Search

Innovation in green technologies is a key factor propelling Jordanian sustainable development in the small and medium enterprises for achieving sustainability. Jordan is considered as a hub of small and medium enterprises, however, despite technological advancements and the efforts of the government, small and medium enterprises in Jordan are scarcely catering the aspect of green activities and researchers have paid less attention towards the same. Green product and green process innovation mode choices have drawn enough attention recently, but limited researchers have thoroughly examined the pathways through which green innovation is transmitted to small and medium enterprises' performance. Green product and process innovation are the two main streams of green innovation that can enhance small and medium enterprises' performance. The current research builds the framework for SMEs performance based on green product innovation and green process innovation following earlier research that have been conducted in the context of developed countries. It conducts an empirical analysis using responses of 384 manufacturing sector small and medium enterprises in Jordan. The findings demonstrate that small and medium enterprises can perform better when green products and processes are innovated. One significant moderating variable over the performance paths of small and medium enterprises is technological turbulence. The findings of the research contribute to a better understanding of green innovation and have implications for designing policies that promote green development. Article highlights: The Paper identifies the synergetic impact of product and process innovation in the context of the developing countries. The current research identified the moderating role of technological turbulence in a growing economy and is considered as a heaven for the SMEs. The novelty of the study is moderating impact of technological turbulence over the synergetic impact of product and process innovation by combining Resource Based View and Contingency theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bioplastics serve as good alternatives to conventional plastics, but their production and adoption globally remain generally low. This paper sought to determine the consumer preference for bioplastics due to the urgent need for an invention on plastic pollution in Nigeria. This was achieved by employing green nudges on consumers' choice experiments on bioplastic products. The study used a sample size of 327 respondents employing the snowball sampling approach. We discovered that there was high preference heterogeneity among respondents probably due to cultural diversity and attitudinal differences. Moreover, respondents preferred to stick with their preferences instead of opting for a change in their decisions. This may have been because Nigerians are known to be brand loyalists. Our results showed that the Text treatment group thought that bioplastic labels were innovative and useful compared to the control group. This perception was probably because of the concise text on the advantages of bioplastics. We conclude that although respondents were exposed to various green nudges, there was little effect of the green nudges on their purchasing decisions. We recommend that further studies be carried out to understand why price effect was not effective in Nigeria against theory and as compared to developed countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Achieving the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) requires an overall and well-balanced achievement of all SDGs rather than cherry-picking a few. While it is vital to assess the evenness of SDGs achievement, such analysis, particularly on a global scale, is still evidently absent from the existing literature. To remedy such a scholarly gap, this paper measures the evenness of SDGs achievement for 193 countries from 2010 to 2019 by adapting the evenness assessment method originating from ecology and biodiversity literature. Our analyses regarding the country-level SDG evenness index scores (EIS) indicate a significant heterogeneity across countries. Global South countries usually underperform in the evenness of 17 goals, while a significant portion of Global North countries also suffer from the unbalanced developments in SDGs. By integrating the evenness measures into the conventional global SDG monitoring framework, this study identifies six development paths in pursuing the SDGs and shows that maintaining the overall SDGs improvements while balancing the development of each goal is practical but has not taken place in at least 35% of countries. We estimate that the SDG evenness and average performance could further increase by 3.5 p.p. and 2.1 p.p., or 74 percent and 50 percent of the growth in the baseline continue past paths scenario, respectively, if each country could follow the effective development path of frontier counterparts with similar income levels. Our SDG evenness measures, complemented by inter-temporal cross-country analyses, could inform policies and cooperation strategies to identify the weaknesses in sustainable development, boost effective growth, and protect unevenly developed countries. Future research could further develop these measures to provide deeper insights into achieving rapid and well-balanced development of SDGs at various levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior researches have highlighted challenges and variations arising from the requirements of research ethics committees and ethics governance systems across diverse research fields. This emphasizes the need to investigate how universities convey and implement research ethical practices. Research ethics plays a pivotal role in guiding the integration of ethical principles throughout all stages of research starting from its inception and planning to its completion and the dissemination of results. These practices encompass a range of considerations, reviews, guidelines, and processes aimed at safeguarding the rights, dignity, health, safety, and privacy of research participants. Using the content analysis technique, this paper aims to analyse research ethical practices information on universities' websites from three developed countries and developing countries respectively using the isomorphism conception. The findings suggest that the coercive, normative, and mimetic isomorphic pressures explain the research ethics governance practices. The ethical practices information was disclosed more on university websites of the developed countries. Suggestions to improve the university's research ethics governance system for the post-COVID-19 era were provided in the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Passive investments such as exchange-traded funds (ETFs) provide an opportunity to invest in indexes, asset classes, and sectors with low maintenance costs and high transparency. Today ETFs dominate the world, with nearly 50% of the investment in the USA coming through ETFs. Numerous studies on specific aspects on ETFs have been done earlier; however, considering the scarcity of thorough summaries in the existing body of literature, this bibliometric and systematic review aims to adopt a methodical approach with the goal of delivering qualitative and quantitative understanding of ETFs, while highlighting general research trends. The authors analyzed 2058 articles associated with ETFs from the Scopus database during the last 50 years, i.e., from 