Analysis of the Security Management Market in Hong Kong

Analysis of the Security Management Market in Hong Kong The Security Management Industry INTRODUCTION Security management is the combination of hardware, software, and services that normalizes, aggregates, correlates, and visualizes data from disparate security products. Security management is a broad term that encompasses several currently distinct market segments. With the presence of the Internet, spam is becoming increasingly costly and dangerous as spammers deliver more virulent payloads through email attachments. According to a recent IDC (2004) study, the volume of spam messages sent daily worldwide jumped from 7 billion in 2002 to 23 billion in 2004. The Hong Kong Population has increasingly Internet users. This boom in the electronic commerce creates ease in communication and on business transactions however this has also compromised the internal data security with the presence of hackers. Industry analysts believe that increased spending on internet security products and the establishment of a corporate data security policy is equally important in avoiding information leakage. Estimated information security spending in Hong Kong will reach USD 231 million in 2003 and will maintain a stable growth to reach USD 252 million in 2004. U.S. security products enjoy an excellent reputation in Hong Kong and should continue to dominate the market. According to Braunberg (2004), a major early driver for security management products is the need to get a handle on event data emanating from intrusion detection systems. Many security management products are chiefly concerned with the consolidation, correlation and prioritization of this type of data. These event management and correlation products address the volume of data and its heterogeneous origin, both in terms of devices and vendors. SECURITY MANAGEMENT MARKET IN HONG KONG Market Highlights The continuous increase in demand for communication internationally, internet has been increasingly in demand. With the Internet in business transactions, companies expanded sales opportunities through e-commerce and reduce business costs. With the presence of Internet, companies can broadly expand customer base. However, in spite of all these benefits that companies experienced with Internet, it has also brought some costs to companies. Internet opens up network and servers to external and internal attacks. In order to guard against these attacks, Hong Kong companies have increasingly felt the need to purchase Internet security. According to the report of HKCERT (2004), the number of PCs installed in Hong Kong has skewed to the low end. In the survey conducted, it shows that 63.5% of the surveyed companies had installed 1-9 PCs and only 1.3% had installed 100 PCs or above. Consumer Analysis In the report of HKCERT (2002), industry players estimated that the Hong Kong market for internet security products and services in 2001 was USD 231 million and will reach USD 252 million in 2004. Generally U.S. internet security products are the major players and are enjoying an excellent reputation in Hong Kong and are continually dominating the market. Industry Estimates The survey of HKCERT in 2004 showed that Hong Kong companies adopted security technologies to secure their computer form attacks. The survey includes 3,000 companies from different industry sectors in Hong Kong. According to the survey anti-virus software was the most popular security measure, being used by 90.9% of the companies interviewed in 2004. Physical security (65.5%), Firewall (65.4%) and Password (60.6%) were the next three common security measures adopted (HKCERT, 2004). The information security awareness of the companies in Hong Kong has increased considerably as the percentage of companies without any security measures in place dropped from 10.1% in 2003 to 3.6% in 2004 (HKCERT, 2004) As the survey shows, the use of firewall has significantly increased in 2004. This is due to the increasing awareness of a number of companies that the basic security tools can not completely stop virus and because software vendors pay great effort in promoting their products. From the table above, US rank number one in the list showing that US is the major host of malware in 2006. On the other hand, Hong Kong only is on the 9th place however it is still a major contributor of malware in the world. Sophos notes that up to 90% of all spam is now relayed from zombie computers, hi-jacked by Trojan horses, worms and viruses under the control of hackers. This means that they do not need to be based in the same country as the computers being used to send the spam (IET, 2007). Sophos found that the most prolific email threats during 2006 were the Mytob, Netsky, Sober and Zafi families of worms, which together accounted for more than 75% of all infected email (IET, 2007). According to the report, email will continue to be an important vector for malware authors, though the increasing adoption of email gateway security is making hackers turn to other routes for infection (IET, 2007). Malware infection will continue to affect many websites. SophosLabs is uncovering an average of 5,000 new URLs hosting malicious code each day (IET, 2007). In 2006, it has been discovered that there is a decrease in use of spyware due to multiple Trojan downloaders. Statistics reveal that in January 2006 spyware accounted for 50.43% of all infected email, while 40.32% were emails linking to websites containing Trojan downloaders. By December 2006 the figures had been reversed, with the latter now accounting for 51.24%, and spyware-infected emails reduced to 41.87%.(IET, 2007) Market Channels In Hong Kong, consumer-oriented products such as anti-virus, overseas companies usually market their products via local distributors who will then channel the products to resellers and in some cases directly to retailers. For enterprise-oriented products, which require value-added services such as system integration and after-sales support, overseas companies can go through local distributors and/or resellers. (Chau, 2003) Competitive Analysis The internet security market has four segments: anti-virus, firewall, encryption software, and Security Authentication, Authorization Administration. Anti-virus Software Anti-virus software identifies and/or eliminates harmful software and macros. Anti-virus are mostly software based. The major players in Hong Kong for the consumer market includes Symantec/Norton which possesses 50% of the market share in Hong Kong, Norman, Nai/McAfee, and Trend Micro which are basically US origin (Chau, 2003). According to Chau (2003), consumers of Anti-virus are generally price sensitive and usually seek for products with established brand name. In the enterprise market of anti-virus, the major players include Trend Micro, NAI/McAfee, Norman and Symantec (Chau, 2003). According to the analysis, enterprise users will usually seek professional opinions from their I.T. service provider and are more likely to focus on brand reputation and offered features and pricing is not the main concern, although with the downturn in the economy, companies are becoming more price-sensitive (Chau, 2003) Firewall Firewall software/hardware identifies and blocks access to certain applications and data. There are two categories of firewall products: software and hardware. The players in Hong Kongs software firewall market are Check Point Software which