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Abstract Sponge city stormwater management (SCSM) strategy in China aims for sustainable stormwater handling. While many studies have examined the technical aspects of sponge city green infrastructure (SCGI), few have explored public perspectives. This study sought to understand public perceptions, the perceived value of SCGI’s ecosystem service benefits, and the potential for diverse financial compensation methods in sponge city construction. A survey conducted in five Northeastern Chinese cities, involving 1,534 participants, was analyzed using descriptive statistics and logistic regression. The findings reveal no significant correlation between socio-demographic factors and understanding of stormwater management, indicating the concept’s broad accessibility. Public valuation of ecosystem services showed clear priorities, and factors like homeownership and flood experiences significantly impacted the valuation of specific services. Moreover, the study identified a generally positive public attitude towards investing in SCSM, particularly through stormwater fees, underscoring the viability of diverse funding mechanisms. These insights are pivotal for policymakers and urban planners in formulating sustainable and resilient urban water management strategies.

Sponge city stormwater management (SCSM) strategy in China aims for sustainable stormwater handling. While many studies have examined the technical aspects of sponge city green infrastructure (SCGI), few have explored public perspectives. This study sought to understand public perceptions, the perceived value of SCGI's ecosystem service benefits, and the potential for diverse financial compensation methods in sponge city construction. A survey conducted in five Northeastern Chinese cities, involving 1,534 participants, was analyzed using descriptive statistics and logistic regression. The findings reveal no significant correlation between socio-demographic factors and understanding of stormwater management, indicating the concept's broad accessibility. Public valuation of ecosystem services showed clear priorities, and factors like homeownership and flood experiences significantly impacted the valuation of specific services. Moreover, the study identified a generally positive public attitude towards investing in SCSM, particularly through stormwater fees, underscoring the viability of diverse funding mechanisms. These insights are pivotal for policymakers and urban planners in formulating sustainable and resilient urban water management strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To overcome financing barriers and to ensure that the progress towards energy transition will continue, alternative financing concepts are required. A promising alternative may be financial citizen participation, where private individuals will contribute to the deployment of renewable energy sources (RES) by investing via various business models and financing concepts. This paper aims to promote energy transition by informing the design of policies and strategies for mobilizing citizen investment. Specific objectives are to investigate citizens' willingness-to-invest (WTI) and to compare the factors influencing WTI in five renewable types, wind, solar, geothermal, hydroelectric energy and biomass. To meet these objectives, our study collected a representative sample of 1,536 citizens in Greece, an EU member state that stands at a critical point in energy transition due to financing barriers and social opposition to renewable projects. Our results showed that most citizens were willing to invest, but would invest mainly low sums pointing at the need to establish investment mechanisms suitable for citizens. Moreover, the factors influencing willingness-to-invest differ significantly for each renewable type highlighting the need to leverage this differentiation in marketing strategies. While perceived barriers and economic motives were important for almost all renewable types, environmental attitudes were less influential suggesting that strategies using the argument of environmental benefits may be ineffective. Findings from this study provide a precise idea on the factors affecting WTI in five renewable types and can offer significantly higher precision for the design of policies and strategies aiming at mobilizing citizen investment in renewables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite increasing attention to sustainability as a source of new business opportunities, current research on new ventures has hardly considered this factor with respect to access to funding. This paper examines the role of new venture sustainability signals on business angels' willingness to invest. Specifically, it considers the effects of third‐party sustainability certification and the self‐proclaimed label of sustainable entrepreneurship as congruent reputational signals for inducing angel investors' willingness to invest. Three studies were conducted using a 2 × 2 between‐subject experimental design on certification and label conditions, respectively, in two samples from the Amazon MTurk crowdsourcing marketplace and one from business angels. Results show that early‐stage ventures would use such signals in their sustainability exemplification strategy to convey quality and prestige and eventually improve their chances of raising business angel funding. Implications for theory and practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study was to examine the factors affecting farmers' willingness to invest in photovoltaics as well as the factors affecting the amount of money they would invest. The study was performed on a representative farmer sample in Northern Greece through the use of structured questionnaires. Two models were developed using categorical regression, with the first model indicating that the willingness to invest was mostly affected by the provision of subsidies and the type of cultivation used for the land in question. The amount of money farmers would invest was mostly affected by the number of hectares of irrigated and dry land that famers had, thereby suggesting that the more farmland they own the more the money they would invest. Results raise policy implications as they show an increased interest in installing renewable systems on farmland which, in turn, raises concerns about the agricultural development of the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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ABSTRACTGiven the generally low adoption of early climate change response technologies among tree crop producers in sub-Saharan Africa, stakeholders interested in the commercialization or scaling of such technologies will require empirical evidence of their market prospects. Using a double-bounded contingent valuation approach, the study evaluated the willingness and ability of 523 Ghanaian producers to invest in solar-powered irrigation pumps (SPIPs) for cocoa irrigation. The sample was split into three segments based on farm size: resource-poor, resource-limited, and resource-rich. Our results show that effective demand increased across the resource segments, with resource-endowed farmers more likely to demand SPIPs than resource-limited or resource-poor farmers. Also, while willingness to invest (WTI) depended on resourcefulness (land), farmers’ ability to invest was directly related to their resource (income class) endowment. We found that WTI across the resource segments was positively influenced by income, education, livestock ownership, credit, and extension services and negatively affected by household size and age of cocoa trees. Among others, we propose that promotional strategies for SPIPs should incorporate well-planned initiatives for income diversification and microcredit services to improve the financial position of the resource-poor and limited segment to encourage the adoption of these technologies.

