Industry In Spain Research Articles

Delphi assessment of occupational hazards in the wineries of Andalusia, in southern Spain

Abstract Risk assessment is essential to making informed decisions on occupational risk prevention. The health and safety conditions of workers can be improved by issuing voluntary certifications, such as ISO 45001. This is particularly important in sectors such as wineries. In 2017 these numbered 4093, representing 14% of the food and drink industry in Spain, of which 290 were in Andalusia. The incidence rate for 2017 in the industrial sector in Spain was 5.264 work accidents with sick leave for every 100,000 affiliated workers, making this the sector with the second highest number of work accidents after that of construction. The study aims to assess the risks in wineries in Andalucia, southern Spain, by analysing the opinions of a group of experts with experience in the sector. The Delphi method was used for this study and was carried out in conjunction with a panel of 11 experts. The results indicated that the most significant workplace risks were those occurring in the production facility, workshop or factory; in terms of occupation, those exposed to the greatest risk were machine operators; regarding the type of work, production, processing and storage posed the highest levels of risk; operating machinery was the physical activity with the highest risk; in the area of causes of accidents, the highest risk was of slipping, tripping and falling; and, finally, with regard to how an accident could occur, the highest level of risk was considered to be contact with electric current.

La modernización en la industria de equipo telefónico en España durante el segundo franquismo. CITESA 1965-1975

This article bring us closer to the telephone equipment industry in Spain, at a turning point in its development, leading to controversy about the impact of multinationals in host countries. It focuses on a crucial period that includes from the creation of Telecommunication and Electronic International Company (CITESA) as a branch of Standard Electrical S. A. (SESA) and associate company of International Telephone and Telegraph (ITT) during the growth economic of the sixties to the last years of the Francoism. The insertion of CITESA in the ITT group granted privileged access to him to new technological developments. There is the key of CITESA to be the manufacturing arm of the operator National Telephone Company of Spain (CTNE) in the special conditions of the Spanish market. The article is founded substantially on primary sources, without forget the contemporary history studies have provided.

La responsabilidad social de los stakeholders en la publicidad: necesidad de un compromiso ético en la industria publicitaria

This article analyses the system of autoregulation in the advertisement industry in Spain. It examines the activity done by Autocontrol, as well as the responsible sense acquired by the agents implied on the advertisement practice. This analysis takes into consideration today’s double functionality of advertisement: its economic dimension as commercial activity, and its social dimension directly influencing the contemporary ways of living. This article must be taken from a qualitative standpoint, focused on the review of bibliographic sources and their analysis. The results show that from a legal point of view and taken as a commercial activity, advertisement is one of the most regulated activities in Spain; however, from the social perspective, its regulation is much more complicated and the consumer is not always protected. In this sense, it is necessary to review ethics in advertisement, beyond Autocontrol, with the purpose of guaranteeing consumer rights. This review must be done by the own market agents and must ensure that advertisement can control itself.

A cluster analysis of tourist attractions in Spain

Purpose Natural and cultural tourism are important motivators for international tourism. Spain has impressive tourist attractions that are outstanding on the natural and cultural tourism dimensions. The purpose of this paper is to identify traits of the most attractive destinations in Spain and to understand the relative importance of natural, cultural, and dual (natural and cultural) attractions to target consumers. Design/methodology/approach The authors compare the level of tourism in the 17 major regions of Spain and identify the key natural, cultural, and dual attractions using a two-step cluster analysis to ascertain the relative importance of the three types of attractions. Findings The findings of the cluster analysis suggest that natural attractions had the highest importance, followed by dual attractions, with cultural attractions having the lowest importance in affecting the level of tourism in a region. The study identified four categories of regions resulting from “high vs low” total number of attractions by “high vs low” levels of tourism (operationalized via the number of tourist-nights). The regions with high levels of tourism were either located in the bodies of water (a group of islands) or on ocean/sea(s) surrounding Spain. The study suggests placing greater emphasis on promoting cultural attractions in Spain. Practical implications The findings suggest that there is a need to put more emphasis on promoting the cultural attractions in Spain. Spain is a diverse country with huge potential for tourism from people all over the world, due to its diverse geography and rich history. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that analyzes 17 regions of Spain in relation to their tourism characteristics, identifying attractions that are not sufficiently leveraged, and suggesting strategies for identifying opportunities for the tourism industry in Spain.