dominates the market of 60% market share, Computer Associates, Symantec and Secure Computing (Chau, 2003). In the hardware firewall market, the major players are Netscreen with 50% market share, Cisco (PIX) with 20% market share, Sonic Wall, Watchguard and Nokie of Finland (Chau, 2003). According to the report, the price for software firewalls averages USD 20 per user. On the hardware firewalls side, the number of users and the kinds of features determine the price. A low-end firewall server costs USD 600 to USD 700, a mid-range server costs USD 2,000 to USD 4,000, and a high-end server costs USD 10,000 and above. Netscreen and Sonic Wall are quite common in small to medium-sized enterprises. Cisco targets large corporations. Brand reputation and price are the prime concerns for buyers. According to industry players, there is an increasing preference for hardware firewalls over software firewalls because the hardware firewall has a speed advantage and is easier to maintain. (Chau, 2003) Encryption Encryption software is a security product that uses crypto-graphical algorithms to protect the confidentiality of data, applications, and user identities. According to the study, the most commonly-used standards in Hong Kong are SSH, SSL, PGP, RSA, and DES. Different standards are used for different objectives. SSH is mostly used to secure TCP connections between remote sites. SSL is commonly used in web browsers to secure web traffic. PGP is used for email encryption. RSA is for PKI system authentication and authorization. DES or 3DES are commonly used in the banking sector. (Chau, 2003) According to the report of Chau (2003), the major players in encryption in Hong are PGP, Utimaco, F-Secure, SSH (Security Shell), and RSA. Security 3A Software Security 3A (administration, authorization, and authentication) software is used for administering security on computer systems and includes the processes of defining, creating, changing, deleting, and auditing users. Authentication software is used for verifying users identities and avoiding repudiation. Authorization software determines data access according to corporate policy. Administrative software includes internet access control, email scanning, intrusion detection and vulnerability assessment, and security management. The major players in PKI system in Hong Kong are Baltimore of UK, Verisign, and Entrust (Chau, 2003). Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) An intrusion detection system (IDS) examines system or network activity to find possible intrusions or attacks. Intrusion detection systems are either network-based or host-based. Network-based IDS are more common. According to the report of Chau (2003), the major players of IDS in Hong Kong are ISS (Real Secure) which dominate in the market of 65% market share, Enterasys (Dragon), Symantec (Intruder Alert), Tripwire (Tripwire), Computer Associates (Entrust Intrusion Protection) and Cisco (Secure IDS). In the analysis it has been known that IDS end-users are mostly medium to large enterprises and the most significant purchasing criteria for end users are reliability and compatibility and price is not a key factor (Chau, 2003). Content Security Products The major players of content security products includes Clearswift which has 50% market share, Websense which has 25% market share, Trend Micro and Serve Control (Chau, 2003). Market Trends According to the report, on corporate side, the demand for network-based anti-virus would likely to increase than the demand for desktop-based anti-virus products since mostly viruses attacks are usually via internet (Chau, 2003). On the other hand, in the consumer side, consumer market would likely to fade away since consumers are downloading free anti-virus from the Internet. It is expected that ISPs will increasingly provide AV protection as a value-added service to the users (Chau, 2003). In the firewall software, it has been expected that the demand for hardware-based appliance products would likely to increase for small and medium-sized companies. (Chau, 2003) For Intrusion detection and vulnerability assessment, it is predicted that it will become very popular as enterprises will shift to a balance between internal and external threats. In addition, the distinction between host-based and network-based IDS is becoming blurry with the creation of IDS consoles that receive data from both the network sensors and host agents. Integrated solutions will become the trend. (Chau, 2003) Market Driver There are several market drivers of security management market. Chau (2003) identified some of these market drivers. In his report, he enumerated three of these market drivers which includes the Internet growth, telecommuting trend, and government generated awareness of Internet security. Internet Growth In Hong Kong, the Internet has become the prevalent communication means between business transaction and even between employees with the increasing trend of globalization. According to Hong Kong Government survey in 2001, 1.25 million households or 61% of all households in Hong Kong has PCs of which 80% are connected to the Internet compared to 50% households with PCs in 2000 of which only 36% are connected to the Internet in 2000 (Chau, 2003). Generally, consumers are making use of the internet to send emails, surf the web, carry out research, conduct on line banking transactions, and make low-value purchases. The survey estimated that around 6% of all persons over 14 had used one or more types of online purchasing services for personal matters in the 12 months before the survey (Chau, 2003). On the other hand, on the business side, more than one third of businesses in Hong Kong have internet connections. In 2001, about 12% of businesses had delivered their goods, services or information through electronic means which is 4% higher than that in 2000. The estimated amount of business receipts received from selling goods, services or information through electronic means in 2000 was USD 1 billion. Increased connectivity to the internet creates higher chances of hacker attacks, especially if the users have a constant live connection, such as through a DSL line. (Chau, 2003) According to the Hong Kong Commercial Crimes Bureau, reports of computer-related offenses increased from 235 incidents in 2001 to 210 in the first nine months in 2002. Computer attacks had affected 5,460 computers in the past 12 months. Financial loss caused by computer-related crimes rose from USD 195,000 in 2001 to USD 236,000 in 2002. The Computer Crime Section of the Hong Kong Commercial Crimes Bureau believes that only 0.3% of the victims reported hacking incidents, fearing that doing so would damage their reputation. Facing increasing internal and external hacking threats, companies are seeking security tools to protect their network and to maintain public confidence. (Chau, 2003) Telecommuting Trend Another major driver of security products, according to Chau (2003), is the increasing decentralization of the work force, such as mobile sales teams in the insurance industry who need to access corporate networks via PDAs. There is an increasing trend of businesses and organizations which benefit from employees ability to dial into corporate networks via the internet, however, this often creates information security risks within the organization, resulting in increased dependence on, and greater deployment of, security products (Chau, 2003). Government-generated