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1 – 10 of 173The extraction of natural resources has long been part of economic development in small islands. The damage to environment and health is extensive, even rendering once productive…
Abstract
Purpose
The extraction of natural resources has long been part of economic development in small islands. The damage to environment and health is extensive, even rendering once productive islands virtually uninhabitable. Rather than providing long-term benefits to the population or to the environment, the culture of “extractivism” – a nonreciprocal approach where resources are removed and used with little care or regard to consequences – has instead left many in far more fragile circumstances, increasingly dependent on external income. The purpose of this paper is to show how continued extractivism in small islands is contributing to global climate change and increasing climate risks to the local communities.
Design/methodology/approach
Through a series of case studies, this paper examines the history of extractivism in small islands in Oceania, its contribution to environmental degradation locally and its impacts on health.
Findings
It examines how extractivism continues today, with local impacts on environment, health and wellbeing and its much more far-reaching consequences for global climate change and human health. At the same time, these island countries have heightened sensitivity to climate change due to their isolation, poverty and already variable climate, whereas the damage to natural resources, the disruption, economic dependence and adverse health impacts caused by extractivism impart reduced resilience to the new climate hazards in those communities.
Practical implications
This paper proposes alternatives to resource extractivism with options for climate compatible development in small islands that are health-promoting and build community resilience in the face of increasing threats from climate change.
Originality/value
Extractivism is a new concept that has not previously been applied to understanding health implications of resource exploitation thorough the conduit of climate change. Small-island countries are simultaneously exposed to widespread extractivism, including of materials contributing to global climate change, and are among the most vulnerable to the hazards that climate change brings.
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Jeremias De Klerk and Bernard Swart
Background: Amid increasing leadership failures in the global business context, the mining industry is one of the industries with many adverse incidents, affecting employee…
Abstract
Background: Amid increasing leadership failures in the global business context, the mining industry is one of the industries with many adverse incidents, affecting employee safety, the environment, and surrounding communities. Emerging economies tend to have unique socio-economic challenges and greater relative economic dependence on mining, presenting unique challenges to leaders. The purpose of this research was to study the realities of responsible leadership in the mining industry in an emerging economy.
Methods: A qualitative research study, consisting of semi-structured interviews was conducted. Nine senior mine managers were selected to represent perspectives from different operations and mining houses. Data was gathered from August to October 2020 in South Africa, an emerging economy with significant mining operations. A thematic analysis of interview transcripts was conducted through the use of software, rendering five themes, with 12 sub-themes.
Results: The research found that requirements on mining leaders in emerging economies demand consistent balancing of a complex set of competing risks, whilst attending to paradoxical requirements among operations, and internal and external stakeholders. Leaders face several competing requirements from stakeholders, the environment, mining practices, and time frames. Responsible leaders must navigate a paradoxical maze of needs and time horizons, with several conflicting forces and dilemmas, and dichotomous relationships. Responsible leadership in the mining industry of an emerging economy is a proverbial minefield of paradoxes and dilemmas between responsible intentions and practical realities. These paradoxes and dilemmas are specifically acute in the context of emerging economies due to the dire socio-economic situations. A total of 10 competencies emerged as essential responsible leadership requirements in this context.
Conclusions: The study provides an in-depth understanding of the intricacies of responsible leadership in the mining industry of an emerging economy. This understanding will contribute to capacitating leaders in the mining industries of emerging economies to act responsibly.
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Martin H. Kunc, Maria Cleofe Giorgino and Federico Barnabè
According to the “strategic focus and future orientation” principle of the integrated reporting (<IR>) framework, <IR> should provide information useful to support investors in…
Abstract
Purpose
According to the “strategic focus and future orientation” principle of the integrated reporting (<IR>) framework, <IR> should provide information useful to support investors in assessing the future financial performance of organizations. This study aims to support the operationalization of this function by improving the forward-looking orientation of the integrated report.
Design/methodology/approach
Basing on the backward- and forward-looking disclosure in <IR> and the dynamic resource-based view (DRBV), this study develops an explorative case study building a quantitative simulation model based on an integrated report.
Findings
This study provides useful insights into how operationalizing the <IR> “future orientation” and obtaining more quantitative information on the organization’s capacity to create value in the future by applying DRBV and quantitative simulation modeling.
Research limitations/implications
The article presents one case study to explore the method suggested to improve the <IR> forward-looking orientation. Additional case studies applying the same research design should be certainly useful to refine the method.
Practical implications
Supporting the <IR> forward-looking orientation, this study provides additional information for the decision-making process of investors, thus contributing to the efficient and productive allocation of capital.
Originality/value
Few studies have investigated forward-looking information in integrated reports, highlighting the existence of an “information gap” referred to such disclosure. Overcoming these previous results, the study provides useful insights on how to improve the <IR> forward-looking orientation.
