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This study aims to seek to analyse the relationships between profitability, productivity, external debt and growth in SMEs. The authors also analyse firm size and age as explicative variables of small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) growth.

In this paper the data were collected for 3309 SMEs for the period 2010–2019. The authors estimate the model using the system generalised method of moments dynamic estimator.

The results show that after a certain level of profitability, this determinant positively impacts SME growth. Productivity influences positively the firm growth. There is a positive effect of external debt on SME growth, which can be explained by the insufficiency of internally generated funds. The authors obtained a negative signal between size and firm growth, contradicting Gibrat's Law (1931). Moreover, the results suggest that SMEs grow less after a certain age, suggesting that small firms grow less after reaching the minimum scale of efficiency.

For SME owner-managers, this study enhances the importance of profitability and labour productivity for firm growth. For policymakers, the results suggest the need for favourable conditions for SMEs in accessing external finance.

Profitability negatively impacts on SME growth. However, the authors found that above a certain level of profitability, probably, as firms accumulate retained earnings, profitability has a positive effect on SME growth. Moreover, this study shows that labour productivity and debt positively impact on SME growth, evidencing the importance of the availability of financial resources to sustain the growth of these firms.

Despite prior studies on cross-border acquisitions (CBAs) have analyzed the determinants of ownership strategies; there is still a quest for evidence on how the differences between home and host market characteristics affect the ownership percentage. Prior studies have acknowledged that entering host countries with greater uncertainty makes multinationals reluctant to acquire high levels of ownership. Nevertheless, emerging multinationals (EMNEs) are usually used to operating under greater levels of uncertainty than multinationals from advanced countries (AMNEs), which can imply different ownership strategies. The purpose of this study is to analyze the ownership percentage acquired by MNEs when designing a CBA in emerging or in advanced countries, and to analyze the extent to which the ownership strategy in emerging countries differs between EMNEs and AMNEs.

Mobile telecommunications industry is used as research setting to provide empirical evidence of the interaction effect of the advanced versus emerging nature of the host and home countries on the ownership acquired in CBAs.

Results confirm that both home and host countries' characteristics are relevant in explaining the ownership strategies of MNEs.

The authors contribute to the strategy and IB literatures by providing empirical evidence on the recent debate on whether the internationalization strategies followed by EMNEs are similar to the traditional patterns of AMNEs, and analyze how EMNEs differ from AMNEs in their ownership strategies in emerging countries. Focusing in the mobile telecommunications industry, the authors also contribute by extending the analysis to an international and cross-cultural setting that includes 48 mobile groups that come from 35 home and 81 host countries.

The purpose of this study is to diagnose and understand Portuguese academics’ perspectives on the components of intercultural competence and on the importance of its development by higher education students.

Academics’ perspectives were identified during two discussion and reflection sessions included in the overall training program Intercultural Competence in Higher Education: building proposals with academics that took place at a Portuguese public university. Data were collected through audio recordings of the two sessions and observation notes and were subject to content analysis, drawing on Deardorff’s process model of intercultural competence (2006).

Academics recognize the multidimensionality of intercultural competence, acknowledging that it comprises attitudes (acceptance and respect; curiosity and openness), knowledge (others’ cultural contexts; self-knowledge and cultural self-awareness) and skills (observation and listening) that altogether will lead to individuals’ desired internal and external outcomes. The development of intercultural competence by higher education students, regarded in close relation to higher education internationalization, is considered crucial for changing prejudiced attitudes, preparing students to live in a global world and empowering them professionally.

The study sheds light on an issue that has been insufficiently addressed by research: academics’ perspectives on intercultural competence development, namely, in the Portuguese higher education context.

The aim of this paper is to explore the affective and cognitive factors that condition banking relationships for economically vulnerable consumers and how these factors contribute to increasing financial difficulties and exclusion. This research, performed on a set of focus groups, bases its findings on a combination of experimental and discourse analysis methods.

Financial decisions are not rational and can be biased by affective and cognitive factors. Behavioural finance has focused very little on analysing how consumer biases influence relationships with banking institutions. Additionally, these relationships are affected by the digitalization and transformation of banking business. Thus, in the case of economically vulnerable consumers, who are not profitable for the increasingly competitive banking industry and lack financial abilities, their risk of financial exclusion is increasing.

The results show that distrust and shame lead to financial difficulties in economically vulnerable consumers. Distrust generates problems of access and self-exclusion, while shame generates difficulties of use. This lack of trust makes them more rational when dealing with machines than with people, showing greater banking difficulties for consumers with a “person-suspicious” profile.

This finding can help regulators establish limits on banking behaviour, require banks to incorporate affective and cognitive factors in their convenience tests and detect new variables that can help them improve their insolvency ratios and reputations.

