Sustainable entrepreneurship and the Sustainable Development Goals: Community-led initiatives,the social solidarity economy and commons ecologies

The social solidarity economy is an approach to the production and consumption of goods, services and knowledge that promises to address contemporary economic, social and environmental crises more effectively than business as usual. The paper employs the concept of commons ecologies to examine the practices, relationships and interactions among actors and organisations in the social solidarity economy, as well as between them and the mainstream economy, which shape the field and its degree of autonomy in relation to capitalism, through a process defined as boundary commoning. Such process shapes both local and regional commons ecologies, as well as the participation of local and regional actors in wider networks at national, international and global levels. The paper takes a case study-based approach to identify practices, relationships and interactions of commons ecologies in relation to selected community-led initiatives in the UK, Portugal, Brazil and Senegal. Each case study illuminates different qualities of local/regional commons ecologies and their forms of engagement with wider networks. Further, the paper shows that these cases demonstrate how the social solidarity economy may facilitate delivery of the Sustainable Development Goals in a distinctive way. In each case, SSE acts as a vehicle for expressing participants' values and principles consistent with those underlying the SDGs. Local implementation of SDGs is thus an in-built feature of these commons ecologies. The participation of community-led initiatives in international and global networks offers opportunities to learn from local level experiences and successes, potentially strengthening SDG implementation more generally.     

Local Government,Spatial Spillovers and the Absorption of EU Structural Funds

The allocation of regional policy funds varies dramatically across regions even when one controls for regional development indicators. We investigate the impact of local government performance as well as spillovers in knowledge, financial means and social relations as determinants of regional fund absorption. Government performance is derived within a Data Envelopment Analysis approach. Spillovers are investigated using a spatial Durbin model. Results show that government performance has a positive impact on fund absorption. Spillovers occur in knowledge as well as in financial means. The empirical analyses focus on Special Accession Program for Agriculture and Rural Development in Slovakia using panel data.     

Estimating the impact of farmer field schools in sub‐Saharan Africa: the case of cocoa

This study measures the economic impact of the first phase of the Cocoa Livelihood Program (CLP‐I), a current World Cocoa Foundation (WCF) project, sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and aimed at improving the livelihood of over 200,000 small cocoa producers in sub‐Saharan Africa via training, crop diversification, and farmer‐based organizations. Using data collected from 2,048 pre‐ and post‐CLP‐I interviews of cocoa producers in Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, Nigeria, and Cameroon, the results show that yield enhancements attributable to CLP‐I are 32%, 34%, 50%, and 62% in Ghana, Côte d'Ivoire, Nigeria, and Cameroon, respectively. Using a total program cost of $151–$200 per beneficiary and estimated annual benefits of $109–$322 per beneficiary over 25 years, the benefit‐cost ratios are estimated to range from $18 to $62 for every dollar spent on human capital development. These results suggest the WCF should endeavor to increase the number of farmers who receive all, not some, of the components of the program. This would not only help ensure that each producer obtains as much human capital as possible from each of the training programs but increases the probability of reaching the CLP goal of doubling the income of cocoa‐growing households.     

四川秦巴山区绿色发展的软路径设计

作为自然资源、生态环境独具特色,发展潜力巨大的欠发达山区,绿色发展之路是四川秦巴山区实现健康科学发展的内在要求,是有效化解经济发展与环境资源矛盾的必然选择。山区绿色发展的软路径,是探寻"绿水青山就是金山银山"的绿色发展之路,主张人口、资源、环境互利共赢的可持续发展。从制度护山推动环境价值实现、市场塑山加强资源产业整合、教育固山促进人口素质提升3条层层递进的软路径出发,探析四川秦巴山区绿色发展之道。提出通过构建绿色制度体系、绿色产业格局、绿色教育模式,推动四川秦巴山区人口、资源、环境绿色协同发展。     

The going public decision and the structure of equity markets

The industries in which listed firms are concentrated in less developed equity markets are not random, nor entirely explained by the underlying composition of production. Listed firms and market capitalization are disproportionately concentrated in industries with low beta (measured with their beta with the market portfolio in the U.S.). We document a strong positive relationship between the industry-weighted country beta and the degree of market development across countries. Recent IPO activity confirms the result since new listings have higher betas than the average firm already in the market.     

IPD军工科研企业研发体系建设研究

在激烈的市场竞争下，军工科研企业面临如何有效地降低研发成本、提高研发效率、提升研发质量，从而实现规模化、产业化发展等问题。集成产品研发（Integrated Product Development, IPD）由IBM首先成功实践，可以帮助企业快速、低成本、准确地开发出满足市场的产品，快速从以项目为核心、解决产品有无问题的阶段，向以平台和共享为核心的产业化发展阶段跨越。从军工企业科研面临的问题，研究了IPD军工科研企业如何借鉴IPD思想，本地化建立符合军工业务特点的研发体系，提出了基于IPD的研发体系建设目标、建设内容和实施步骤。     

A Proposed Sustainable Rural Development Index (SRDI): Lessons from Hajij village,Iran

While there are many indices to gauge growth and development, there remains an ambiguity on how best to measure the development of tourism in rural locations. Current thinking emphasizes the specific characteristics of a given location and the European Charter for Sustainable Tourism in Protected Areas depicts a requirement for participatory processes in local development. This study is inspired by implementation of the European Charter in Northern Italy, using it as a guideline. The context for this study is Hajij Village in Iran, and the approach adopted differed from that undertaken in Italy with regards to the main target, time and procedures of implementation. The study proposes the novel index based on the weighted averages of 20 variables as used with a sample of 87 members of the Hajij Community. The study explores the possibility of quantitative measurements between the weaknesses, strengths, threats, and opportunities associated with development plans.     

广西中期工业化纵深发展的战略思考

2011年,广西经济总量突破万亿,进入中期工业化阶段。接下来广西应该走怎样的工业化道路,是需要认真思考的问题。文章通过构建TCI指数,指出广西目前的重型化工业道路是一条不能实现经济可持续发展的道路。广西的工业发展需要走一条最优工业化道路,即按照广西的要素禀赋结构,选择最优工业技术水平,使企业具有自生能力,以最快的速度实现资本积累、技术进步和产业升级。     

甘肃省承接产业转移的行业间技术溢出效应影响因素分析

利用计量经济模型和通径分析法，该文对甘肃省工业行业的区际产业转移行业间溢出效应的影响因素进行分析。计量回归结果显示：人力资本、资本密集度对技术溢出具有显著的促进作用，技术差距对技术溢出具有显著的抑制作用，行业发展水平与技术溢出没有显著的相关关系。通径分析法与多元回归结论基本一致，但通径分析法比多元回归更加优越。分析结果表明，技术溢出效应的影响因素应该是承接地一系列因子指标的一个集合。     

The main paths of medical tourism: From transplantation to beautification

Medical tourism, combining the very polarized purposes of pleasurable travel and potentially stressful health care services, is an emergent and growing business worldwide. Medical tourism patients are willing to travel abroad to seek better quality, lower cost, domestically unavailable, no wait-time destinations for non-emergency medical care. There are numerous related studies in the academic literature that are substantiated with multidisciplinary and diverse backgrounds. This study uses the main path analysis, a unique quantitative and citation-based approach, to analyze the significant development trajectories, important literature, and recent active research areas in medical tourism. We find that there are two distinctive development paths: one path focuses more on the evolution of medical tourism, the motivation factors, marketing strategies, and economic analysis; the other path emphasizes organ transplant and related issues. These two paths eventually merge to a common node in the citation network, which foretells transplantation to beautification as the future research direction trend.