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Globally, corporate social responsibility (CSR) has been a voluntary practice, but faced serious limitations in its institutionalization. Resultantly, India, through the Companies Act, 2013, mandates corporates to change voluntary and ad hoc CSR practices into strategic and systematic projects. This paper aims to explore the changes brought in CSR practices by corporates under the influence of CSR law. The goal is to fill the literature gap on qualitative changes brought in CSR practices by the mandate.

This qualitative study used purposive sampling and conducted in-depth interviews of corporate officials, nongovernmental organization (NGO) officials and academicians. The findings are discussed with the theoretical framework of institutional isomorphism.

This paper presents changes in CSR practices in six themes: ad hoc to project-mode program designing and planning, stricter due diligence of NGOs, multi-stakeholder implementation of impact-driven projects, strict monitoring mechanisms, higher funding and rigorous reporting. These changes contribute to an understanding of the shift from voluntary to mandatory CSR in India, institutionalized through a mix of normative, coercive and mimetic pressures.

Indian corporates can adopt the systematic practices in their CSR programmatic cycle, as presented in this study. NGOs would gain insights into newer requirements of corporates to design effective collaborations. Future studies can be conducted to describe the extent of institutionalization of CSR practices in India.

This paper creates knowledge for multiple stakeholders of CSR in India and other developing countries by presenting changes brought in CSR practices by a legal mandate in comparison to voluntary CSR.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) was mandated and institutionalised in India through the Companies Act (2013), a decade ago. It is critical to understand the priorities of the models used by the companies to effectuate their CSR policy. This paper aims to understand the skewing of interest towards Education and Health interventions. The paper then proposes a framework to cross-level and effectuate CSR programme implementation.

The qualitative study conducted in-depth interviews of the stakeholders from the CSR environment. The findings are used to derive a model to effectuate CSR in India.

The findings may be divided into two sub-themes – (a) observations from the field study and (b) integrated solution ecosystem (ISE) framework. The qualitative study and the insights form the first component. The proposed framework which can enhance the efficiency of CSR practices may be found in the second sub-theme.

Operationalisation of the proposed model, if adopted would require integrated efforts from multiple functional departments which could lead to an extended timeframe for implementation. This may eventually lead to a need to revise the model in the making. The research could also include perspectives from governmental stakeholders which is missing here.

The emerging model can present an opportunity for corporates and policymakers to revisit the CSR structure and frameworks. It can also be used to evaluate and audit the CSR practices of companies.

The ISE posits a bunch of actionable themes which can deliver an impactful transition from the existing approach to CSR to a more far reaching one. While the ground rules are revisited, the approach also allows a critical departure from a corporate-driven model of engagement with the community. The modifications or corrections in this model would also mean a more inclusive layering of developmental interventions. The diversity which could potentially be brought in to designing interventions can be another key impact.

This paper presents insights for some of the pivotal stakeholders of CSR in countries like India. It presents a possible model of effective and optimal utilisation of CSR spending.

This paper aims to examine the applicable legal framework, various concerns regarding the price support methodology and the merits and pitfalls of the Bali peace clause that currently shields India’s public stockholding (PSH) policy, to provide suggestions on moving forward in the World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations.

At the WTO, PSH for food security is considered a trade-distorting price support measure when food stocks are purchased from farmers at administered prices instead of market prices. The price support is measured by a specific methodology stipulated under the Agreement on Agriculture. India is concerned that the price support methodology overestimates the actual support provided to the farmers and makes India susceptible to violating the WTO law.

The paper explains the domestic implications for India arising due to the applicable WTO law. Given the centrality of India’s PSH programmes in ensuring food security, India must seek more clarity on the interpretation of Article 18.4 of the AoA and the ambiguous provisions of the Bali peace clause.

The paper provides a timely and updated analysis of the contentious issue of PSH for food security, exclusively from the Indian perspective, highlighting the persisting challenges for India in WTO agriculture negotiations. This is timely as many WTO members have raised serious concerns about India’s market price support policies recently and this analysis informs the reader about the underlying issues.

