Compliance Behaviour of New Zealand Exporters with Best Practices of Supply Chain Security

<p>Uninterrupted growth of international trade and the constant threats to global supply chains have led to the emergence of numerous voluntary compliance guidelines based on standards and compliance. Initiatives, such as, the Authorised Economic Operators is the result of the global efforts to facilitate, prevent and secure international trade against cross-border crime. The Authorised Economic Operator is an initiative of the World Customs Organisation and its member countries. Its core philosophy is developing public to private partnerships for the safety of international trade and trade facilitation. These initiatives are growing in scope with a variety of programmes developed by governments. The objective of these programmes is encouraging an ethos of voluntary compliance based on standards, best practices and self-governance. Certified firms can obtain a trusted trader status and cross-border benefits when they demonstrate that their supply chain is secure. New Zealand has its own programme called the Secure Export Scheme. While this programme is voluntary in nature, firms entering the programme are required to adopt, maintain, and comply with the standards of security for their supply chain. This thesis investigates the compliance behaviour of New Zealand exporters with the standards of security of the Secure Export Scheme. The Authorised Economic Programme is a new concept, and while there is scholarly research of other types of voluntary standards, research in this particular area is minimal. To the best of the researcher’s knowledge, this is one of the first studies to examine the compliance behaviour of firms that have been part of the programme since inception. Accordingly, this study is guided by the various views of the compliance theory and proffers a conceptual framework to delineate the different actors and factors that influence firms’ compliance behaviour. The study measured compliance and non-compliance of firms to understand the underlying patterns with specific best practices. This study contributes towards our current understanding of compliance behaviour. While, overall, the compliance of the New Zealand exporters with the best practices is high, there are some areas of concern. The study further identified that a number of firms were not compliant with certain best practices. This finding indicates that other factors, such as, the way the governing body presents its written requirements might influence the compliance behaviour with those specific best practices. The conceptual model proposed in this study lays the foundation for further research seeking to probe compliance behaviour of Authorised Economic Operators.</p>

Compliance Behaviour of New Zealand Exporters with Best Practices of Supply Chain Security

<p>Uninterrupted growth of international trade and the constant threats to global supply chains have led to the emergence of numerous voluntary compliance guidelines based on standards and compliance. Initiatives, such as, the Authorised Economic Operators is the result of the global efforts to facilitate, prevent and secure international trade against cross-border crime. The Authorised Economic Operator is an initiative of the World Customs Organisation and its member countries. Its core philosophy is developing public to private partnerships for the safety of international trade and trade facilitation. These initiatives are growing in scope with a variety of programmes developed by governments. The objective of these programmes is encouraging an ethos of voluntary compliance based on standards, best practices and self-governance. Certified firms can obtain a trusted trader status and cross-border benefits when they demonstrate that their supply chain is secure. New Zealand has its own programme called the Secure Export Scheme. While this programme is voluntary in nature, firms entering the programme are required to adopt, maintain, and comply with the standards of security for their supply chain. This thesis investigates the compliance behaviour of New Zealand exporters with the standards of security of the Secure Export Scheme. The Authorised Economic Programme is a new concept, and while there is scholarly research of other types of voluntary standards, research in this particular area is minimal. To the best of the researcher’s knowledge, this is one of the first studies to examine the compliance behaviour of firms that have been part of the programme since inception. Accordingly, this study is guided by the various views of the compliance theory and proffers a conceptual framework to delineate the different actors and factors that influence firms’ compliance behaviour. The study measured compliance and non-compliance of firms to understand the underlying patterns with specific best practices. This study contributes towards our current understanding of compliance behaviour. While, overall, the compliance of the New Zealand exporters with the best practices is high, there are some areas of concern. The study further identified that a number of firms were not compliant with certain best practices. This finding indicates that other factors, such as, the way the governing body presents its written requirements might influence the compliance behaviour with those specific best practices. The conceptual model proposed in this study lays the foundation for further research seeking to probe compliance behaviour of Authorised Economic Operators.</p>

An industrial oriented workflow for 3D printed, patient specific orthopedic cast

The clinical use of 3D printed patient specific orthopaedic cast is of wide interest. However, design and production have problems such as production time, which can take up to 35 h, and standardized procedure considering that there are medical devices that must comply mandatory and/or voluntary standards. Moreover, the proposed procedures do not fully consider the traceability of this innovative medical device design to comply with standards and industrial proposes. The aim of this work is to propose a semi-automatic workflow for the production of the 3D printed orthopaedic casts. The procedure is oriented towards a reduction time in different phases (as scan setting, designing technique, printing orientation) of the production flow. The workflow is compliant with recognized quality standards for the production of additive manufactured medical devices. This approach offers the possibility to introduce new 3D printed medical devices in clinical practice as well as to design an optimized industrial workflow.