1973 till date. The search was initially conducted using title, keyword, and abstract, yielding 2058 articles, which were narrowed to only include research papers and review papers, resulting in a final count of 958 items. The most important authors, highest cited articles, prominent journals, important themes, and associated countries have been identified using bibliometric research. The numerical and visual representations of the analysis show that ETFs are a widely studied research area, and the enormous rise in publications in 2020, 2021, and 2022 demonstrates that researchers are quite interested in the topic. According to affiliation statistics, most research is focused in the USA together with other developed nations, opening new options for the research on ETFs in relation to developing economies. The current analysis reconciles numerous exchange-traded fund studies associated with volatility, liquidity, risk-return trade-off, and tracking errors and identifies possible research gaps. Some of the emerging topics that evolved in passive investments include the use of machine learning, AI, and the emergence of ETFs associated with ESG and sustainability. This research will help lawmakers, scholars, and regulators understand the core principles of ETFs and identify areas that deserve additional investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper answers calls for a better understanding of the importance of domestic collaboration networks for innovation in immigrant- and native-owned firms. With a specific focus on the domestic networks established with other firms, research institutions, and business associations, we question whether cultivating such social capital with diverse actors is linked to better innovation performances for immigrant-owned firms. We investigate this research question by exploiting a unique matched-pair sample of immigrant and native domestic entrepreneurs who are active in high-tech mainstream (non-ethnic) markets. Our results show that universities and research institutions, along with business associations, are more important for innovation in immigrant-owned firms. In addition, we discover that immigrant entrepreneurs' acculturation to the host country's culture acts as a substitute for interactions with business associations. These findings contribute to the academic and policy knowledge on the link between immigrant entrepreneurship and innovation in developed countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A number of indications, such as the number of Nobel Prize winners, show Japan to be a scientifically advanced country. However, standard bibliometric indicators place Japan as a scientifically developing country. The present study is based on the conjecture that Japan is an extreme case of a general pattern in highly industrialized countries. In these countries, scientific publications come from two types of studies: some pursue the advancement of science and produce highly cited publications, while others pursue incremental progress and their publications have a very low probability of being highly cited. Although these two categories of papers cannot be easily identified and separated, the scientific level of Japan can be tested by studying the extreme upper tail of the citation distribution of all scientific articles. In contrast to standard bibliometric indicators, which are calculated from the total number of papers or from sets of papers in which the two categories of papers are mixed, in the extreme upper tail, only papers that are addressed to the advance of science will be present. Based on the extreme upper tail, Japan belongs to the group of scientifically advanced countries and is significantly different from countries with a low scientific level. The number of Clarivate Citation laureates also supports our hypothesis that some citation-based metrics do not reveal the high scientific level of Japan. Our findings suggest that Japan is an extreme case of inaccuracy of some citation metrics; the same drawback might affect other countries, although to a lesser degree. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, voting in elections has become a major topic of debate. The legitimacy of election results is being questioned, whether it be elections on the government, municipality, university, or even department level. This led to a general distrust between the voting populations of developing countries and developed nations and electoral committees. Looking at election turnout rates, it becomes clear that an ever-widening rift between voters and trust in traditionally held elections has caused prominent voter apathy. The general population sees policymakers as not having taken serious strides in solving these problems. Electronic voting was seemingly introduced to alleviate some problems. Yet, the public has expressed concerns about election manipulation through hacking since electronic systems are notoriously vulnerable to those kinds of attacks and are hard to shield from. Introducing blockchain technology to this field is a logical step to evolving traditional e-voting systems. Traditional voting and, by extension, e-voting suffer from centralization, where a single entity oversees the election process. This creates a single point of failure. Thus, it becomes easy to tamper with voter data and election results. Blockchain technology offers a solution to decentralize and restore trust in the process; it embraces decentralization, the entire process becomes open to the public, and the need for a centralized managerial entity is reduced. In this paper, we introduce and implement a blockchain-based voting system that addresses the issues mentioned earlier in centralized voting. Moreover, our system proposes solutions to some of the problems and side-effects that are likely to happen when adopting blockchain-based voting systems, especially the anonymity of the voters and the confidentiality of the results until the time of the official announcement. We show that it is possible to have a voting system that accomplishes decentralization and trustworthiness for all the parties involved in the voting process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enhancing the quality and safety of exported agricultural products and improving export competitiveness is the key to establishing enhanced competitive advantages in agricultural products, developing a trade powerhouse and realising high-quality development of agriculture. This paper uses the data of Chinese listed companies and Chinese Customs from 2007 to 2016 to discuss the effect and mechanism of digital transformation of enterprises on the quality and safety level of export agricultural products by using the staggered differential method. The study shows that (1) Enterprise digital transformation effectively improves the quality and safety of exported agricultural products, and this result holds after endogeneity, placebo and multiple robustness tests; (2) Heterogeneity analyses reveal that the quality and safety effect of enterprise digital transformation is greater for exporting to developed countries' markets, non-state-owned enterprises and enterprises in the eastern region, in addition to bulk agricultural products and consumer-oriented agricultural products; (3) Mechanism analyses shows that enterprise digital transformation raises the quality and safety of exported agricultural products through technological innovation, product tracing, information sharing and quality