most of the women tend to buy the whitening product to lighten their skin (Deirde, et al., 2010). To fulfill the consumer needs, the whitening product was still developing to match the market demand (August, 2008). The result of the Asian women using skin lightening products i s shown in the Table 2.1 Table 2.1: Result of Asian women using skin lightening products Asian country Estimated % of Women Using Skin Lightening Products Thailand 58 Philippine 50 Hong Kong 45 Malaysia 41 Indonesia 60-65 (Source from The Quest For Beauty: Asias Fascination With Pale Skin, p27, 2010) There are a lot of myths about fair skin tone. In the current social context, fair skin tone not only symbolizes womens beauty, but also will project womens marital prospects, job prospects, social status, and earning potential (Ashikari 2003b; Goon and Craven 2003; Leslie 2004). One of the surveys was conducted in The Quest for Beauty: Asias Fascination with Pale face shown Malaysian men thought their partners would be more attractive with a fair skin tone (Deirde, et al., 2010). In the same study, it also stated that different culture may result in different interpretation on the meaning of whiteness. To provide a clearer picture, in Japan, fair skin is equal to wealth and high education level (Deirde, et al., 2010). As in Thailand, the fair skin is always associated with the higher social status and wealth (Deirde, et al., 2010). As contrast to the white, black, in Indian culture symbolize as underprivileged people and often related to dark, dirty, wrong, hell, and etc (Arif, 2004 ). On the contrary, Indian culture prefers lighter skin tone as it associated with the bright side of the culture(Arif, 2004).White, in Indian culture, is regard as a sign of beauty, purity, cleanliness, happiness, and symbol of power (Arif, 2004). Moreover, fair skin is also presented as good marriage in India. Overall, whiteness is an important predictor for presenting the positive image in the Indian society (Arif, 2004). Desires for whiteness, under this chain of associations, is pursued Despite of the diverse cultural different in Asia region, they are holding the common belief to have light skin. However, some of the academics, activists and sociologists reflect the marketing of skin-lighteners as racism. (Sage, 2009; August, 2008; BBC News, 2003) In this research study, not only focus on the advertisement of women magazine in Malaysia, but also focus on whitening body care product. 2.2 Background There are several items will discuss in the session of background which included beauty products for women, the fairness is more craze, discrimination of people, advertising in general for these products, printed advertisement and magazine advertisements. 2.2.1 Beauty products for women Peoples needs and desires to be beautiful are supposed to be identical all over the world. With the aid of beauty product, people can gain confidence and stand in front of crowd without fear. In this modern society, the first impressions brought to people are crucial. People are increasingly emphasis on the appearance rather than other more durable criteria (Barthel 1988: 3) and emphasize on the decoration of the female body, with the aids of the fashion and cosmetic products (Barthel 1988: 8) Based on this reason, the latter product categories, the hair care, fragrance, and personal products are frequently used to enhance the attractiveness and the degree of sexuality on the person. Moreover, beauty also refers to traditional make-up, which included lipstick, mascara and foundation, as well as contemporary make-up, such as tinted/flavored lip balm/gloss (Pawlowski, 2007, p. 62). 2.2.2 Fairness is more craze According to Bray (2002), there are almost half of 35 to 54 years of Asians used skin care product with whitening function, some analysts have said it could be worth billions of dollars. In Asian countries, that has been a trend of growth of whitening and lightening product since that have long histories of utilizing fair skin as a key criterion of personal beauty (Bray, 2002). There is a Chinese idiom One whiteness can cover three kinds of ugliness (Leong, 2006; Eric, Hyun, Kimura, Russell, Bahl, 2008). In people perception, fair skin is always a symbol of elegance and nobility (Leong, 2006). White jade is often used as a metaphor to describe such fairness (Leong, 2006, p.167). The preferences for white of fair skin are common in the modern Asian market (Leong, 2006). In India, for example, a significant part of many Sunday newspapers is dedicated to personal advertisements by men seeking fair-skinned brides (Leong, 2006, p. 168). 