Worldwide, recent corporate collapses have added to the insecurity of financial markets, triggering regulatory responses. This study provides empirical evidence of the relationship between corporate governance and the efficiency of Australian banks between 1999 and 2013, using two-stage double-bootstrap data envelopment analysis. Of the five corporate governance factors considered, we find board size and committee meetings have robustly significant and positive effects on efficiency. We also find evidence of improvements in overall industry efficiency following the 2003 introduction of the Principles of Good Corporate Governance, but not of any statistically-significant influence of the GFC.

In this study, we analyze the impact of threshold value of energy saving level set by the policy maker on energy saving level and price set by green supply chains. Then, the decision of the policy maker and the coordination of a supply chain are investigated. The results suggest that both regulation and supply chain structure have significant impacts on energy savings and profits. From the observations, we can conclude vertical integration and coordination should be advocated if energy savings is urgent and regulation is implemented.

Purpose-The purpose of this paper is to investigate the efficiency and productivity growth of the Iranian banking industry between 2003 and 2008, encompassing pre-and post-2005-reform years. Design/methodology/approach-The study uses a new decomposition of the Hicks-Moorsteen total factor productivity index developed by O'Donnell to analyse efficiency and productivity changes in a banking context. The advantage of this approach over the popular constant-returns-to-scale Malmquist productivity index is that it is free from any assumptions concerning firms' optimising behaviour, the structure of markets, or returns to scale. The paper assumes that the production technology exhibits variable returns to scale. Findings-The banking industry's technical efficiency level-which had improved between 2003 and 2006-deteriorated after regulatory changes were introduced in Iran. The results obtained also show that during 2006-2007, the industry's total factor productivity increased by 32 per cent. However, the industry experienced its highest negative scale efficiency rate of 38 per cent (DROSE ¼ 0.62) and its highest negative efficiency growth of 43 per cent (DEff ¼ 0.57) during this period. The industry also witnessed a strong drop in productivity in 2007-2008. Overall, changes in the production possibility set and scaleefficiency changes exerted dominant effects on productivity changes. Originality/value-This study is the first to use a comprehensive decomposition of the Hicks-Moorsteen TFP index to analyse efficiency and productivity changes in a banking context.

Background: Oncology nurses play a crucial role in cancer pain management and must be highly informed to ensure their effective practice in the cancer setting. The aim of this study was to determine the baseline level of knowledge and attitudes of oncology nurses regarding cancer pain management. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional survey research design was employed. The sample comprised 58 cancer nurses working in Shahid Sadoughi hospital, Yazd, Iran. The ''Nurses Knowledge and Attitudes Survey Regarding Pain'' (NKAS) tool and a demographic form were utilized to ascertain the knowledge and attitudes of oncology nurses working in oncology settings. Results: The average correct response rate for oncology nurses was 66.6%, ranging from 12.1% to 94.8%. The nurses mean score on the knowledge and attitudes survey regarding pain management was 28.5%. Results revealed that the mean percentage score overall was 65.7%. Only 8.6% of nurse participants obtained a passing score of 75% or greater. Widespread knowledge deficits and poor attitudes were noted in this study, particularly regard pharmacological management of pain. Conclusions: The present study provides important information about knowledge deficits in pain management among oncology nurses and limited training regarding pain management. Our results support the universal concern of inadequate knowledge and attitudes of nurses regarding cancer pain. It is suggested educational and quality improvement initiatives in pain management could enhance nurses knowledge in the area of pain and possibly improve practice.

This study proposes a by-production Luenberger-Hicks-Moorsteen indicator that includes undesirable outputs, here CO2 emissions, in airline performance analysis. We use capital and staff as inputs and tonnekilometres available as a desirable output to evaluate operation stage efficiency and productivity of the world's major airlines between 2007 and 2013. Our results demonstrate European airlines are relatively stronger performers in terms of both pollution-adjusted operational efficiency and productivity. Middle-Eastern airlines have made gains in terms of output growth but perform poorly in terms of pollution-adjusted productivity, evidence that ETSs may produce greener airlines.