awareness of internet security Another major driver of security products is the government awareness on the importance of Internet security. With this awareness, government organizations are formed. Like for example the SAR Government. The SAR Government is committed to providing a safe and secure environment to foster the development of e-commerce in Hong Kong in which has built a public key infrastructure (PKI) through the establishment of a public certification authority and a voluntary CA recognition scheme in Hong Kong (Chau, 2003). Currently, there are four recognized certification authorities operating in Hong Kong which includes JETCO, Digi-Sign Certification Ltd., HiTRUST.Com and the Hong Kong Postmaster General. In addition to the establishment of the PKI systems, the Hong Kong Government has also engaged substantial resources to educate the public regarding the importance of information security. For instance, the Crime Prevention Unit of the Technology Crime Division of the Hong Kong Police is responsible for providing advice on all aspects of computer security. It also produces educational materials on raising computer security awareness and makes presentations on technology crime prevention topics. (Chau, 2003) In addition to the market drivers in which Chau has enumerated, there are still other market drivers of security management market. Braunberg (2004) identified two major groups of market drivers which are the near-tern market drivers and long-term market drivers. Under the near-term market drivers are manage or prevent, perimeter management, vulnerability assessment, embracing standards and the brains of the operation. Long-term market drivers include complexity and cost, device and security integration, knowledge database resources, lack of trust, on demand of computing and social engineering. Near-Term Market Drivers Manage or Prevent. In the analysis of Braunberg (2004), the chief driver of event management solutions is the continuing and hugely annoying number of false positives pouring out of intrusion detection systems. According to him, a counter driver to growth in the managed security segment is the emergence of intrusion prevention systems, particularly in-line solutions that can perform real-time data blocking (Braunberg, 2004). The adoption of intrusion prevention system could inhibit spending on event management systems and security management vendors should consider these products competitive to their own (Braunberg, 2004) Perimeter Management. Security management products has evolve due tot to the demand of securing the perimeter. According to Braunberg (2004), security management solutions are evolving to integrate data from a host of perimeter products in which event management systems often evolved along separate lines with products for firewall, antivirus, and IDS. Vulnerability Assessments. According to Braunberg (2004), one of the near- term drivers for which end-users are of concern is understanding what the security risks are. Generally, clients are looking to leverage vulnerability assessments to help prioritize emerging threats. Increasingly vulnerability data is being leveraged in event management systems (Braunberg, 2004). Embracing Standards. According to Braunberg (2004), the industry is a long way from embracing standards for sharing event information but some progress has been made over the last year. The Internet Engineering Task Forces Incident Object Description and Exchange Format (IODEF) draft specification is gaining some traction and its adoption would be a significant step forward for the market (Braunberg, 2004) The Brains of this Operation. According to Braunbergs analysis (2004), the infatuation with IPS will be short-lived unless significant improvements can be made in reducing false positives in events however security management products will increasingly play a major role in providing the analytic smarts behind IPS solutions. Long-Term Market Drivers: Complexity and Cost. With the increasingly complexity in the web-based business models, the more tangled is the security solutions for the end-users. According to Braunberg (2004), businesses building online strategies from scratch can be overwhelmed by the initial investment of security solutions, while those trying to adapt existing solutions to evolving security concerns are besieged by maintenance costs. Device and Security Integration. According to Braunberg (2004), equipment makers are paying much closer attention to imbedded security functionality in devices and are actively attempting to integrate security as a value-added service in order to change the thinking of the end users of security products as an â€Å"add-on† or an extraneous component of infrastructure. In addition, vendors are looking to unite service providers with standards programs that simplify client understanding and reduce the complexity of product buying (Braunberg, 2004). Knowledge Database Resources. Another market driver for security products is to actively secure the knowledge database from attack patterns and other descriptions of the enemies. The security products vendors should reinvent a faster response to the known threats. According to Braunberg (2004), multi-product vendors particularly will look to evolve from real-time monitoring to broader real-time management. Lack of Trust: According to Braunberg (2004), end users, whether they are corporate users putting a business plan on a server or a consumer buying a CD, have ingrained habits that they are not necessarily willing to give up. For example, no matter how good an online banks security system is, a consumer will have to be convinced that its services are not only as good as a brick and mortar banks services, but better (Braunberg, 2004). On demand Computing: According to Braunberg (2004), the availability of ubiquitous computing resources on demand will further drive the need for sophisticated, highly flexible security management solutions that combine both identity management and event management. According to him, the demand for more esoteric offerings such as GRID computing is the major long-term driver for security management solutions (Braunberg, 2004). Social Engineering. According to Braunberg (2004), clients are still facing risks in security that employees represent just through the human desire to be helpful, and hackers exploit this through â€Å"social engineering.