assurance effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The social discount rate (SDR) for infrastructure policies is applied in public projects' benefit/cost analysis and measures the rate at which a society is willing to pay for present consumption. The choice of the discount rate in such project evaluation may play a vital role in the relative weighting of cost and benefits. A high SDR will evaluate the benefits of certain projects at a lower present value. A low SDR will raise the present value of the project's economic benefits, and it will weigh the long-term environmental damages more heavily. The current paper has examined variations in social discount rate policies of various countries around the world. Developed countries have applied lower rates like 3–5% while developing countries apply 7.3–15%. Higher SDR numbers means intervention to future generation rights. Developing countries should review the appropriateness of their SDR levels according to changing domestic economic circumstances and international capital market conditions. Developed countries should give less-developed countries or developing countries a chance by transferring their technologies applied in abatement policies. The key that will open the door to a better future for our grandchildren is in the hand of developed communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to compare the economic resilience of industries and regions along the last four decades, which include the three last major crises for the advanced countries (90s, Great Recession in 2007 and recent COVID-19 pandemic). Productive structure and sectoral specialization are introduced as explaining factor for the different regional behaviors. For this purpose, we estimate both resilience and specialization indices based on employment data. To analyze the relationship between specialization and resilience, a cross-sectional descriptive analysis is complemented by a panel data model that includes some controls. Finally, a regional shift-share analysis contributes to exert some other regional effects affecting economic resilience. The results of this research show some continuities and other significant changes in the regional impact of crises from one to the next. Although there are other effects to have played a role, results show economic specialization is found to have exerted influence on the recovery of certain regions during this period. Recovery periods differ from each crisis and the results might be affected for this dimensionality limitation. Due to the characteristics of the database, the study includes only six sectors. However, general results are generalizable to other regions as the response of employment growth to crises is similar in many advanced regions and specialization patterns does not significantly differ among regions. The paper carries a structural long-term comparison between the last major crises for Spanish regions, which clearly differentiates one from another in their causes and effects. We introduce specialization to explain the different regional resilience patterns. Methodologically, we estimate both sectoral and regional resilience indices for these three crises and relate this resilience to specialization and other explaining factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we aim to analyze the behavior of developed-country acquiring firms in dealing with Cross-Border Mergers and Acquisitions location choices at both national and sub-national levels with the impact of carbon risk and heterogeneous environmental regulations (Government, Civil, and Market Environmental regulations) and to explore their Cross-Border Mergers and Acquisitions performances under different situations. A sample of 874 intra-manufacturing Cross-Border Mergers and Acquisitions completed by developed-country acquirers and conducted in developed countries and China during 2002–2021 was analyzed using logistic regression and multiple linear regression. The results show that: (1) Acquirers with higher carbon risks tend to choose China rather developed country as the target location, while this relationship is not strengthened by the home country's high-level environmental regulations; (2) At the sub-national level, Chinese provinces' government environmental regulations cannot impede acquirers to enter; what's more, the civil environmental regulations even attract these acquirers, this is particularly the case if the acquirer has high carbon risk; (3) Acquirers with higher carbon risks can achieve more performance, no matter whether they choose China as the target country. Our findings add insight into the effect of carbon risks on companies' decisions and the unique characteristics of the heterogeneous environmental regulations in China. What's more, implications are provided for Chinese regulators and policymakers, e.g., listening to the public opinion, improving the governance quality, and attracting foreign investors to help domestic industry upgrading and maintain long-run economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Islamic banking is among rapidly-growing components in the world's financial system. Within its institutions, continuous criteria of efficiency facilitate the evaluation of the impact of the reforms and policies on the banks' performance. In this paper, we employ the Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines (MARS) method for estimating the efficiency of Islamic banks in developed and developing countries. MARS is a well-known efficient method for the flexible modelling of high-dimensional data. Unlike previous work, using a nonparametric technique of such a robustness instead of parametric approaches contributes to the improvement of the various estimates, which provides investors with accurate and timely information they can immediately react upon for a better decision-making in turbulent times. On the one hand, the results of the experiments show that, in the emerging region, there is evidence of a strong linkage between Islamic banking efficiency and gross domestic product. On the other hand, in the developed region, the efficiency is rather based upon Sharia Supervisory Board and board committees. These outcomes confirm previous works showing that governance-related variables have a significant positive effect on Islamic banking efficiency. Furthermore, the overall MARS-based predictions reveal that Islamic banks operating in developed countries are relatively more efficient than their counterparts in emerging countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID-19 has significantly influenced global financial markets, including Bitcoin. Recent studies have focused on investigating the first wave of the COVID-19 outbreak and accounting for market changes, which were mostly due to the pandemic. This research not only analyzes the contagion effects of COVID-19 but also considers aftermath events beyond the first pandemic wave to examine spillovers of Bitcoin. The study employs Diebold and Yilmaz's method to explore the static and dynamic spillovers of the selected variables and identifies several major global events, including crypto-specific affairs, macroeconomic policies, and geopolitical conflicts, to explain the new market dynamics of Bitcoin using network analysis. The findings identify a few high-contagion periods related to Bitcoin. The paper also found that Bitcoin is more likely to produce extreme returns and is more connected to other markets. Contagion effects "from" and "to" other markets are asymmetrical in terms of arrival time and market response. Bitcoin is more likely to be affected by other markets in extreme situations and receives spillovers from them sooner than it transmits spillovers to others. In the context of various global events, impacts arising from developed countries are stronger. China still has some impact on cryptocurrency markets, but they are waning. Bitcoin is thus not a safe haven from the shocks of global events, but can sometimes work as a hedge or diversifier. The results offer alternative explanations for Bitcoin's different market dynamics and enrich our understanding of Bitcoin's safe haven, hedge, and diversifier properties within a diversified portfolio. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the mobility patterns of older adults in ten countries, with a focus on the differences produced by urban environments in their non-work trips. Using detailed time use diaries from the Multinational Time Use Study for the last two decades, we analyze the trips associated with leisure and housework of non-working older adults. The results show that older adults in urban areas spend more time in leisure trips than similar individuals in rural areas. On the other hand, male older adults in urban areas spend less time in housework trips than do their counterparts in rural areas. However, such correlations are found to differ by country, gender, type of trip, and mode of transport, revealing complex correlations between urban forms and older adults' daily mobility. Furthermore, factors such as the number of railway kilometers, gross domestic product growth rates, and the percentage of urban population in the country seem to be associated with differences in the behavior of older adults in their non-work daily trips. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie ( KZfSS) is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The debate about the impact of robots on employment has been lively. In this paper, I examine the effect of robots on local labor demand in South Korea, one of the most technologically advanced countries in terms of robotics. Using the regional variation in robot exposure constructed from national industry-level robot adoption data and the initial distribution of industrial employment in cities, I find that robots did not reduce local labor demand. However, I estimate declines in labor demand in the manufacturing sector and routine jobs. An increase in one robot per 1000 workers in terms of exposure to robots is correlated with a decline in the job vacancy growth rate of 2.6%p in the manufacturing sector and of 2.5%p in routine jobs. No significant relationship is found between robot exposure and labor demand in the service sector or non-routine jobs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pollen-induced allergies affect a significant part of the population in developed countries. Current palynological analysis in Europe is a slow and laborious process which provides pollen information in a weekly-cycle basis. In this paper, we describe a system that allows to locate and classify, in a single step, the pollen grains present in standard glass microscope slides. Besides, processing the samples in the z-axis allows us to increase the probability of detecting grains compared to solutions based on one image per sample. Our system has been trained to recognise 11 pollen types, achieving 97.6 % success rate locating grains, of which 96.3 % are also correctly identified (0.956 macro–F1 score), and with a 2.4 % grains lost. Our results indicate that deep learning provides a robust framework to address automated identification of various pollen types, facilitating their daily measurement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spurred by the need for increased adequacy and international comparability, absolute poverty measures are gaining in policy relevance around the world. This paper proposes a simple and feasible method of calculating absolute poverty thresholds on the basis of households' minimum food needs in advanced economies. It makes three important contributions. First, it demonstrates that conventional statistical methods used in the developing world deliver either unrealistically low or improbably high poverty estimates in rich countries where household spending on food is modest in relative terms. Second, it proposes a new simulation-based inverse method that focuses on the non-food Engel curve and uses predetermined minimum food bundles not as inputs but as targeted reference points in order to calculate adequate poverty thresholds. Finally, an empirical application of the new method using household budget survey data from Italy shows that resulting poverty estimates are comparable to the official figures of the Italian Statistical Office in terms of both the poverty rate and the poverty profiles. Requiring few and easily procurable resources, the proposed algorithm is well suited to produce robust, consistent and internationally comparable absolute poverty estimates in a large number of developed countries and emerging economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Asia has constantly been in the spotlight regarding economic development as it has been the fastest-growing global region over recent decades. This study investigated the effect of financial development on economic growth in selected Asian countries at various stages of economic development. A recently introduced approach, the Dynamic Common Correlated Effects (DCCE) method, was applied to 12 Asian countries/areas covering 26 years (1995–2020). The 12 countries/areas were divided into three groups based on their current economic development status: underdeveloped, moderately, and highly developed. The study results indicated that the effect of financial development on economic growth varied for countries at different economic levels. The association between financial development and economic growth was strongly negative for underdeveloped countries. However, a positive relationship existed between the sampled moderately and highly developed countries/areas. This situation implied that financial development should not be considered a viable way to boost economic growth for countries with underdeveloped economies. Instead, countries with a higher economic status should priorities financial development to promote economic prosperity effectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Insomnia is the most reported sleep disorder in industrialized countries, affecting, in the chronic form, around 10% of the European population. In Italy, such a percentage seems to be even higher. Although insomnia can be an independent disorder, it is frequently described as comorbid condition and may precipitate, exacerbate, or prolong a broad range of physical and mental disorders. Evaluating and targeting insomnia in the Italian clinical practice should be a priority. Methods: The present expert opinions and recommendations represent an update from 2020 and insights from Insomnia Expert Consensus Group, based on systematic reviews according to PRISMA on available options in Italy from January 2020 to March 2023. Results: We evaluated 28 papers among international guidelines, expert opinions, systematic reviews, and meta-analysis produced during the last 26 months. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that symptoms of insomnia must be assessed in the Italian clinical practice by evaluating nocturnal and daytime symptoms, comorbid conditions, and lifestyle. Cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia should be the first option according to availability. The choice of the drug should be based on different factors including type of insomnia, age, comorbidities, and potential side effects. If the choice would be a Z-drug or a short-acting benzodiazepine (in subjects < 65 years old), the use should be in the short term (≤ 4 weeks). Indeed, eszopiclone, as a new option in Italy, may present a different profile and may be used for up to 6 months, also in the elderly. If the choice is melatonin, it should be used melatonin 2 mg prolonged release in adults ≥ 55 years for up to 13 weeks. A new dual orexin antagonist, daridorexant, is available in Italy; it has been shown to be effective in adults and elderly and it can be used for at least 3 months and up to 1 year. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the contribution of industrial robots to labor productivity growth and cross-country economic convergence in a sample of 19 developed and 16 emerging countries over the period 1999 to 2019. To answer our research questions, we extend the non-parametric production frontier framework by considering industrial robots as a separate production factor. We find a positive contribution of robotization to labor productivity growth for all countries in our sample. In the period after the financial crisis (2009 to 2019) the contribution of robot capital deepening to productivity growth gained in importance. Over the period 1999 to 2019 we find some evidence of i) unconditional β-convergence (countries with lower initial productivity levels grow faster), ii) a reduction in the dispersion of productivity levels across economies (σ-convergence) and iii) a depolarization (shift from bimodal to unimodal distribution) of the labor productivity distribution in our sample. Accumulation of 'traditional' physical capital is the main driver of β-convergence. Robot capital deepening significantly contributed to economic convergence and the depolarization of the labor productivity distribution, but its effect on the entire shift of the labor productivity distribution is modest and dominated by other drivers of productivity growth such as 'traditional' physical capital deepening and technological change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, there has been a persistent intensification of the global greenhouse effect. Balancing carbon emission reduction with economic growth poses an unprecedented global challenge. To better comprehend the relationship between economic growth and carbon emissions, this study first utilized the Tapio decoupling index to compare the decoupling relationship (the USA, Japan, and Germany) and three developing countries (China, India, and Russia) from 2000–2020. Additionally, the logarithmic mean Divisia index (LMDI) method was employed to investigate the factors influencing changes in carbon emissions. Our findings indicate that (1) the USA and Germany basically achieved strong decoupling; China, India, and Russia mainly showed weak decoupling; and Japan showed recessive decoupling. (2) Economic growth predominantly contributed to increased carbon emissions, with a lesser impact from population growth. A significant reduction in energy intensity restrained carbon emissions growth, as did energy structure replacement in most countries, excluding Japan. Based on this, a decoupling effort index was formulated. It has shown that the decoupling efforts made by developing countries are weaker than those of developed countries, primarily attributed to a lesser degree of decoupling between energy intensity and structure. This paper offers valuable insights for developing countries undergoing a low-carbon economic transformation. They should counterbalance carbon emission escalation resulting from economic growth through technological and energy structure improvements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between entry-regulation, corruption, and entrepreneurship is controversial in the literature. Using a broad cross-country dataset to deepen the investigation, this paper distinguishes opportunity and necessity-motivated entrepreneurship in different development contexts. Corruption might grease the wheels of ineffective administrative machinery in developing countries with heavy entry-regulation. Yet, the marginal effect of corruption will generally be non-significant in other developing countries and in developed countries. Moreover, our results suggest that corruption deters opportunity-motivated entrepreneurship—the type of entrepreneurship that may contribute the most to productivity, economic growth, and development—in developed countries. Plain English Summary: Corruption and regulation can have ambiguous relationships with entrepreneurship unless you take a careful look at it. We examine the impact of corruption and entry-regulation on opportunity and necessity-motivated entrepreneurship within different economic development contexts. Corruption and entry-regulation correlate negatively with entrepreneurship but might have a tempering effect on each other. Thus, we consider whether corruption reduces the negative impact of entry-regulation on entrepreneurship while remaining globally negative (i.e., the "weak view") or if it completely counterbalance the negative effect (the "strong view"). Exploiting a cross-country dataset on 105 countries over the 2003–2016 period, we find that, while corruption might somewhat temper the negative impact of a heavy administrative machinery in developing countries, this tempering effect of corruption will generally be non-significant. Furthermore, our findings suggest that corruption deters opportunity-motivated entrepreneurship—the type of entrepreneurship that may contribute the most to productivity, economic growth and development. Corruption and regulation would then be particularly harmful for economic development. The policy-maker tackling these issues would do well to consider direct effects and possible interrelationships according to context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fast emergence of intensive robotization in combination with artificial intelligence implies a reappearance of the debate about the effects of innovation on the labor market. Many empirical studies have explored this phenomenon at the micro level, especially since the surge of innovation surveys, which use worldwide standardized indicators at the firm level. Most empirical studies suggest a robust, positive labor effect generated by new products, while the impact of process innovations on employment seems to be ambiguous. This paper offers a meta-regression analysis to seek some logical explanations for the results reflected in studies that apply the model proposed by Harrison et al. Our meta-regression suggests that the effect of sales growth due to new products on employment seems to be homogeneous and positive by different types of sub-samples. However, the labor effect of process innovation on employment depends on different circumstances. Its magnitude seems to be more negative for developing countries, manufacturing sectors, and periods of crisis. On the other hand, the magnitude tends to be positive for samples with the methodological approach (using instrumental variables), control variables, and high-tech sectors. The exercise is repeated, splitting the sample between developing and developed countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the