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Linking Sustainability Practices to Financial Success: Insights from Bangladesh
Full text linkThe rapid industrialization and economic growth of Bangladesh, particularly in the ready-made garment sector, have raised significant concerns about sustainability. This study investigates how businesses and consumers in Bangladesh are incorporating sustainability into their practices and decision-making. By exploring factors influencing the adoption of these practices, their impact on financial performance, and consumer attitudes toward sustainability, the research contributes to understanding the sustainability scenario of Bangladesh. Data from 225 businesses and 639 consumers were analyzed. Findings reveal a growing emphasis on these factors among businesses, linked to improved financial outcomes. However, challenges such as consumer price sensitivity and limited knowledge about sustainability persist. While consumer awareness of sustainability is increasing, a significant segment remains willing to pay a premium for sustainable products. The study highlights the importance of businesses embracing these practices and the need for supportive policies to foster a sustainable future
Theories of Sustainable Development
Full text linkThis article presents new theories of sustainable development. The need for new theories of sustainable development arises from the need to explain the attitudes and various dispositions towards the sustainable development agenda. Five theories of sustainable development are presented, namely, the extinction avoidance theory of sustainable development, the collective stewardship theory of sustainable development, the rogue agent theory of sustainable development, the divine intervention and providence theory of sustainable development, and the resource-resilient world theory of sustainable development. These theories articulate the unspoken philosophy or paradigms regarding the need for sustainable development and who should be responsible for achieving sustainable development. These unspoken philosophy or paradigms have the power to move people to take action towards sustainable development or to do nothing about it, or to oppose the sustainable development agenda. Scholars, policy makers and researchers will find these theories useful in their work in sustainable development
The costs of social and environmental degradation in affluent economies
Full text linkIndividuals’ attempts to defend from the deterioration of common goods, such as natural and social capital, stimulate defensive growth, that is new economic activity driven by private solutions to collective problems. In this paper, we provide a first estimate of the value of defensive expenditures, that is of the individual consumption needed to protect subjective well-being against collective problems. We conduct a regression analysis of life satisfaction on aggregate consumption levels and various social and environmental externalities (which we refer to as "bads"). Using a compensating differentials approach, we estimate the monetary valuation of social and environmental disruption for which no market price exists. Our estimates indicate that the consumption needed to defend against collective problems is worth nearly a quarter of actual individual consumption. In terms of national income, this is equivalent to nearly half Gross Domestic Product per capita in affluent economies. Defensive consumption stimulates economic growth, however, in so far as the equivalent of nearly half of growth is defensive, its expansion does not reflect true progress
A Novel Approach to Determining Spatially Explicit Values of Natural Capital
Full text linkDespite the urgent need to preserve natural capital, little is known about the direct benefits people receive from it. Reliable benefit estimates are required to incorporate the complex values of natural capital in national capital accounting, cost-benefit analyses, project appraisal, and international policy agreements. The study employs a spatial-explicit choice experiment approach, which estimates benefits people receive from changes in natural capital conditional on the current endowment in their places of residence. Studying changes in protected areas and high nature value farmland across Germany, we identify significant use and non-use values of natural capital stocks. We find that the marginal values of natural capital are conditional on the spatial endowment and on whether the type of natural capital is use or non-use related. We use our estimates together with geographic information system data to aggregate and map the distribution of the demand for protected areas and high nature value farmland across Germany. The results are easily transferable to other regions and contexts and allow trading off the benefits and costs of restoring natural capital and biodiversity. Our findings enrich the discussion on the loss of natural capital and biodiversity and can significantly contribute to broader policy discussions in the context of the interlinked climate and biodiversity crises
Can women's literacy and education spending serve as robust pillars of development in Madagascar?
