The farmers’ welfare and its interlinkages to energy efficiency and farm sustainability has attracted global scientific interest within the last few decades. This study examines the contribution of ...Agriculture 5.0 to the prosperity of the farmers in the post-pandemic era and the gradual transition to an energy-smart farm. To obtain an insight into the attributes of Agriculture 5.0 and the emerging technologies in the field, Bibliometrix analysis with the use of an R package was conducted based on 2000 data consisting of peer-reviewed articles. The data were retrieved from the Scopus database. A bibliometric approach was employed to analyze the data for a comprehensive overview of the trend, thematic focus, and scientific production in the field of Agriculture 5.0 and energy-smart farming. Emerging technologies that are part of Agriculture 5.0 in combination with alternative energy sources can provide cost-effective access to finance, weather updates, remotely monitoring, and future energy solutions for the establishment of smart farms. Keywords such as “renewable energy,” “Internet of Things,” and “emission control” remain the trending keywords. Moreover, thematic analysis shows that “economic and social effects”, “energy efficiency”, “remote sensing”, and “Artificial Intelligence” with their associated components such as “anaerobic digestion”, “wireless sensor network,” “agricultural robots”, and “smart agriculture” are the niche themes of Agriculture 5.0 in combination with green energy sources, which can lead to the cut cost, energy-efficient, and sustainable energy-smart farms.
The research for the investigation of the quality of the Corporate Annual Reports (CAR) and particularly the part of the narrative information contained in it has long been underestimated, mainly due ...to the lack of tools that allow an objective measurement and analysis of the narrative disclosed information of each company. The concept of narrative portion is extremely difficult and multidimensional, most studies use ESG composite scores to measure the CSP. The studies which investigate this issue are facing two major problems. The first problem related with the aggregation number of Key Performance Indicators while the second problem is that all ESG factors are not equal importance. This research focuses on the detailed presentation of a new method of reliable measurement of the quality of the narrative part of the CARs, which is greatly enhanced by using two composite indices, the unweighted index Ma.Co.I and the weighted one Ma.Co.Iw. These specific indices, for the first time, offer a comprehensive and coded checklist (for the measurement of the quality of the narrative information) which follows the guidelines set by the International Accounting Standards Board in 2010. Finally, this article proposes a novel weighting scheme of narrative portion and suggest specific minimum and maximum weights per ESG factors with purpose to contribute to a better understanding of the complexity of composite scores and to improve the quality of their outputs.
The ever-changing business environment, coupled with increased competition and rapid technological advances, exert pressure on businesses looking for modern ways of production and operation, based on ...their survival and success in profitability. In order to strengthen their market position and ultimately to gain competitive advantage over others, a large number of companies—perhaps the majority—at a global level have installed or are in the process of adopting Enterprise Resource Planning—ERPs Systems. ERPs reorganize business practices and enhance the processes of business units. Changes that ERPs bring to businesses have significant effects on Management Accounting and Internal Audit but also on Accountants and Internal Auditors who are often asked to adapt their methods and techniques to the requirements of new IT systems. This paper looks for findings from previous research in the field, research conducted on possible changes in Administrative Accounting and Internal Control and depends on the effectiveness of ERP systems. In this study, the research interest is focused on the identification, recording and understanding of critical dimensions and factors for the effective implementation of ERPs in firms through their adoption and effective use. There is a theoretical framework for clarifying some terms useful for a better understanding of key issues discussed below. It also demonstrates the international trends and prospects of ERP systems as well as the issues encountered in their effective implementation while presenting the research methodology used, the conclusions and finalizing this chapter with proposals for future research.
The efficient and sustainable exploitation of energy resources may secure a sustainable economic growth for different regions. However, the peripheries are subject to social, economic, and political ...constraints, with limited power over energy management. The present work examines regional convergence in exploitation efficiency as synopsized in the GDP generated by energy and minerals in an era of the country’s efforts to shut down the lignite-run power production. With the assistance of panel unit root tests, we confirm non convergence of the variables employed, an expected result given the fact that different energy sources are being used for energy production by each different periphery, generating different economic results. In the second stage the methodology employed is a Bayesian vector auto-regressive model (BVAR) with an informative prior on the steady state. The particular methodology outperforms the conventional VAR methodology due to limited degrees of freedom. The Impulse response analysis and the Variance Decomposition analysis confirmed interlinkages among the regions studied. This result implies that the growth generated by different energy and mineral resources are interconnected. Furthermore, the energy transition taking place in Megalopoli and West Macedonia, where the two greatest lignite industries were located until recently, affects the growth generated by energy and resource exploitation for all the other peripheries, according to our findings. The novelty of the present work stands on the concept to detect interlinkages of energy and resources-based growth for the peripheries in Greece with the assistance of the Bayesian Var. The results of the present work are significant, since our findings suggest to policy makers tools to promote economic growth generated by energy based on alternative energy sources, including the environmentally friendly ones, by taking into consideration the interlinkages established by the existing infrastructure and the conventional energy sources used.
Within the last few decades, the issue of the environmental performance of European financial institutions has become a significant feature of their strategic plans. Financial institutions can ...contribute through their own activities and investments, and also through their relationship with economic sectors and consumers, in decreasing environmental footprint. The purpose of this research is to investigate the determinants that affect the environmental performance of European financial institutions. Financial markets have been selected as the main research field for this study, as it presents an opportunity for environmental policy and is useful in view of the need for a wider range of policy instruments. Moreover, on a more practical level, financial institutions can interact with the environment in several ways, such as investors, innovators, valuers, powerful stakeholders, and polluters. The study is based on a mixed methodology approach, which integrates: (i) bibliometric analysis based on R package and (ii) panel data analysis with the assistance of a generalized linear model (GLM). Findings show that socioeconomic, governance, and technology factors positively affect the environmental performance of European financial institutions. Moreover, the incorporation of alternative energy sources, such as renewable energy in the corporate function, is a requirement for greening the financial institutions. The above can guide financial institutions to develop the appropriate strategies for decreasing their environmental footprint, improving their operational efficiency, and becoming more attractive and competitive in the market.
