free online learning

Sometimes, we may not have the money or time to attend formal lectures/talks/seminar.
However, we can learn through online learning at our own free time, own pace.
Many of these online lectures/talks are free :-)

MIT OpenCourseWare
MIT OCW website
MIT courses' materials for many disciplines are put online..
Look for Economics, Sloan School of Management

MIT World
MIT World website
Look for Business/Leadership, Economics, Innovation/invention etc.
This website has lots of video by great speakers..
On business alone, we can find Jack Welch, Carly Florina,Peter Senge, Negroponte, Muhammad Yunus, LesterThurow, Bill Gates.... wow :-)

OOPS
OOPS website
this is the chinese version of OpenCourseWare..
course materials for many other universities too..
website

OOPS video
OOPS video website
Chinese version of "MIT World" + video of presentationin Taiwan..

Open Learn
Open Learn website
UK version.

Industry Analysis – get data from MICE

MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions and Exhibition) information is a good source to do Industry Analysis.

Malaysia Convention & Exhibition Directory
website
Look for calendar of events .
It shows a list of events, conventions, exhibitions that have been held and are going to be held.
We can get a lot of information from Industry Exhibition, for e.g

• Industry participants (industry leaders, challengers, numbers of main participants etc.)
• Buyers
• Suppliers
• Industry publications, magazines, newsletters
• Industry groups
• Regulators
• Industry experts
• Talks/seminars (sometimes presentation materials are available)
• Products, niche markets etc…

Take for example, from Calendar of Events,

choose ISF 2008 (17 June – 20 June 2008)
go to ISF website (International Security & Safety Expo & Forum) (click on the logo),
you can get "e-brochure" (can find related Ministry, industry body, lots of industry participants can be found inside).

The logo shows the sponsors (usually important industry players), industry publications etc.

We will be able to get even more information about the industry cluster (to use Michael Porter’s word: "cluster") if we continue to search for the sponsors, industry publications, professional bodies etc.
We have not even set foot on the real Exhibition and already got so much information :-)

Malaysia - 2007 Auditor-General Report

Jabatan Audit Negara Malaysia

2007 Auditor-General Report (only Malay version available as of now)
2007 Auditor-General Report
(going a level up will be other Audit Report)

• It comes with :
  Penyata Akaun Awam & Pengurusan Kewangan
  (can see how Ministries, government agencies’ financial accounts are managed)
  
• Pengurusan & Aktiviti Kementerian/Jabatan dan Pengurusan Syarikat Kerajaan Persekutuan
  (can see what are the activities carried out by Ministries, their structures, new projects etc.. a good source of information)
  

From (a), (Sigh) What a mess ! Lots of rooms for improvement !

Page 20: Table showing weaknesses of expenditures for development
(subsequent pages showing the details and amount involved. )
Page 74-75: "scores" for financial management of different Ministries, Departments
Page 115: Conclusion

Both reports also have some photographs showing examples of what need to be improved.
Seems like this Audit is really painstakingly done.

Hopefully, those weaker Ministries & Departments can buck up as soon as possible and improve themselves in financial "governance".

Economic Analysis : Malaysia

Where to get data for economic analysis of Malaysia ?

1. Bank Negara Malaysia
BNM website

Some of the data available:
National Summary Data,
Statement of Asset & Liabilities (official international reserves position) ,
detailed breakdown of official international reserves,
rates like: exchange rate, interest rates, Islamic interbank rates,
Malaysian Government Securities ("risk free rate" for Malaysia, useful in investment calculation. Also can look at MGS yield curve),
Kijang Emas prices (gold price),
primary issues of all instruments etc.

• Some information comes with downloadable historical data or historical chart. A good source to see the trend of the parameters.
• By checking Advance Release Calendar, we can proactively know and check for timely, relevant data, instead of passively waiting to see the same data appearing in newspaper etc..
• Monthly statistical bulletin is a compilation of monetary, financial & macro economic statistics. A good one-stop summary.

2. Department of Statistics, Malaysia
website
We can find macro-economic statistics for e.g population, vital statistics, GDP/GNI, BOP, external trade, exports, production, CPI, PPI etc. from the website. The growth rate is useful as a benchmark for economic growth.