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Clothing quality, performance, safety and health have become important considerations for consumer welfare. Properties of these aspects are encompassed on standards which regulates clothing products reaching consumers. The purpose of this paper is to categorize these aspects in a common platform by suggesting minimum requirements expected on readymade garments from which clothing standards compliance assessment is performed.

With the aid of standard compliance assessment model, scored Standard Compliance Rate (SCR) values of the discussed properties of clothing standardization are synthesized from a standard compliance matrix, and the compliance of any clothing standards are assessed and assigned a “Standard Compliance Index/Level (SCI/SCL)” ranging from non compliance to full compliance at six levels.

In reference to the standard compliance assessment model, 12 children and infant clothing standards, three from Kenya and nine from China, and eight protective clothing standards from Kenya, China, Britain and USA, two from each country, were assessed and the compliance level of each standard evaluated and results presented. The results of the study reveal the importance of every aspect of clothing standardization properties to fulfil the requirements of standard compliance assessment whereby, though they meet their role in developing Standard Compliance Index (SCI), they may have different impact depending with the context applied and the scope of every standard.

The selection of standardization parameters and characteristics, and the criteria for scoring some of the Standard Compliance Rating was subjective and may require mutual agreements between relevant bodies. Furthermore, this method can only be applied on clothing standards and not other textile testing standards.

The proposed method can be applied when evaluating and comparing specific clothing standards between bodies or countries. Clothing SCI would be of primary importance as a guide on required clothing quality specifications to designers, manufacturers, standard regulators and consumer welfare bodies.

This research reports the development of an original framework to assess compliance level of any clothing standard using standardization parameters and characteristics considered when determining the quality of a garment. It establishes a theoretical framework of clothing standards compliance assessment, which has not been reported in the literature to date.

Spectrum regulations have major impact on the development and deployment of innovative technologies. Current regulations for license-exempt radio spectrum generally are given in terms of technology-related criteria. This paper aims to propose a set of metrics that can be used to define technology-agnostic spectrum regulations which encourage rather than restrict technology innovation.

This paper builds on and expands two other papers on regulatory criteria for license-exempt spectrum which define metrics for spectrum loading and spectrum sharing efficiency. Here, we add metrics for Block Edge Masks and for medium access adaptivity. This gives a complete toolset for the management of radio spectrum.

Because of the diversity of use of license-exempt spectrum, performance criteria must be formulated in terms that abstract from the details of equipment properties. Instead, they must be formulated in terms of spectrum utilization dimensions: RF power, time and frequency occupation. The result is a concise set of metrics that can be applied to the regulation or management of shared spectrum.

The mathematics used in this paper deal with high-level parameters and may ignore factors that are important in certain cases and may require refinement.

The implications of the proposed metrics include an increase emphasis on the objectives of spectrum policy and on measures to assure efficient spectrum utilization both within frequency bands and between adjacent bands.

There are no social implications the authors are aware of.

The originality of this work lies in recognizing that the extreme variety of devices and mode of operation deployed in license-exempt spectrum calls for spectrum management criteria that are technology agnostic.

This chapter proposes an optimized innovative information technology as a means for achieving operational functionalities of real-time portable electronic health records, system interoperability, longitudinal health-risks research cohort and surveillance of adverse events infrastructure, and clinical, genome regions – disease and interventional prevention infrastructure. In application to the Dod-VA (Department of Defense and Veteran's Administration) health information systems, the proposed modernization can be carried out as an “add-on” expansion (estimated at $288 million in constant dollars) or as a “stand-alone” innovative information technology system (estimated at $489.7 million), and either solution will prototype an infrastructure for nation-wide health information systems interoperability, portable real-time electronic health records (EHRs), adverse events surveillance, and interventional prevention based on targeted single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) discovery.

The purpose of this paper is to explain the rule‐based and risk‐based anti‐money‐laundering (AML) approach, to demonstrate the implementation problems in carrying out a risk‐based approach (RBA) to AML and finally propose in what way the RBA should be conducted in China.

This paper analyzes the practice of money‐laundering risk management in Chinese AML programs, compares the rule‐based AML approach and the risk‐based AML approach, and discusses the practical condition of carrying out the risk‐based AML approach in China.

