Suraiya Ishak

A study on the mediating role of halal perception: determinants and consequence reflections

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine potential determinants of halal perception and to validate the mediating model of halal perception on purchasing decision of Malaysian consumers. Design/methodology/approach This study uses a survey to obtain the relevant data. The survey involved self-administration of questionnaires to 420 consumers and 96 per cent responded. The questionnaire consists of four sections designed to obtain information on demography, halal perception, determinants of halal perception and purchase decision. Findings The main finding reiterates the role of credible signals in credence items purchased as suggested by the signaling theory. Halal perception has association with respondents’ purchase decision. Thus, it highlights that halal perception is the mediating variable that intervenes in the relationship of a few independent variables and the purchase decision trends. The independent variables such as manufacturer identity, product label, physical product and packaging as well country of origin are considered to be important extrinsic cues that deliver messages regarding the halal of certain food products. The association of the four variables with halal perception is also found to be significant. Originality/value The originality of this study lies in its attempt to explore the role of halal perception in the marketing of food products especially within the scope of a Muslim’s market. Besides, this study attempts to investigate the halal issue based on a specific model that includes potential variables and the intervening role of halal perception.

Enhancing sustainability amongst oil palm smallholders in Malaysia

Oil palm research is performed to develop new and upgraded products to face global challenges and thus, the industry is emerging as a dependable source of empowerment for the country. However, it also poses a serious threat due to unawareness of sustainability issues by the smallholders. Thus, this study assesses the actions of oil palm smallholders in a sustainable manner from the environment, economic, and social perspectives. The primary data is collected through a questionnaire survey with 50 supported smallholders in the Terengganu state under the FELDA scheme in Malaysia. The result demonstrates that dependent smallholders with primary level education are responsible for most of the pollution in the environment due to wrong agricultural practices. The study suggests that there is room for improvement in the social, environmental, and economic aspects of sustainability through intensive and quality training, depending on the role played by the authorities and the dependent smallholder cooperatives.

A Study on Costs, Risks and Competitiveness of Palm Oil Fruit Dealers’ Business in Malaysia

This exploratory study aims to describe the nature of palm oil intermediary business focusing on the costs structure, risks and competitive challenges. This study employs qualitative research design. Five fruit dealers (FD) are involve in the interview. The findings show that palm oil fruit dealer business requires enormous amount of cash and equipment investments during the start-up and growth stages. In addition, FDs must comply with specific requirements to apply for the operating license. The risks are divided into non-controllable and controllable risks. The non-controllable risk refers to the external source of risks such as fresh fruit bunch (FFB) shrinkage due to weather factor, volatility of market price and inconsistent mills purchase decisions. Meanwhile, the controllable risk consist of the probability of unripe FFB purchased from the smallholders. Furthermore, the finding indicates that the business competitive structure is relatively intense due to strong bargaining power of buyers and sellers, high service substitutability from nearby FDs, high rivalry among existing firms, and the need of special equipment. However, the threat of new entrants is low due to the high entrance and exit barriers of the business. Finding of this study suggested that agriculture intermediaries have important roles within the palm oil smallholders’ value chain. Therefore, this study disseminates preliminary insights on FDs’ business in terms of costs, risks and challenges.