2.2.3 Discrimination of people Although skin whitening product can lighten people skin tone, it may indirectly discriminate the races that have darker skin tone. For instance, that is an argument in India due to the Fair and Lovely advertisement. The advertisement showed a young, dark-skinned girls father lamenting he had no son to provide for him, as his daughters salary was not high enough the suggestion being that she could neither get a better job or get married because of her dark skin. (BBC News, 2003). This advertisement has an overwhelming responces. According to Luce and Merchant (2003), 90% of Indian women want to use whitening product and that is a phenomenal trend growth in the number of skin-lightening products. In their perception, fair skin represent good education and more likely to marry well. However, some of the sociologists and academics pointed out that is not only a wrong moral value, but also pollute the young generations mind (BBC News, 2003). According to Lipsitz (1998, p. 3), the power of whiteness depended not only on white hegemony over separate racialized groups, but also on manipulating racial outsiders to fight against one another, to compete with each other for white approval, and to seek the rewards and privileges of whiteness for themselves at the expense-literally-of other racialized populations. 2.2.4 Advertising in general for these products Television, radio station, internet, and even outdoors advertising are categorized as broadcast media. The different promotional tools will deliver different benefits to the advertisers. Due to this reasons, majority of global advertising adopting more than one type of advertising tool to promote their product. 2.2.5 Print advertisement Print advertising defined as the dissemination of advertising messages using visual, printed item, such as newspapers, catalogs, mailers, flyers and magazine advertisement (Jade, nd). Under the strong competition with other broadcast media, such as television and radio, print advertisement still place an important role to the advertiser. Compare with other broadcast media, print advertisement allow to present more detailed information. By the way, print advertisement such as newspaper and magazine refer as a high involvement of media, it means printed advertisement is more selectivity and it can help the company reach the specific target readers and customers. 2.2.6 Magazine advertisement Through magazine advertisement, the company can reach the certain target market in and educated the reader about the product knowledge in the short period. Besides, the cost of the advertising on magazine is much cheaper compare with other communication tool, such as television and radio. From the 1880s onwards, advertising has played a vital role in shaping the form and content of womens magazines. And, it has a clear and strong relationship between advertising and womens magazines. Besides, magazines were designed as forums for national advertisements aimed for women. According to Veronica (2010), there is no indication for change in the near future as the pattern has existed for more than 100 years. Magazines advertisement is essential tool for marketer because it provides a forum for gender targeted advertising. Marketer can effectively deliver their message to the target audiences. According to McCracken (1993), womens magazines refer as a powerful advertising medium since advertising occupies up to 95 per cent of the space in some womens magazines, earning these publications the more appropriate title, womens advertising magazines. Womens magazines, are a sphere of activity that readers view as an area of freedom, free choice and free time (McCracken 1993) and the advertising within creates new wants and needs. The statement from McCracken (1993) indicates the high readership for women magazines. The role of women magazines is slowly changing to the storytelling mechanism of society because of the increase of advertising material. (Jhally 2000: 30). 2.3 Variable 2.3.1 Size of the advertisement In general, the options of the size of the magazine classified into half page, one page, double page or more than two pages (Pu, Y,R, 2003). According to McCracken (1993), women magazines contained 50%-60% of full-page advertisement. There large size of the advertisement provides a clearer advertisement detail and advertiser more easily to correct it. In the recent article, one of the researchers, double page of the advertisement can attract more one-quarter of reader than one page and one page of size advertisement can attract more one-third reader than half page. (Print Ad Placement, 2011) Some of the marketer will prefer half page size of advertisement, if they faced the tight budget problem. In the other research study of shown the one page size of the advertisement are majority which is 85%. (L. Wasylkiw, A.A. Emms, R. Meuse, K.F. Poirier, (2009), This may due to the price of advertising is reasonable and it is more easily to attract attention. 2.3.2 Advertising layout In the study conducted by (Anna Peter, 2006) states that are 3 components in term of layout consists in the printed advertisement, which are visual information, verbal information and brand name. Different of advertisement layout reflect the different characteristic of product. According to the study of Pu, N, R, (2003), the author found that both personal and cosmetic product present their advertisement with visual and copy layout. In general, visual consider as visual element and copy defined as words. This may due to the visual element in the advertisement can serve to the visualization and verbal element serve to the verbalization. 