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Sophia EVERETT and Ross ROBINSONE
Recently, the entry of new players has prompted significant restructuring in the Australian coal market with value migrating away from the existing fragmented, traditional…
Abstract
Recently, the entry of new players has prompted significant restructuring in the Australian coal market with value migrating away from the existing fragmented, traditional production/export model characterised by competing operators generally using 'common user' infrastructure facilities to new, fully integrated supply chains creating a multi-tiered production-consumer framework.
This paper argues that not only are coal markets restructuring but they are doing so within the framework of a significant paradigm shift towards efficiency-seeking and efficiency-driven mechanisms. Value innovation and a deregulated market are enabling operators to enter the industry seeking and implementing end-to-end control of the supply chain - and, in so doing, capturing the significant gains of integration.
This paper explores these changes within the framework of integrative efficiency - a product of end-to-end control by a single party, derived from a number of companies, or chain elements, working cooperatively rather than competitively, or a single operator vertically integrating the chain from point of production to point of consumption to capture and deliver significantly higher value. The paper focuses attention on this paradigmatic shift in a brief though detailed case study of a major new industry entrant into export coal chains from the rapidly developing Galilee Basin in northern Queensland. It examines the dynamics and implications of this shift in the context of chain efficiency and value innovation
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This study aims to capture the “persistence effect” of credit risk in Indian banking industry using the bank-level data spanning over the period of 19 years from 1998/1999 to…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to capture the “persistence effect” of credit risk in Indian banking industry using the bank-level data spanning over the period of 19 years from 1998/1999 to 2016/17. Alongside, the study explored how the bank-specific, industry-specific, macroeconomic variables alongside regulatory reforms, ownership changes and financial crisis affect the bank's asset quality in India.
Design/methodology/approach
Using two-step system generalized method of moment (GMM) approach, the study derives key factors that affect the bank's asset quality in India.
Findings
The empirical results confirm the time persistence of credit risk among Indian banks during study period. This reflects that bank defaults are expected to increase in the current year, if it had increased past year due to time lag involved in the process of recovery of past dues. Further, higher profitability, better managerial efficiency, more diversified income from nontraditional activities, optimal size of banks, proper credit screening and monitoring and adherence regulatory norms would help in improving the credit quality of Indian banks.
Practical implications
The practical implication drawn from the study is that nonaccumulation of nonperforming loans (NPLs), higher profitability, better managerial efficiency, more diversified income from nontraditional activities, optimal size of banks, proper credit screening and monitoring and adherence regulatory norms would help in improving the credit quality of Indian banks.
Originality/value
This study is probably the first one that identifies in addition to the current year, whether lag of bank industry-macroeconomic affects the level of NPLs of Indian banks. So far, such an analysis has received less attention with respect to Indian banking industry, especially immediate aftermath of the global financial crisis.
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Katarzyna Pukowiec-Kurda and Michal Apollo
This paper gives mining area managers guidance on how to begin this process and which scenario to choose. It aims not only to improve the quality of the environment but also to…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper gives mining area managers guidance on how to begin this process and which scenario to choose. It aims not only to improve the quality of the environment but also to attend to the well-being of societies previously benefiting from the economic resources of raw materials. However, this task can be difficult to accomplish in countries of the poor South.
Design/methodology/approach
Building resilient infrastructure, promoting inclusive and sustainable industrialization and fostering innovation are among WHO’s main goals. Ensuring the possibility of an equitable transition from traditional resource industries to sustainable resource management is a key task for global society.
Findings
The transformation of mines into tourist attractions has been studied by several authors. In many countries of the Global North, this transformation has been successful (to a greater or lesser extent). Unfortunately, much remains to be done in many countries of the South. These countries, often at the risk to miners’ lives, engage in mining that is often economically unsustainable. The reason may not only be economic shortcomings but also a lack of conceptual solutions.
Practical implications
The current climate situation presents opportunities to receive funds from Northern countries that can be used for such a transformation.
Originality/value
Regions of the world with a history of transformation from raw material industries to services can provide know-how assistance and knowledge of good practices. Tourism in this aspect can become one of the game changers in the fight for a better future, including tourism itself.
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Weliswa Matekenya and Clement Moyo
The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of foreign direct divestments (FDD) on economic growth and development in South Africa for the period 1991–2019.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of foreign direct divestments (FDD) on economic growth and development in South Africa for the period 1991–2019.
Design/methodology/approach
The non-linear autoregressive distributed lag technique is used for the empirical analysis. Two regression models are specified, one for economic growth and the other for development which is proxied by poverty.
Findings
The empirical results suggest that foreign divestments are detrimental to both economic growth and development. Furthermore, the results suggest that the negative effects of foreign divestments outweigh the positive effects of FDI inflows.