Influencing consumer boycott: between sympathy and pragmatic

Purpose This paper aims to examine consumers’ responses to products that are influenced by their moral justification. Specifically, this paper examines the factors related to consumers’ moral response and choices, including religious affiliation and obligation, group memberships, group reference, type of product and link of egregious conduct to particular products. This study explicates Adam Smith’s concept of people’s proprietary emotion that potentially affects their purchasing behavior. Design/methodology/approach This study uses focus group discussion with nine consumers across ethnic groups in Malaysia. A recent boycott case was used to stimulate the group discussion. Their statements are displayed in the findings to show their expressions verbatim. Findings The findings outline that consumers’ participation in the boycott of products is influenced by their moral judgment with frequent addressing of the religious affiliation and obligation, group reference and group membership factors. Additionally, there is a tendency that certain issue(s), although perceived as a universal humanistic issue, would be relatively closer to people with backgrounds similar to the majority of the victims of a particular issue. However, such a boycott action has issues such as duration of action, consistency of action and choice of pragmatic over moral decision that weigh the efficacy of the boycott action toward products related to certain egregious actions. Overall, the non-participation decision had been attached to factors such as type of product, boycotting cost, brand attraction and function or usefulness of products. These factors may also moderate consumers’ sentiment to boycott a particular product(s) in the long term. Originality/value This paper offers new insight regarding factors influencing participation in the boycott of products which were suspected to have link with egregious conduct towards certain Muslim groups. This paper offers a different perspective by integrating ethical theory into the discussion. In addition, it explores the influence of Muslims’ brotherhood concept on participation in boycott activities.

