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This paper uses institutional theory to analyze the structure of the sustainability assurance market (SAM) at a global level. The purpose of this paper is to determine if regional differences affect industry specialization in this market.

Using a sample of 3,657 sustainability reports (SRs) with assurance statements, the authors study the global and regional specialization of assurers by breaking down the sample into three main regions. The authors approach industry specialization using previous methodologies applied to the financial audit market, and explain differences statistically significant among regions.

The authors find different industry specialists depending on the geographical region in which the audit firm is located. The Europe, Middle Eastern and Africa region has the highest number of industry specialists and the Asia-Pacific region the lowest. Notwithstanding the global participation of Big 4 firms, assurance specialization depends on the country where the company is located.

The paper reveals the need to include regional differences in the analysis of the SAM at the international level.

The study shows an in-depth study of the SAM that may be useful for assurers, to decide strategic actions in industries and countries and for regulators, to control the risk of monopolistic/oligopolistic markets.

The study presents a novel approach to the analysis of the assurance market for SRs, by studying it from the supply point of view. The analysis provides a measure of specialization that may help understand the structure of the SAM.

This paper aims to analyse the impact of the European Union (EU) Directive on the quality of sustainability reporting under the institutional theory lens. Specifically, the authors evaluate what kind of institutional pressure has the highest impact on the quality of corporate disclosure on sustainability issues.

The authors build a quality index based on the content analysis of sustainability information disclosed, before and after the transposition of the Directive, by Italian and Spanish companies belonging to different industries. The authors use an OLS regression model to analyse the effect of coercive, normative and mimetic forces on the quality of the sustainability reports.

The results highlight that normative and mimetic mechanisms positively affect the quality of sustainability reporting, whereas there is no evidence regarding coercive mechanisms, indicating that the new requirements do not provide a significant contribution to the development of better reporting practices, at least in the two analysed countries.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the few studies assessing the quality of sustainability reporting through an analysis involving the period before and after the implementation of the EU Directive. It enriches the literature on institutional theory by analysing how the different dimensions of isomorphism affect the quality of information disclosed by companies according to the EU requirements. It contributes to a better understanding of the impact of the non-financial information Directive, and the results of this paper can be relevant for regulators, practitioners and academia, especially in view of the adoption of the new Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive proposal.

According to the importance of higher education institutions (HEIs) in meeting sustainable development goals (SDGs), the purpose of this study is to analyze how sustainability was implemented in Ecuadorian higher education. The case study of the Universidad Técnica del Norte (UTN) process was analyzed to show the advantages of implementing projects with SD approaches.

This study includes an analytic-synthetic method. In the case study, a longitudinal-documentary method was used to analyze the projects implemented in the UTN. The primary source of information corresponds to reports, minutes, publications, interviews and surveys from the academic staff of UTN, which can be found in the Postgraduate Institute of the UTN archives.

Projects implemented at UTN facilitated the development of skills in the participating university community and influenced the general organizational development of the university. Likewise, the potential benefits of the projects in each of the components are highlighted, so that social learning and the development of skills in students and teachers have been facilitated, focusing on internationalization.

The population analyzed corresponds to Ecuadorian universities and technical institutes, however, access to information from all HEIs is limited, due to processing time and economic resources.

This study presents implications for representatives of higher education and policymakers at the national level since the positive aspects can be rescued to promote the sustainable performance of HEIs.

HEIs train ethical professionals capable of transforming the world. The study shows successful experiences that can be used by other HEIs to have a positive impact on society, providing a sustainable future. In addition, UTN has prioritized the initiative of the students in several activities.

The primary information for the case study comes from the experiences obtained during the international cooperation projects of the UTN. Positive findings and limitations have been identified, which are published with the purpose of contributing to the scientific community.

This work examines the relationship between transformational leadership and enablers and results of the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) model 2013 and the relationship between the EFQM model elements (enablers and results).

The work employs partial least squares (PLS) and empirical data from 102 hotels.

Transformational leadership is key to facilitate the enablers of the EFQM model (strategy, people, partnership and processes) and improve customer, employee and social results and organizational performance.

The present work expands previous studies that focus on analyzing the link between enablers and results of EFQM by showing that transformational leadership is an appropriate leadership style to foster the EFQM model elements. It empirically supports the view that transformational leadership is a facilitator that can foster the EFQM enablers and improve results in hotels. Thus, it also sheds light on the controversial link between transformational leadership and various performance measures (customer, employee and social results and organizational performance).