concept of de-risking in the context of international economic linkages and globalization. It highlights the importance of coherence across policies to mitigate risks associated with geopolitical shocks and ensure national defense objectives and economic development. The article mentions the commitment of the Group of 7 (G7) nations to de-risk without decoupling from China, reducing their dependence on Chinese trade while maintaining a constructive relationship. It also addresses the risks associated with economic interlinkages, technology linkages, and information flows. The article emphasizes the need for government intervention, collective action, shared values, and institutional commonalities to effectively de-risk and manage geopolitical risks. It suggests that orderly and phased de-risking is preferable to complete decoupling, as decoupling could have negative impacts on global welfare, particularly for low-income countries. The article concludes by discussing the importance of negotiating free trade and investment agreements that are resilient to geopolitics, promote economic development, and strike a balance between protectionism and policy maneuvers. [Extracted from the article]

Several countries have focused on achieving optimal economic growth in the past decades, which has caused diverse environmental concerns among policymakers and managers. The present study aims to introduce new metric using mathematical modeling to examine strategies to promote environmental performance in OECD countries. Thus, we propose a target-oriented Distance Friction Minimization (TO-DFM) model to design a practical improvement strategy for low-efficiency DMUs. In this regard, considering the efficient and inefficient frontiers, we present two models, IDMU and ADMU, respectively, based on TO-DFM and DFM models. Then, the distance scores yielded by the two models are combined to evaluate the efficiency of each DMU using the hybrid index of relative closeness (RC). The results reveal that the proposed model has a better distinctive potential compared to the standard TO-DFM model. Overall, implementing the proposed model on a set of sustainability data, for OECD countries, resulted in a more logical performance in classifying countries regarding their distance from the efficient and inefficient frontiers. Therefore, less developed countries should pay considerable attention to implementing environmental policies to improve their performance and control environmental pollution with a reliable and healthy economy. For instance, the implementation of such policies in countries such as Turkey, Estonia, and Hungary, with lower efficiency scores, can affect the sustainability of their development performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China’s supreme leader Xi Jinping pursues a “whole-nation” approach to acquire strategic technology from advanced nations. It means the Chinese state uses all resources at its disposal to tap and steer Chinese citizens and members of the Chinese diaspora to use their expertise, money, and network to acquire strategic technology from abroad. This article demonstrates that this approach has three main defining features. The first is to attract foreign technology firms to China, where they are incentivized or coerced into sharing technologies with Chinese companies, especially state-owned enterprises. The second is to acquire foreign technology firms abroad through mergers and acquisitions, portfolio investment, loans, foreign venture capital firms, and greenfield investment. The third is to recruit global technology talents, especially by enticing scientists from advanced countries to relocate to China to carry out research for the benefit of Chinese entities. This paper concludes that while the “whole-nation” approach has delivered significant results, it is reaching the limit of what it can deliver due mainly to backlashes from the governments and companies in Western countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, migration and migrated distance significantly affects people's mood and satisfaction, and this idea has been recently incorporated in literature. The objective of this research is to analyze the relationship between migrated distance and job satisfaction in Ecuador distinguishing between formal and informal workers. We use a repeated cross-section data from the National Survey of Employment, Unemployment and Underemployment from the period 2014–2017, and ordered probit models with random parameters to meet our objective. Our results suggest that there is a negative and heterogeneous relationship between distance on migration and job satisfaction. Moreover, we found that formal workers should be compensated at $ 0.51 USD and informal workers should be compensated at $ 0.59 USD per kilometer migrated to mitigate the negative impact of migration. These results have important policy implications, for instance, the need to promote labor policies that promote labor well-being and offset the negative effects of long-distance migration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to investigate the complex landscape of climate finance, assessing the adequacy, predictability, and implications for sustainable development in least developed countries (LDCs). This study is motivated by the pressing need to assess the adequacy, predictability, and implications of climate finance for sustainable development in least developed countries (LDCs). Employing an econometric framework, this study utilizes ARIMA models to analyze time series data (from 2000 to 2021) on climate finance. The analysis revealed a notable gap between the needed and actual climate funding received by LDCs. Despite an annual requirement of $93.7 billion according to the UK-based International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), LDCs have only received an average of $14.8 billion annually since 2015. The study suggests that climate funding for LDCs lacks predictability and falls short in meeting their needs, potentially facing an 80% decrease by 2030 under certain scenarios. It advocates for a strategic revamp in climate finance mechanisms to ensure adequacy and predictability, urging policymakers and international funding bodies to adopt more robust, fair, and needs-based approaches to climate financing. This research emphasizes the responsibility of developed nations and global agencies in bridging the considerable funding gap faced by LDCs. By integrating advanced forecasting techniques with a comprehensive analysis of global economic and political factors, this study sheds light on the challenges LDCs encounter in securing stable and sufficient climate finance, stressing the urgency for systemic reforms in global climate finance policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the densely populated Kathmandu Metropolitan City, inadequate fire service coverage poses a significant fire risk. With the demand for fire services increasing due to rapid growth in population and infrastructure development, the limited number of fire stations, insufficient human and physical resources, poor street connectivity, narrow streets, and delays in response to calls for emergency services have resulted in significant property loss, environmental impact, serious injuries, and even loss of life. Although a substantial body of research exists on understanding fire patterns and fire station site selection in developed countries, there is a noticeable lack of