2.3.3 Advertising copy elements Advertisement is a tool that used by marketers to deliver the intended message to their targeted customer. It is crucial to ensure the concept of the advertisement fit with the overall marketing objectives. For print advertisement, display copy and body copy are the two elements of copy sheet. (Anna Peter, 2006) As defined by Wells et al (2006), display copy is the entire element that the reader able to see at the first glance, such as headlines, subhead lines, taglines and slogans. In general, headline is the words in the leading position of the advertisement and it also reflects as selling idea in the advertisement. (Anna, P; Peter, W, 2006; Major elements of copy for copywriting, nd) Usually, headlines of the advertisement presented in the large size and obvious position. With the aims of enhance the readability of the message, sub headlines normally presents in the new paragraphs with larger size and bold type. (Anna, P; Peter, W, 2006) Body copy defines as the text with smaller size typed which to provide a clear and further explanation about the product. (Anna, P; Peter, W, 2006) According to the Anna, P and Peter, W (2006), slogan regarded as a motto for a campaign, brand and company. To increase the probability to recall the advertisement, marketer usually integrated the slogan in the advertisement, to better address the products attribute. (Advertising Strategy, nd) 2.3.4 Color Color is a powerful element which represent for brand identification, feature reinforcement and differentiation. (Anna, P, Peter, W, 2006) Other than that, vibrancies of color also more easily to catch the attention of the audience, provide realism, establish moods and build brand identity. (Anna, P, Peter, W, 2006) According to the Pamela S. Schindler (1986), color advertisement had the higher response rate and better recall probability when compare with the dull blank and white advertisement. In the other aspects, color can be classified to warm color tone, cool color tone and earth color tone. Red, orange and yellow are the example of warm color tone; green, blue and violet are present in cool color tone and earth color tone reflects neutral color. The different colors always associated with different characteristics. Due to the same advertising pattern, some of the color associated in the characteristics of femininity, cultural interpretations or even emotional responses. (Pamela S. Schindler, 1986) For instance, the use of the color red symbolizes love and passion, while the color white generally signifies purity and virginity. (Pawlowski, 2007) Pink is seen to be very feminine which can also be deemed as sexual while pastel type coloring generally refers to non-sexual. (Pawlowski, 2007) 2.3.5 Visual element The roles of visual element in the advertisement not only for catches the attention of reader, but also importance of creating brand awareness and brand beliefs (John R. Rossiter, 1982) According to Kosslyn and Alper, 1977; Kosslyn, 1980, larger size of the visual element can produce the better learning . And, other than memory responses, the visual size also influence on the evaluative responses. (Rossiter and Percy (1978; 1980) and Mitchell and Olson (1977; 1981) 2.3.6 Language Today, English is regarded as an international language. It acts as an important and common language in the world, you can used English in every part corner of world. The statement proved by 72 of in flight-magazine around the world used English as main language. (Veronica, 2010) Although English is a universal language, but the advertiser of some countries, such as Taiwan, South Korean, and United States still prefer their local language to present the message of the advertisement. (Jaehee, J Lee, Y,J, 2009; Veronica, M, S, 2010) As global company advertises their product globally, the languages they used are vary according to the social context. They are usually ignoring the local nuance, and translate directly from their original copy. (Veronica, 2010) Communication with customers is essential in the marketing perspective. The local language can integrate with the local community effortless. In the multi cultural country such as Singapore and Malaysia, there is a diverse market opportunity for each of the races. Hence, by targeting different group of customers, the publisher have to publish different languages of magazines to better address the need and wants of the different groups of people. By publishing different languages of magazines, they can better deliver the message to their reader by the languages that they are familiar to. 2.3.7 Type of Appeal Generally, there are two type of appeal which is rational appeals and emotional appeals. In advertising, rational appeals defined as the element used to motivate consumers through information and logical arguments. (Jeon, George, Bruce, Joseph, 1999) Visual elements were coded as rational if the advertisement contained picture of the brand, before and after comparisons, product demonstrations, or comparatives portraying the competition. The