Cooperative bank efficiency in Japan: a parametric distance function analysis

This study examines the relative performance of Japanese cooperative banks between 1998 and 2009, explicitly modeling non-performing loans as an undesirable output. Three key findings emerge. First, the sector is characterized by increasing returns to scale which supports the ongoing amalgamation process within the sector. Second, although restricted in product offerings, markets and their membership base, Japanese cooperatives secured both technical progress (a positive shift in the frontier) and a decrease in technical inefficiency (distance from the frontier). Third, the analysis highlighted that regulatory pressure to reduce non-performing loans will have an adverse impact on both output and performance. 

Cooperative traits of technology adoption: Website adoption in Irish credit unions

The purpose of this paper is to examine website adoption and its resultant effects on credit union performance in Ireland. Credit union specific factors influence adoption as does the socio-economic profile of the population from where the credit union draws its membership. Website adoption results in a reduction in the spread between the loan and dividend rate with this primarily driven by a fall in the loan rate. Given that the adoption of a website, albeit with limited functionality, translates into cost benefits this augurs well for the current restructuring process underway for Irish credit unions which has as one of its objectives the upgrade of credit union ICT sophistication.

Simultaneous and cooperative gas storage and gas production using bifunctional zeolites

Nitric oxide can be stored in and produced from zeolites in a simultaneous and cooperative process

Nanometer-scale mapping of irreversible electrochemical nucleation processes on solid Li-ion electrolytes

Electrochemical processes associated with changes in structure, connectivity or composition typically proceed via new phase nucleation with subsequent growth of nuclei. Understanding and controlling reactions requires the elucidation and control of nucleation mechanisms. However, factors controlling nucleation kinetics, including the interplay between local mechanical conditions, microstructure and local ionic profile remain inaccessible. Furthermore, the tendency of current probing techniques to interfere with the original microstructure prevents a systematic evaluation of the correlation between the microstructure and local electrochemical reactivity. In this work, the spatial variability of irreversible nucleation processes of Li on a Li-ion conductive glass-ceramics surface is studied with ~30 nm resolution. An increased nucleation rate at the boundaries between the crystalline AlPO4 phase and amorphous matrix is observed and attributed to Li segregation. This study opens a pathway for probing mechanisms at the level of single structural defects and elucidation of electrochemical activities in nanoscale volumes.

Cooperative Learning in Science: Follow-up from primary to high school

This paper reports a two-year longitudinal study of the effects of cooperative learning on science attainment, attitudes towards science, and social connectedness during transition from primary to high school. A previous project on cooperative learning in primary schools observed gains in science understanding and in social aspects of school life. This project followed 204 children involved in the previous project and 440 comparison children who were not as they undertook transition from 24 primary schools to 16 high schools. Cognitive, affective, and social gains observed in the original project survived transition. The implications improving the effectiveness of school transition by using cooperative learning initiatives are explored. Possibilities for future research and the implications for practice and policy are discussed.

Late Bronze Age settlement nucleation in Umbria.

Malone, C.A.T. and S.K.F. Stoddart, .

Decentralised formation control and stability analysis for cooperative multi-vehicle manoeuvre

Multi-vehicle cooperative formation control problem is an important and typical topic of research on multi-agent system. This paper presents a formation stability conjecture to conceive a new methodology for solving the decentralised multi-vehicle formation control problem. It employs the “extension-decomposition-aggregation” scheme to transform the complex multi-agent control problem into a group of sub-problems which is able to be solved conveniently. Based on this methodology, it is proved that if all the individual augmented subsystems can be stabilised by using any approach, the overall formation system is not only asymptotically but also exponentially stable in the sense of Lyapunov within a neighbourhood of the desired formation. Simulation study on 6-DOF aerial vehicles (Aerosonde UAVs) has been performed to verify the achieved formation stability result. The proposed multi-vehicle formation control strategy can be conveniently extended to other cooperative control problems of multi-agent systems.

Raiffeisenism abroad: why did German cooperative banking fail in Ireland but prosper in the Netherlands?

Why did imitations of Raiffeisen’s rural cooperative savings and loans associations work well in some European countries, but fail in others? This article considers the example of Raiffeisenism in Ireland and in the Netherlands. Raiffeisen banks arrived in both places at the same time, but had drastically different fates. In Ireland they were almost wiped out by the early 1920s, while in the Netherlands they proved to be a long-lasting institutional transplant. Raiffeisen banks were successful in the Netherlands because they operated in niche markets with few competitors, while rural financial markets in Ireland were unsegmented and populated by long- established incumbents, leaving little room for new players, whatever their institu- tional advantages. Dutch Raiffeisen banks were largely self-financing, closely integrated into the wider rural economy, and able to take advantage of economic and religious divisions in rural society. Their Irish counterparts were not.