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Purpose: The paper innovates on the existing literature by assessing the gender gap in Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) tertiary education enrolment and career choice in a small country setting and by extending on Master and Meltzoff (2016) theoretical framework to provide a holistic explanation of the gender disparity through a mix of personal, environmental and behavioural factors. The study first probes into the existence of potential gender disparity in STEM tertiary enrolment in Mauritius. Second, in contrast with existing studies where selective factors are used to measure the gender gap in STEM education, this paper investigates into a combination of personal, environmental and behavioural factors that may influence participation in STEM education and career. Design/methodology/approach: The study uses a survey of 209 undergraduates enroled in the main public university and investigates into the existence of a gender gap in STEM tertiary education enrolment and the reasons behind this disparity. Consistent with the theoretical model, the empirical analysis also investigates into the work environment (which cannot be measured from the survey), via semi-structured interviews of 15 women in STEM professions. Findings: The logit regression results first reveal the existence of a gender disparity in the choice of STEM-related degrees. The probability of a female student to enrol in a STEM degree is lower than that of a male student, after controlling for all the personal, environmental and behavioural factors. The most important set of reasons influencing the student's STEM degree choice are self-efficacy and the student's academic performance in STEM subjects at secondary school level. The findings also demonstrate that young women are relatively more likely to choose STEM degrees than their male counterparts when they are supported by their family, school and teachers. There is further evidence of lower participation of women in STEM professions as well as significant challenges which women in STEM careers face compared to their male colleagues. Originality/value: This study adopts a holistic framework to assess the factors that hinder women's participation in STEM tertiary education and career in Mauritius.

This empirical paper aims at investigating the dynamic impact of sustainable development on tourism growth for the case of the small island developing state of Mauritius. The study is done for the period 1980–2018. The vector error correction model is being used and the results point out that sustainable development variables, notably economic, social and environmental, have influenced tourism development. Furthermore, the results also endorse the presence of bi-directional causality and feedback effects in the tourism-economic growth model hence supporting both the tourism-led growth hypothesis and the economic-driven tourism growth hypothesis. Furthermore, tourism development is observed to contribute towards environmental degradation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Small island developing states (SIDS) are highly dependent on coastal marine resources. Artisanal fishers in SIDS currently face multiple stressors related to global environmental change. Considering Mauritius (South Western Indian Ocean) as a case study, this paper characterizes artisanal fishers in SIDS and assesses their perception of global change using the Local Ecological Knowledge (LEK) approach. A semi-structured survey method was used to interview 247 fishers from all around the country. Artisanal fishers used multiple fishing areas and gears, with half of the fishers using Fish Aggregating Devices (FADs). Six main groups of fishers were identified according to their fishing strategies, which reflected different target species in their reported catches. The majority of fishers reported lower fish abundances and fewer species now compared to 10 to 15 years ago. All groups of fishers observed environmental change over the same period. Such ecological knowledge highlights the exposure of fishers to stressors induced by environmental change. The characterization of the groups of fishers and their fishing strategies will be useful to better evaluate adaptation strategies and support management measures to face global environmental change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the impact of infrastructural development on bilateral trade flows using a panel of 51 African countries from 2003 to 2015. An infrastructure‐augmented gravity model was estimated with different indicators of infrastructural development. Three aggregate indicators were computed namely: (i) a soft infrastructure index, (ii) a hard infrastructure measure, and (iii) an effective infrastructure index combining both soft and hard infrastructure components. The soft and hard infrastructure indices were constructed using the principal component analysis. Disaggregated hard infrastructural development indices for transport, information and communication technologies (ICT), and electricity were also used to assess their differential effects on intra‐African trade. By adopting the Pseudo Poisson Maximum Likelihood estimator with High Dimension Fixed Effects, the results confirm that both hard and soft infrastructures matter for trade in Africa. A disaggregation of the hard infrastructure index reveals that the electricity composite index has a greater impact on trade flows relative to transport and ICT infrastructures. Importantly, there is evidence that soft infrastructure matters most and complements hard infrastructure in the region. Targeted policies and resources should be channelled towards improving energy infrastructure and soft infrastructure in terms of streamlining trading rules and procedures to better propel and maximise the benefits of intra‐African trade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to investigate the link between women's labour force participation and intimate partner violence, using the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) across 20 Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries between 2010 and 2015. The study contributes to the existing literature by incorporating a macroeconomic dimension to previous framework measuring the risk factors of intimate partner violence. The findings reveal a positive link between employment status and the risk of intimate partner violence, where working women in SSA have 19% higher odds of abuse compared to non-working ones. This result holds robust across sexual, emotional and less severe physical abuse and is particularly relevant for the Eastern and Western parts of SSA. It is further observed that more educated women and those married or started living with their partner at a very early age face higher risk of partner abuse. Similarly, gender discrimination in social institutions and polygyny are important risk factors for the occurrence of violence. Women's empowerment in Africa, through greater access to the labour market needs to be accompanied by appropriate laws, to reduce any form of gender inequality at both the microeconomic and macroeconomic levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]