Although China has made significant progress on combating money laundering, the practice of money‐laundering risk management in Chinese AML programs is still weak, and the pre‐conditions for fully implementing the RBA in China are yet to be met.

This paper highlights the practical issues preventing Chinese authorities from fully implementing a risk‐based AML approach, and proposes a “rule‐based but risk‐oriented” AML approach (a partial RBA) in the context of Chinese realities.

The quality of produced textile fibers plays a very important role in the textile industry, and detection and assessment schemes are the key problems. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to propose a relatively simple and effective technique to detect and assess the quality of produced textile fibers.

In order to achieve automatic visual inspection of fabric defects, first, images of the textile fabric are pre-processed by using Block-Matching and 3-D (BM3D) filtering. And then, features of textile fibers image are respectively extracted, including color, texture and frequency spectrum features. The color features are extracted by using hue–saturation–intensity model, which is more consistent with the human vision perception model; texture features are extracted by using scale-invariant feature transform scheme, which is a quite good method to detect and describe the local image features, and the obtained features are robust to local geometric distortion; frequency spectrum features of textiles are less sensitive to noise and intensity variations than spatial features. Finally, for evaluating the quality of the fabric in real time, two quantitatively metric parameters, peak signal-to-noise ratio and structural similarity, are used to objectively assess the quality of textile fabric image.

Compared to the quality between production and pre-processing of textile fiber images, the BM3D filtering method is a very efficient technology to improve the quality of textile fiber images. Compared to the different features of textile fibers, like color, texture and frequency spectrum, the proposed detection and assessment method based on textile fabric image feature can easily detect and assess the quality of textiles. Moreover, the objective metrics can further improve the intelligence and performance of detection and assessment schemes, and it is very simple to detect and assess the quality of textiles in the textile industry.

An intelligent detection and assessment method based on textile fabric image feature is proposed, which can efficiently detect and assess the quality of textiles, thereby improving the efficiency of textile production lines.

About five per cent of ‐ generally very frail ‐ older people live in long‐term care in the UK; approximately a fifth of all deaths occur in care homes. Depression and dementia are prevalent mental health conditions in care homes; depression is reported in around a third of residents and dementia in two thirds. While there is some evidence about efficacy of medication in treating psychiatric and behavioural symptoms among residents, much less is known about the potential role of psychosocial interventions in enhancing mental health and quality of life. Quality of care varies widely across the carehome sector including support from primary and specialist health and quality and level of training. In terms of enhancing care quality, there is evidence that investing in staff training and conditions, establishing good links with healthcare providers, and developing care standards that genuinely promote good practice are likely to improve resident quality of life. This is an exciting area for research development and practice innovation for the future; taking account of users perspective, holds particular potential.

Public management work has tended to ignore the application of benchmarking accountability of local government authorities (LGAs) in public procurement. To that effect, the purpose of this paper is to present the applicability of a benchmarking model as an instrument for improving accountability of procuring entities such as LGAs in public procurement practices.

A case study from United States Agency for International Development funded Chemonics International’s Program—Pamoja Twajenga in Tanzania has been used to effectively showcase the efficacy of the benchmarking model in increasing compliance and improve accountability of LGAs as procuring entities. Performance assessment of eight Tanzania LGAs’ internal public procurement practices was conducted using the benchmarking model. Benchmarking Framework of Compliance Standards and Performance Indictors in Public Procurement (FCSPIPP) was developed and applied in conducting a benchmark assessment of the LGAs. The methodology of a benchmark assessment encompassed number scoring of perceived performance of each LGA for each indicator of a compliance standard.

The case study has conceded that the benchmarking model is an instrument which can be applied for improving the accountability of LGAs in public procurement practices. Looking at the scale of LGAs’ purchases, the case study reveals that monitoring compliance may greatly benefit from the methodological approach of benchmarking. The benchmark assessment adopted in this case study offers a collective instrument for LGAs in developing countries to measure, compare and learn to improve in public procurement practices. The model offers public procurement entities, such as LGAs, with an opportunity to learn based on performance and improvement of peers. The FCSPIPP presented in this case study is the main pillar of the benchmark assessment in public procurement.

