KNOWLEDGE AND DEVELOPMENT
Year:2009 | Volume:16 | Issue:27|Papers Count:11

In this study, we examine financial development effect on the economic growth of Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) member countries. For this, we have estimated convergence-growth equation by using powerful panel technique, two stages least square method and generalized moments technique during 1980-2004. The results indicate the positive effect of financial development on economic growth of OIC member countries. Furthermore, based on all estimations, financial development created by private sector has greater effect on economic growth compared to that of banking system. In these countries, economic growth motives are very weak, while obstructive elements in front of economic growth are more powerful. As a general result, one can say that these countries settle in proximity of steady state level, but due to the level differences among OIC member countries, there is a large difference between their per capita gross domestic products. Countries with larger financial development, bigger trade openness, larger physical and human investment rate, larger labor growth rate and smaller government size, could experience higher growth during this period.

Public pricing of products is one of the most important economical issues, since any changes in the pricing, affects both the welfare of consumers and quantity of goods and Services which are produced. This paper deals with the optimal gas pricing in different sectors, including households, public- commercial and industrial sectors by the Ramsey method of pricing. In this regard, at the first market demand is estimated and then price elasticitiy’s of demand for different sectors of economy are calculated. Regarding to Ramsay pricing method which, is based on the assumption of increasing return to scale, and one of its application is natural monopoly, after the estimation of natural gas production function, the issue of existence of increasing return to scale is surveyed in this industry. After determination of production function, marginal cost of industry is calculated. And at the end with solving Ramsey equation system via Matlab software, optimal prices in all sectors are calculated in 2006, and compared with the current prices. These prices are estimated on the basis of demand elasticities in different sectors and non- lose of Khorasan Gas Company.

E-commerce is globally developing and is as a business fashion. EC adoption results in many benefits. These benefits strengthen every company's motivation toward EC adoption. Small companies because of their vital role in Iran economy can promote system productivity and efficiency. Identifying barrier and facilitators improve manager/owner of small business for planning and decision making. This paper tries to apply e– commerce experts’ viewpoints in presenting a conceptual model for identifying factors effect adopting e- commerce in small business. We design a 43-item questionnaire with Likert five point's scale. Total reliability of research instrument was calculated 0.94 based on Cronbach alpha. By examining 20 ecommerce expert's viewpoints through t- student and freedman tests we test research hypotheses. The 6-stages proposed electronic maturity model has been proved (P<0.001). t-student test indicated that organizational factors, market factors & Electronic Commerce Characteristics (three main hypotheses) along with their subfactors (12 minor hypotheses) are recognized as effective factors in small business EC adoption.

In Iran, agriculture is the largest production sector after oil and services that has allocated around 20 present of Gross national product and main share of non oil export to it. Moreover it is a location for employment of large number of country population. So growth of this sector can determine country growth notably. Infrastructure investment is one of the factors that can increase productivity in agriculture by increasing labor, capital and other inputs performance .This study surveys effects of public infrastructure investment on agricultural productivity growth in Iran for period 1350- 1382 and for this purpose, uses government's development expenditures in agricultural sector as a proxy of agricultural infrastructural investment. In this research, the dual manner and Translog cost function has used. These models were estimated through the Seemingly Unrelated Regression System and the Maximum Entropy models. Estimating of cost elasticity respect to infrastructure investment indicate on the negative and significant effect of infrastructure investment on production cost in agriculture sector. Moreover, result of productivity growth's decomposition to scale, tec1mical,infrastructure and human investment effects, showed that after technical change, public infrastructure In Iran, agriculture is the largest production sector after oil and services that has allocated around 20 present of Gross national product and main share of non oil export to it. Moreover it is a location for employment of large number of country population. So growth of this sector can determine country growth notably. Infrastructure investment is one of the factors that can increase productivity in agriculture by increasing labor, capital and other inputs performance. This study surveys effects of public infrastructure investment on agricultural productivity growth in Iran for period 1350- 1382 and for this purpose, uses government's development expenditures in agricultural sector as a proxy of agricultural infrastructural investment. In this research, the dual marmer and Translog cost function has used. These models were estimated through the Seemingly Unrelated Regression System and the Maximum Entropy models. Estimating of cost elasticity respect to infrastructure investment indicate on the negative and significant effect of infrastructure investment on production cost in agriculture sector. Moreover, result of productivity growth's decomposition to scale, tec1mical,infrastructure and human investment effects, showed that after technical change, public infrastructure investment is the most important factor in increasing of agricultural productivity growth.

