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Sustainability, Volume 10, Issue 5

2018 May - 384 articles

Cover Story: The 20th century was the age of great acceleration. Population grew by a factor 3.7, material extraction by a factor 8 and combustion of fossil fuels by a factor 12. In response to an increasing evidence for fundamental shifts in the functioning of ecosystems after 1950, Johan Rockström, Will Steffen and 26 scientists at the Stockholm Resilience Centre have developed a new concept: they proposed boundaries for nine planetary life support systems which humanity must not transgress without risking abrupt changes and potentially catastrophic consequences. After humanity having developed within relatively stable ecosystems for the last ten thousand years, the great acceleration has put these systems under multiple pressure. We have ample evidence for having entered a zone of high risk for climate change, biosphere integrity, land-system change and biochemical cycles. We need reconnecting society to the biosphere. View this paper
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Articles (384)

  • Article
  • Open Access
18 Citations
14,528 Views
12 Pages

22 May 2018

Recently, offshore outsourcing has become extremely important for companies that compete worldwide. In many industries, only companies that manage to be competitive globally can aspire to attain sustainable competitive advantages. Therefore, offshore...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue How does Outsourcing Affect the Economy and its Sustainability?)
  • Article
  • Open Access
14 Citations
5,468 Views
14 Pages

22 May 2018

This study aims to investigate the impacts of dependence on supplier and supplier trust on green supplier integration, and the moderating role of contract management difficulty. In this study, we develop a dependence-trust-integration model based on...

(This article belongs to the Section Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
50 Citations
10,671 Views
22 Pages

22 May 2018

As the core of sustainable development strategy, corporate social responsibility (CSR) is a concept that influences business missions, management, operations, finance, and marketing. Studies of the economic consequences of CSR have focused on the the...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in Developing Countries: Current Trends and Development)
  • Article
  • Open Access
6 Citations
5,395 Views
15 Pages

A Tool for Sourcing Sustainable Building Renovation: The Energy Efficiency Maturity Matrix

  • Christian Stenqvist,
  • Susanne Balslev Nielsen and
  • Per-Otto Bengtsson

22 May 2018

The success of sustainable building renovation is inevitably dependent on the capabilities of the involved stakeholders throughout the entire project. Therefore, any building client with intentions of sustainable building renovations must reflect on...

  • Article
  • Open Access
48 Citations
9,109 Views
17 Pages

Influence Factors and Regression Model of Urban Housing Prices Based on Internet Open Access Data

  • Hao Wu,
  • Hongzan Jiao,
  • Yang Yu,
  • Zhigang Li,
  • Zhenghong Peng,
  • Lingbo Liu and
  • Zheng Zeng

22 May 2018

With the commercialization of housing and the deepening of urbanization in China, housing prices are having increasing influence on the land market, and thus indirectly affecting urban development. As various spatial features of an urban housing prop...

(This article belongs to the Section Sustainable Urban and Rural Development)
  • Article
  • Open Access
23 Citations
5,329 Views
17 Pages

22 May 2018

As a consequence of globalization, increased international transport generates many pollutants. Pollution generation from other industries related to international transport also cannot be ignored. This paper thus aims to investigate the carbon emiss...

(This article belongs to the Section Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
51 Citations
10,889 Views
23 Pages

22 May 2018

The Urban Heat Island (UHI) phenomenon, namely urban areas where the atmospheric temperature is significantly higher than in the surrounding rural areas, is currently a very well-known topic both in the scientific community and in public debates. Gro...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Urban Remote Sensing: Sustainability of Earth’s Environment, Resources and Ecology)
  • Article
  • Open Access
34 Citations
10,300 Views
21 Pages

Balancing Urban Biodiversity Needs and Resident Preferences for Vacant Lot Management

  • Christine C. Rega-Brodsky,
  • Charles H. Nilon and
  • Paige S. Warren

22 May 2018

Urban vacant lots are often a contentious feature in cities, seen as overgrown, messy eyesores that plague neighborhoods. We propose a shift in this perception to locations of urban potential, because vacant lots may serve as informal greenspaces tha...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustaining the Shrinking City: Concepts, Dynamics and Management)
  • Feature Paper
  • Article
  • Open Access
226 Citations
23,862 Views
23 Pages

Validating the City Region Food System Approach: Enacting Inclusive, Transformational City Region Food Systems