There is a keen interest in renewable energy sources (RES) as a key aspect of reducing the emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG). Supporting policies have facilitated citizen investments in renewable energy, as such investments can make a substantial contribution to emissions reduction. The problem, however, is that the factors affecting citizen willingness- to invest in renewable energy are still uncertain and tend to constantly change, highlighting the need to perform studies on the subject more frequently. As citizen investments in RES can contribute to emissions reduction, the aim of this study is to understand the factors that affect the willingness of citizens to invest in renewable energy. Using simple random sampling, a representative sample of 1536 citizens in an EU country was administered structured questionnaires, and the results were analyzed using logistic regression. It was shown that willingness to invest is affected by both financial and non-financial factors, such as citizens' agreement with the construction of renewable facilities near their residence, information sources for obtaining information about environmental and energy topics, satisfaction with the media's coverage of renewable investments, and their occupation. Results from this study raise substantial policy implications and may be used to improve the design of strategies for attracting citizen investments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traditionally, finance has paid attention to the risk-return trade-off. Recently, given the incorporation of the 2030 Agenda and climate change, a third pillar has been incorporated into the investment decision: sustainability. Socially responsible investment is an instrument that can incorporate all three pillars. This paper aims to assess sustainability by Spanish investors using a choice experiment by applying the Bayesian approach with Markov chain Monte Carlo sampling and obtain the willingness to pay (invest) for each attribute. The results show that profitability remains the most important factor, although risk is at the same level as sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the year of 2022 was marked by many significant and rapid changes on the cryptocurrencies market, this comparative study explores perceptions of Romanian students about cryptocurrencies before and after the market collapse. A qualitative approach has been used to understand attitudes towards cryptocurrencies in March 2022 (when prices of most cryptocurrencies were higher) and then the same study was conducted during August-November 2022 (when the prices of most cryptocurrencies were lower after a dropout in prices that lasted all throughout the summer). Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to compare the results. Our findings show that cryptocurrencies were associated with more negative words in the second wave of the study, but surprisingly, the willingness to invest in such assets did not change that much. However, the willingness to invest seemed to be influenced by how secure/trustworthy respondents perceived cryptocurrencies. Implications and future research suggestions are finally discussed.