The Business Behaviors of Malaysian Food Hawkers

Social organization as a subsystem of a large system of social organization has a unique governance capabilities. The level of social organization autonomous ability what is better to promote the level and the ability of the social governance’s system more scientifically , more modernization, especially in the modern open society. In this paper ,it is based on the perspective of system theory, the meaning of social governance, the status of social organizations, and the effective ways that social organizations to participate in social governance are put forward. In the condition on the basis of the theory of system, the ways of the organizations to participate in social governance shows: overall planning development goals, strengthen the top-level design, perfect social organizations working content, strengthen the responsibility consciousness.The twin challenges of building pathways to sustainable development and reducing poverty have never been more pressing and cannot be effectively tackled without gender equality. It is the realization of this that prompted the United Nations to include poverty elimination and fight against inequality and injustice in its post 2015 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Equality among men and women is more than a matter of social justice—it is a fundamental human right. It also makes good economic sense. When women have equal access to education and go on to participate fully in business and decision-making, they are a key force against poverty. Women with equal rights are better educated, healthier, and have greater access to land, jobs and financial resources. Their increased earning power in turn raises household incomes. By enhancing women’s control over decision-making in the household, gender equality also translates into better prospects and greater well-being of children, reducing poverty of future generations. It is against this backdrop that this paper examines the critical nexus between gender equality, poverty reduction and sustainable development. The paper makes the case that achieving gender equality and realizing the human rights, dignity and capabilities of a diverse group of women is a central requirement in the fight against poverty and a just and sustainable world. The paper also submits that essential public services like health and education, benefit women, men, girls and boys equitably.Wannan Incident, as an important event significantly affecting the Anti-Japanese War and Kuomintang (KMT)-Communist Party of China (CPC) relationship during the second KMT-CPC cooperation, has promoted KMT and CPC to make significant adjustment in policy under the premise of continuing to resist Japan. The KMT-CPC relationship and their policy adjustment, from a fundamental point of view, depend on the development of the Sino-Japanese contradiction. Under the leadership of CPC Central Committee, the Southern Bureau has implemented the Party’s principles and policies as the CPC delegation and Eighth Route Army office. It has taken a principled but flexible strategy to promote the democratic political process in the KMT ruled areas, and has made outstanding contributions in maintaining the KMT-CPC cooperation and the Anti-Japanese national united front.China does not auction radio spectrum for wireless service but uses operations license granted by the government. The paper takes on LTE license to show how a flawed policy impairs adoption of LTE technology in China and how excessive interference hurts telecom operators. LTE has two flavors: TDD and FDD. The Chinese government favors TD-LTE, a “minority” technology, to rescue struggling China Mobile from its failing 3G service, and to make China a leader in LTE. China does this by suppressing LTE FDD and China Mobile’s rivals China Unicom and China Telecom that prefer LTE FDD. As the paper argues, the bad policy has turned a business decision to a politically charged issue that brings harm to LTE development. The high price China has to pay: delayed LTE deployment, eliminated competition, discontent public and a laggard behind many countries in a tight race. The paper then traces the root of the bad policy, what can happen when technology is viewed with political bias, how extraneous factors influence directions of technology without challenge, and what China can learn from the mistake and prevent it from impairing a promising technology. Key words : LTE; TD-LTE; LTE FDD; business decision; 3G; competition; technology adoption; government interferenceBased on the specific regional culture, targeted at configuration of landscape plants at the edge of campus, this article studies the selection, art, culture, function and ecology of plants, and highlights the principles of people orientation and harmonious humanity. It takes Henan Polytechnic University as an example, puts forward the principles of planning landscape plants at the edge of campus, and explores new ideas for deigning the spaces at campus edge.As China’s economic strength and political influence have been greatly increased during the past decades, Tai Chi culture, which has been long viewed as one of the very essential parts of traditional Chinese culture, is being given a golden opportunity to step into the world. Tai Chi contains a variety of values that are quite beneficial for people all over the world to live a peaceful and healthy life. Actually it represents a life attitude that stresses the harmony between man and nature, which is obviously significant in the contemporary society. Today with the intensification of globalization, Tai Chi culture cannot and also should not be restricted only to Chinese people. Instead, it should belong to the whole world. However, the international communication of Tai Chi culture meets both challenges and opportunities. Some myriad stereotypes, misperceptions, and distortions about China may hinder the cultural spreading. The conflict and competition between Tai Chi and other cultures are another problem. In addition, lack of theoretical study of international communication systems should be taken into serious consideration. On the other hand, the culture communication is faced with a favorable internal and external political and economic environment. Besides, practical demands in strained life of contemporary society also call for the wide spreading of Tai Chi culture. In short, joint efforts should be made to overcome the challenges and make full use of the opportunities so as to promote the worldwide spreading of Tai Chi culture.cet article presente un bref apercu de l’histoire des Forces Armees espagnoles remarquant l’importance de l’institution militaire et son role dans l’histoire espagnole contemporaine. Depuis la mort de Franco il y a eu une tentative de canaliser le commandement des Forces Armees dans la voie democratique et constitutionnelle, jouant un role essentiel dans ce sens le general Gutierrez Mellado. Depuis 1981, deux mesures importantes dans le domaine militaire sont prises: la dite Cause 2/81 pour la poursuite judiciaire des responsables de la tentative de coup d’Etat, et la demande d’adhesion de l’Espagne a l’OTAN, etape tres importante qui determinera l’avenir du pays et conduira a la modernisation des Forces Armees espagnoles, comparables, depuis, a celles du monde occidental. Apres la victoire socialiste de 1982 le changement de position du PSOE fut clef: le gouvernement transforma habilement son anti-americanisme initial, ce qui permit l’acces du pays a l’OTAN apres le referendum de 1986, modifia profondement l’armee, et elimina les tensions militaires. La derniere etape du processus de modernisation fut menee par le gouvernement Aznar, qui reussit la professionnalisation des Forces Armees et l’integration de l’Espagne dans la structure militaire de l’OTAN.A teacher’s “accomplishment” plays an important role in education by “soul to soul influence”, especially in the era that Internet changes human life, how to recognize the teacher still has a very large space for improvement. In the era of “Internet +”, the developmental pursuits of students have undergone great changes, but real existence of teacher remains