Full text linkThis study examines the role of women’s literacy and pub
lic education expenditure as drivers of sustainable develop
ment in Madagascar. Despite high female labor force par
ticipation (82.6% in 2024), structural constraints, includ
ing low secondary school completion rates (33.5% for girls in
2023) and predominant engagement in vulnerable employ
ment (88.2%), hinder women’s economic contributions. Em
ploying an econometric framework with three models—time
series analysis for Madagascar (1990–2023) and panel re
gressions (fixed and random effects) across low-income Sub
Saharan African countries—we find that a one-percentage
point increase in female literacy corresponds to an approxi
mate 1.7 USD increase in per capita GDP and a 0.00235
point rise in the Human Development Index (HDI), with
statistically significant coefficients across all models. These
f
indings underscore the critical role of women’s education in
fostering economic growth and human development. How
ever, persistent gender gaps in formal employment, financial
inclusion (only 25.2% of women held financial accounts in
2022), and political representation (16.5% of parliamentary
seats) highlight the need for comprehensive policy interven
tions. We recommend increased investment in girls’ educa
tion, labor market formalization, and enhanced financial and
political inclusion to unlock the full potential of women’s hu
man capital for Madagascar’s sustainable development
Financial Ratios for SEABRIDGE GOLD 2000 to 2024 Mining Exploration Balance Sheet Analysis
Full text linkFinancial statistics can be used to understand mining exploration and development companies that are successful over time. For example, how do the acquisition costs compare to exploration spending for the most bullish projects? These statistics can be generalized between mining exploration companies, and this paper demonstrates basic statistics calculated using only a few variables from the financial records of SEABRIDGE GOLD INC. from 2000 to 2024 as a case study of success
Carbon emissions, financial stability and bank profitability in non-crisis years
Full text linkCarbon emissions, or CO2 emissions, is an important but often overlooked factor affecting financial stability and bank profitability in non-crisis years. The effect of carbon emissions on financial stability and bank profitability in non-crisis years has not been examined in the literature. It is argued that carbon emissions can bring about changes in the environment that create health challenges and financial risks which affect bank profitability and pose a threat to the stability of the financial system in non-crisis years. This study examines the effect of carbon emissions on bank profitability and financial stability in non-crisis years. Twenty-two diverse countries were analysed in non-crisis years. The findings reveal that higher carbon emissions impair financial stability by decreasing banking sector solvency and capital buffer which impair financial stability. Institutional quality mitigates the adverse effect of carbon emissions on financial stability by ensuring greater banking sector solvency in carbon-intensive environments. Institutional quality also reinforces the positive relationship between carbon emissions and bank profitability, particularly banking sector non-interest income. Lagged nonperforming loans, institutional quality, economic growth and regulatory capital ratio are significant determinants of financial stability in non-crisis years while the determinants of bank profitability in non-crisis years are lagged return on asset, the efficiency ratio, institutional quality, inflation rate and unemployment rate
Pro-Patent Policy in the Knowledge-Based Economy
Full text linkIn a knowledge-based economy, innovation plays a significant role in determining the level of economic growth and social welfare. Meanwhile, patent protection is a pivotal factor for research and development (R&D) incentives, and innovation performance depends on the degree of patent protection. Therefore, elucidating the mechanism for impact of patent protection on innovation; and hence economic growth is a crucial issue from the perspective of macroeconomic policy. Our research questions are twofold. (1) What conditions are necessary for patent protection to effectively promote innovation and economic growth? (2) Can strengthening patent protection enhance social welfare? This study addresses these problems using an expanding variety model of R&D-based endogenous growth. Our major findings are summarized as follows: If an economy satisfies conditions that the productivity in the final goods sector and labor force population are relatively large, while the patent duration elasticity of patent fee is relatively small, extending the patent duration fosters on the rate of innovation, the growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, and the growth rate of livelihood-based public infrastructure. Moreover, strengthening patent protection by extending the duration of the patent right does not necessarily enhance social welfare. Furthermore, the patent duration that maximizes social welfare may be shorter than the patent duration that maximizes the growth rate of GDP per capita, the rate of innovation, or the growth rate of livelihood-based public infrastructure
Semantic Synergy: Unlocking Policy Insights and Learning Pathways Through Advanced Skill Mapping
Full text linkThis research introduces a comprehensive system based on state-of-the-art natural
language processing, semantic embedding, and efficient search techniques
for retrieving similarities and thus generating actionable insights out of raw textual
information. The system works on automatically extracting and aggregating
normalized competencies out of multiple documents like policy files and curricula
vitae and making strong relationships between recognized competencies,
occupation profiles, and related learning courses. To validate its performance,
we conducted a multi-tier evaluation that included both explicit and implicit
skill references in synthetic and real-world documents. The results showed
near-human-level accuracy, with F1 scores exceeding 0.95 for explicit skill detection
and above 0.93 for implicit mentions. The system thereby establishes a
sound foundation for supporting in-depth collaboration across the AE4RIA network.
The methodology involves a multiple-stage pipeline based on extensive
preprocessing and data cleaning, semantic embedding and segmentation via SentenceTransformer,
and skill extraction using a FAISS-based search method. The
extracted skills are associated with occupation frameworks as formulated in
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the ESCO ontology and learning paths as training programs in the Sustainable
Development Goals Academy. Moreover, interactive visualization software,
implemented based on Dash and Plotly, presents interactive graphs and tables
for real-time exploration and informed decision-making for involved parties in
policymaking, training and learning supply, career transitions, and recruitment
opportunities. Overall, the system outlined in this paper—supported by rigorous
validation—presents promising prospects for better policy-making, human
resource improvement, and lifelong learning based on providing structured and
actionable insights out of raw, complex textual information
Regulating Electricity Spot Markets during Extreme Events: The 2021 Texas Case
Full text linkThis paper discusses the economic and legal challenges of price regulation in spot electricity markets during extreme events, taking the 2021 Texas winter storm as an example. The dual role of spot electricity prices (resource allocation and overall system reliability) in ERCOT's energy-only market resulted in allocating system reliability costs to load-shed consumers and spot electricity buyers, implying that complementary tools for covering system reliability costs should be sought. Further nuances are highlighted through a comparative qualitative analysis of value-of-lost-load pricing and anti-gouging legislation in the event context