The Future of EU Cohesion Policy. Endogenous Development – Added Value of Intervention – Regulatory Frameworks

The successful operation of the regional development – or cohesion – policy of the European Union has a strategic importance from the point of view of the whole integration process. Strengthening economic, social and territorial cohesion and decreasing disparities between member states and regions are not only one of the main priorities of the integration, but at the same time these are justified expectations of the people living in the member states of the union. The cohesion transfers should be spent on those factors which have the biggest contribution to the improvement of development prospects and competitiveness in the given regions. Theories on regional development have controversial conclusions about the long-term formation of development disparities. However, it has become evident that successful development policies are based on endogenous factors, innovation and well-functioning institutions. After examining theoretical considerations and regional disparities the study analyses the impacts of EU regional policy and evaluates the main elements of the proposed regulatory frameworks for the period 2014-2020.

Changing visual value of deciduous species in the climate change

The article deals with the changing visual value of deciduous species. Due to climate change, the climatic patterns found on the plants’ growing area may change. Therefore, foliage of deciduous trees changes itscolor in the fall season witha different timing and intensity. This shift can modify the functional, ornamental and ecological value of these plants in the fall season, which is of special interest in the context of landscape design. However, this effect of climate change hasn’t been examined in terms of landscape architecture yet.In the article we are looking for deciduous species that can be appropriate subjectsforresearch, we are giving suggestions for choosing the right location for a future research and proposing available resources of satellite images, that can provide the basis for evaluation of leaf coloring. We also review already existing methods for calculating the degree of fall leaf coloring.We propose a novel method of satellite image processing to evaluate the coloring of a stand. Leaf Coloring Index (LCI) shows the leaf color’s relation to the color realms. LCI is appropriate for setting up a phenological model based onclimate data in a future research. Based on future climate models, the change of the examined stand’s visual value can be predicted. The results might affect the future use of plant species in landscape architecture.

An asymptotic test for the Conditional Value-at-Risk

Conditional Value-at-Risk (equivalent to the Expected Shortfall, Tail Value-at-Risk and Tail Conditional Expectation in the case of continuous probability distributions) is an increasingly popular risk measure in the fields of actuarial science, banking and finance, and arguably a more suitable alternative to the currently widespread Value-at-Risk. In my paper, I present a brief literature survey, and propose a statistical test of the location of the CVaR, which may be applied by practising actuaries to test whether CVaR-based capital levels are in line with observed data. Finally, I conclude with numerical experiments and some questions for future research.