unchanged, so teachers should properly treat the accomplishment of change and unchanged: To highlight the humanities of tolerance, sincerity and kindness; integrate individuation and innovation in profession; accumulate the beauty of client and data thinking.Jinan Old Railway Station, as the only Germanic-style station architectural group in the world, was a landmark of Jinan with high architectural and cultural value. Both its demolition and reconstruction have affected the nerves of Jinan people. This article starts with from a review of the historical evolution of Jinan Old Railway Station, focuses on the history, architectural and cultural value of this station, and further explores the significance of the reconstruction of Jinan Old Railway Station.Action research method is taken in the research. The researchers conduct Chinese character multi-dimensional education from the aspects of experience & expression of Chinese characters forms to cultural infiltration and cooperative learning upon Yiyi who is interested in Chinese culture as well as obstacles in Chinese learning and social adaptability. Yiyi’s imagination, observation ability, knowledge, experience and prosocial behavior, etc. were observed and analyzed by qualitative research method through interviews with teachers, parents and young children and analysis on preschool painting and handiwork in Chinese character multi-dimensional education. The result shows that Yiyi’s imagination has become more and more and her comprehensive ability has improved; knowledge and experience have gradually enriched and observation ability has become persistent; prosocial behavior has increased and enhanced.As the soul of Chinese national culture and profound foundation of advanced socialist culture, Chinese excellent traditional culture reflects the essence of national culture. Vocational colleges shoulder the heavy task of cultivating high-quality workers and skilled talents. It is objectively necessary to regard Chinese excellent traditional culture education as a basic general education course system and scientifically integrate it in course teaching of vocational colleges. Besides, this is an important acting point and key point of course setting innovation in vocational colleges. Vocational colleges must scientifically and reasonably plan course setting of Chinese excellent traditional culture.With economic globalization, trades all over the world have become more frequent, commodities have circulated more rapidly, and diversified consumer demands have been also met. The public has come to realize the importance of brand effect in stimulating consumption and exploring market. The promotion of advertisement on the product is beyond the reach of other forms and has been favored by the public. With the continuous emergence of foreign products, advertisements tend to have more diversified forms and plentiful connotations. In this context, it’s especially important to study on the principles and strategies in foreign brand translation. From a perspective of functional equivalence, this article proposes the “Three Aesthetics” principle and association principle in brand translation, has an introduction to the commonly used translation methods, and puts forward examples to further discuss the feasibility to implement foreign brand translation under the guidance of functional equivalence.Under the background of the competition and upgrading between enterprises; management of enterprises has been the focus of competition. Whether the enterprise could update its management has been a key factor for the enterprise’s success during the competition; which requires the manager of the enterprise paying high attention to the management as well as enhancing the core competitiveness by management innovation. This paper has emphasized briefly the importance of the enterprise’s management innovation to enterprise’s development; and analyzed the basic principles for the enterprise’s management innovation. Based on the current obstacles existed in enterprise’s management innovation, this paper discussed the basic strategies for enterprise’s management innovation, which expected to offer some effective ways for the management innovation work’s carrying out. As an important component factor of enterprise’s core competitiveness improvement, management innovation has played a more and more important role in that field. Currently, our countries’ enterprise management innovation still developed in a low level; and there are large gaps between enterprise’s management innovation and enterprise’s development. Faced with the drags to enterprise’s competitiveness caused by backward enterprise’s management innovation, the enterprises need to have a more objective and general view towards management innovation; envisage the deficiency in the management innovation and take effective measures to update so that the enterprise could improve its management skills and lead up more energy for enterprises’ healthy development. Key words: Enterprise management; Innovation; Principles; StrategiesAlthough voluntary carbon offset market is an important solution to the climate crisis, there hides a variety of risks behind it because of lack of global registration system and measurement method. In this paper, we focused on the default risk from the original carbon supplier in voluntary carbon market, and built an evaluation indicator system according to several principles. Then analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and fuzzy comprehensive evaluation technology were used to construct evaluation model to measure default risk level which are simple but effective. Finally, a simulation case proved the evaluation indicator system and model proposed can not only work out the comprehensive risk level but also calculate risk level from different aspects, which is useful for stakeholders to make their decisions in voluntary carbon market. Key words: Default risk level; Carbon credit trade; Voluntary carbon offset market; Comprehensive evaluationA citizens’ society needs and promotes the behavior of helping and sympathy for other people. The behavior of charity first is under the premise of respecting for citizens’ freedom and equal status and follows the concept of people-oriented. Only if we take citizens as the center to nurture the spirit of charity (i.e., citizens’ recognition and belief about the charity), it can meet needs of human society and realize the fundamental value of human beings. In the background of citizens having rational individual independence and freedom, we form a charity consensus that is a possible way to nurture the citizens’ spirit of charity and solve conflict issues. When rationally examining unselfish and altruistic acts of charity, we find the charity’s moral consensus rooted in the life way of people’s helping each other in society solidarity. Through the charity, people seek win-win situation for individuals and the society under the background of society solidarity, namely, saving others as if saving oneself is the consensus basis of nurturing citizens’ charitable spirit.The tea markets of Sichuan Province were divided into the origin, entrepot and consumer markets. The original markets of tea were widely distributed in Sichuan, but the main entrepot markets were Kangding and Songpan, which were called frontier tea. This paper will focus on trading of the western frontier tea and the southern frontier tea. Meanwhile, the author will also analyze the distribution of tea firms in this area.Starting from the perspective of cultural talent cultivation, this paper discusses the reason why the inheritance and innovation of culture become the fourth function of college education, the great value the college cultural construction possesses in talent cultivation, the restrictive elements of college talent cultivation from the perspective of culture, and also the leading role of college culture in college talent cultivation.The characteristics of pre-school children’s Chinese learning are: Being dominated by oral communication; instinctive acquisition; acceleration development of learning; learning in context and obviously student-centered learning.