  • Alison Blay-Palmer,
  • Guido Santini,
  • Marielle Dubbeling,
  • Henk Renting,
  • Makiko Taguchi and
  • Thierry Giordano

22 May 2018

This paper offers a critical assessment of the value and utility of the evolving City Region Food Systems (CRFS) approach to improve our insights into flows of resources—food, waste, people, and knowledge—from rural to peri-urban to urban and back ag...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Assessing the Sustainability of Urban Agriculture: Methodological Advances and Case Studies)
  • Article
  • Open Access
27 Citations
7,305 Views
12 Pages

22 May 2018

Jeju Island experienced an approximately 42% increase in energy consumption from 2006 to 2015 and the demand for energy consumption is expected to continue to increase. Thus, Jeju Island is planning a project entitled “Carbon Free Island by 203...

  • Review
  • Open Access
69 Citations
16,848 Views
18 Pages

Flooding Hazards across Southern China and Prospective Sustainability Measures

  • Hai-Min Lyu,
  • Ye-Shuang Xu,
  • Wen-Chieh Cheng and
  • Arul Arulrajah

22 May 2018

The Yangtze River Basin and Huaihe River Basin in Southern China experienced severe floods 1998 and 2016. The reasons for the flooding hazards include the following two factors: hazardous weather conditions and degradation of the hydrological environ...

(This article belongs to the Section Environmental Sustainability and Applications)
  • Article
  • Open Access
22 Citations
12,491 Views
20 Pages

22 May 2018

Peru has historically been among the Latin-American countries with a low rural electrification rate. Aiming to improve this situation, the country conducted several electrification efforts in the last few decades that included off-grid photovoltaic (...

(This article belongs to the Section Social Ecology and Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
21 Citations
6,235 Views
16 Pages

Building Ownership, Renovation Investments, and Energy Performance—A Study of Multi-Family Dwellings in Gothenburg

  • Mikael Mangold,
  • Magnus Österbring,
  • Conny Overland,
  • Tim Johansson and
  • Holger Wallbaum

22 May 2018

The European building stock was renewed at a rapid pace during the period 1950–1975. In many European countries, the building stock from this time needs to be renovated, and there are opportunities to introduce energy efficiency measures in the renov...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Built Environment and Urban Growth Management)
  • Article
  • Open Access
121 Citations
9,790 Views
23 Pages

22 May 2018

Energy security and sustainability are crucial factors for the development of China. The creation of an evaluation theoretical system of the energy has theoretical and practical significance that is important for ensuring the safe and sustainable dev...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Security and Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
37 Citations
6,204 Views
23 Pages

22 May 2018

At present, online shopping is becoming increasingly popular. In particular, low-carbon products are becoming more favored as consumers’ low-carbon awareness increases. Manufacturers sell their low-carbon products through e-commerce platforms....

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Supply Chain System Design and Optimization)
  • Article
  • Open Access
28 Citations
5,916 Views
17 Pages

Climate Change Perceptions and Observations of Agricultural Stakeholders in the Northern Great Plains

  • Bruna Irene Grimberg,
  • Selena Ahmed,
  • Colter Ellis,
  • Zachariah Miller and
  • Fabian Menalled

22 May 2018

This study explored whether Montana agricultural stakeholders’ perceptions and observations of climate change vary according to four socio-ecological variables: income, political view, agricultural occupation, and production region. A survey includin...

  • Article
  • Open Access
70 Citations
11,119 Views
15 Pages

22 May 2018

This paper discusses the current state of thought amongst the Sustainability Indicator (SI) community, what has been achieved and where we are succeeding and failing. Recent years have witnessed the rise of “alternative facts” and “fake news” and thi...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Scenarios and Indicators for Sustainable Development–Towards A Critical Assessment of Achievements and Challenges)
  • Article
  • Open Access
17 Citations
7,876 Views
12 Pages

21 May 2018

As hacking techniques become more sophisticated, vulnerabilities have been gradually increasing. Between 2010 and 2015, around 80,000 vulnerabilities were newly registered in the CVE (Common Vulnerability Enumeration), and the number of vulnerabiliti...

(This article belongs to the Collection Advanced IT based Future Sustainable Computing)
  • Article
  • Open Access
18 Citations
4,916 Views
25 Pages

21 May 2018

In this paper, we investigate the relationship between environmental performance (EP) and financial performance (FP) from the perspective of technical innovation in Chinese industrial sectors. We also consider industrial heterogeneity and take tempor...