This study aims at understanding how higher education institutions (HEIs) can contribute to sustainable development, by designing their programmes for bringing about a transformative impact on communities and students, and also to examine what alternative pedagogical approaches could be used for that. In the past decades, HEIs have increasingly created social innovation (SI) programmes, as a way to achieve United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. These community-oriented and field-based programmes are difficult to ally with conventional classroom education. This study explores how these programmes could integrate the participatory approach and what would be the benefits. It also investigates the effectiveness of the experiential learning approach for teaching sustainability.

A case study method is used to document SI projects initiated by an HEI programme in rural India.

It was found that the participatory approach contributes to empowering communities and also benefits the students in terms of academic, professional and personal growth. Empirical findings show that experiential learning is an efficient method to teach sustainability. Ultimately, both pedagogical approaches are found to be mutually beneficial.

This study fills a gap in the literature, by providing empirical evidence on how HEI can implement innovative educational strategies such as participatory approach and experiential learning in their programmes towards teaching sustainability. A conceptual model for HEI interested in developing similar programmes is also proposed. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the first studies focusing on the context of Indian HEI.

The purpose of this paper is to use spatial thinking (space-time) as a lens through which to examine the ways in which the socio-economic conditions and values of the post-Fordist academy work to diminish and even subsume the immaterial affective labour of librarians even as it serves to reproduce the academy.

The research question informing this paper asks, In what ways does spatial thinking help us to better understand the immaterial, invisible and gendered labour of academic librarians' public service work in the context of the post-Fordist university? This question is explored using a conceptual approach and a review of recent library information science (LIS) literature that situates the academic library in the post-Fordist knowledge economy.

The findings suggest that the feminized and gendered immaterial labour of public service work in academic libraries – a form of reproductive labour – remains invisible and undervalued in the post-Fordist university, and that academic libraries function as a procreative, feminized spaces.

Spatial thinking offers a corrective to the tendency in LIS to foreground time over space. It affords new insights into the spatial and temporal aspects of information work in the global neoliberal knowledge economy and suggests a new spatio-temporal imaginary of the post-Fordist academic library as a site of waged work.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a method to aid design practitioners and students towards the design of additive manufactured products or parts produced using laser sintering (LS).

A design feature taxonomy was first developed as a guide for the development of a computer‐based design support tool. It comprised four taxons based on the reasons for utilising additive manufacturing (AM). These were user fit requirement, improved product functionality, parts consolidation and improvement of aesthetics or form. Each of the requirements was further expanded into 13 sub‐categories that contained examples of various design features that was then represented in the form of an MS Access database.

Results from user trials of the database provide evidence to show the potential of the database, as it enables users to easily visualise and gather information about AM design features.

The paper describes a database, the aim of which is to serve as a collective source of information for design features produced by AM and as a method to aid the conceptual design process of AM parts or products.

Environmental dynamics affect all sectors, and retailing is no exception. Scholarships reveal that, in such turbulent times, entrepreneurial characteristics are essential for business. In academic research, entrepreneurial characteristics like entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and entrepreneurial competence (EC) are seldom evaluated for retailers. This study aims to decode the impact of small retailers’ EO and EC on firm business performance (BP). It also traces the mediation effect of EC in the relationship between EO and BP.

The study executed among 740 small retailers is a pioneering work to trace EO’s efficacy via EC on the retailer’s BP. The present research is a primal work in the Indian context. This work redesigns the EC scale to suit the retail context and evaluate its mediation role in the EO and BP relationship.

Examining the mediation model through structural equation modelling (SEM) adds empirical evidence to entrepreneurial value creation (EVC) theory and throws light on the indispensable qualities required for small business retailers. The outcomes of the SEM model portray that there is an association between the EO, EC and BP.