Most oligopolistic models in the oil market begin with the assumption that OPEC is a cartel. Successive increases in oil prices during recent years, and OPEC’s inability to regularize the oil market fortifies the possibility of the existence of competitive behavior in the oil market. Now, with regard to the intense fluctuations in the oil market, prediction of oil supply for politicians and oil companies is important. In the recent years, use of neural networks, along with econometrical methods, of forecasting of economic variables is a norm. Because neural networks have, exclusive characteristics like release of statistical hypotheses and capability of solving complex nonlinear problems. In this article in addition to prediction oil supply in the eleven producing countries, by use of linear regression and neural networks, the results of every country are separately compared. The estimation results show that neural networks are presenting better predictions in comparison to the linear regression models.

In recent years, along with enhancement of boards of directors’ status and their crucial role on organizational strategic decisions, it has been paid significant attention to the improvement of board performance level. On the other hand, the increase of environmental complexities of the organization and its environment has highlighted the significance of information role on managerial decisions. Therefore, it seems that the use of information plays a vital role on performance improvement of the modern board in today’s knowledge-base economy. The purpose of the study is to investigate the factors affecting information technology used by the board and their impacts on board's performance. To examine the hypothesis, a number of board members were chosen in both manufacturing and services companies in Mashhad. The applied research methodology was a combination of various data, both quantitative and qualitative. Quantitative data were analyzed by using regression analysis and goodness of fit index. The research results indicate that the factors include; environmental dynamism, culture and firm strategy have effect on using information Technology and that performance level can improve with information use of board of directors. In addition, chief information officer plays a moderator role on influence of using information technology on firm performance level.

Openness index is an issue that considered by many economists, decision and policy makers in most countries. In this paper the relationship between openness and economic growth in Iran with using of indigenous growth model as well as, time series data over 1971-2004 is investigated. For this purpose, we used Auto Regressive Distributed Lag Model (ARDL) and long-run and short-run relations between involved variables in model are considered. Results indicated that, there was long-run relationship and co-integration between involved variables and Gross Domestic Production variable. Furthermore, accompanied by other variables openness as a new variable, had a positive and significant effect on dependent variable. With regard to these findings, we are able to point that the growth of openness index will improve the economic growth.

In this research, we investigate the effects of foreign direct investment on non-oily exports in Iran. For this purpose, by using data for the period 1963 to 2005, an Auto-Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model has been estimated. Findings show that the inflow of FDI has a significant and positive effect on non-oil exports in long run and short run of Iran. Moreover, increasing in real exchange rate and decreasing domestic demand, because growing in non-oily export. The result of dynamic model confirms the long run relationship between explanatory variables and non-oil exports. The ECM model also implies that any shocks imposed to each of independent variables of the model may continue to 2.5-3 years are need for FDI to return to its long -term trend.

Social justice is one of the fundamental concepts of sustainable urban development. To elaborate the concept of social justice, is essential to review and comment from urban areas, basic facilities and basic services. Therefore, this article is trying, to show how the rate and distribution of space health indicators - health, religious, social - cultural, sports - recreational, administrative - Services, and Research in the city of Mashhad. It also analyzes the pay level of enjoyment in the regions of Mashhad and describe the effect of equitable distribution of facilities and urban sustainability a provides possible solutions for achieving optimal postural. For this purpose the above index was measured as separated regions, by the Morris model and ArcGis software. The results of the study show that 25 percent of the city regions (including regions 1, 8 and Samen) are enjoying, 25 percent of areas (including areas 7, 9 and 11) are entitled, 8/3 percent (only the region 4) are average, 25 percent of areas (including areas 2, 3 and 10) are excluded and finally 16/7 percent of areas (including areas 5 and 6) are very deprived. Correlation coefficient calculation between the number and degree of development of regions shows a negative relationship about -0/656. Because gaining the people's participation is important in the path of sustainable development Therefore, Level partnerships people were assessed by different parameters, including social participation in political parties, associations and different...Then the correlation coefficient was calculated between the Amount of social participation People with the Level of enjoyment regions in terms of indicators mentioned, that the result shows a negative relationship (-0/13) poor between them.