Practical implications
South African policymakers should thus use policies that promote the retention of FDI inflows together with those that attract inflows. Furthermore, policies that promote economic freedom such as transparency and reduction in the time frame for granting government permits for business operations are also of paramount importance.
Originality/value
Most of the available literature on FDD focuses on the firm perspective. Available studies on the effect of FDD on economic growth do not investigate the effect of divestment on economic development. Economic growth is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for the achievement of socioeconomic development.
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Mark Alan Rhodes II and Kathryn Laura Hannum
Industrial heritage works within a world of contradictions, contentions and scalar liminality. Archaeologists and historians focus upon oral histories and discourses of tangible…
Abstract
Purpose
Industrial heritage works within a world of contradictions, contentions and scalar liminality. Archaeologists and historians focus upon oral histories and discourses of tangible and intangible memory and heritage while planners and economists see industrial World Heritage, in particular, as a marketing ploy to redevelop deindustrialized spaces. Within this liminality, we explore the potential for geographical perspectives to solder such contradictions into transdisciplinary heritage assessments and tourism contexts. How might the spatial tools of landscape and scalar analyses expose alternative and sustainable futures within broader patterns of industrial heritage management and consumption?
Design/methodology/approach
Using three comparative cases, interview and landscape methods and conducting discourse analysis within a spatial and scalar framework, we explore the increasing presence of industrial World Heritage.
Findings
We present both an institutional reflection upon the complexities of heritage discourse across complex spatial configurations and the intersectional historical, cultural, political, environmental and economic geographies that guide and emerge out of World Heritage Designations. Framed scalarly and spatially, we highlight common interpretation, tourism and heritage management styles and concerns found across industrial World Heritage. We point out trans-scalar considerations for future municipalities and regions looking to utilize their industrial landscapes and narratives.
Originality/value
We believe that more theoretical groundings in space and scale may lead to both the flexibility and the applicability needed to assess and, in turn, manage trans-scalar and trans-spatial complex heritage sites. These perspectives may be uniquely poised to assess the complex geographies of industrial, particularly mining, World Heritage Sites.
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Hakan Karaosman, Donna Marshall and Irene Ward
Just transition is a fundamental concept for supply chain management but neither discipline pays attention to the other and little is known about how supply chains can be…
Abstract
Purpose
Just transition is a fundamental concept for supply chain management but neither discipline pays attention to the other and little is known about how supply chains can be orchestrated as socioecological systems to manage these transitions. Building from a wide range of just transition examples, this paper explores just transition to understand how to move beyond instrumental supply chain practices to supply chains functioning in harmony with the planet and its people.
Design/methodology/approach
Building from a systematic review of 72 papers, the paper identifies just transition examples while interpreting them through the theoretical lens of supply chain management, providing valuable insights to help research and practice understand how to achieve low-carbon economies through supply chain management in environmentally and socially just ways.
Findings
The paper defines, elaborates, and extends the just transition construct by developing a transition taxonomy with two key dimensions. The purpose dimension (profit or shared outcomes) and the governance dimension (government-/industry-led versus civil society-involved), generating four transition archetypes. Most transitions projects are framed around the Euro- and US-centric, capitalist standards of development, leading to coloniality as well as economic and cultural depletion of communities. Framing just transition in accordance with context-specific plural values, the paper provides an alternative perspective to the extractive transition concept. This can guide supply chain management to decarbonise economies and societies by considering the rights of nature, communities and individuals.
Originality/value
Introducing just transition into the supply chain management domain, this paper unifies the various conceptualisations of just transition into a holistic understanding, providing a new foundation for supply chain management research.
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Philip Andrews-Speed, Xiangyang Xu, Dingfei Jie, Siyuan Chen and Mohammad Usman Zia
This paper aims to identify the factors that are constraining technological innovation to support the development of coalbed methane in China.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to identify the factors that are constraining technological innovation to support the development of coalbed methane in China.
Design/methodology/approach
The analysis applies ideas relating to national and sector systems of innovation to explain why China’s strategies to support research and technological innovation have failed to stimulate the desired progress in coalbed methane production. It also provides a counter-example of the USA that implemented a number of measures in the 1970s that proved very effective.
Findings
The deficiencies of China’s research and development strategies in support of coalbed methane development reflect the national and sectoral systems of innovation. They are exacerbated by the structure of the national oil and gas industry. Key constraints include the excessively top-down management of the national R&D agenda, insufficient support for basic research, limited collaboration networks between companies, research institutes and universities and weak mechanisms for diffusion of knowledge. The success of the USA was based on entirely different systems for innovation and in quite a different industrial setting.
Originality/value
The originality of this analysis lies in placing the challenges facing research and innovation for China’s coalbed methane development in the context of the national and sectoral systems for innovation and comparing with the approach and success of the USA.
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