Xuelian Tang,1 Keyi Yu,2 Wenjun Yu2 1College of Science and Technology Ningbo University, Ningbo, Zhejiang, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Psychology, Ningbo University, Ningbo, Zhejiang, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Wenjun Yu, 818 Fenghua Road, Ningbo, Zhejiang, People’s Republic of China, Tel +86 18868646620, Email yuwenjun@nbu.edu.cnPurpose: There is ample evidence that investors respond negatively to firm’s unethical behavior. However, researchers cannot explain investors’ reactions and the mechanisms of change when faced with firm’s unethical behavior. By collecting and analyzing data from questionnaires, this study investigated the effects of firm’s unethical behavior on investors’ willingness to invest and further focused on different targets involved in unethical events. Moreover, this study explored the roles of firm development stages and the moderation effect of investors’ moral support level. It aims to reveal investors’ decisions on firm’s unethical behaviors in different situations.Methods: This study employed a 2 (behavioral ethics: unethical behavior versus normal behavior) X 2 (stages of firm development: startups versus mature firms) X 4 (targets involved in the events: employees, peers, customers, and society) mixed design. Two hundred and fifty-seven participants were finally recruited for final analysis, and then repeated-measures ANOVAs were adopted to assess the valid data collected from 257 participants.Results: The results showed that disclosure of unethical behavior in due diligence reports significantly decreased investors’ willingness to invest. However, investor willingness was higher for startups with unethical behavior than for unethical mature firms. Investors’ willingness to invest decreased most significantly when evaluating firms with unethical behavior toward employees, followed by society and peers. Their willingness to invest decreased the least when evaluating firms exhibiting unethical behavior toward customers. The level of investors’ moral support moderated the above effects, that is, the higher the moral support, the more considerable the decrease in investment willingness in unethical firms.Conclusion: Current results demonstrated that when facing firms with unethical behaviors, investors would make investment decisions after considering the firm’s stage of development and the stakeholder of the unethical event. This study provides a valuable theoretical basis for decision-making by government, institutional investors, and firm managers.Keywords: unethical behavior, startups, mature firms, willingness to invest, level of moral support

Sub‐Saharan Africa has the least mechanized agriculture in the world due to various reasons including low effective demand at farm level, low policy attention, and ineffective mechanization strategies. However, the situation has changed since recently in favor of mechanization while limited empirical evidence is available on how mechanization can be enhanced among smallholder farmers. In this study, we explore farmers' willingness to invest in mechanization services by considering the group business model (GBM) and the individual business model (IBM) of mechanized maize shelling in Tanzania. Moreover, we analyze the potential financial benefit for those farmers who would like to invest in mechanized maize shelling. We use data mainly collected through a household survey and apply econometric and mathematical models for analysis. The results show that about 65% of the sample farmers are willing to invest in mechanized maize shelling within the GBM, while about 10% of them would like to do so within the IBM. Moreover, the results show that investment in mechanized maize shelling is profitable considering both small‐scale (4 and 7 HP engine capacity) machines and medium‐scale (16 and 20 HP engine capacity) machines. The results show that expanding agricultural mechanization in Tanzania through investments coming from smallholder farmers, as also experienced elsewhere, is possible while they suggest that policy instruments such as targeted loan programs, entrepreneurial and technical trainings, and smart subsidies or tax exemptions are important to encourage and enable smallholder farmers to participate in the mechanization supply chain. [EconLit Citations: Q120, Q130, D250]. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays most of Economies are involved in the 2030 Agenda. But, are business decisions affected by the 2030 Agenda? In order to answer this question, we propose to analyze the effect of SDGs 6: "clean water and sanitation" in the financial market throughout investors choices. Then, the aim of this letter consists of analyzing investors' preferences about investment funds which investment policy contributes to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 6: "clean water and sanitation", given the global importance of achieving this goal. To do that, a survey was carried out in which a total of 456 valid observations were obtained. Choice experiment methodology has been applied to try to obtain a valuation by Spanish investors. The results show that there is a high valuation of funds whose portfolios include investments that contribute to SDG 6 and that there is also heterogeneity in preferences. These results have important implications for economic and professional policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the year of 2022 was marked by many significant and rapid changes on the cryptocurrencies market, this comparative study explores perceptions of Romanian students about cryptocurrencies before and after the market collapse. A qualitative approach has been used to understand attitudes towards cryptocurrencies in March 2022 (when prices of most cryptocurrencies were higher) and then the same study was conducted during August-November 2022 (when the prices of most cryptocurrencies were lower after a dropout in prices that lasted all throughout the summer). Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to compare the results. Our findings show that cryptocurrencies were associated with more negative words in the second wave of the study, but surprisingly, the willingness to invest in such assets did not change that much. However, the willingness to invest seemed to be influenced by how secure/trustworthy respondents perceived cryptocurrencies. Implications and future research suggestions are finally discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Traditionally, finance has paid attention to the risk-return trade-off. Recently, given the incorporation of the 2030 Agenda and climate change, a third pillar has been incorporated into the investment decision: sustainability. Socially responsible investment is an instrument that can incorporate all three pillars. This paper aims to assess sustainability by Spanish investors using a choice experiment by applying the Bayesian approach with Markov chain Monte Carlo sampling and obtain the willingness to pay (invest) for each attribute. The results show that profitability remains the most important factor, although risk is at the same level as sustainability.