This chapter provides a critical discussion of challenge-based learning (CBL) within future trends in higher education (HE). It explores how CBL may address challenges facing higher education institutions (HEIs) in response to these future trends by using a framework of common CBL characteristics. Clear recommendations for CBL practitioners to succeed in CBL implementation within the ever-changing HE landscape are presented. It complements previous chapters on CBL case studies by situating CBL in the broader HE space. A discussion on the interrelationships between these characteristics and predictions on the future integration of CBL in HE concludes this chapter. These macrolevel discussions of CBL will be of interest to government officials, managers, business stakeholders, teachers, policy advisors, and academic teachers. Insights on the future institutional impact of CBL, how it may improve business and academic collaborations, how it aligns with sustainability and transversal skills policies, and where CBL is situated in the post-COVID-19 landscape are discussed. Ultimately, it argues that CBL is part of a pedagogical toolkit to meet future trends in HE.

This paper aims to report on the status and the development of education for sustainable development (ESD) and sustainability literacy (SL) in three Latin American (LA) higher education institutions (HEIs) business programs in Peru, Brazil and Colombia. The paper examines institutional efforts to both introduce and implement ESD curricula and provide SL.

The methods used in this paper included reviews of university Web pages and course materials. Structured interviews were also conducted with program leaders, to examine the level of ESD, as input affecting the business programs curricula of the universities concerned.

Initial findings suggest that, in the three HEIs surveyed, there is still a tendency to talk about issues related to ESD but actions that confirm this interest are not sufficiently advanced. The authors surveys a sample of business programs curricula and interviewed its leaders and a mixed and dated picture emerged. When compared to other regions particularly the USA and Europe, the findings show that the HEIs surveyed still have not developed enough work to distinguish conceptually between sustainable development, ESD and SL making the embedment of these concepts in the curriculum not fully developed.

In LA HEIs, the ESD message seems to be slowly taking ground, equipping HEIs to respond to SL concerns. Implementation and practice in some HEIs are still at an embryonic and conceptually confused stage with regard to LA HEIs SL. This paper sheds light to help ESD delivery. It offers some strategies for moving on from this inception phase to a more structured SL provision and ESD outlook.

The purpose of this paper is to present a quantitatively supported explanation of the intellectual development, the schools of thought and the sub-areas of the food cold chain (FCC) research to derive meaningful avenues for future research.

This study builds on bibliometric analysis and network analysis to systematically evaluate a sample of 1,189 FCC articles published over the past 25 years. The descriptive statistics and science mapping approaches using co-citation analysis were performed with VOSviewer software.

The findings reveal a state-of-the-art overview of the top contributing and influential countries, authors, institutions and articles in the area of FCC research. A co-citation analysis, coupled with content analysis of most co-cited articles, uncovered four underlying research streams including: application of RFID technologies; production and operation planning models; postharvest waste, causes of postharvest wastage and perishable inventory ordering polices and models; and critical issues in FCC. Current research streams, clusters and their sub-themes provided meaningful discussions and insights into key areas for future research in FCC.

This study might reshape practitioners’, researchers’ and policy-makers’ views on the multifaceted areas and themes in the FCC research field, to harness FCC’s benefits at both strategic and tactical level. Finally, the research findings offer a roadmap for additional research to yield more practical and modeling insights that are much needed to enrich the field.

This study aims to identify how Spanish consumers’ extrinsic preferences for food have evolved by examining the extant literature on food preferences in Spain, focusing on food-related attributes and food-related values.

This study is based on a synthetic review of the extant academic literature on Spanish consumer preferences for food-related attributes and food-related values from the mid-20th to the 21st century. This study uses key economic and social milestones that are most likely to influence food value chain actors to show how consumer preferences have evolved over the study period.

Spanish consumer food attribute preferences expanded as the food sector of the nation continued to grow, and value preferences showed a similar pattern from the mid-20th to the 21st century. The drivers of these preferences were trust, lifestyle, education (campaigns), sociodemographic factors and purchasing power.

Evaluating the extant literature’s contribution to consumer preferences for food-related attributes and values is important because it can aid in understanding the hierarchy and variety of consumers’ food preferences as well as the factors that drive these preferences. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to explore how Spanish consumer preferences evolved between the mid-20th and 21st centuries.