Innovation and productivity in a science-and-technology intensive sector: Information industries in Spain†

This article shows that the innovation objectives of firms in the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) industry are multidimensional. These objectives translate into complex innovation modes that in turn condition firms’ competitiveness. The ICT industry definition used in this article includes firms from the Content and Media sector, in line with modern delimitations of ICT-related activities. This article reports the results of an empirical exercise that focused on Spanish ICT firms included in the PITEC database, the source for the Community Innovation Survey, for the period 2004–13. The analysis uses the well-known Crepon-Duguet-Mairesse model, which captures the linkages between R&D, innovation, and productivity. The main results indicate strong innovation complementarities, different from those found by previous contributions for manufacturing and service sectors. If these complementarities are not taken into account when analysing the relationship between innovation and productivity, one could conclude that the link between the two is weaker than it really is. This innovation complexity may be one explanation for the productivity advantage of ICT firms.

International ecopreneurs: The case of eco-entrepreneurial new ventures in the renewable energy industry

In this paper, we explored the relationship between the sustainable and international entrepreneur to define the phenomenon of “international ecopreneur.” This notion is applied in an empirical case study research about six Spanish eco-entrepreneurial new ventures competing in the renewable energy industry and showing their early endeavors to enter international markets. Results of this study emphasize that sustainability issues and making the world a better place to live, as ecopreneurs’ philosophical view, are key driving forces for early international development of eco-entrepreneurial companies, even in the pre-commercialization phase. Evidences derived from the cases show that appropriate international skills and experience-based knowledge in the energy sector and entrepreneurship are essential qualities for being successful in an emerging and globally integrated industry like renewable energies. Our results imply that ecopreneurs’ formal and informal ties, inner values, and prior international experience and education, particularly accumulated in the international context, are a determinant factor in opportunity recognition and international business development. Policy makers, for designing a more effective policy, should pay particular attention to the importance of non-financial incentives for encouraging ecopreneurs to enter international market. An important limitation of our study is that we only explored ecopreneurs’ behavior in renewable energy industry in Spain. Further research is suggested to empirically examine the current results in other contexts with distinctive energy policy schemes and in other sustainability-related industries.

Innovation Patterns in the Canned Fish Industry In Galicia (Spain)

In this paper, we analyze the compettve and innovatve trajectories followed by the canned fsh industry in recent tmes. We base our study on four case studies from the Galician industry in Spain, which comprises the largest share of the European canned fsh sector. At least four different innovaton paterns are found in the industry. The frst patern is a conservatve one where innovaton is seen as a risk and therefore maintaining current routnes is the chosen opton. The second patern has been defned as “large retailer-dominated” and is followed by companies that have signed exclusive agreements with large retailers, which increasingly determine most of their innovaton actvites. The third strategy we have defned as “territory-orientated,” since product innovaton and incorporaton of quality distnctons based on the territory are the main innovaton drivers. Finally, we have an “ecological or natureorientated” innovaton strategy where meetng ecological normatve requirements is the main innovaton driver.

Residual biomass potential in olive tree cultivation and olive oil industry in Spain: valorization proposal in a biorefinery context

Olive crop and olive oil industry generates several residues, i.e., olive tree pruning biomass (OTPB), extracted olive pomace (EOP) and olive leaves (OL) that could be used to produce high-added value products in an integrated biorefinery. OTPB is generated in the field as a result of pruning operation to remove old branches; EOP is the main residue of the pomace olive oil extracting industry after extraction with hexane of residual oil contained in olive pomace; and OL comes from the olive cleaning process carried out at olive mills, where small branches and leaves are separated by density. In this work, an analysis of the potential of OTPB, EOP and OL residues was addressed by estimating the production volumes at national level and the spatial distribution of these residues using geographic information system software. Information provided by public institutions and personal surveys to the industries was evaluated. Moreover, chemical analysis of the residues was undertaken and the results used to make a first assessment of valorization into biofuels such as bioethanol and bio based chemicals. Results show that close to 4.2 million tons/year of EOP, OL and OTPB derived from olive oil industry and olive tree cultivation in Spain could be available as a raw material for biorefineries in Spain. The analysis of the chemical characteristics indicates the relevant potential of these feedstocks for the production of bioethanol and other compounds such as phenols based on suitable processing and conversion routes, although techno-economic evaluations must be tackled to refine this approach.