In recent decades, academia has addressed a wide range of research topics in the field of ethical decision-making. Besides a great amount of research on ethical consumption, also the domain of ethical investments increasingly moves in the focus of scholars. While in this area most research focuses on whether socially or environmentally sustainable businesses outperform traditional investments financially or investigates the character traits as well as other socio-demographic factors of ethical investors, the impact of sustainable corporate conduct on the investment intentions of private investors still requires further research. Hence, we conducted two studies to shed more light on this highly relevant topic. After discussing the current state of research, in our first empirical study, we explore whether besides the traditional triad of risk, return, and liquidity, also sustainability exerts a significant impact on the willingness to invest. As hypothesized, we find that sustainability shows a clear and decisive impact in addition to the traditional factors. In a consecutive study, we investigate deeper into the sustainability-willingness to invest link. Here, our results show that improved sustainability might not pay off in terms of investment attractiveness, however and conversely, it certainly harms to conduct business in a non-sustainable manner, which cannot even be compensated by an increased return. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Venture capital investment has serious conflicts of interest and information asymmetry. Venture capitalists often make investment decisions on the basis of the passion of entrepreneurs, including enthusiasm and preparedness, in the process of interacting with them. Most of the previous research on relational capital have focused on the cooperative relationship between suppliers and buyers. However, the role of relational capital in the process of partnership between venture capitalists and entrepreneurs has not been revealed. On the basis of signaling theory, we explore the relationship between entrepreneurial passion and venture capitalists' willingness to invest. We also examine the mediating and moderating roles of relational capital. This study takes 79 projects between venture capitalists and entrepreneurs as samples for empirical analysis to verify our hypothesis. Results show that entrepreneurs' enthusiasm and preparedness have a significant positive impact on venture capitalists' willingness to invest. Relational capital plays a mediating role between entrepreneurial passion and venture capitalists' willingness to invest. Relational capital positively moderates the relationship between preparedness and venture capitalists' willingness to invest but has no moderating effect between enthusiasm and venture capitalists' willingness to invest. Results deepen the understanding of the relationship between entrepreneurs' passion and venture capitalists' willingness to invest, which has guiding significance for venture capital practice in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Venture capital investment has serious conflicts of interest and information asymmetry. Venture capitalists often make investment decisions on the basis of the passion of entrepreneurs, including enthusiasm and preparedness, in the process of interacting with them. Most of the previous research on relational capital have focused on the cooperative relationship between suppliers and buyers. However, the role of relational capital in the process of partnership between venture capitalists and entrepreneurs has not been revealed. On the basis of signaling theory, we explore the relationship between entrepreneurial passion and venture capitalists’ willingness to invest. We also examine the mediating and moderating roles of relational capital. This study takes 79 projects between venture capitalists and entrepreneurs as samples for empirical analysis to verify our hypothesis. Results show that entrepreneurs’ enthusiasm and preparedness have a significant positive impact on venture capitalists’ willingness to invest. Relational capital plays a mediating role between entrepreneurial passion and venture capitalists’ willingness to invest. Relational capital positively moderates the relationship between preparedness and venture capitalists’ willingness to invest but has no moderating effect between enthusiasm and venture capitalists’ willingness to invest. Results deepen the understanding of the relationship between entrepreneurs’ passion and venture capitalists’ willingness to invest, which has guiding significance for venture capital practice in China.

This research aims to observe and analyze Correlation between Background Education, Willingness to invest into New Technology, and Success Factors of Heavy-Duty Transportation: Crane Rental Business in Samut Sakhon. This research applies the quantitative research method, purposive sampling, the data was collected using reviewed questionnaire. The questionnaire dived into 3 parts: Demographic of the business operators, business background information and perception of the business operators toward future investment. Data collected from 120 crane rental business owner, or management team with least five years-experience in crane renal business. All educational background is positively related. There is no significant correlation between background education and year in business, size of the business and total employee. There is significant correlation between year in business, size of the business and total employee. The respondents agree to invest of all aspect in business. There is significant positive correlation between willingness to invest on human resources management and year in business. There is significant positive correlation between willingness to invest on management technology and total employee.