† According to him, a component of managed security will need elements of employee training to build awareness of outside threats (Braunberg, 2004). According to the analysis of Braunberg (2004), the security segment will continually be strong in which the diversity of interest ranges from an array of different types of companies which indicates a leverage of controlling security function. In addition, since end users demand has also evolve in which they demand for more in-depth defensive strategies ad best of breed approaches to purchasing decisions, security solution in turn has become more complex. Case Study: Trend Micro Enterprise History In 1988, Trend Micro Incorporated was founded by Steve Chang and his wife in California. Trend Micro Incorporated is a global leader in network antivirus and Internet content security software and services. The company led the migration of virus protection from the desktop to the network server and the Internet gateway—gaining a reputation for vision and technological innovation along the way. Trend Micro focuses on outbreak prevention and on providing customers with a comprehensive approach to managing the outbreak lifecycle and the impact of network worms and virus threats to productivity and information, through initiatives such as Trend Micro Enterprise Protection Strategy. Trend Micro ha grown into a transnational organization with more than 2,500 employees representing more than 30 countries around the globe. Many of the leading high-tech and security industry analysts have tracked Trend Micros growth and performance for the last several years, hailing the company as â€Å"visionary†, citing its leadership and innovation in the security industry. According to Brian Burke, IDC Research Manager, â€Å"Trend Micro has consistently demonstrated a strong position in the Secure Content Management market. To remain successful Trend Micro has adapted quickly to market challenges and the evolution of security threats such as spyware, phishing and spam, in which financial gain has become the number one driving force. Given Trend Micros track record and its strong upward momentum, we expect the company to continue delivering innovative solutions that provide customers with timely protection against unpredictable threats.† Trend Micro has earned a reputation for turning great ideas into cutting-edge technology. In recognition of the antivirus companys strategy and vision, the analyst firm Gartner has hailed Trend Micro as a visionary malicious code management supplier for four consecutive years. Citing its flexible and efficient transnational management model, BusinessWeek acknowledged Trend Micro as one ofa new breed of high-tech companies that are defying conventional wisdom. According to IDC, Trend Micro has held the top global market share in internet gateway antivirus for six consecutive years. A history of innovation In 1995 Trend Micro became an industry pioneer in the migration of virus protection from the desktop to the server level, with the launch of Trend Microâ„ ¢ ServerProtec. In 1997 it launched the industrys first virus protection for the Internet gateway with InterScan VirusWall. Since then, it has demonstrated a history of innovation in server-based antivirus products that has contributed to the leadership position it holds today in this market (according to the recent IDC report Worldwide Antivirus 2004-2008 Forecast and 2003 Competitive Vendor Shares. Trend Micro continues to shift the paradigms of antivirus security with cutting-edge products, services and strategies like Trend Micro Network VirusWall, Outbreak Prevention Services, and its Enterprise Protection Strategy. Trend Micro is committed to following its path of innovation to help companies manage todays ever-increasingly complex, fast-spreading malware threats. SWOT Analysis Strengths Business and security knowledge Trend Micro has been a pioneer and innovator in the antivirus software market since 1988, anticipating trends and developing products and services to protect information as new computing standards have been adopted around the world. Service and support excellence, that is, Trend Micro products and services are backed by TrendLabs a global network of antivirus research and support centers. TrendLabs monitors potential security threats worldwide and develops the means to help customers prevent the spread of outbreaks, minimize the impact of new threats, and restore their networks. Flexible workforce through contingent workers for seasonal/cyclical projects Loyal, hardworking, and diverse workforce who, in addition to good compensation, have an opportunity to do well Multinational corporation operating through regional subsidiaries to minimize cultural differences Low employee turnover Relatively rapid product development processes that allow for timely updating and release of new products Revenues and profits rising at 30% a year with merger/acquisition or investment in 92 companies over past five years Software products have high name recognition, broad-based corporate and consumer acceptance and numerous powerful features that are in use worldwide, thereby promoting standardization and competitive advantage through their ease of integration and cost-effectiveness Top rating from Fortune for best company to work at and most admired company Worlds largest software company with global name recognition and strong reputation for innovative products Weaknesses Perceived by many as a cut-throat competitor that uses its dominant market position to marginalize competition by stealing/destroying the competitions products, stifling product innovation, and decreasing the availability of competitor products Products have a single application focus and do not work well with or on-top of other products Reputation has suffered because of entanglement in antitrust and â€Å"permatemps† Vizcaino litigation Misperceptions of securitys value or purpose Opportunities Cheaper global telecommunication costs open new markets as people connect to the Internet in which in turn increases the need for security products Mobile phone applications and exploitation of personal digital assistants represent a growth industry so that strategic alliances could provide the company with opportunity in a market where it currently has little or no significant presence Business Continuity Reduced Costs Potential Revenue Opportunities Trend Micro holds the top market share for both worldwide Internet gateway and email-server based antivirus sales. Threats Currency exchange rates affect demand for application/operation software and hardware, and fluctuating currencies can negatively impact revenues in the global marketplace Recession or economic slowdown in the global market impacts personal computer equipment sales and their need for an operating systems which in turn would slowdown the need for security systems Software piracy of commercial and consumer applications software on a global scale threatens revenue streams Technology life cycle is shorter and shorter Inconsistency across the enterprise Loss of sponsorship or visibility Current Strategy The continuous success of Trend Micro is guided by its strategies. Innovation was always been the strategy of a technological company however in Trend Micro, innovation was not the only strategy implemented. There are many essentials that are to be considered. The current strategy of Trend Micro are the following. â€Å"Focus On the Essentials and Sacrifice the Rest† It is known that focus is important and essential for the success of any business. According to Steve Chang, strategy is about focusing on essential and sacrificing the rest. (Chang, 2002) in addition, according to Peter Firstbrook, program director, security risk strategies, META Group, Trend Micro has done just that, having an amazing laser-like focus on their business. And the authors of a Harvard Business School case study commented: â€Å"Although very entrepreneurial, Steve Chang held fast to a single strategic focus for over a decade. Rather than attempt to provide all security products to all customers, Trend Micro concentrated on developing ‘best-of-breed antivirus solutions.