Evaluation and comparison of a lean production system by using SAE J4000 standard: a case study on the automotive industry in the state of Mexico

Lean manufacturing (LM) is a management system focused on eliminating waste and activities that do not add value, with the aim of reducing costs and improving the quality and productivity of organizations. LM has been adopted in diverse industries and several countries due to its advantages in cost, flexibility and rapid response (Muslimen et al., 2013). The objective of this investigation is to analyze the implementation level to the Lean System via the SAE J4000 (SAE 1999a) standard carried out among companies of the State of Mexico automotive industry. In addition, this investigation shows the inferential and descriptive statistics data analysis of Mexican companies compared to the automotive industries in Spain and Brazil. Results show that the implementation level of the automotive industry is at 48.4% in the State of Mexico according to the SAE J4000 standard. Moreover, the involvement of suppliers and the use of lean tools in processes are higher in the State of Mexico compared to automotive industries in Spain and Brazil. However, previous studies ranked the State of Mexico at a lower level of LM in contrast with Spain and Brazil production lines.

La industria galletera en España

La industria galletera en España. En el trabajo se estudia este subsector agroindustrial, su delimitación, evolución y situación actual, producción en cantidad y valor, empleo, principales empresas, participación del capital exterior, cambios en el consumo y comercio exterior.
 
 [fr] L'industrie biscuitière en Espagne. Dans ce travail on étudie ce sous-secteur agroindustriel, sa délimitation, son évolution et sa situation actuelle, sa production en ce qui concerne la quantité et la valeur, l'emploi, principales entrepises, participation du capital extérieur, changements produits dans la consommation et le commerce internationale.

Inbreeding in Southeastern Spain : The Impact of Geography and Demography on Marital Mobility and Marital Distance Patterns (1900-1969).

In this paper, the structure of a southeastern Spanish population was studied for the first time with respect to its inbreeding patterns and its relationship with demographic and geographic factors. Data on consanguineous marriages (up to second cousins) from 1900 to 1969 were taken from ecclesiastic dispensations. Our results confirm that the patterns and trends of inbreeding in the study area are consistent with those previously observed in most non-Cantabrian Spanish populations. The rate of consanguineous marriages was apparently stable between 1900 and 1935 and then sharply decreased since 1940, which coincides with industrialization in Spain. A marked departure from Hardy-Weinberg expectations (0.25) in the ratio of first cousin (M22) to second cousin (M33) marriages in the study population (0.88) was observed. The high levels of endogamy (>80%) and its significant steadiness throughout the twentieth century is noteworthy. Accordingly, our results show that exogamous marriages were not only poorly represented but also that this reduced mobility (<6km) suggests that the choice of a mate was preferentially local. We found higher mobility in M22 with respect to M33 cousin mating. The relationships between population size and consanguinity rates and inbreeding fit power-law distributions. A significant positive correlation was observed between inbreeding and elevation. Many Spanish populations have experienced a prolonged and considerable isolation across generations, which has led to high proportions of historical and local endogamy that is associated, in general, with high [Formula: see text] values. Thus, assessing genomic inbreeding using runs of homozygosity (ROH) in current Spanish populations could be an additional pertinent strategy for obtaining a more refined perspective regarding the population history inferred from the extent and frequency of ROH regions.

Roofing Slate Industry in Spain: History, Geology, and Geoheritage

Spain is one of the leading producers of dimension stone and the biggest producer of roofing slate in the world. As a result, the roofing slate industry has shaped the landscape in some regions of Spain. The industry goes back to the 1500s, and over the centuries it has had its ups and downs. In the 1960s, Spain became the industry’s undisputed leader, accounting for up to 90% of world production. Today, Spain’s roofing slate industry continues to be the largest in the world, despite the emergence of new slate-producing countries. The intensive modern extraction methods used in mines and quarries tend to destroy the vestiges from earlier periods in the history of the industry. On the other hand, quarry work has unearthed exceptional geological structures that form part of the geoheritage of this industry. This paper describes the history and geology of the Spanish roofing slate industry and evaluates the potential geoheritage linked to this industry.

Falling off the Tourism Ladder

Before the economic crisis of 2008, Spain's tourism economy was held up as a global model of how to ascend the virtuous tourism “ladder” from budget beachfront package tours to more profitable cultural tourism that emphasizes art museums, cuisine, and heritage. This article examines how the maturation of the tourism industry in Spain became a symbol of democratization and European integration in the 1980s and 1990s. The piece then considers how the 2008 crisis challenged public confidence in the tourism economy due to the scale of the real estate crash, revelations of corruption and misappropriation of public funds, and crushing regional debt. Finally, it shows how the new political geography of Europe is divided between creditor countries, from the European core, that visit and debtor countries, in the Mediterranean, that are visited.