use of rational appeals can be apply by reduce the uncertainly requires, distinct logical, and direct information from the communicator. (Zandpour etal. 1994) Nevertheless, emotional appeals reflect the images and feelings to mold consumers perceptions toward the brand. Among the emotional appeal are storytelling, metaphors, and aesthetics. (Jeon, George, Bruce, Joseph, 1999) Advertising appeal usage can be applied in different product types. According to Cutler and Javalgi (1993), the overall content of the advertisement can be categories into rational, emotional or both. In the past research, the authors found that advertisement for durable goods tend to presents more information than advertisement for nondurable goods. (Abernethy and Franke 1996) However, service advertisement is more emphasize on emotional appeals. (Abernethy and Butler 1992; Cutler and Javalgi 1993) In the research conducted by Golden and Johson (1983), they examined the impact of thinking versus feeling appeal in print ads on various measures of advertising effectiveness. The author defined thinking appeal as appealing to the rationality of the receiver, and feeling appeal as creating a mood and appealing to the emotions. (Golden and Johson, 1983) In this study, they concluded that the underlying reason for the popularity of thinking appeals is the rich of product information, and elicit higher purchasing intentions. (Golden and Johson, 1983) According to a research conducted by McGuire (1969), he denied the effectiveness of emotional appeal in the advertisement after directly comparing the rational and emotional appeal from the advertisement. Based on his research, neither of the rational and emotional appeal outperform of each other. The core idea behind this is that emotional message can also be rational, and vice versa 2.3.8 Product Categories Product categories in the advertisement can be divided into 22 categories. (Nelson Paek 2007) Beauty product was defined broadly, which consisted cosmetic, jewelry and clothing. In addition, special group of products such as womens apparel, perfume and cosmetic categories occupy large portion of total marketing costs. (Veronica, 2010) In the recent study, the authors classified apparel product, perfuse and cosmetics as self-image projective product. (Veronica, 2010) The targeted market segment would affect the marketing strategies applied in different market. (Veronica, 2010) In the other researches, product categories can be categories into hedonic or utilitarian element. (Crowley, 1992) Hedonic products are primarily related to sensory attributes and concentrate on consumatory effective gratification whereas utilitarian products are mainly associated with functional and non-sensory attributes and focus on fulfillment of instrumental needs. (Crowley, 1992) According to the research of Jung and Lee (2009), Korean and United Stated beauty magazines consisted a lot of body-related products than non-body related products advertisement, with a ratio 91.1 to 8.9. The body-related products include clothing, beauty product, diet services, and accessories. 2.3.9 Product origin The country of production has certain degree of influence on the consumers decision making process. Zhou (2004) provided some evidence in study that Chinese consumer is willing to pay more on the western product, mainly because of the common belief to reflex the prestige and social status. There is some opposite point of view from Nelson(2004). He stated that there is growing population who are supporting the local product and cultural identity. 2.3.10 Whitening function of the product Skin whitening product is a global trend throughout the world. There is a huge market opportunity for Europe, Asia and the United States market. (Deirdre, B, Helen, C, Mark, D, nd) According Ashikari (2005), whitening and lighten product growth rapidly in Asia which influence by the Asian wealth and growing consumer cultures. Mostly, the whitening function of product can classified to UV features, whitening effect and function in both way.UV features of product can decrease the damage and protect the skin from ultraviolet rays and long time exposure under the sun. In additional, the role of whitening effect shows the product focus on lightening complexion of womens skin, which from the yellow or darker skin color to white and fair skin color. (Johanson, 1998) The example of products with whitening effect are Kose, Za, Olay, Lancome, Nivea and Sk II, normally we can found it in shopping mall. With the trend of whiteness, a lot of companies introduce a lot of whitening and UV function of product, and then customer can kills 2 birds with one stone with the multi-functional product. 2.3.11 Degree of sun protection factor (SPF) In the market, there is a lot of cosmetic and skin care product contained sun protection factor (SPF), which can protect our skin from the direct ray from the sun. The different degrees of SPF have different functions. In the research conducted by Autier et al. (1999), they assessed the impact of the 2 different degree of sunscreen sun protection factor (SPF) of unlabeled product on the duration of sun exposure in two groups of young people. They concluded that the volunteers who used SPF 30 were exposure 25% longer than these who used SPF 10. The result of the finding is not surprising. The doubt in this research is on the basis of increased exposure, there was no difference in sunburn or skin-reddening episodes in the two study groups. 