Tatsuo Oyama

Investigating the health care delivery system in Japan and reviewing the local public hospital reform

Japan’s health care system is considered one of the best health care systems in the world. Hospitals are one of the most important health care resources in Japan. As such, we investigate Japanese hospitals from various viewpoints, including their roles, ownership, regional distribution, and characteristics with respect to the number of beds, staff, doctors, and financial performance. Applying a multivariate analysis and regression model techniques, we show the functional differences between urban populated prefectures and remote ones; the equality gap among all prefectures with respect to the distribution of the number of beds, staff, and doctors; and managerial differences between private and public hospitals. We also review and evaluate the local public hospital reform executed in 2007 from various financial aspects related to the expenditure and revenue structure by comparing public and private hospitals. We show that the 2007 reform contributed to improving the financial situation of local public hospitals. Strategic differences between public and private hospitals with respect to their management and strategy to improve their financial situation are also quantitatively analyzed in detail. Finally, the remaining problems and the future strategy to further improve the Japanese health care system are described.

Economic, Energy and Co2 Intensity Valuation in Indonesia's Manufacturing Industry

Analisis sektor industri manufaktur lebih banyak fokus pada evaluasi aspek ekonomi, seperti output, nilai tambah, dan kesempatan kerja, namun tidak banyak studi yang secara simultan mencoba untuk mengombinasikan aspek konsumsi energi dan emisi gas karbon dioksida (CO2) di dalam analisis. Kami mengaplikasikan teori grafik ( graph theory) untuk memilih industri dominan. Namun, tidak ada satupun industri yang mendominasi semua kriteria. Hasil ini menunjukan bahwa pro-pertumbuhan tidaklah harus sama dengan pro-lingkungan hidup, bahkan kedua kriteria tersebut dapat saling bertengtangan satu dengan lainnya. Kami berargumentasi bahwa perbedaan dalam hal karakteristik industri menjadi penting diperhatikan dalam menilai kinerja industri. Akhirnya, dalam konsteks intervensi kebijakan, kami menyarankan pemerintah perlu menyiapakan indikator intensitas dan membangun kerangka kebijakan yang lebih menyeluruh untuk memacu efisiensi energi.

Investigating economic growth, energy consumption and their impact on CO2 emissions targets in China

This article aims to analyse economic growth, energy consumption and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions data in China comparing with the US and Japanese data. Then, we try to evaluate the Chinese governments targets in reducing energy use and carbon intensity. Economic growth is a key factor that determines the Chineses ability to meet these targets. If we suppose that Chinas economic growth is maintained at 9.54% per year, and total primary energy supply (TPES) growth is stabilized at 3.82% on average, the country would be able to cut energy consumption per unit amount of gross domestic product (GDP) by 23.5% in 2010: if carbon-GDP intensity could decrease by 4.5% on average, China would be able to achieve a reduction in carbon-GDP emissions target by 49.87% or above the target in 2020. We suggest that China needs to stabilize CO2 per total primary energy supply intensity. This target can also push government to implement clean coal technology and promote renewable energy target more seriously. Finally, we argue that binding target on CO2 emissions has worked effectively in the case of Japan, but we have to be careful when analysing economic-energy-CO2 emissions in Japan due to ‘the lost decade’ of Japans economy. Finally, we expect that developed countries such as Japan and the United States can help China not only in transferring technology but also in strengthening the institutional capacity such as in harmonizing regulations, in energy planning and in developing human capability.

An optimal track maintenance scheduling model analysis taking the risk of accidents into consideration

This paper presents an optimal track maintenance scheduling model developed for maintaining adequate conditions of the railway tracks and accomplishing an efficient management of the railway service. Our model has been used in several major Japanese railway companies to develop optimal track maintenance schedules (OTMS). Since train accidents cause enormous losses (not only for the railway company but also for society), we propose to take into account the risk of train accidents while developing the OTMS. Thus, it is critically important to identify measures to quantitatively evaluate the risk of accidents to ensure safe and stable transportation. We propose a method to estimate track maintenance costs and the related costs associated with the risk of train derailment due to longitudinal level irregularities of the railway track. We attempt to show a desirable condition of railway tracks by applying the accident cost estimation method and the OTMS model to an actual railway section. We also demonstrate how to apply these models to actual railway networks in general by validating the estimation results using actual numerical data.

