Farm assurance schemes are an inevitable and essential part of the UK livestock industries as they provide valuable assurances to the market over food safety, nonhuman animal welfare, and environmental concerns. However, there is potential for welfare assessment within such schemes to extend beyond existing resource-based parameters to include outcome-based observations of the behavior and phys...

Abstract Syntax Tree’s (AST) are used in language tools, such as compilers, language translators and transformers as well as analysers; to remove syntax and are therefore an ideal construct for a language independent tool. AST’s are also commonly used in static analysis. This increases the value of ASTs for use within a universal Quality Assurance (QA) tool. The Object Management Group (OMG) ha...

Abstract Climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of natural disasters can threaten functions ecosystems. Affected, damaged or destroyed ecosystems in turn also make our societies more vulnerable to hazards climate (i.e. their assurance value). In addition, expanding communities concentrations wealth high-risk areas are risk exposure dramatically. This chapter outlines growing i...

We present an overview of key aspects of the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Program Climate Research Facility (ACRF) data quality assurance program. Processes described include instrument deployment and calibration; instrument and facility maintenance; data collection and processing infrastructure; data stream inspection and assessment; problem reporting, review and resolution; data ar...

Exploiting a natural experiment in which voluntary audits replace mandatory audits for U.K. private companies, we analyze whether imposing audits suppresses valuable information about the types of companies that would voluntarily choose to be audited. We control for the assurance benefits of auditing to isolate the role signaling plays by focusing on companies that are audited under both regime...

Safety activities may provide assurance of safety even where such assurance is unwarranted. This phenomenon – which we will call “probative blindness” – is evident both in hindsight analysis of accidents and in the daily practice of safety work. The purpose of this paper is to describe the phenomenon of probative blindness. We achieve this by distinguishing probative blindness from other phenom...