† (Pain and Bettcher, 2003) Trend micros consistent and persistent focus allowed the company to build their strengths and consistently leading the market. Innovation Isnt Just About Your Software Products Trend Micro has many product firsts under its belt: the first antivirus product for a server in 1993; the first Internet gateway protection antivirus software in 1996; the first e-mail anti-virus software product in 1998; the first Internet content security service in 1999. However, for the Trend Micro innovation applies to more than just the products. It is a pervasive notion that applies to other areas of your business as well. Innovation should be seen new type of global organization and in a new service offering. According to Steve Hamm in a 2003 Business Week article, Borders are So 20th Century, Trend Micro is an example of a new form of global organization, transnational organization in which aimed to transcend nationality altogether. Hamm quotes C. K. Prahalad, a professor at the University of Michigan Business School, who says â€Å"Theres a fundamental rethinking about what is a multinational companyDoes it have a home country? What does headquarters mean? Can you fragment your corporate functions globally?† (Hamm, 2003) According to Hamm (2003) Trend micro was one of the first responder to viruses which can deliver services in 30 minutes before the market leader Symantec. He commented that â€Å"Trend Micro is able to respond so quickly because its not organized like most companies. (Hamm, 2003) The strategy of Trend Micro is to spread its top executives, engineers, and support staff around the world. The main virus response center is in the Philippines,

A proposal for a training program for international peace-keeping organizations Essay

The peace keeping program explores the training needs and practices of four distinct groups involved in peace operations- US government agencies, the military, international civilian police, and non governmental organizations- that are expected to respond, separately or collaborate, to emergencies in affected areas around the world (Schoenhaus, 2002 p 9). The United States government has been said to have little ability today to respond rapidly to an international humanitarian emergency with a well-trained disaster response team. The delivery of adequate training to U. S. government personnel for the management of complex emergencies has been hampered by three distinct shortcomings; inadequate training content, inadequate training coverage, and the absence of a single command center with responsibility for improving training in complex emergency management (Schoenhaus, 2002 p 9). There is a stark contrast between the capabilities of the military and civilian communities at the beginnings of operations. The military in general has abundant resources and a clear mission under unified control. However this has not been the case with the civilian sector in peace operations, which is beset with multiple and conflicting agendas and generally enters the post intervention period lacking adequate resources, builds slowly, and spends an inordinate amount of time coordinating its own efforts rather than addressing the needs of the society in which it has intervened (Schoenhaus, 2002 p 9-10). The militaries role should be to lead from behind acknowledging the primacy of the primacy of the civilian goals and coordinating its support so that it becomes a continuation of the civilian effort by other means. (Bailey, 1982). The civilian success will be based on adapting the international standards to the new political environment and gaining public acceptance instead of re-establishing failed systems. The development of all fronts is necessary like infrastructural, economic, human and the leadership (Bankus 2002, p. 4) A system should be put in place to generate leaders who can articulate, evaluate, and solve problems. There must be a public debate on how the international community prepares its post intervention efforts. There should also be a core training curriculum for all actors involved in the humanitarian-relief and peace operations that are based on common, holistic visions. Such a curriculum would be built around enhanced human relations, interpersonal skills, communi cation, and management (Schoenhaus, 2002 p 9). Beyond this core training requirement, the individual agencies and organizations must recruit and train their staff to be experts in their areas of operations. At present, however there is no centralized training facility or a common curriculum that prepares civilians for the challenges they face in responding to international emergencies (Schoenhaus, 2002 p 9). Although both the US. Government agency and NGO communities recognize that there is need for common and more efficient training, the lack of commitment in terms of organizational culture, as well as the lack of time and resources, limits their efforts. The U. S. Government as suggested should take the lead in developing core training requirements and assign responsibilities to various agencies and other participants that could be trained at a common -use facility devoted to international training and response to complex emergencies. Doing this however requires significant resources, as well as a consensus among the agencies and the governments that support them (Felfer, 2002). The Military Training the Military for Peace Operations: A Past, Present and Future View. It has always been a practice on the global front to use the military forces in performing military related operations apart from war. (Goodbye, 1992)Granted the main responsibility of the military is to be prepared for any threat of war. In many countries, attempts have not been made by many governments train the military forces in other areas which are not related to main mission. (Bedrail, 1993). This has led to a realization among many states that there is need to train the military in other areas different from war because it is increasingly becoming important to do so (Zartman & Rasmussen, 1997). In the pat training the military for matters of peace has been not been structured and were largely based on the experiences which were inherited from the predecessors in which case the military acquired skills which were unique to some specific operational area (Miltenberger & Weiss, 2000). In coming up with a training program for the military destined for peacekeeping missions, it will be important to consider several factors like doctrine leadership as well as equipment. At the same time it is necessary to factor in the element of force mix besides other factors like training as well as the quality of the human capital. It is important to note that all these factors will be of utmost importance though the doctrine will provide the basic principles upon which the military will support the objectives of the nation. This implies therefore that there will be a positive correlation between tough but realistic military training and their victory on any war mission. This actually is the basis of the training philosophy of the U. S military (Berger & Rice, 2001). It will therefore be important that in pursuit of the above philosophy, the military training program be guided by the following fundamental factors. First it will be important that the military be trained as a combined team. The rationale behind this is that it will lead to the achievement of the proficiency of not only the leaders and individuals but also the specific military units. It will equally be important to structure the training as to replicate a real fighting situation besides employing the most appropriate doctrines and rules obtained from documents like the training plan for mission activities (Schoenhaus, 2001). It will also be important that the