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This paper aims to better understand community of practice (CoP)’s dynamics with a focus on the hotel sector and perceived benefits to members and business performance.

This is a case study research focusing on a successful experience within a CoP found in the hotel sector. The study reports in detail how a CoP was created and how it evolved to a digital platform to give birth to a fully co-designed tourism product. It analyzes this CoP’s social dynamics, processes of communication and interaction, as well as digital evolution. To collect rich data, method triangulation was applied by mixing quantitative and qualitative analyses.

The community is highly participated and valued because it is perceived as a dynamic system contributing to rapid information exchange and diffusion, efficient context for knowledge transfer and individual responsiveness to daily professional activities and challenges. The reasons why members perceive Amigas do Trade as a distinctive community include shared values and attitudes; professional area and position; and group composition. The majority of members acknowledged that belonging to this CoP has helped in making an informed decision with impact on business practice. The sub-theme more intensely participated and discussed concentrated on human resources issues.

A case study brings useful insights into the understanding of CoP members’ behaviour; however, findings are not generalizable to other communities.

This study contributes in several ways to business practice and management. Hotel businesses pertain to a sector in which CoPs easily thrive. This seems to happen because businesses in the tourism and hospitality industry are highly dependent on networks, people, communication channels and technologies. Engagement with technological platforms is stimulated because of the unproblematic integration of these digital platforms into other technologies members already use in their daily work and life. Moreover, digital platforms are not expensive and potentially increase motivation levels within CoP, and consequently in companies. This example inspires the use of digital platforms to exchange knowledge in other CoPs in the hotel sector.

CoPs are contexts of good interaction within a group of people by nurturing a good value system (comprehending trust, cohesion and good communication climate). Thus, a non-hierarchical and non-biased approach to CoP by managers could be accomplished by fostering an organizational culture based on joint innovation, coopetition and open communication principles. Expectedly, in this respect, intensive use of digital technologies in the business arena will keep playing a key role.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study on CoP applied to the hotel sector. Additionally, it is also the first time a CoP composed only by women working in the hotel sector was analyzed. One other element of novelty links to the fact that a CoP with physical and virtual dimensions was studied, introducing the use of digital platforms to the analysis of CoP dynamics.

This study aims to present a general approach for understanding and analyzing the thematic evolution of the concept of co-creation in smart environments within the tourism context.

This study performs a co-word analysis with a longitudinal framework that produces strategic diagrams to categorize the detected themes and concepts related to co-creation.

By combining the performance analysis of science mapping, the following clusters are distinguished: information technology, social media and behavior; tourism organizations, management and innovation; co-creation, technology and sharing economy; co-production and hospitality; and Smart tourism, destinations, sustainability and residents.

This study provides a valuable tool for tourism scholars and managers to effectively analyze the importance of different themes linked to co-creation in the concept of the smart environment. This research outlines the evolving issues in and around the touchpoints and associated emerging research topics for future research.

This study aims to evaluate in the Portuguese population the consumption of packaged food (PF) vs non-packaged food, the associated factors and to estimate the contribution of specific food groups to the use of packaging materials.

A representative sample of the population was evaluated within the National Food, Nutrition and Physical Activity Survey 2015–2016 (n = 5,811, 3 months-84y). Dietary data were collected by two non-consecutive food diaries (children) or 24-h recalls, using a software program which integrates FoodEx2—Food classification system. Food packaging materials were measured according to the amount of PF by linear regression. The results were analyzed considering the distribution of the Portuguese population.

The reported amount of PF was 1,530 g/person/day (57%), in which PF in plastic was the most reported (69%), mainly associated with “Non-alcoholic beverages” (38%). “Fruit and vegetables” food group is most frequently reported without a package (35%). Men consumed significantly more quantity of PF for all materials, excepted for “paperboard/paper”, but also significantly more quantity of food without a package (β = 135.3 [95%IC: 63.7; 207.0]). Children and adolescents consumed more quantity of PF in multilayer materials (β = 177.8 [95%IC: 154.8; 200.9]) and significantly less quantity of food without a package (β = −343.8 [95%IC: −408.9; −278.6]). Also, more educated people consume more food without a package (β = 106.9 [95%IC: 33.2; 180.7]).

The Portuguese population presents a large consumption of PF. Male population and adults were identified as groups with higher consumption of PF.

This paper aims to characterize the type of support provided to victims of violence against women and domestic violence (VAWDV) during the first lockdown, assessing the training of professionals to use remote support (RS).

This cross-sectional study involves a sample of 196 support professionals, mainly women (91.8%) and who integrate the Portuguese National Support Network for victims of domestic violence (NSNVDV) (Mean age = 36.49; SD = 10.52).

Telephone emerges as the main RS communication media used in the lockdown (43.9%) and the emergency state periods (57.1%). Participants reported to have never used any social applications (41.8% vs 41.8%) or videoconference (46.4% vs 58.2%), in both periods assessed, i.e. lockdown and emergency state, respectively, and 82.7% assumed to have no training with RS to assist VAWDV victims. However, support professionals recognized several advantages in using RS such as dealing with isolation, reducing inhibition, fear and shame and in promoting the victims’ empowerment.