This study, though carried out methodically, it is constrained by the ensuing intricacies. The investigation was limited to the small- and medium-retailers engaged in retailing with a floor space from 500 to 5,000 square feet. All three constructs used in the study are measured using the self-reported perceptual scale, which infuses the subjectivity in the data. Exploring the EO and EC of widely dispersed retailers, examining the entrepreneurial character of large-format independent retailers and evaluating financial performance measures through retailers will add value to the study in future.

The study verified the central role of EC in the intangible resource-reward relationship. Among the five pillars of EVC theory, the role of intention and external finance are not considered in this work. The present work explored the EO and EC of existing retailers, and hence intention is excluded. The study concentrates on small retailers, and the role of external financing is not explored. Mishra and Zachary (2014b) opined that the EVC process should be studied in different context and listed out several prepositions. Considering the role of intention and external financing and studying several prepositions spelt out in the theory in varying contexts will throw more lights on the EVC process.

This research aims to investigate the influence of building design on the thermal comfort of occupants of naturally ventilated hospital (NVH) wards to identify the aspects with the most significant influence on the thermal comfort of hospital buildings during the hot-dry season in the hot-humid tropics of Southeast Nigeria.

Field measurements, physical observations and a questionnaire survey of 60 occupants of the wards of the Joint Presbyterian Hospital, Uburu in Ebonyi State, Nigeria were undertaken. The data were analysed using Humphreys' neutral temperature formula, descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis.

The results revealed that the neutral temperature for the wards ranges from 26.2 °C to 29.9 °C, the thermal condition in the wards was not comfortable because it failed to meet the ASHRAE Standard 55 as only 65% of the occupants said the thermal condition was acceptable. The number and sizes of windows, building orientation, the presence of high-level windows and higher headroom significantly influenced the occupants' thermal comfort vote.

This research is valuable in estimating comfort temperature and identifying aspects that require attention in enhancing the capacity of NVH wards to effectively meet the thermal comfort needs of occupants in the hot-humid tropics of Southeast Nigeria and other regions that share similar climatic conditions.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study of this nature that provides valuable feedback for building design professionals on the performance of existing hospital buildings in meeting users' thermal comfort needs in the hot-dry season of the hot-humid tropics in Southeast Nigeria.

At the center of apple production province in China, how to increase apple per unit yield and to improve apple production efficiency in Shaanxi become big issues. The objectives of this paper are to investigate the technical efficiency (TE) and cost efficiency (CE) of apple orchard and to analyse determinants which affect apple production efficiency. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This paper conducts a two‐stage DEA to achieve the objectives. In the first‐stage, a cost minimization model is applied to measure apple production efficiency. Then, a Tobit model is provided to estimate regression coefficients which are used to adjust the efficiency scores in the first‐stage.

The results indicate that TE and CE are rather low in Shaanxi. The research also explores that the inefficient production of apple farmers is caused mainly by two aspects. One is the inefficient apple orchards operation of farmers. The other is the disadvantageous environmental conditions which heavily affect apple growth and fruit bearing situation.

Most of the research are based on national statistical data, and only measure the TE. This paper primarily focuses on the estimation of efficiency scores with the data involved in both quantity and price information of traditional inputs and outputs based on 255 apple farmers in Shaanxi. Specifically, This paper also consider farmer's opportunity cost to which little literature refers. The results not only reveal the efficient determinants of apple production, but also provide suggestions for agricultural policy makers.

The paper aims to determine the thermal comfort perception of schoolchildren from a warm and humid environment. There is a concern about the effect of high temperature on the health and academic performance of schoolchildren.

Objective and subjective methodological approaches were adopted to collect data during the fieldwork in the selected primary schools. ASHRAE adaptive comfort model was adopted to analyze the data.

The paper provided empirical results about the comfort requirements of schoolchildren from the warm and humid environment. During the occupied school time, the studied schoolchildren were found to tolerate temperatures higher than the upper limit temperature recommended by ASHRAE Standard 55. The paper recommends that the studied children may not need any active ventilator to be thermally comfortable during the occupied school hours

The paper found the range of temperatures that schoolchildren from the warm and humid environment can adapt to. The information may be useful to architects, engineers and facility managers