Literature about transparency in public-sector organizations has been attracting the attention of scholars for the last two decades. This study reviews the existing literature with the intention of creating a description of the state of the art, categorized by geographical areas, levels of government, topics, and methodologies.

The authors have developed a structured literature review following a rigorous protocol. The initial search was launched on 25 April 2022 on Scopus and Web of Science, resulting in 3,217 articles. After removing duplicates and studies that did not meet all the inclusion criteria specified in the review protocol, the final sample includes 956 articles from 1991 to 2021.

The analyses show a considerable increase in studies since 2005, especially in the last two years, when 30% of the publications have been produced. Most of the studies analyze the national/central level of government. Many authors compare different countries, while other scholars focus on specific countries, overall, the USA and the UK. The local level of government has also been widely studied, especially in the Spanish and Chinese contexts. The most frequently used methodologies are quantitative and empirical techniques, and the most common topics are those associated with accountability.

This study uses a huge sample (956 articles over the period 1991–2021), which has never been used before, to examine the literature on transparency. The structured literature review facilitates the identification of gaps that can be filled by future studies. These include analyzing transparency in specific geographical areas like Africa, Asia, and Latin America, studying transparency at different levels of government, especially at the regional and federal levels, and providing comparative studies and case study collections.

This study aims to present a methodological experience using geodesign as a process and instrument that facilitates citizen awareness and the use of alternative urban parameters in a discipline of an undergraduate course in architecture and urbanism, about urban planning at a local scale.

Aiming to develop solutions more suited to the reality of the area and attentive to contemporary practices of collaborative urban planning – for and with people – the methodological approach was divided into two complementary steps. The first step was elaborated through a general plan of ideas, with the aid of the Geodesign Hub platform, and for the more detailed second step, we used the Brazilian virtual GISColab geodesign platform. Both steps were conducted in workshop format.

In this experience, by incorporating geoinformation technology resources, geodesign proved to be a potential tool for creating opinions and decision-making regarding co-creative planning and experimenting with alternative urban parameters.

In the context of a current scenario of city growth oriented from the perspective of motor vehicles, the urban sprawl and in turn, the progressive loss of the human dimension in the urban space, students were introduced and encouraged to reflect on the different functions of the street and on the possibility of measuring urban quality from alternative parameters: completeness indicators.

This paper aims to provide an estimation of the costs of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic with a special focus on Spain. Costs include macroeconomic costs of foregone gross domestic product (GDP) attributable to the pandemic and the direct and indirect costs of prevention, treatment and lost productivity. This study also analyzes the cost-effectiveness of the test-tracking-quarantine (TTQ) strategy in Spain.

The macroeconomic costs of foregone GDP attributable to the pandemic are estimated for different countries and areas by comparing the present GDP forecasts for 2020 and 2021 with counterfactuals estimated before the COVID-19 crisis aftermath. The total cost of the COVID-19 for Spain in 2020 was obtained using the cost of illness approach with a bottom-up process. A cost-effectiveness analysis of the TTQ strategy in Spain is based on the estimation of the total costs of TTQ and the health gains and avoided health-care costs associated with the TTQ strategy. A sensitivity analysis explores the consequences of uncertainty in key parameters.

The GDP cost of the COVID-19 is by far larger than all the other components of the cost. The global cost of the Covid-19 crisis in 2020–2021 is estimated at 14% of 2019 GDP (around 12,206 mm$). In the specific case of Spain, it amounts to 24% of the 2019 GDP; which is 397.3 m €. Spain is and will be by far the European country most economically affected by the pandemic. In Spain 2020, the GDP cost accounts for 94.7% of the total cost of the COVID-19 and health-care direct costs are only 2.14%. TTQ is a dominant strategy in Spain. For each euro spent on it, 7 euros will be recovered only in terms of saved health-care resources.

Given the large degree of uncertainty and the fast-evolving nature of the epidemic, a number of assumptions are required to arrive at the estimates provided in this study. The results were found to be robust to the assumptions applied.

TTQ is a key strategy for the contention of the epidemy and it is justified from the economic perspective.

This is the first estimation of the cost of the COVID-19 and the cost-effectiveness of the TTQ strategy for Spain.

This study aims to explore the role of local community in tourism co-creation. Despite the importance of internal stakeholders, there is a dearth of research on the process of place branding co-creation with the local community, considering their interconnections and influencing relationships.

An old and picturesque local market under a rebranding process was used as a case study. The research involved 10 interviews with market vendors to understand their views regarding place identity, their involvement in brand co-creation, their expectations about the process and the perceived results of such co-creation. Public information was also collected as secondary data to illustrate the rebranding process.