Given the exploratory nature of this study, only descriptive analyzes were conducted.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, little is known about effective RS given by professionals to victims of VAWDV in the Portuguese context. The paper aims to add knowledge to the studied field.

This research is about the evaluation of organizational risks in the hospitality sector, using the experience of a guest with visual impairments. The objectives of this research are to (1) identify if the previous expectations of a guest with visual impairments trip will be exceeded in the final; (2) classify organizational risks in the hotel sector; (3) verify if there are direct impacts on the travellers' future behaviour, such as destination recommendation and intention to return to the destination. Despite of the fact that organizational risks are composed by transport, hospitality and tourism attractions (tourism players can jeopardize the success of a travel experience), this research will only focus on the hospitality sector. To assure the achievement of the referred objectives, a case study will be used based on the analysis of the experience of a Portuguese guest with disabilities, who traveled alone, around Europe, with a guide dog. His expectations, constraints and risks will be analysed through a deep-depth interview, in which questions are organized from the literature review. Finally, it is expected that this exploratory research helps to find new avenues for the study of organizational risks, more precisely, hospitality risks for disabled people.

The recent COVID-19 virus outbreak, as well as many other global risks, has put the tourism industry on the brink of collapse. Even if interesting advances have been seen the light of publicity based on risk perception, no less true seems to be that the current theory is not enough to understand and describe the impacts of new global risks that may destroy the industry in question of weeks. This introductory chapter gives a snapshot on the fragile conditions we are moving today and interrogates further the future of tourism.

Since it was adopted from psychology just after the turn of twentieth century, risk perception theory has multiplied and successfully evolved in the fields of tourism research. A dearth of studies has focused on risk perception over the recent decades. We have certainly identified three clear-cut traditions: demographical school, psychological school and critical perspective. With benefits and problems each theory has shed light trying to measure the impact of global risks in the tourism and hospitality industries.

This book keeps the originality to update what has been published in the earlier decades. We are incorporating new topics to the discussion as well as new epistemologies and methodologies. Gathering different high-quality products authored by well-renowned authors coming from different countries, it lays the foundations to a new understanding of risk perception and tourism safety-security debating the next steps and the real challenges posed on the industry in a not so long near future.

The national immigrant rights campaign of 2006 stands as one of the largest mobilizations by people of color in US history, yet less scholarly attention has been given to systematically comparing these mobilizations at the local level. To develop an understanding of what led to sustained mobilization, a comparative case study analysis of seven cities in California's San Joaquin Valley is employed. The empirical evidence is based on interviews with key organizers and participants, newspaper documentation of protest events, census data, and other secondary sources. I find that the presence and size of policy threats explained the initial protest during the spring of 2006 in all localities, but cities with elaborate resource infrastructures (preexisting organizations, histories of community organizing, and coalitions) had more enduring levels of collective action.

This article aims to compare the LiDAR handheld mobile laser scanner (HMLS) scans with traditional survey methods, as the tree gauge and the hypsometer, to study the efficiency of the new technology in relation to the accuracy of structural forest attributes estimation useful to support a sustainable forest management.

A case study was carried out in a high forest located in Tuscany (Italy), by considering 5 forest types, in 20 different survey plots. A comparative analysis between two survey methods will be shown in order to verify the potential limits and the viability of the LiDAR HMLS in the forest field.

This research demonstrates that LiDAR HMLS technology allows to obtain a large amount of valuable data on forest structural parameters in a short span of time with a high level of accuracy and with obvious impact in terms of organisational efficiency.

Findings could be useful for forest owners highlighting the importance of investing in science and technology to improve the overall efficiency of forest resources management.

This article adds to the current knowledge on the precision forestry topic by providing insight on the feasibility and effectiveness of using precision technologies for monitoring forest ecosystems and dynamics. In particular, this study fills the gap in the literature linked to the need to have practical examples of the use of innovative technologies in forestry.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused job losses to rise dramatically. Herein, the purpose of the article is to identify which personal and job characteristics make individuals more vulnerable or more resilient to COVID-19 unemployment in Portugal and thus to help policymakers, organizations and individuals themselves, in creating mechanisms to avoid unemployment within this new context.

Using extensive personal and job-related data on the complete population of newly unemployed in Portugal over several months after the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, a logit model is estimated to identify the characteristics that make workers more resilient or more vulnerable to COVID-19 unemployment, in comparison with the pre-crisis period.

The COVID-19 crisis is shown to be disruptive by changing the unemployment structure, increasing socioeconomic inequalities and weakening traditional mechanisms of employment protection. Additionally, the authors identify a higher vulnerability of low-skilled individuals and of those in occupations with low working-from-home feasibility and/or from non-essential sectors (particularly tourism).

Policy indications are given aiming to protect the most vulnerable individuals, sectors and regions in Portugal, in this new and unprecedented context.

A seven-month period following the emergence of the pandemic is considered, which allows investigating both the immediate and the medium-term effects of the COVID-19 crisis on job losses. Additionally, by matching data from three different sources, an extensive set of multilevel variables is considered, some of them new in the literature.