designed military training program incorporates a practical approach. This implies that the training program will need to be performance related. At the same time, it will be necessary to anticipate and train for challenging scenarios besides training in such a way as to ensure that the proficiency of the military is not eroded in any way. The implication for this is that there will be need to ensure that the trained military personnel do not lose the skills they will have acquired. It will equally be important to consider the various rank-techniques comprise several levels of the structures of command. Last it will be important to take good care of the training equipment as well as employing the senior and experienced military commanders to facilitate the training programs (Smock, 1999). It is important note here that just like in any training program, time will play a crucial role in influencing the military training program. It therefore implies that both the training time as well as other resources will be limited thereby necessitating the need to structure the training program in a way that only the very important mission tasks are accomplished. This would mean that all the essential activities are first selected before conditions and benchmarks for each of the identified activities can be set under the guidance of the commander. The expectation will be that all the military units will be capable of accomplishing the tasks in relation to the performance benchmarks. The end result of the above structure will be the development of a training strategy which will determine the required standard of proficiency (Smock, 1999). The military do have the opinion that issues of peace building are not central to its main objective of war. However it is interesting to note that there is a considerable agreement that properly trained military also make the best agents of peace given the fact that they are usually disciplined. Depending on the level of technical knowledge of a military officer ( Huggland, 1992). destined for a peace keeping mission, it is important to offer additional training like on the areas of negotiations, check areas, skills for stopping civil arrests as well as risk managements (Sisk, 1999). Additional training would equally be needed for instance in cases where there is need to familiarize oneself with the affected region as well as for operations that are multinational in nature. (Mackinlay and Chopra, 1992). It will equally be necessary for the military officers to understand the engagement rules pertaining to the various settings besides the need to have skills for managing a case of confiscated materials. All these factors will be necessary owing to the fact that a peace keeping environment would not be the same as an environment of war as the former will require a great deal of sensitivity in the conduct of the operations (Simmons, 1999). It is thus important to acknowledge the fact that it would be adequate to conduct some training for the military before deploying them to the affected areas. However this alone would not suffice thus calling for the need for additional peacetime training in matters concerning peace. (Rifkind, 1993). The realization was that it was still a challenge for the military to manage political as well as civilian aspects of the military Thus, there is needed a benchmark of generic activities as well as standards to act as a guide to all the military units in matters relating to peace operations trainings(Berger & Rice, 2001).

Externalities in Economics Essay

Externality is yet another significant source of market failure. It is owing to the lack of property rights that externality arises. According to Jaen (2005), by externality we mean the situation when the cost or benefits related to a transaction not only affects the transactors but also the other parties which is called party effect. Non-inclusion of such effect in decision making causes externality and hence market failure. Jaen added that an example of this is pollution from factories which adversely affects the health of the people in the neighborhood. But such a cost is not included in the estimation of cost of production; accordingly there is increase supply. This is called negative or harmful externality. Jaen (2005) added that externality could be beneficial as well and he cited an example, the painting of house by individual A may lead in its market value and also that of the other properties in the neighborhood. Thus the benefit accrues to the third party; this is an example of positive externality. Before explaining externality further, we must make a distinction between private cost or benefit and social cost or benefit. In a given society, the resources are said to be optimally allocated when the social marginal cost is equal to the social marginal benefit. Free markets would optimally allocate the resources when private costs are equal to social costs and private benefits are the same as social benefits (Jaen, 2005). There would be negative externality when social cost exceeds private costs and positive or beneficial externality when social benefits exceed private benefits. _________________________ Jaen, T. R. & Ohri, V. K. (2005). Principles of Microeconomics. Page 324 – 332 Externalities arise when one economic agent does not compensate others for his actions which may directly affect their consumption or production possibilities. Smokers, who do not, for example, pay for increasing others’ risk of cancer, or for the discomfort they may cause, produce externalities. According to Miyao & Kanemoto (1987), urban life is filled with examples of externalities: manufacturing producers may cause air and water pollution which negatively affects residence and other producer; some individuals may have racial prejudice against certain ethnic groups; a household may benefit from beautiful gardens of its neighbors; firms often prefer to locate in larger cities because of proximity to other firms; and an additional traveler in a congested road imposes external cost on other travelers by slowing them down. According to the Fundamental Theorem of Welfare Economics, a competitive equilibrium is efficient in the Pareto optimal sense if all goods are private goods and no externalities exist. This result, however, breaks down if there are externalities. An individual decision maker who generates externalities does not take into account actual external cost or benefits imposed on others; his decision must therefore be corrected to account for external effects. Externalities, thus present a case of potential market failure where go government intervention may be called for to guide a decentralized market system toward a point where resource allocation is efficient (Miyao & Kanemoto, 1987). It is however, too early to jump to the conclusion that government action are always justified when there are externalities; for example, individual who suffer from water pollution have an incentive to get together and bribe firms to reduce pollution. The reason why this may not happen is that the transaction cost to set up a market for pollution may be too high. ___________________________ Miyao, T. & Kanemoto, Y. (1987). Urban Dynamics and Urban Externalities. Page 100 According to Miyao & Kanemoto (1987), if the government has to incur the same transactions cost as private individuals, then government intervention cannot improve resource allocation. Even if government