The major limitation of this case study is that it relies only on the findings and lessons learnt from the benchmarking of eight LGAs in Tanzania. Presumably, it would be useful to would have been more useful if more countries from developing economies were included in the case study; it could have increased the plausibility of the applicability of the model at the local government levels.

Implicitly, public procurement and regulatory authorities in developing countries need to learn, improve its role and develop capacity in the application of benchmarking for enforcing compliance in public procurement practices. Since the approach is based on listening from the procuring entities, the model provides the procurement Authority to work on policy challenges affecting the procuring entities to comply with what the procurement process requires. Deliberate efforts are needed to strengthen the capacity of developing countries to put in place policies and reforms that pave the way for the use of process benchmarking in public procurement at the LGAs level.

Since benchmarking encourages active participation of the user department and community in the procurement process, presupposes curbing corruption red flags and improved value for money contracts for improved social services. The methodological approach of monitoring procuring entities, using process benchmarking, provides public procurement and regulatory agencies and LGAs a collegial, participative and self-discovering on what constitutes compliance. This may enhance the sense of answerability of procurement officers to citizens.

This study confirms the efficacy of the benchmarking model as an alternative and complementary instrument to traditional compliance audit in public procurement. The application of an FCSPIPP means that benchmarking results may be used to improve public procurement practices.

To review the reported compliance levels of third round mutual evaluations with a view to determining any change or differences in compliance levels for Financial Action Task Force (FATF) member countries following the updating of FATF's Forty Recommendations in 2003 and the introduction of the Nine Special Recommendations relating to the financing of terrorism.

A comparison of pre‐ and post‐2003 compliance with the FATF's Forty Recommendations and Nine Special Recommendations is made using both self‐assessment and mutual assessment data.

There are significant differences in compliance levels pre and post 2003. Since, the FATF updated their Forty Recommendations in 2003 compliance with those Recommendations has declined. With regard to the Nine Special Recommendations which have not changed since their introduction there is a significant difference between self‐assessment compliance levels in 2003 and compliance determined using independent mutual evaluations, casting doubt on the value of self assessment.

In using an analytical approach it has been necessary to put numerical values on compliance levels used by the FATF. Given that these are very broad, substituting a single value for each compliance level will provide only a crude measure of compliance for comparisons to be made. The results should therefore be used as a guide to the ranking and compliance of countries rather than some exact measurement of compliance.

The value of self assessment by FATF members should be re‐evaluated.

Publication of the third round of FATF mutual evaluations provides an opportunity, not previously available, to analyse the compliance levels amongst FATF members.

Via the Institute of Internal Auditors, founded in 1941, the internal auditing profession actively promote the quality of internal auditors and internal audit activities. Since 1999, internal auditing standards have been revised. From 1 January 2002, all internal audit activities/any consultant rendering internal auditing services must undergo quality control, according to the provisions of Attribute Standard 1300. The revised internal auditing standards on quality control in internal audit activities reflect fundamental changes for the internal auditing profession. This article analyses the formal prescriptions and guidelines on quality in internal audit activities contained in the internal auditing standards and related practice advisories.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate differences in the degree of usage and compliance with the Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA) International Standards for the Professional Practices of Internal Auditing (Standards) by organizations' internal audit activities (IAA) located in the USA and a sample of European countries which have affiliates with the IIA. This paper shows the differences among Belgium, Italy, The Netherlands, the UK and Ireland, and the USA with respect to the level of use of the Standards and compliance with the Standards by respondents' IAAs.

Survey results from questionnaires sent to IIA members in September 2006 about various topics relating to internal auditing are summarized in the Common Body of Knowledge 2006 database. These results are compared among Belgium, Italy, The Netherlands, the UK and Ireland, and the USA.

This paper shows the differences among Belgium, Italy, The Netherlands, the UK and Ireland, and the USA with respect to the level of use of the Standards and compliance with the Standards by respondents' IAAs. There are significant levels of variation in responses by country. For Standards 1300, Quality Assurance and Improvement Program, and 2600, Resolution of Management's Acceptance of Risks, respondents indicate high levels of non‐compliance.

This study compares the status of the use of the IIA Standards in five countries to determine if there is any difference in application in different parts of the world.