(This article belongs to the Section Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
119 Citations
11,130 Views
14 Pages

21 May 2018

In the context of the Chinese government’s strategy for sustainable development, the study of sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) for enterprises has important practical significance. Drawing data from 172 Chinese firms, the model studie...

(This article belongs to the Section Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
147 Citations
16,322 Views
21 Pages

Ten Years of Sustainability (2009 to 2018): A Bibliometric Overview

  • Ming Tang,
  • Huchang Liao,
  • Zhengjun Wan,
  • Enrique Herrera-Viedma and
  • Marc A. Rosen

21 May 2018

Sustainability (SUS) is a journal in the field of environmental, cultural, economic and social sustainability of human beings and civilization, which was founded in 2009. This paper provides a comprehensive bibliometric overview of the journal and 64...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue 10th Anniversary of Sustainability—Recent Advances in Sustainability Studies)
  • Article
  • Open Access
6 Citations
5,828 Views
21 Pages

Context-Aware Multimodal FIDO Authenticator for Sustainable IT Services

  • Seung-Hyun Kim,
  • Daeseon Choi,
  • Soo-Hyung Kim,
  • Sangrae Cho and
  • Kyung-Soo Lim

21 May 2018

Existing sustainable IT services have several problems related to user authentication such as the inefficiency of managing the system security, low security, and low usability. In this paper, we propose a Fast IDentity Online (FIDO) authenticator tha...

(This article belongs to the Collection Advanced IT based Future Sustainable Computing)
  • Article
  • Open Access
59 Citations
16,507 Views
17 Pages

21 May 2018

In the service sector, the issue of customer satisfaction is being paid great attention. It has become central concern for companies of services to improve service quality, and to maintain customer loyalty within a highly competitive marketplace. The...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Quality Management and Sustainable Development)
  • Article
  • Open Access
8 Citations
4,739 Views
26 Pages

21 May 2018

The extant sustainability literature has argued that supply chain (SC) members can gain both financial and operational benefits from a joint sustainability development (JSD) effort. However, no guidance has been provided on how SC members could colla...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Toward Sustainability: Supply Chain Collaboration and Governance)
  • Article
  • Open Access
17 Citations
8,090 Views
17 Pages

21 May 2018

Inpatient health buildings in the United States are the most intensive users of water among large commercial buildings. Large facilities (greater than 1 million square feet) consume an average of 90 million gallons per building per year. The distribu...

  • Article
  • Open Access
45 Citations
7,454 Views
20 Pages

21 May 2018

Reservoirs are recognized as one of the most efficient infrastructure components in integrated water resources management. At present, with the ongoing advancement of social economy and requirement of water, the water resources shortage problem has w...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Selected Papers on Sustainable Water Resources Management from the 2017 and 2018 International SWAT (Soil and Water Assessment Tool) Conference)
  • Article
  • Open Access
127 Citations
73,016 Views
27 Pages

The Impact of Automation on Employment: Just the Usual Structural Change?

  • Ben Vermeulen,
  • Jan Kesselhut,
  • Andreas Pyka and
  • Pier Paolo Saviotti

21 May 2018

We study the projected impact of automation on employment in the forthcoming decade, both at the macro-level and in actual (types of) sectors. Hereto, we unite an evolutionary economic model of multisectoral structural change with labor economic theo...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue The Impact of Technological Change on Employment, Skills and Earnings)
  • Article
  • Open Access
11 Citations
5,021 Views
16 Pages

Developing a Model to Assess the Potential Impact of TUM Hydropower Turbines on Small River Ecology

  • Weiwei Yao,
  • Yuansheng Chen,
  • Guoan Yu,
  • Mingzhong Xiao,
  • Xiaoyi Ma and
  • Fakai Lei

21 May 2018

Small hydropower is a renewable energy technology that is used for electricity generation worldwide, but still has potential for further development. However, during the installation of small hydropower, the ecological impacts of the power plants nee...