Developing a Green Path Power Expansion Plan in Indonesia by Applying a Multiobjective Optimization Modeling Technique

AbstractThis paper aims to apply a multiobjective optimization modeling technique to a power expansion problem evaluating two objectives functions: minimizing the power generating cost and minimizing CO2 emissions, between which there is a tradeoff. A convex curve is obtained representing the relationship between the generating cost (Rp/kWh) and CO2 emissions (ton). This represents a bad-luck curve where there is an increasing marginal cost to reduce 1 t of CO2 emissions. This is because most of the less-carbon-intensive power plants consume oil, which has the highest fuel cost. Instead of simply minimizing CO2 emissions, this paper argues that Indonesia needs to pursue technology to switch from steam coal subcritical technology to supercritical and ultra-supercritical technology to reduce CO2 emissions. It is further found that the generating cost will increase by less than 1.6% and yearly CO2 emissions can be reduced by about 6.9% by adopting supercritical technology. This implies that adopting ultra-su...

Applying OR Theory and Techniques to Social Systems Analysis

The paper describes applications of Operations Research (OR) theory and techniques used to solve various types of social problems occurring in our social system. Social systems analysis has for quite some time been the main analytical and scientific approach used to investigate systems and to solve various problems related to modern social systems, including industry, business, the military, public administration, politics, and society in general. We will present here three major roles that operations research (OR) and social systems analysis (SSA) technique have played both practically and theoretically in the solution of social systems problems since it was developed almost 60 years ago. Firstly, we explain briefly OR, SSA, and public policy (PP) regarding what they are, how OR can be contributing to SSA and PP, and how traditional academic disciplines are related each other with the SSA. Secondly, we introduce several examples of the quantitative data analysis, which we have investigated in our school (National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies) to solve various types of social problems including population, traffic and accident, higher education policy, energy policy, and agriculture policy data analyses. Thirdly, we give mathematical modeling analysis with its application to the optimal location model analysis for integrating promotion branch offices in the local government. Fourthly, as an important role of OR as a theory building analysis technique, we explain two problems of apportionment problem and shortest path counting problem. Finally, in the summary section future perspectives of OR are given.

Investigating the impact of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and evaluating the restoration and reconstruction performance

Three years have passed since the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake (GEJE) hit the northeastern part of Japan. The earthquake then triggered a devastating tsunami and a nuclear accident, which in turn created a compound disaster that claimed a large number of human casualties and devastated properties. The 2011 GEJE caused the economy growth to decline by 2.2% with the largest decrease experienced by the industrial sector (−7.1%), followed by the agricultural sector (−3.6%) and the services sector (−0.2%). The agriculture and manufacturing sectors underwent large decreases in growth since the economies of most of the affected prefectures have relied on these two sectors. Thus, by investigating the damaging impacts of the 2011 GEJE, we try to evaluate the restoration and reconstruction performance in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors. Our study finds that there has been significant progress made towards restoration and reconstruction on the areas affected by the disaster. Using prefectural data from 2000 to 2012, we apply econometric methods based upon the bias-corrected least-squares dummy variable to estimate the impact of the 2011 GEJE on the agricultural and manufacturing sectors. From this analysis, two major insights emerged. First, the 2011 GEJE had a significant negative impact on agriculture and manufacturing sectors. On average, the impact on the agriculture sector was higher than on the manufacturing sector about twice as large. Second, the most affected prefectures experienced an impact about three times greater than the less affected prefectures in both agriculture and manufacturing sectors.