2.3.12 Origin of model Model can be classified into different ethnic groups, such as Asian (Chinese/ East Asian, Malay or Indian), Caucasian, or mixed. In the study by (Eric P. H. Li, Hyun,J.M, Kimura, J, Russell, W. B, Bahl, S, 2008; Cheng, H, Katherine, F, Shaw, P, 2005; ), authors found that most of the Asian beauty product advertisements using Caucasian model. The underlying reason is the globally recognized beauty standard. According to Goon and Craven, the popularity of Caucasian and Eurasian models reflects the postcolonial structure of commoditization and consumerism and is still influenced by a colonial past. In the other study, it also revealed 70.2% Caucasian model was used frequently in Korean advertisement to promote their product. (Jaehee, J, Lee, Y, J, 2009) This phenomenon happened because the fair skin has been aggressively marketed across Asian culture over this past decade. According to (Sean, R, 2003), white women with those characteristics such as lean, pure and radiant images are representing the feminine ideal and identification. Whiteness also presumes the ideas of purity, integrity, decency and auspiciousness. (Russell, Wilson, and Hall 1992; Sean, R, 2003) By the way, model of the advertisement always plays an important role to deliver the message to the targeted audiences and it pervasive to our daily life. The particular magazines readers will project themselves as the models appear in the magazines advertisement, which enable them to make a positive impact to them, and inevitably make a good evaluation to the product. Besides, the researchers also found that Caucasian women were more willing presented in sexual portrayals which compare with Asian women. (Cheng, H, Katherine, F, Shaw, P, 2005; Christina N. Baker1, 2005) This reason may due to the Asian women are influence by the Confucian culture and philosophy of them has not yet been prepared. (Cheng, H, Katherine, F, Shaw, P, 2005) 2.3.13 Demographics of model Age of the model of the advertisement also acts as a factor influence the consumer behavior. (Chang, C, C, 2008) People are keen to be fresh, beauty and look younger than their actual age. If the model of the advertisement is forties or old featured, then the young generation of consumer may categorized the product as not for me based on this factor. (Chang, C, C, 2008) The result analysis of Women Stereotypes Portrayed in Print Ads by Luxury Fashion Brands found that most of the young model are majority in the advertisement of magazine which is 72.7% (15 and 30 years old). (Carlos, M, M, Paloma, D, S, 2008) 2.3.14 Celebrities Used Celebrity endorsement is the growing trend in the magazine advertisement. A celebrity endorser is defined as any individual who enjoys public recognition and who uses this recognition on behalf of a consumer good by appearing with it in an advertisement. (McCracken 1989, pg. 310). Credibility and attractiveness are the two important criteria to improve the persuasiveness of the advertisement. Hence, the companies are strike to determine the element of credibility and attractiveness to present their advertisement to public. (Kahle and Kahle 2006). Furthermore, Friedman and Friedman (1979) showed that celebrities endorsement is more eyes catching than expert or typical consumer endorsers in advertisement recall and brand name recall, in spite of the product type. In the other research also showed there are a positive effect between adolescents word-of-mouth intentions and brand loyalty among the celebrity sports athletes. (Bush, Martin, and Bush 2004) Besides, female teenagers word-of-mouth intentions are more affected by female celebrities than male celebrities, and female teenagers agree more than male teenagers that they are affected by celebrities in buying certain brands. (Bush, Martin, and Bush 2004) By applying attribution theory, Mowen (1980) used it to explain on the effectiveness of celebrity endorsement. The effectiveness of celebrity endorsement is largely correlated to the consumers willingness to understand the causal reasons for a celebrity to endorse the product. The celebrity endorsement strategy works best if consumers think that the celebrity endorses the product because the celebrity can symbolize the product, rather than the financial incentives. Mowen (1980) Furthermore, Asian celebrity perceived their success is highly related to their fair skin. (Eric, Hyun, Russel, Junko, Shalini, 2008) 2.3.15 Appearance of model Based on the research conducted by Thomas and Treiber (2000), the advertisers prefer to use gorgeous model to represent their product. It can indirectly inform the reader they can as beautiful as the model after them using the product. In the research study named Real Beauty in Advertising: Fab or Fad, appearance was the main subject. It usually used to refer the link between the usage of the particular product and the consequences after of using that product. According to the research, model likes to apply the heavy makeup, such as applied lipstick and particular perfume to become more attractiveness and appeal to public (Reichert Lambaise, 2003, p126). 