(This article belongs to the Section Environmental Sustainability and Applications)
  • Article
  • Open Access
56 Citations
10,537 Views
22 Pages

Environmental Behavior of Secondary Education Students: A Case Study at Central Greece

  • Stamatios Ntanos,
  • Grigorios L. Kyriakopoulos,
  • Garyfallos Arabatzis,
  • Vasilios Palios and
  • Miltiadis Chalikias

21 May 2018

During the last three decades, human behavior has been becoming energy alarming towards environmental sustainability. One of the most influential initiatives towards environmental protection and increased environmental consciousness is the solidifica...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Development of Electrical Energy Storage Technologies in Energy Production)
  • Article
  • Open Access
65 Citations
22,160 Views
20 Pages

21 May 2018

Least-developed countries face many challenges regarding their plastic waste management systems. In 2017, Kenya imposed a selective ban targeting manufacturers and consumers of plastic carrier bags. However, this selectivity does not avoid the contin...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Circular Economy—Sustainable Energy and Waste Policies)
  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
7,840 Views
17 Pages

21 May 2018

The purpose of this study was to investigate the moderating effect of corporate technology configuration capability on the relationship between strategic flexibility and organizational performance throughout the different stages of the technological...

(This article belongs to the Section Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
24 Citations
5,046 Views
25 Pages

21 May 2018

A lack of trust in Energy Service Company (ESCo) is the most critical factor affecting the development of Energy Performance Contracting (EPC) in China, compared with other constraints. One cannot easily estimate the energy-saving performance of an E...

(This article belongs to the Section Energy Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
11 Citations
5,028 Views
17 Pages

An Empirical Study on Optimal Strategies of Industry-University-Institute Green Innovation with Subsidy

  • Wenqing Wu,
  • Kexin Yu,
  • Saixiang Ma,
  • Chien-Chi Chu,
  • Shijie Li,
  • Chengcheng Ma and
  • Sang-Bing Tsai

21 May 2018

With the increasing awareness of environmental protection and the complexity and rapid change of technological innovation, more and more enterprises seek to develop and research (R&D) institutions to cooperate with green innovation. In order to p...

  • Article
  • Open Access
47 Citations
8,424 Views
14 Pages

21 May 2018

This paper examines the investment behavior of research and development (R&D) under uncertainty. We assume that there is a heterogeneous effect of uncertainty on R&D investment depending on characteristics of a firm. According to the results,...

  • Feature Paper
  • Article
  • Open Access
22 Citations
8,574 Views
18 Pages

21 May 2018

Mining causes severe adverse effects such as pollution and forced resettlement. Accordingly, it has prompted conflicts that are also evident in China. Our study assesses whether and how rural residents’ engage in environmental activism (EA) against m...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Institutions and Policies for Rural Land Conversion in the Quest for Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
44 Citations
11,056 Views
17 Pages

21 May 2018

Recruitment strategy and policy are significantly affected by both the internal conditions of the enterprise and the external environment. It is important to anticipate and react to changes in the labor market in a timely manner, to eliminate potenti...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainability in E-Business)
  • Article
  • Open Access
19 Citations
10,375 Views
17 Pages

21 May 2018

The aim of our research is to investigate the physical connection between light, perception, and information by means of an integrated methodological approach. The proposed method was used for sustainable lighting design aiming at light efficacy and...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Lighting and Energy Saving)
  • Article
  • Open Access
15 Citations
4,732 Views
14 Pages

A Framework for Tracing Social–Ecological Trajectories and Traps in Intensive Agricultural Landscapes

  • Daniel R. Uden,
  • Craig R. Allen,
  • Francisco Munoz-Arriola,
  • Gengxin Ou and
  • Nancy Shank

20 May 2018

Charting trajectories toward sustainable agricultural development is an important goal at the food–energy–water–ecosystem services (FEWES) nexus of agricultural landscapes. Social–ecological adaptation and transformation are t...

(This article belongs to the Section Environmental Sustainability and Applications)
  • Article
  • Open Access
6 Citations
3,765 Views
15 Pages

20 May 2018

Since the 1990s, the rapid urbanization of China has been fueled by the massive movement of workers from the countryside to cities. Using descriptive statistics and binary regression analysis, we investigate the factors underlying rural residents&rsq...