similar research in developing countries, which can be attributed to a lack of available data and interest. This study utilises ward-level urban fire incident data in Kathmandu from July 2019 to February 2023 to examine the spatial pattern of fire risk, fire service coverage and identify potential sites for fire stations. Results reveal a significantly higher fire rate in the central part of the city. Fire rescue service cannot reach most areas in Kathmandu within 5 min, with some areas exceeding 10 min response time. The findings from this study will enable fire agencies to enhance the operational efficiency of emergency response and help develop policies and programs related to fire risk prevention and mitigation. This includes targeted education and awareness campaigns and the allocation of finite fire service resources, such as the strategic placement of fire stations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we examine the impact of fiscal rules on debt affordability across an extensive sample of developed and emerging market economies, employing a panel data model that accommodates weakly exogenous regressors and effectively addresses cross-section dependence. Our findings consistently reveal a positive and significant effect of fiscal rule implementation on public debt affordability, regardless of the various model specifications employed. Notably, the effect of fiscal rules is more pronounced in emerging market economies, where the implementation of any fiscal rule leads to improved debt affordability. In contrast, for developed countries, the benefits are realized primarily through the adoption of high-quality fiscal rules. These results provide robust evidence of the efficacy of fiscal rules in enhancing debt management and fiscal sustainability, particularly in emerging market economies. The findings underscore the importance of prudent fiscal policy in achieving favorable debt affordability levels, offering valuable insights for policymakers seeking to bolster fiscal resilience and optimize debt management strategies in both developed and emerging economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The automotive industry serves as a crucial support system for the economies of industrialized nations in their pursuit of international market competitiveness. Despite this industry's importance, most developing countries face the challenge of acquiring a reasonable economic position at the global level in the automotive sector for various reasons. The most salient reasons include inconsistent government policies, multiple taxes, investor insecurity, political instability, and currency devaluation. Identifying risks is crucial for a new entrant in the already-established automotive industry. The researchers have used multiple (qualitative and quantitative) techniques to identify and prioritize risks in setting up manufacturing plants. The efforts to tackle these identified risks are undertaken at the domestic and government levels to smoothen the establishment of industry. The risks are first identified, in the current study, by reviewing the previous literature and conducting interviews of the various stakeholders (automotive dealers, managers, and customers). Then this study uses Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) approach and develops a risk exposure (high, medium, or low) matrix for the automotive industry of Pakistan. The findings reveal that the depreciation of local currency against the foreign exchange, oligopoly nature of competition, and low market acceptability of new entrants due to their products' image are the most critical risks the automobile industry faces. These findings will help automotive research institutes in developing national policies that specifically aim to support new players in the automotive industry, particularly in addressing high-priority hazards. The results may also provide valuable insights for new participants seeking to identify and address the key challenges in the Pakistani automotive industry before entering it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The traffic in developing countries presents its own specificity, notably due to the heterogeneous traffic and a weak-lane discipline. This leads to differences in driver behavior between these countries and developed countries. Knowing that the analysis of the drivers from developed countries leads the design of the majority of driver models, it is not surprising that the simulations performed using these models do not match the field data of the developing countries. This article presents a systematic review of the literature on modeling driving behaviors in the context of developing countries. The study focuses on the microsimulation approaches, and specifically on the multiagent paradigm, that are considered suitable for reproducing driving behaviors with accuracy. The major contributions from the recent literature are analyzed. Three major scientific challenges and related minor research directions are described. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores the impact of inclusive education on the educational outcomes of students without Special Educational Needs (non-SEN) in Peru, utilizing official Ministry of Education data and implementing cross-sectional regression analyses. Inclusive education is a complex issue that, without appropriate adaptations and comprehensive understanding, can present substantial challenges to the educational community. While prior research from developed nations offers diverse perspectives on the effects of inclusive education on non-SEN students, limited evidence exists regarding its impact in developing countries. Our study addresses this gap by examining inclusive education in Peru and its influence on non-SEN students, thereby contributing to the existing literature. Our findings reveal that, on average, the presence of SEN students in regular classrooms does not significantly affect their non-SEN counterparts. However, we uncover heterogeneous results contingent on the specific type of SEN and students' academic placement. These results emphasize the importance of targeted resources and parental involvement in facilitating successful inclusive education, particularly for specific SEN types. In summary, this study underscores the need for tailored strategies and additional resources to foster the success of inclusive education and calls for further research in this field to expand our understanding and enhance educational policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Massive increases in the risks of depressive disorders and the ensuing suicide have become the overarching menace for children/adolescents. Despite global consensus to instigate psychological healthcare policy for these children/adolescents, their effects remain largely unclear neither from a small amount of official data nor from small-scale scientific studies. More importantly, in underprivileged children/adolescents in lower-middle-economic-status countries/areas, the data collection may not be as equally accessible as in developed countries/areas, thus resulting in underrepresented observations. To address these challenges, we released a large-scale and multi-center cohort dataset (n = 249,772) showing the effects of primary psychological healthcare on decreasing depression and suicidal ideation in these children/adolescents who were underrepresented in previous studies or current healthcare systems, including unattended