intervention is justifiable, the government has to choose an appropriate policy among alternative policy measures. For example, introducing a Pigouvian tax/subsidy system is one way of modifying individuals’ action to achieve an efficient allocation (Miyao & Kanemoto, 1987). A tax` placed on pollution will ten to reduce the amount of externality. If a corrective tax is set equal to the marginal externality cost suffered by others, an efficient allocation is achieved. One problem with the Pigouvian tax/subsidy, however, is that it usually requires high administrative cost. As Miyao & Kanemoto (1987) stated, in some cases, direct regulation of private activities such as ceiling on pollution emissions and a control of land use may be less costly; moreover the government might also have to resort to cruder measures. For example, a Pigouvian tax/subsidy system for traffic congestion requires congestion tolls whose levels are different for different roads depending on the severity of congestion. External effects have been studied by economist ever since the days of Marshall & Pigou; along with development of the field environmental economics, the theory of externalities has remained of great and growing importance in economic science (Jeroen 1999). As Jeroen (1999) quoted, â€Å"indeed it is fair to say that, starting from the traditional neoclassical economic framework, the most logical way to look at problems of environmental pollution is from the perspective of external cost†. It was also added that â€Å"however, although economist have been investigating the concept of externalities for a long time, both theoretically and empirically, ______________________________ Miyao, T. & Kanemoto, Y. (1987). Urban Dynamics and Urban Externalities. Page 100 Jeroen, C. & van den Bergh, J. M. (1999). Handbook of Environmental and Resource Economics. New York: Edward Elgar Publishing. externalities still prove to be an area of slippery ice†. Frequently, one finds fuzzy discussions on the discussions on the policy implications of external cost. According to Jeroen (1999), this may often result from, for instance, mixing up equity and allocative efficiencies arguments , from mistaking pecuniary externalities for true or technological externalities from some sense of compassion with the victims of externalities on equity ground, leading to pleas for ‘compensation’ which may often be unwarranted from the perspective of allocative efficiency The Concept of Environmental Externalities in Economics In recent years, economist have reluctantly added new variable in their economic thinking to account for the side-effects induced by the production of goods (Hokikian, 2002). They have labeled the parameter â€Å"externalities† (normally used in plural due to its multiple effects) because it usually affects, costwise, people other than who are directly buying, selling, or using the goods in question. When nuclear reactors produce electricity, we are gratified because we put electricity to such uses as washing and drying dishes and clothes. But when the nuclear generate highly reactive by-products, we are annoyed because the nuclear wastes are dangerous to our health. Economist call these unwanted nuclear waste externalities, because most of the cost associated with storing, regulating, and transporting them are not added directly into the cost of electricity. Pollution from economic point of view is the production of waste, dirt, noise, and other things we do not want. As Hokikian (2002) illustrated, for example, we do want steel and cement, but we do not want the smoke produced by the output processes; we do want mechanical energy from heat engines, but we do not want the released heat, which we call thermal pollution. _____________________________ Hokikian, J. (2002). The Science of Disorder: Understanding the Complexity, Uncertainty, and Pollution in our World. page 161 Economists’ externalities are nature’s entropy. Since the middle of nineteenth century, we have known that all processes increase in entropy; yet only recently have humans become a highly entropic creature, generating massive amounts of entropy. Externalities have become a major variable in industrial societies; as humans advanced technologically, we became a major producers of waste products that through the years have gradually accumulated to the point when we can no longer ignore their existence (Hokikian, 2002). Paretian Welfare Criteria and Market Failures Mainstream neoclassical micro and welfare economics theories suggest that governments should in principle be reserved in intervening directly in the economic process (Jeroen, 1999). According to Jeroen (1999), it is broadly accepted that economic science should aim at providing value free descriptions and analyses of human choice, and the associated social processes, under conditions of scarcity. As it is not possible to construct a value-free social welfare function according to some ethically objective criterion, welfare economics has an inherent tendency to rely on quite humble criteria for the evaluation of different possible outcomes of economic processes, for instance under different forms of government interventions. As Jeroen (1999) stated, although the concept of external effects is widely used in economics, there seems to be some confusion about its exact definition and interpretation. He added that, it is commonly recognized that externalities are an important form of market failure. ______________________________ Hokikian, J. (2002). The Science of Disorder: Understanding the Complexity, Uncertainty, and Pollution in our World. page 161. Jeroen, C. & van den Bergh, J. M. (1999). Handbook of Environmental and Resource Economics. page 197. their existence leads to a deviation from the first-best neoclassical world, in which the price mechanism takes care of an efficient resource allocation (Pareto Efficiency). According to Jeroen (1999), in the presence of ext3ernalities, market prices do not reflect full social costs or benefits, and, for instance, regulatory taxes or subsidies are called for to restore the efficient workings for the market mechanism. Furthermore, it is generally accepted that the source of externalities is typically to be found in the absence of well defined property rights (qtd. in Jeroen, 1999). Consequently, the theory of is often applied in environmental economics: environmental quality is a typical good from which property rights are not defined and hence no market exists. These commonplaces may clearly indicate the causes and consequences of external effects, but still leave the definition unclear; such a definition can be as follows: an external effect exists when an actor’s utility function contains a real variable whose actual value depends on the behavior of another actor, who does not take this effect of his behavior into account in his decision making process. According to Jeroen (1999), the above definition concerns technological externalities as opposed to pecuniary externalities. These latter which are ruled out by considering real variables only (that is, excluding monetary variables), do not lead to shifts of production and utility functions, but merely to movements along these functions. Consequently, externalities as defined above are potentially ‘Pareto relevant’ (if costs of correcting for the market failure do not exceed the welfare gains to be obtained), whereas pecuniary externalities are not, because they do not reflect a