In this study we aim at assessing the willingness to invest of small‑apple farms in Korça region‑Albania. Furthermore, we want to identify and assess what are major determinants, as percept by farmers’, willingness to invest. To this purpose we used data collected through face‑to‑face interviews with apple farmers. We used descriptive statistics, as well as classical and multinomial logistic regression. Most of farmers are willing to invest in view of their positive expectations for investment climate. Other important factors of willingness to invest are access to loans, advisory extension services, market competition, willingness to cooperate and willingness to take loans, and farm income, while socio‑demographic factors such as age, education, and farming experience do not have significant effect on willingness to invest. Large farms are generally more willing to invest. We present also a general framework of constraints and policy levers to improving the investment climate which is almost valid also for Albania. Improving farmers’ access to private credit sources, policy stability, providing information and public advisory services to small farmers, support farmers to adopt new technology, support to the creation of farmers’ formal and informal groups, and mitigate risks of various type are some but essential policy measures to motivate farmers to invest more in apple.

The growth of containerisation and the increase in ship size have resulted in a greater need for transhipment hubs. Hence, some peripheral ports are upgrading to become secondary hub ports. However, it remains unclear why these ports would move towards this strategic direction. The aim of this study is to investigate stakeholders' perceptions on the importance of peripherality, so as to understand their willingness to invest in secondary hub ports. Stakeholders from the Indonesian port and maritime industry were chosen as the focus of the present study, representing a connected network of peripheral and hub ports at a country level. The study used a mixed-methods approach. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 46 respondents, while quantitative data were collected through an online survey, involving 171 respondents. The data were subsequently analysed through exploratory factor analysis and correlation tests. Results show a pattern in stakeholder behaviour, explaining their reasoning, locational decisions, their perceptions on the importance of peripheral locations and their willingness to invest. It is believed that these findings will prove of value both for governments and the private sectors of international shipping and port operations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an assessment of the Economic, Energy and Environmental (E3) impacts of different scenarios related to the penetration of renewable energy systems in an urban context. For this purpose, Coimbra, a medium sized Portuguese city, has been chosen as decision-making set. The results of a survey aiming at analysing and evaluating the perceptions andwillingness to invest in residential photovoltaic systems, along with a technical and economic evaluation of different photovoltaic systems focusing on the installed power, together with the data characterizing the housing stock of the city, have been used for the definition and analysis of three scenarios. The obtained results, pointing to a relatively small contribution from the photovoltaic component to the overall city residential electricity consumption, may be considered by electricity operators and can help policy-makers to define stronger measures to support the installation of residential renewable energy systems.

This paper presents an assessment of the Economic, Energy and Environmental (E3) impacts of different scenarios related to the penetration of renewable energy systems in an urban context. For this purpose, Coimbra, a medium sized Portuguese city, has been chosen as decision-making set. The results of a survey aiming at analysing and evaluating the perceptions and willingness to invest in residential photovoltaic systems, along with a technical and economic evaluation of different photovoltaic systems focusing on the installed power, together with the data characterizing the housing stock of the city, have been used for the definition and analysis of three scenarios. The obtained results, pointing to a relatively small contribution from the photovoltaic component to the overall city residential electricity consumption, may be considered by electricity operators and can help policy-makers to define stronger measures to support the installation of residential renewable energy systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study we aim at assessing the willingness to invest of small-apple farms in Korça region-Albania. Furthermore, we want to identify and assess what are major determinants, as percept by farmers', willingness to invest. To this purpose we used data collected through face-to-face interviews with apple farmers. We used descriptive statistics, as well as classical and multinomial logistic regression. Most of farmers are willing to invest in view of their positive expectations for investment climate. Other important factors of willingness to invest are access to loans, advisory extension services, market competition, willingness to cooperate and willingness to take loans, and farm income, while socio-demographic factors such as age, education, and farming experience do not have significant effect on willingness to invest. Large farms are generally more willing to invest. We present also a general framework of constraints and policy levers to improving the investment climate which is almost valid also for Albania. Improving farmers' access to private credit sources, policy stability, providing information and public advisory services to small farmers, support farmers to adopt new technology, support to the creation of farmers' formal and informal groups, and mitigate risks of various type are some but essential policy measures to motivate farmers to invest mor e in apple. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate parents' Willingness to Invest (WTI) in their children's oral health in terms of money, visits to a dental practice, and brushing minutes. Objectives were to assess the association between parents' WTI and a) children's dental caries experience, b) children's oral hygiene behavior (OHB), and c) maternal education level and ethnic background.Methods: A sample of 630 five to six-year-old-children was recruited from pediatric dental centers in the Netherlands. Children's dmft scores were extracted from personal dental records. Parental questionnaires were used to collect data on parents' WTI, children's OHB, maternal education level and ethnicity.Results: On average, parents were willing to spend a maximum of €37 per month, 3.0 dental visits per year, and 4.5 brushing minutes per day to maintain good oral health for their child. The mean dmft was significantly higher in children whose parents were willing to pay more money and visit the dentist more often (P = 0.028 and P = 0.002, respectively), while the mean dmft was significantly lower in children of parents who were willing to invest more brushing minutes (P < 0.001). Parental WTI in terms of money and brushing minutes was higher in native and higher-educated parents, and was associated with more favorable OHB of children.Conclusions: Parents' WTI in their children's oral health is related to children's dental caries status and reported OHB. Results suggest that children are better off when parents are willing to invest in self-care, rather than in money or dental visits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence from recent studies suggests that management strategically uses linguistic manipulations to "sugar coat" corporate narratives particularly when it is to their advantage. Research also suggests that investors are influenced by these manipulations and that they are not capable of detecting them on their own. Emerging technologies such as textual analysis software are capable of analyzing corporate narratives; however, their impact on investors' decision making remains unknown. This manuscript explores the effect of these emerging technologies a priori to their availability and investigates whether providing investors with a decision aid (DA) that is capable of detecting linguistic manipulations can be an effective tool that can be used by investors. We theorize that these DAs may have an effect on investors' judgment and decision making and that their effect may interact with other contextual factors such as management incentive to provide a more optimistic disclosure when the news is not necessarily good. More precisely, we investigate the effect of management incentive and the detection of linguistic manipulations in management's disclosures on investors' perceptions of disclosure credibility and willingness to invest, and whether the detection of linguistic manipulations moderates the impact of management incentive. Results show that both management incentive and detection of linguistic manipulations have a significant effect on investors' perceptions of disclosure credibility and willingness to invest. Therefore, these DAs can be an effective tool that investors can use to detect linguistic manipulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PV-storage-systems play a more and more important role in the energy system, especially in private households. Not only can they be used to increase self-consumption but they can provide ancillary services like peak-shaving or balancing energy. It can be tricky to use private PV-storage-systems for the latter because this could mean economic losses due to reduced self-consumption or there might be acceptance problems. Therefore, we carried out an empirical investigation to analyze acceptance issues and willingness to invest in PV-storage-systems. In a face-to-face interview 500 private PV owners in Germany were questioned regarding their willingness to invest and their acceptance of ancillary services under several circumstances. The survey was conducted during the period from Mai 2014 to August 2014. Results are motivations of willingness to invest in battery storage systems under different funding options and obstacles regarding the purchase of a PV-storage-system. The survey gives also hints on which frame conditions are relevant for acceptance of ancillary services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A valuation scenario was designed using a contingent-valuation approach and presented to decision makers in business firms in Kenya’s Lake Naivasha basin to test how applicable a water fund might be as a potential financing mechanism for a payment for water-related ecosystem services scheme. The findings indicate that measuring a firm’s willingness to invest in ecosystem services could help determine whether a firm would invest and engage with other stakeholders to pool their investments in ecosystem services. Linking the institutional decision-making behaviour of a firm and its willingness to invest in a water fund is the novelty of this article. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Water resources, previously considered as free and abundant, are now becoming scarce, which will potentially affect human welfare. Urban areas experience increased water demands directly proportional to the rate of urbanisation, causing a stress on water sources. Rooftop rainwater harvesting in cities and towns is an effective tool for recharging depleting aquifers and for meeting the demand for water. Indian national and state governments have framed rules and policies supporting installation of rainwater harvesting structures, but implementation of these requires the acceptance and willingness of people. The present study explores the awareness about rooftop rainwater harvesting systems, attitudes towards them and their acceptance among the people of Dehradun, India. The results indicate that rooftop rainwater harvesting is acceptable to the people but the government needs to provide supportive implementation plans. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study analyzes some fundamental factors that influence member willingness to invest in an agricultural cooperative. The relationship between the selected factors and willingness to invest (a binary variable) is investigated by probit regression using data from a survey of 122 members in 9 apple-marketing cooperatives in Shaanxi Province in north-central China. The investment regression identifies five factors that have a statistically significant positive effect on members' willingness to invest in the cooperative. These factors are members' perception of self-importance in the cooperative, the subjective evaluation of difficulties faced in farming operations and sales, the evaluation of the cooperative's economic performance, the evaluation of the cooperative's ability to deliver services, and the availability of government support to the cooperative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The empirical results of the paper show that the private fixed capital accumulation in Turkey is constrained by the demand constraint and the availability of financial resources. The significance of the liquidity variable clearly points out that credit policy and accommodating monetary policy with the lower rates of interests must be the essential elements of economic policies that revive investment in Turkey. It seems from the empirical results that the cost of capital has a significant but discouraging effect on investment expenditure. With this empirical finding it also becomes evident that fiscal stimuli would work in stimulating private investment, they must be the essential components of an investment programme in Turkey. In regard with the purpose of this paper, the variable, namely the willingness-to-invest, that is expected to capture the perception of investors on investment climate, also appears to be significant factors for the overall sample period. Interestingly, the speed of adjustment of private investment from disequilibrium is fairly slow. This is because there may be some frictions (such as heavy tax burden) and/or some structural constraints (e.g. insufficient infrastructure and inadequate legislative structure) in the economy causing this slow down. In reviving private investment, especially in the long run, one must pay attention to the importance of these factors, and appropriate government actions have to be taken. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Innovation and adaptation are key factors for success in today's agricultural markets. The ability to mobilise funds to finance investment therefore plays a key role. This is particularly relevant in marketing cooperatives, whose property structure has been identified as a handicap compared to investor-owned firms. The aim of this study is to test the roles of market orientation and property rights problems in explaining the cooperative members' willingness to invest in their marketing cooperatives. The hypotheses were tested on a sample of 172 first level marketing cooperatives. The results show the positive effect of market orientation on the member's willingness to invest and the role that property rights problems have in moderating this effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The aim of this study was to investigate the parental willingness to invest in good oral health for their child in terms of money and time and to relate this to oral health related knowledge and behavioral aspects. 290 parents of 6-year-old children, participating in a RCT on caries preventive strategies in the Netherlands were asked to provide information on education, oral health habits, dietary habits, knowledge on dental topics, willingness to pay and perceived resistance against investing in preventive oral health actions for their children. Despite the fact that parents overall valued oral health for their child highly, still 12% of the parents were unwilling to spend any money, nor to invest any time by brushing their children''s teeth to maintain good oral health for their child. Additionally, they indicated that they were unwilling to visit the dentist for preventive measures more than once a year. These children may certainly be considered at higher risk of developing oral diseases because worse oral hygiene habits and dietary habits were found in this group. Given the results, it may be necessary to differentiate in allocating caries prevention programmes to target parents or (school-based) children directly. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• Willingness to invest in rural community renewable energy (CRE) projects is subject to heterogeneity and complexity. • Alternative causal recipes of sociodemographic features of potential CRE investors can be related to alternative sociopsychological, financial, and willingness to invest outcomes. • Alternative causal recipes of sociopsychological features of potential CRE investors can be related to alternative financial and willingness to invest outcomes. • Alternative causal recipes of financial features of potential CRE investors can be related to alternative willingness to invest outcomes. • This heterogeneity and complexity should be accounted for by policy makers, promoters of rural CRE projects, and researchers when approaching the analysis of the antecedents of the decision to invest in rural CRE. Community Renewable Energy (CRE) is a central concept of current political agendas aimed at fostering a sustainable energy transition that can be linked to the development of rural areas. To design effective policies and strategies to promote the development of rural CRE, the diverse conditioning factors of the decision to invest in CRE projects should be analyzed. However, to the best of our knowledge, little research has examined this issue and no study has explicitly focused on rural "bioenergy village" projects under a quantitative research design. Moreover, although past research on the decision to invest in CRE has acknowledged the importance of the influence of alternative cognitive factors, the financial determinants of that decision have been somewhat disregarded. Furthermore, the complex and heterogeneous nature of human behavior has not been directly addressed through appropriate methodological frameworks. Applying a fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) to the responses obtained through a survey on the decision to invest in a hypothetical small bioenergy village project, we analyze a varied set of propositions related to the role of different sociodemographic, sociopsychological, and financial features as antecedents and outcomes. Results reveal the diverse configurations of all these factors that policy makers, promoters of CRE projects, and researchers should consider to effectively contribute to the development of CRE in rural settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]