Research on the quality of narrative information of annual financial reports has long been dominated by a lack of tools that permit an objective analysis of qualitative disclosure. This study is ...focused on accounting disclosure research and proposes a comprehensive index that uses Key Performance Indicators to enhance understanding of the quality of narrative information during the period of 2002–2007, using a sample of European (EU) and USA (US) firms operating in that context. We use previous research of Garefalakis et al. (Corp Ownersh Control 13(4):317–334,
2016
) to underscore the relation between the Management Commentary Index and the Weighted Management Commentary Index with several explanatory variables that put emphasis on firms’ attributes regarding their volumes in total assets, their book values, as well as the use of corporate governance indicators, etc. in a regional level. Our results show that the US firms with the mandatory requirements do not provide a greater amount of disclosure information in their reporting than their counterparts in Europe (i.e. firms located in Western and Northern Europe). The proposed approach seeks to enhance understanding of the quality of companies’ narrative information disclosure and reveals a critical path to analyze the link between corporate governance and firms’ performance.
Corporate social responsibility can assist in reducing the noise caused by pricing volatility and a lack of energy-efficient business solutions. The study’s objective is twofold: (i) to investigate ...the role of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in reducing volatility through the contribution of energy-efficient strategies; (ii) to identify research trends in the field that may indicate future research directions for the development of more dynamic strategies that will help in mitigating the impact of pricing volatility. A five-step bibliometric analysis was applied to address the research question. The findings were visualized by using bibliometric tools such as R Studio, Biblioshiny, and VOSViewer. Chinese academics have been revealed as pioneers in integrating CSR into corporate strategies to reduce volatility and support energy-efficient investments. Moreover, results indicate that financial institutions must embrace a new business model based on both CSR and environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) principles. Since very little is known about the interaction structure between CSR and ESG in the mitigation of price volatility, the purpose of this article is to bridge that knowledge gap. The pioneering character of this research—the construction of a business model based on the principles of CSR and ESG—contributes significantly to both the field’s knowledge and the practice of corporate sustainability management.
Management Commentary Index (Ma.Co.I) is a composite measuring index developed for the detailed evaluation of narrative disclosure quality, as this has been delineated by the
Financial Accounting ...Standards Board
—
FASB
and the
International Accounting Standards Board
—
IASB
in 2010 in the “An Improved Conceptual Framework for Financial Reporting” publication. The Ma.Co.I comprises of 70 Key performance Indicators (KPIs) and these KPIs are classified in five categories. A total of 129 Corporate Annual reports (CARs) of major, stock market listed companies in Canada, the US and Europe (including Switzerland, France, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Sweden and the UK) were classified as either pre-IFRS (P-IFRS) for the period spanning from 2000 to 2004 or after-IFRS (A-IFRS) for the period from 2005 to 2007. The primordial aim of this study is the exploration of whether the mandatory narrative guidelines set in Canada and the USA yield increased the disclosure quality of narrative section in CARs, in contrast to Europe firms that comply with non-mandatory guidelines. The secondary aim of this study is to examine a pioneering, new qualitative measurement tool used in testing for CARs quality, what we referred to as
G&T
-
AIQAD
. The present study’s conclusions indicate that this new measurement tool is an efficient and reliable method for exploring CARs quality.
The unprecedented conditions of restrictive measures that were suddenly imposed in 2020 due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic affected business activity globally. To deal with the consequences ...that were caused by the pandemic, most SMEs had to adopt strategies which will enhance their development and footprint in the business arena. With this study, we aim to propose a theoretical approach, via bibliometric analysis, of a new business model innovation that will be based on the triple-win formula of strategic agility, ambidexterity, and open innovation. Open innovation can help SMEs develop their ambidexterity and agility capacity and become more efficient, which can contribute to gaining competitive advantage. To approach this issue, a bibliometric analysis was conducted based on 606 articles that were published in the timespan of 2008-2021. The bibliometric analysis used various indicators such as the scientific production in the studied field, h-Index, co-occurrence collaboration, Multiple Correspondence Analysis (MCA), keyword analysis, and thematic mapping. Biblioshiny and VOSviewer were used to process the data, and contributed to the visualization of the results. Of the 476 sources that were analyzed, most of the articles were published by Journal of Business Research; British scholars are those with the highest number of citations on the topic. This research provides insights related to the state of the art of the study area under analysis and highlights the gaps, which contributed to the building of a new business model innovation that will integrate not only ambidexterity and strategic agility, but open innovation, too. The new business model can help SMEs quickly adapt in the new business environment created by the past successive series of crises, such as the most recent financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic.
Effective and thorough credit-risk management is a key factor for lending institutions, as significant financial losses can arise from the borrowers’ default. Consequently, machine learning methods ...can measure and analyze credit risk objectively when at the same time they face increasingly attention. This study analyzes default payment data from a credit cards’ portfolio containing some 30,000 clients from Taiwan with twenty-three attributes and with no missing information. We compare prediction accuracy of seven classification methods used, i.e. KNN, Logistic Regression, Naïve Bayes, Decision Trees, Random Forest, SVC, and Linear SVC. The results indicate that only few out of most of the typical variables used can adequately analyze default characteristics in terms of lending decisions. The results provide effective feedback to credit evaluators, lending institutions and business analysts for in-depth analysis. Also, they mention to the importance of the precautionary borrowing techniques to be used to better understand credit-card borrowers’ behavior, along with specific accounting, historical and demographical characteristics.