children/adolescents, orphans, children/adolescents in especially difficult circumstances, and "left-behind" and "single-parenting" children/adolescents. We provided all individual data recording the depressive symptoms and suicide ideation that had been collected at baseline (Oct 2022) and half-year follow-up (May 2023) from practicing this psychological healthcare system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the Pressure–State–Response model and the experience materials of waste gas emission prevention and control in industrialized nations, we construct the PSR framework for stationary waste gas emissions (WGEs) in this study, identifying five pressure factors and six policy instruments. Using a moderated chain mediating established by structural equation modeling measurement, we examined the effects of pressures and responses to stationary WGEs. The key conclusions are that (1) pressures were brought on by the heavy industry proportion, the energy consumption intensity, the coal consumption proportion, and the industrial labor productivity, while the pressure was significantly reduced by green technology. (2) The heavy industry proportion was the most effective negative mediator, while energy consumption parameters including energy consumption intensity and coal consumption proportion failed to produce the desired results from policy instruments on stationary WGEs. (3) Command-and-control policy instruments led to the greatest direct impacts on the fall of stationary WGEs, whereas information-based policy instruments led to the greatest indirect impacts on the decline of stationary WGEs. These findings may provide important policy recommendations for nations that are rapidly industrializing. (1) We suggest that technology and industrial internal structure should be significant regulatory issues. (2) In addition to maintaining command-and-control policy instruments, we advise the government to give information-based instruments more consideration. (3) We also suggest that before the adoption of market-based instruments, thorough plans and experimental subsidies be prepared. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between imported technology and employment is a controversial issue. This study aims to test the hypothesis that the relationship between imported technology and employment is non-linear and evolves with the level of technology imports. The study covers two groups of developed and developing countries over the period 2000–2019. The Panel Smooth Transition Regression (PSTR) model is used to estimate the technology import threshold and its impact on industrial employment. The study finds a positive relationship between imported technology and industrial employment for technology import rates above the 13.667% threshold, above which imported technology begins to improve industrial employment in developed countries. In contrast, for developing countries, the results showed a negative relationship between imported technology and industrial employment for technology import rates above the 3.44% threshold above which imported technology begins to reduce industrial employment. These results suggest that the threshold level of technology imports can be considered as an indicator for promoting innovation policies in both developed and developing countries to minimize the negative effect of process innovation resulting from imported technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The production of liquid biofuel in Eastern Africa countries has the potential to play an important role on the global biofuel markets in the coming years, because transportation fuel demand is expected to grow. Despite the presence of suitable environmental conditions for bioenergy crop cultivation in Eastern Africa, liquid biofuel production has been restricted by different factors, including market situation and government policies. The objective of this review is to evaluate the potential markets, policies, strategies, and plans for liquid biofuel production in some Eastern Africa countries, including Ethiopia, Kenya, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. Main text: Over 64 scientific articles and reports published between 2002 and 2023 related to liquid biofuel production market and policies were collected from internet search engines and unpublished grey literatures and reviewed. Since liquid biofuel production was in early stage of investment in Eastern Africa countries by 2020, all the countries showed similar restrictions. It was found that the global market demand for liquid biofuel increased after 1980s. For example, although Ethiopia started bioethanol production in 1950s, the production was discouraged by the lack of a market. Biofuel trade is globally determined by the biofuel policies of industrialized countries, which are mainly driven by the willingness to reduce emissions and to tackle volatile fossil fuel prices. Eastern Africa liquid biofuels has a number of market openings, including rural domestic use, substituting fossil fuel imports, and supplying the European market. There are also attractive legal conditions and political willingness to invest in the production of liquid biofuels. However, institutional weaknesses hindered the possibility to coordinate liquid biofuel production. The lack of adequate domestic institutions, coordination mechanisms, and robust monitoring resulted in land-use conflicts, corruption, and technical challenges. Appropriate policy measures are required to local land use determination, selection of appropriate type of bioenergy crops, and biofuel processing types and scales. In particular, small and large-scale biofuel production projects are required to include biofuel production in the conventional agricultural farming practices. Conclusions: Good governance is highly important for bioenergy crop production, liquid biofuel processing and consumption in the whole liquid biofuel value chain. Moreover, it is important to exchange good practices through cooperation, including—but not limited to—intra-African countries, which would accelerate the learning process and the deployment of effective measures and mechanisms. There should be biofuel value chain upgrading to overcome fragmentation and inconsistency of measures; match-making between demand and supply at domestic, intra-African, and internationally with proper public awareness creation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is the first examination of competitive devaluation in the 1930s using data on exchange rates. It analyses the impact of currency changes on foreign trade flows of fourteen industrialized countries 1929–1939. It reviews the development of nominal and real effective exchange rates together with trade and economic growth and conducts a disaggregated analysis of trade and bilateral exchange rates with trade partners. Tests show that the beggar-thy-neighbour effects of exchange rate adjustments were few and temporary. Moreover, it is argued that currency depreciations were expansionary not only for countries that devalued but for the international economy as a whole. This argument draws on Ragnar Nurkse (Nurkse, International currency experience, Lessons of the Inter-War Period. League of Nations, 1944) who undeservingly has been associated with the notion of "competitive devaluation". Nurkse showed that currency depreciations increased global monetary reserves, an observation that has gone remarkably overlooked in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]