The vendor community had limited involvement in the market rebranding and felt they should have been more widely involved in the decisions as a group rather than individually. However, their satisfaction with the results of the rebranding led to the continuity of the sense of place and to the proud adoption of the new brand.

This study proposes greater integration of local communities as important internal stakeholders of place branding in addition to residents and suggests group meetings to involve the local community in the co-creation process.

This paper explores the context of a vendor community in a local market. This context has deserved little attention in the tourism literature. This study reflects the importance of local community to co-create place brands from a group perspective, taking into consideration. their roles, rights, responsibilities and relationships.

本研究探讨了地方社区在旅游共同创造中的作用。尽管内部利益相关者很重要, 但关于地方品牌与当地社区共同创造的过程, 考虑他们之间的相互联系和影响关系的研究却很缺乏。

一个古老的、风景如画的地方市场在品牌重塑的过程中被作为案例研究。研究涉及对市场商贩的10次访谈, 以了解他们对地方身份的看法, 他们对品牌共同创造的参与, 他们对这一过程的期望, 以及对这种共同创造结果的感知。此外, 还收集了公共信息作为二级数据来说明品牌重塑的过程。

供应商群体对市场品牌重塑的参与是有限的, 他们认为自己应该作为一个团体而不是个人更广泛地参与决策。然而, 他们对品牌重塑的结果感到满意, 这导致了地方感的延续和对新品牌的自豪采用。

本文探讨了一个地方市场中的供应商社区的背景。这一背景在旅游文献中几乎不值得关注。这项研究反映了当地社区从团体的角度共同创造地方品牌的重要性, 考虑到他们的角色、权利、责任和关系。

本研究提出, 除了居民之外, 当地社区也是地方品牌建设的重要内部利益相关者, 并建议召开小组会议, 让当地社区参与到共同创造的过程中。

Este estudio analiza el papel de la comunidad local en la cocreación turística. A pesar de la importancia de los grupos de interés internos, existe una carencia de investigaciones sobre el proceso de cocreación de la marca del lugar con la comunidad local, teniendo en cuenta sus interconexiones y relaciones de influencia.

Se utilizó como caso de estudio un antiguo y pintoresco mercado local en proceso de cambio de marca. La investigación incluyó 10 entrevistas con los vendedores del mercado para conocer su opinión sobre la identidad del lugar, su participación en la cocreación de la marca, sus expectativas sobre el proceso y los resultados percibidos de dicha cocreación. También se recogió información procedente de datos secundarios para ilustrar el proceso de cambio de marca.

La comunidad de vendedores tuvo una participación limitada en el cambio de marca del mercado y consideró que debería haber participado más ampliamente en las decisiones como grupo y no de forma individual. Sin embargo, su satisfacción con los resultados de la renovación de la marca condujo a la continuidad del sentido del lugar y a la adopción complacida de la nueva marca.

Este trabajo explora el contexto de una comunidad de vendedores en un mercado local. Este contexto ha recibido poca atención en la literatura turística. Este estudio refleja la importancia de la comunidad local para co-crear marcas de lugar desde una perspectiva de grupo, teniendo en cuenta sus roles, derechos, responsabilidades y relaciones.

Este estudio propone una mayor integración de las comunidades locales como importantes actores internos de la marca de lugar, además de los residentes, y sugiere la celebración de reuniones de grupo para implicar a la comunidad local en el proceso de cocreación.

This paper aims to explore the impact of the origin of hops on the sensory and hedonic evaluation of highly involved craft beer consumers.

Data was collected through a between-subject tasting experiment, where the origin of hop was manipulated (imported vs locally grown). The craft beer samples used in the experiment were produced using hops of similar age but grown in two distinct places: USA (imported hop) and in the city of Ribeirão Preto, Brazil, where the experiment was conducted (locally grown hop). The sensory and hedonic evaluations of highly involved craft beer consumers (n = 100) were collected after tasting the samples.

The origin of hop proved to be significant in affecting participants’ sensory and hedonic evaluations. It was observed that women were more sensitive than men to the origin information: when information was given, differences were found only on men’s scores of dryness/astringency; while in women, significant differences were found not only in dryness/astringency, but also in bitterness and refreshing, which are important attributes in the sensory profile of craft beer. It was also confirmed the effect of localness in hop cultivation, once men’ and women’s scores on liking were higher for the sample brewed with locally grown hop.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first work using craft beer brewed with hops cultivated in Brazil and a sample of Brazilian craft beer consumers, therefore, providing a significant contribution to the field of consumer behavior. Furthermore, it adds to the discussion on sex-/gender-related differences regarding sensory expectation and perception of foods.