2.3.16 Apparel of model There are different degree dressing of the model, however nudity of the model becomes a rising trend in the advertisement of the magazines; it also associated with the idea of sexual attractiveness. (Bridgette Desmond, nd) Generally, there are 4 categories of the nudity which are demure, suggestive, partially clad and nude. (Jaehee, J, Lee, Y, J, 2009) According to (Jaehee, J, Lee, Y, J, 2009 Reichert, T, Carpenter, C, 2004), demure dress was defined as everyday dress which included walking shorts, but excluded short-shorts or underwear. Suggestive dress defined as partially exposed the upper body, such as unbuttoned blouses or muscle shirts. (Jaehee, J, Lee, Y, J, 2011; Reichert, T, Carpenter, C, 2004), According to the studies conducted by scholars, Models were considered partially clad if they were shown in underwear or bathing suits. (Jaehee, J, Lee, Y, J, 2011; Reichert, T, Carpenter, C, 2004) Nude was represent models were holding only a towel or if the photograph was composed so that genitals were concealed. (Jaehee, J, Lee, Y, J, 2011; Carpenter, C, Reichert, T, 2004) Sex approach is more appeal to the male consumer, given the evidence that in year 2003, four out of five women who are appeared in the advertisement were suggestively dress, partially clad, or nude. (Bridgette Desmond, nd) An interesting study conducted by the Desmond, B (2008) stated that society nowadays becomes more sexually explicit and adapt with the high degree nudity level in the advertisement. Even so, there are some the magazines also prefer demure dress, since they target the wider variety of groups. (Bridgette Desmond, nd) 2.3.17 Hairstyle of model In the judgment female beauty, hair color, hair length, and hair style plays a vital role in positive rating on attractiveness. In the research of Mbure, 2009, 63.6% of models, 63.6% had long hair length, and 36.4% of model had short hair length. Besides, in the same research, the author found that 70.8% of model had straight hair and 29.2% of model non-straight hair style, such as kinky, wavy, medium curly, braided and so on. (Mbure, 2009) 2.3.18 Degree of models whitening Skin color stratification is a crucial sociological issue, which included the difference between lightness and darkness of skin tone. (Micaela, 2005) According to Hunter (2002), light skin tone works as capital to women. Moreover, it symbolizes status, educated person, and high income. Light skin tone also associated with sexual attractiveness. In her analysis, it showed that light skin of African American women represent the higher personal earnings and higher spousal status. According to the other research, the author found that prominent models were more likely prefer to be light skin tone than medium skin tone or dark skin tone. However, models minority were less likely to be seen in the workplace than whites but more likely to be portrayed in leisure places and school than whites. Low volumes of studies emphasize on the interpretation of white beauty idea among Asian female. Meanwhile, Sahay Piran (1997) also revealed that the desire to be light skinned was higher the darker am ong South Asian-Canadian females. In the research title Comparisons of Cosmetic Advertisements: Strategies for cultural adaptation in Womens Magazines in Taiwan also shown that most models in Nong-Nong and Elle Taiwan magazines were displayed in a light skin tone; regardless whether the model was western or Asian looks. (Pu, Y, R, 2003) Furthermore, in another research also reflects that light skin tone is ideals in advertising. It were advanced using a diversify of strategies consisting the promotion of benefits related to skin lightening such as skin related (e.g. Increased moisture), emotional (e.g. Increased self confidence) and relational/social (e.g. increased attention from the opposite sex). Mak (2007) Furthermore, among 58 models, 30 models were light skinned, 16 models had medium brown skin tone (mid-point of dark and light brown) and only 9 models were dark skinned. (Mbure, 2009) 2.3.19 Most frequently shown body part Study of Carlos, M, M, Paloma, D, S, (2008) defined human body as dressed body, and the external appearance, such as hand, neck and face play an important role of the first impression while meeting someone. On the same time, different kind of body part shown in the magazines advertisement conveyed the different kind of messages that convey messages to the magazines reader. Most often, marketer emphasized certain body display based on the product categories, such as face with skin care product or upper body part with body care product. In the recent study, researchers found that the advertisement in Korea and Taiwan more focus on the models face rather than bod