Do Small Firms Possess Innovative Behavior? Evidence from Malaysia

The aim of this article is to describe patterns of innovative behaviors among small firms in Malaysia. The significant of this study lies in its attempt to differentiate innovation practices by small firms from the general innovation prescriptions which dominated by large firms. The underlying theoretical arguments for this study are based on Greiner Growth Model and Readiness Theory. Greiner model explains the role of innovation as a source of competitive advantage that support small firms’ growth, while Readiness Theory and slack resources concept explain about concentration of innovation types in small firms. This study employs case-study which involved in-depth structured interviews with eight small firms’ owners. The respondents are classified into two groups based on its’ owner social background. The first group consists of small firms owned by the ordinary social background owners and the second group consists of small firms owned by poor owners selected from a special economic empowerment program conducted by a government agency. The findings indicate that most small firms performed the administrative, incremental and product innovations. The administrative innovation is applied as perseverance reactions to market turbulent and dynamic. Nevertheless, small firms which are owned by poor owners have yet to adopt extensive innovative behavior due to their tight financial constraint. The originality of this study lies in its approach as well as the simultaneous emphasis on owners’ demographic characteristic effect, namely the social background, on innovative practices among particular small firms.

Perlindungan Pemagang Saham Minoriti Di Malaysia Dalam Konteks Pengambilalihan Korporat

Pengambilalihan (acquisition) korporat boleh memberi implikasi negatif kepada pemegang saham minoriti. Makalah ini telah meneliti isu perlindungan bagi pemegang saham minoriti dalam konteks pengambilalihan (acquisition) syarikat senaraian awam (public listed companies) di Malaysia. Penelitian dilaksanakan dengan melihat liputan peruntukan yang disediakan menerusi perundangan dan keperluan-keperluan tatacara bagi pemantauan pelaksanaan pengambilalihan korporat di Malaysia. Di samping itu, gerakan shareholder activism oleh Minority Shareholder Watchdog Group (MSWG) bagi memelihara kepentingan pelaburan pemegang saham minoriti di Malaysia turut diteliti. Hasil penelitian merumuskan perlindungan pemegang saham minoriti di Malaysia wujud dalam bentuk kaveat emptor yang bergantung kepada peruntukan peraturan. Peruntukan undang-undang telah digunakan bagi menyediakan prasarana asas dalam menjaga kepentingan pelabur minoriti. Namun masih wujud peruntukan yang longgar dan dimanipulasi oleh pemegang saham majoriti dalam melaksanakan pengambilalihan aset dan liabiliti serta memudaratkan kepentingan pemegang saham minoriti.