Sustainable development in accounting

The purpose of this chapter is to present and discuss the essence and importance of accounting in the concept of sustainable development. Considerations are particularly focused on reporting CSR issues. The growing importance of the idea of sustainable development and the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility that arose on its basis, gave rise to the need for accounting systems to develop solutions enabling the provision of information on the methods and results of implementing these concepts in entities operating on the market. The interest in accounting with regard to the area of sustainable development has contributed to the development of vocabulary related to measurement, calculation, disclosure, reporting and verification of information on the activities of units for sustainable development. Reporting on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is still largely voluntary and non-standardised. However, there are various international organisations that develop frameworks and voluntary standards for non-financial reporting, the so-called Social Reporting Standards. The most important EU legislative initiative in the field of disclosure concerning environmental, social and corporate governance information is Directive 2014/95/EU of the European Parliament and Council from 22 October 2014 amending Directive 2013/34/EU as regards disclosure of non-financial and diversity in formation by certain large undertakings and groups. The combination of financial information (financial statements) with non-financial information relating to the environment, society and corporate governance is included in the integrated report. In Poland, the requirement to present non-financial information related to CSR was introduced by the Accounting Act. Polish companies should prepare a separate report—“Statement on nonfinancial information”. In 2017, the Polish Standard of Non-Financial Information (SIN, 2017) was published to help enterprises fulfil their obligations under the EU Directive.

Corporate Social Responsibility and MNCs: An Appraisal from Investment Treaty Law Perspective

Recent investment treaties recognize corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a mechanism for regulating corporate behavior concerning the protection and promotion of human rights, social and environmental standards. These treaties often include a universally recognized soft law version of CSR developed by the International Labor Organization (ILO) and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), considered prominent sources of CSR voluntary standards. This study analyzed significant advances in including such voluntary standards in investment treaty law, which led to implementing globally agreed norms regarding sustainable development into action. In addition to the inclusion of CSR standards in legally binding documents, this study argued that the practical issues involved in implementing the CSR standards should be addressed from the perspective of capital-dependent developing countries. To this end, this study adopted the due diligence test to apply CSR standards in cross-border investments better. For this purpose, theoretical analysis that combined descriptive and analytical approaches based on the available primary and secondary sources best suited current research. The study showed that applying CSR standards in capital-dependent developing countries was only possible when corporate, home state, and the host government took appropriate actions at the policy level. It concluded that such additional measures were needed to effectively implement CSR standards emphasizing prevention was better than cure and ensuring the appropriate due diligence process by the relevant parties. KEYWORDS: Corporate Social Responsibility, Investment Laws, Developing Countries.

The Role of the Engineering Expert in Product Liability Litigation

The purpose of this article is to assist the reader in understanding the role that an engineering expert witness plays in evaluating incidents related to product liability, so that he or she may become better acquainted with the role that an engineer plays in such litigation. The topics covered are admissibility of expert opinions, how to evaluate data, factual evidence, mandatory and voluntary standards, physical evidence, medical records, scientific literature, design decisions evaluation, environment of use, user's contribution, reports of opposing experts, report of findings, and deposition and trial testimonies.

The Place of Voluntary Standards in Managing Social and Environmental Risks in Global Value Chains

Under the notion of human rights due diligence (HRDD), firms are under a responsibility to account for the social and environmental impact connected to their operations across global value chains. This responsibility intersects with the sphere of operation of voluntary sustainability standards (VSS), which certify production against certain social and environmental criteria. With mandatory European rules on HRDD in the making, the question arises regarding the extent of alignment of VSS with HRDD notions and, consequently, the possibility for this form of transnational private regulation to complement European Union (EU) HRDD legislation. After presenting the regulatory effects of HRDD in global value chains and its current transposition in EU instruments, this contribution examines the relationship between private standards and HRDD. By delving into the substantive requirements and policies of several schemes certifying agricultural commodities, this paper studies the extent to which they manage social and environmental risks in global value chains and the possible support they provide to firms subject to the upcoming HRDD obligations.

Agroforestry And Reforestation With The Gold Standard - Decision Analysis of A Voluntary Carbon Offset Label

Voluntary standards help to ensure the quality of projects eligible for carbon offsetting, i.e. selling carbon certificates. However, in deciding on whether to adopt such standards the managers of carbon offset projects are faced with uncertainty regarding the costs and risks involved. Decision Analysis provides a helpful set of tools that can support such decisions by forecasting outcomes under different scenarios. We applied Decision Analysis methods to generate models for the decision to certify two projects in Costa Rica with the voluntary carbon offset label Gold Standard. We evaluated certifying an additional site of a partially certified reforestation project, as well as the initial certification of an agroforestry project. We calibrated and interviewed decision-makers and stakeholders of the certification projects to identify important parameters and translated these into a decision model. We ran the final decision model as a Monte Carlo simulation to project plausible ranges of decision outcomes, expressed as Net Present Values and annual cash flows. We identified critical uncertainties and research priorities by using the Expected Value of Perfect Information. The results indicate that certification of the two projects would result in a positive Net Present Value. The partially low return on investment of the certification, however, shows the need for projects to undergo thorough evaluation and generate customized strategies before participating in a voluntary carbon offset scheme. The Decision Analysis approaches we describe can help to improve the process of decision making under uncertainty and should be widely adopted for evaluating the potential impacts of certification.