failing market. As Jeroen stated, the final condition in the __________________________ Jeroen, C. & van den Bergh, J. M. (1999). Handbook of Environmental and Resource Economics. page 197. definition distinguishes externalities from other types of unpriced interactions, such as barter, violence, jealousy, altruism or good-will promoting activities (for instance , handing out samples as products as part of a commercial campaign). Such phenomena differ fundamentally from external effects, both in a theoretical and in a policy-relevance sense. There have always been economist interested in positive or negative externalities; however, they largely been marginalized within the profession as externalities were seen as market failure that needs to be corrected or avoided (Maiser & Sedlacek, 2004). The consequences that recent literature has demonstrated also made economist shy away for along time from accepting externalities as integral part of the economic system. If economist want to understand the growth of an economy over time, they need t allow for externalities. Based on Maiser & Sedlacek (2004), these externalities lead to imperfect competition and tend to agglomerate production at certain locations in the economy. They added that, the resulting spatial structure leads to specialization, transportation and further externalities. This moves the spatial perspective closer to the core of economics. â€Å"As it turns out, if we can explain geographical concentration, then we can go along way toward explaining important aspects of international trade and economic growth (qtd. in Maiser & Sedlacek, 2004). The Influence of Government Policy on the Choice of Production Practices and Chemical Use Government influence on the choice agricultural production practices and the attendant use of chemicals has a variety of forms. Before exploring these alternatives, it is important to __________________________ Maiser, G. & Sedlacek, S. (2004). Spillovers and Innovations: Space, Environment, and the Economy. page 11. understand the rational for government intervention: externalities arising from the interaction between the agricultural sector and the rest of society. Externalities exist in situations where the activities of an economic agent (qtd. in Uri, 2005). As what Uri (2005) stated, consider the application by the farmer of pesticides that runoff into surface drinking water supplies and are ingested by individuals. Drinking water with high concentrations of pesticides has suspected risk and associated cost to human health; this is an example of a negative externality because the action of the farmer adversely affects the welfare of consumers. The absence of externalities is one of the conditions required for competitive markets to achieve an efficient allocation of resources. This is not meant to imply, however, that the presence of an externality requires government intervention. According to Uri (2005), in many situations, the involved parties may negotiate a solution that will address the externality problem and result in an efficient resource allocation. For example, restricting pesticide spaying during certain times to minimize community exposure to drifting pesticides can be the result of voluntary agreement between a farmer and the residents surrounding the farmer’s cropland. There are, however, externalities where the interaction between private parties does not lead to an efficient allocation of resources. Government intervention may be consider in these instances even though there is no guarantee that the intervention will lead to an enhance efficiency; such situations are referred to as externality problem or market failure (Uri, 2005). Uri, N. D. (2005). Agriculture and the Environment. New York: page 60. Government intervention can take a variety of forms including, taxes, subsidies, subsidies, and educational, and technical assistance, as Uri (2005) stated. There are other situations where intervention is justified on the basis of distributional equity considerations. Even if an efficient resource allocation could be obtained through private and public approaches, the solution could be sub-optimal from society’s perspective if it results from equities in terms of income distribution or the burden of regulation (Uri, 2005). Because distributional inequity is so highly subjective, however, little discussion will be devoted to it in what follows. As previously noted externalities play a central role in the economics of the interaction between the agricultural sector and the stock of natural resources. According to Uri (2005), to mitigate the impact of externalities, a number of policy options are available to the government; these policy options in general have the potential to impact the production practices adopted by farmers and the use of agricultural chemicals.

Causes and Effects of the Assassination of John F. Kennedy...

â€Å"We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.† (â€Å"JFK’s†). This encouraging quote was given by a man who literally shot for the stars all the way up until the day he was shot down. While being the youngest and first Roman Catholic president, John F. Kennedy always motivated and encouraged America to strive for the best. Until a horrible silence struck the American people, he was removed from society in 1963. There were many believed causes regarding Kennedy’s death. There is the belief that Oswald shot him as a lone gun man. There are also other theories that state that there could have been more than one gun man. Some people even†¦show more content†¦Other sources believe differently. Oswald had a Soviet wife, and the United States was not exactly friendly with the Russians at the time (â€Å"Kennedy Assassinated†). Some belie ve that he could have killed Kennedy because of his Soviet beliefs (Bradford). It is hard to justify Oswald’s reasoning to murdering Kennedy because before he could properly answer this question, he was already dead. However, other sources believe that Oswald was not a lone gunman. It has been noticed that eight out of ten Americans believe there was more than one gunman. (Kennedy Assassination) It was believed in the â€Å"Oswald lone shooting† theory that he shot one bullet. From educated background knowledge about rifles, the rifle believed to be used in the assassination might have been accurate enough to get the job done, but at the angle and height it would have been almost impossible to make the shot. That bullet was believed to have traveled from the sixth floor of the book depository on a downward slant. It had to be timed perfectly considering the target was moving at fourteen miles an hour. While this seems like a hard shot to make already, the bullet entered Kennedys back and then moved upward on an apparent ricochet, out his throat and into John Connelly’s chest, where it created seven wounds all together (â€Å"JFK Assassination†). â€Å"There is no way that one bullet was shot. In the video Kennedy moves more than once† (Bradford). Many people have doubted the one bulletShow MoreRelatedThe Assassination Of The War And Formation Of C ivil Rights1550 Words   |  7 Pages Political Assassination Danielle Ferreira U.S Government Date Introduction Political assassination is defined as the act of killing a political figure mainly for political reasons. In most cases, the motive behind political assassinations is beyond the person who is killed. 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