(This article belongs to the Section Sustainable Urban and Rural Development)
  • Editorial
  • Open Access
41 Citations
10,136 Views
21 Pages

20 May 2018

The sustainability and the prospects of contemporary agribusiness are discussed taking into account trends, controversies, ideologies, practices and pending demands. The growing hegemony of agribusiness in the world today is analyzed making use of a...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Agribusiness and Agri-food Prospects)
  • Article
  • Open Access
21 Citations
5,365 Views
14 Pages

Role of Creative Industries as a Regional Growth Factor

  • Ronny Correa-Quezada,
  • José Álvarez-García,
  • María De la Cruz Del Río-Rama and
  • Claudia Patricia Maldonado-Erazo

20 May 2018

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the impact of employment in creative industries on the regional and national economic growth of Ecuador. The methodology used is a panel econometric model in which the temporary and structural dimensions consi...

  • Article
  • Open Access
10 Citations
3,968 Views
19 Pages

20 May 2018

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) refers to the set of behaviors that businesses ought to or are expected to perform in a society. Many companies expect to increase profits through CSR behavior. However, it is a reasonable question to consider wh...

  • Article
  • Open Access
38 Citations
8,106 Views
13 Pages

20 May 2018

Socially and economically marginalized people and environmentally vulnerable areas are disproportionately affected by natural hazards. Identifying populations and places vulnerable to disasters is important for disaster management, and crucial for mi...

(This article belongs to the Section Sustainable Urban and Rural Development)
  • Article
  • Open Access
10 Citations
8,343 Views
24 Pages

Sustainability and Ethics in the Process of Price Determination in Financial Markets: A Conceptual Analysis

  • Maria-Teresa Bosch-Badia,
  • Joan Montllor-Serrats and
  • Maria-Antonia Tarrazon-Rodon

19 May 2018

This paper explores how financial markets can support the practical applicability of Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs) principles and why ethics has a central role in this process. The efficient market hypothesis holds that a financial market i...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainability and Ethics: Reflections on the UN Sustainable Development Goals)
  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
5,020 Views
18 Pages

19 May 2018

Carbon dioxide emissions in developing countries are closely tied to their economy and play a crucial role in the world’s future emissions. In this paper, we put forward an alternative energy use paradigm shift of low-carbon emissions from oper...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue International Perspectives on Sustainable Energy Transition)
  • Article
  • Open Access
10 Citations
5,365 Views
12 Pages

19 May 2018

Coarse woody debris (CWD) is an important component of natural forests and is now being used in reclaiming oil sands land to control erosion, enhance diversity, and function as longer term storage of organic matter. However, the impact of woody debri...

(This article belongs to the Section Environmental Sustainability and Applications)
  • Article
  • Open Access
7 Citations
3,894 Views
19 Pages

19 May 2018

Growing waste production has become a global sustainability challenge that is in need of innovative solutions. It has been argued that greater public engagement in science and technology policy could stimulate new directions for innovation and provid...

  • Article
  • Open Access
32 Citations
5,270 Views
17 Pages

Do Customers Value CSR Disclosure? Evidence from Italian Family and Non-Family Firms

  • Giovanna Gavana,
  • Pietro Gottardo and
  • Anna Maria Moisello

19 May 2018

CSR reporting is a relevant part of a firm’s dialogue with stakeholders, therefore it is of interest to study whether this form of communication is an effective tool for gaining customers’ support. This paper addresses this issue by compa...

(This article belongs to the Section Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability)
  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
5,360 Views
16 Pages

Characterizing Drought Effects on Vegetation Productivity in the Four Corners Region of the US Southwest

  • Mohamed Abd Salam EL-Vilaly,
  • Kamel Didan,
  • Stuart E. Marsh,
  • Michael A. Crimmins and
  • Armando Barreto Munoz

19 May 2018

The droughts striking the Colorado Plateau, where the Hopi Tribe and Navajo Nation Native American reservation lands are located, and their impacts have appeared slowly and relatively unnoticed in conventional national drought monitoring efforts like...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Impacts of Climate Change on Hydrology, Water Quality and Ecology)
  • Article
  • Open Access
66 Citations
13,207 Views
18 Pages

Women on Boards and Financial Performance: Evidence from a European Emerging Market

  • Mihaela Ionascu,
  • Ion Ionascu,
  • Marian Sacarin and
  • Mihaela Minu

19 May 2018

This paper examines the association between gender diversity on corporate boards and firm performance for a European emerging market, which lags behind in terms of both corporate governance quality and social cohesion indicators. In a sample of Roman...

(This article belongs to the Section Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability)

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Sustainability - ISSN 2071-1050