Sustainability is a top priority for municipal administrations, particularly in large urban centers where citizens rely on transportation for work, study, and daily errands. Public transportation faces a significant challenge beyond availability, performance, safety, and comfort: balancing the cost for the city with fare attractiveness for passengers. Meanwhile, bicycles, supported by public incentives due to their clean and healthy appeal, compete with public transit. In Curitiba, the integrated transport system has been consistently losing passengers, exacerbated by the pandemic and the rise in private vehicle usage. To address this, the city is expanding bicycle infrastructure and electric bike rental services, impacting public transit revenue, and prompting the need for financial compensation to maintain affordable fares for those reliant on public transport. Therefore, this study’s objective is to analyze the bicycle’s impact on public transportation, considering the impact of public policies on economic and social efficiency, not just ecological and environmental factors. Data from six main bus lines were collected and analyzed in two separate linear regression models to verify the effects of new bicycles in circulation, bus tariffs, and weather conditions on public transportation demand. Research results revealed a significant impact of bus tariffs and fuel prices on the number of new bicycles that are diverting passengers from public transportation. The discussion may offer a different perspective on public transport policies and improve city infrastructure investments to strategically change the urban form to address social and economic issues.

Given the eclectic and localized nature of environmental risks, planning for sustainability requires solutions that integrate local knowledge and systems while acknowledging the need for continuous re-evaluation. Social-ecological complexity, increasing climate volatility and uncertainty, and rapid technological innovation underscore the need for flexible and adaptive planning. Thus, rules should not be universally applied but should instead be place-based and adaptive. To demonstrate these key concepts, we present a case study of water planning in Texas, whose rapid growth and extreme weather make it a bellwether example. We review historic use and compare the 2002, 2007, 2012, 2017 and 2022 Texas State Water Plans to examine how planning outcomes evolve across time and space. Though imperfect, water planning in Texas is a concrete example of place-based and adaptive sustainability. Urban regions throughout the state exhibit a diversity of strategies that, through the repeated 5-year cycles, are ever responding to evolving trends and emerging technologies. Regional planning institutions play a crucial role, constituting an important soft infrastructure that links state capacity and processes with local agents. As opposed to “top-down” or “bottom-up”, we frame this governance as “middle-out” and discuss how such a structure might extend beyond the water sector. 

Investors and company managements often rely on traditional performance evaluation indicators, such as return on equity, return on assets, and other financial ratios, to explain changes in a company’s market value added (MVA). However, the effectiveness of these traditional measures in explaining market value fluctuations remains uncertain. This research aims to investigate the impact of various profitability measures, namely return on equity, gross profit margin, operating profit margin, and return on assets, on explaining changes in the MVA of pharmaceutical and chemical companies listed on the Amman Stock Exchange. To achieve the study’s objectives, we analyzed the published financial statements of a sample consisting of 14 industrial companies out of a total of 53 companies listed on the Amman Stock Exchange during the period from 2008 to 2022. Relevant financial indicators were extracted from these statements to serve the purposes of the study. Correlation coefficients were employed to measure the extent to which the independent variables (profitability measures) could interpret changes in the dependent variable (MVA). One of the most significant findings of the study is that three dimensions of profitability measures have a statistically significant impact on explaining changes in the MVA of pharmaceutical and chemical companies listed on the Amman Stock Exchange, albeit to varying degrees. This suggests that traditional profitability measures still play a crucial role in influencing market perceptions of a company’s value, despite the potential limitations of these measures in capturing the full scope of a company’s performance and potential.

Purpose: This research aims to examine the influence of intellectual capital disclosure and the geographical location of universities on the sustainability of higher education institutions in Southeast Asia. Design/methodology/approach: This research is quantitative and uses secondary data obtained through the annual reports of universities that have the Universitas Indonesia Green Metric Rank. This research uses two stages of data analysis techniques, namely the content analysis stage to determine the number of Intellectual Capital disclosures and the hypothesis testing stage. The analysis tool uses the SPSS version 23 application. The population of this research includes all universities in Southeast Asia that are included in the UI Greenmetric World University Rankings. The sampling technique used was purposive sampling technique, which resulted in 86 analysis units of higher education institutions in Southeast Asia. Findings: The research results prove that the geographical location of universities has a negative and significant influence on Universitas Indonesia Green Metric’s performance in Southeast Asia and human capital has a positive influence on UIGM’s performance in Southeast Asia. However, the structural capital and relational capital components do not affect the UIGM performance of universities in Southeast Asia. Originality/value: The originality of the research is the use of higher education sustainability variables with UIGM proxies and modified IC indicators for universities and geographical areas that have not been widely used to see whether there are fundamental differences in the disclosure of intellectual capital for higher education institutions in Southeast Asia.

The research explores academia and industry experts’ viewpoints regarding the innovative progression of Virtual Reality (VR)-based safety tools customized for technical and vocational education training (TVET) within commercial kitchen contexts. Developing a VR-based safety tools holistic framework is crucial in identifying constructs to mitigate the risks prevalent in commercial kitchens, encompassing physical, chemical, biological, ergonomic, and psychosocial hazards workers encounter. Introducing VR-based safety training represents a proactive strategy to bolster education and training standards, especially given the historically limited attention directed toward workers’ physical and mental well-being in this sector. This study pursues a primary objective: validating a framework for VR-based kitchen safety within TVET’s hospitality programs. In addition to on-site observations, the research conducted semi-structured interviews with 16 participants, including safety training coordinators, food service coordinators, and IT experts. Participants supplemented qualitative insights by completing a 7-Likert scale survey. Utilizing the Fuzzy Delphi technique, seven constructs were delineated. The validation process underscored three pivotal constructs essential for the VR safety framework’s development: VR kitchen design, interactive applications, and hazard identification. These findings significantly affect the hospitality industry’s safety standards and training methodologies within commercial kitchen environments.