The electricity industry in Spain: A structural analysis using a disaggregated input-output model

This paper describes the construction and analysis of a disaggregated input-output model and its extension to a social accounting matrix (SAM) for the Spanish economy in 2013. Our focus is the specific disaggregation of the electricity industry into the generating, transmission, distribution and marketing businesses, which were decoupled in 1997 under legislation prohibiting any single company from conducting more than one of them. The multi-sectoral framework also allows disaggregation of electricity generating by production technologies (wind, nuclear, conventional thermal, hydropower, solar and other technologies). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper in which this information is presented in a multi-sectoral framework for the Spanish economy, which is enormously dependent on the electricity industry. The structural analysis reveals the industry's role in Spain and the importance of its activities. None of the electricity generating businesses is a Rasmussen key sector, and generating and distribution are both capital-intensive activities. Meanwhile, conventional thermal and hydropower generating together make up more than 50% of total output in value terms, while nuclear power accounts for only around 7%. Finally, imports and exports of electricity are small, and almost all demand is covered by domestic production.

The relevance of information transfer in learning culture

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to analyse the impact of the processes of orientation and empowerment and the transfer of information in the learning culture.Design/methodology/approachThe first hypothesis predicts that information mediates the relationship between orientation and empowerment processes and learning culture and the second hypothesis suggests that organisational size moderates the relationships between constructs. The empirical work is conducted in the wine industry in Spain through a structural equation analysis, partial least squares.FindingsThe hypothesis of mediation is confirmed; however, the hypothesis about size moderation is not confirmed.Practical implicationsThe importance of the transfer of information in the foundation of a learning culture is highlighted and, therefore, its importance in the development of learning in organisations, especially in building learning organisations.Originality/valueThis research contributes to the literature on learning in organisations by sharing not only the characteristics that identify a learning culture, but also the mechanisms or processes through which a learning culture can be developed.

Glass import and production in Hispania during the early medieval period: The glass from Ciudad de Vascos (Toledo).

One hundred and forty-one glass fragments from medieval Ciudad de Vascos (Toledo, Spain) were analysed by laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS). The glasses fall into three types according to the fluxing agents used: mineral natron, soda-rich plant ash, and a combination of soda ash and lead. The natron glasses can be assigned to various established primary production groups of eastern Mediterranean provenance. Different types of plant ash glasses indicate differences in the silica source as well as the plant ash component, reflecting changing supply mechanisms. While the earlier plant ash groups can be related to Islamic glasses from the Near East, both in terms of typology and composition, the chemical signature of the later samples appear to be specific to glass from the Iberian Peninsula. This has important implications for our understanding of the emerging glass industry in Spain and the distribution patterns of glass groups and raw materials. The plant ash that was used for the Vascos glasses is rich in soda with low levels of potash, similar to ash produced in the eastern Mediterranean. It could therefore be possible that Levantine plant ash was imported and used in Islamic period glass workshops in Spain. Unlike central and northern Europe where an independent glass industry based on potassium-rich wood ash developed during the Carolingian period, the prevalence of soda ash and soda ash lead glass on the Iberian Peninsula indicates its commercial and technological interconnection with the Islamic east. Our study thus traces several stages leading to the development of a specifically Spanish primary glassmaking industry.

Logistics Flexibility and Customer Satisfaction in Spain’s Furniture Industry

The use of flexibility has been analyzed and discussed in the literature as a strategy that produces many competitive advantages and as an essential resource in enterprises for some decades. However, logistics flexibility is a rather recent construct and a variable that has also been considered as a business strategy that produces not only higher competitive advantages but also a higher level of customer satisfaction. Although logistics flexibility has several benefits in enterprises, there is still in the literature a high percentage of ignorance from a considerable amount of organizations about the effects of logistics flexibility in customer satisfaction. For this reason, the main objective of this empirical research is the analysis of the effects of logistics flexibility on the logistics related to customer satisfaction by using a sample of 322 enterprises in furniture industry in Spain. The results obtained provide empirical evidence of the positive and significant effects that logistics flexibility has on the logistics related to customer satisfaction.

Cooperation in R&amp;D, firm size and type of partnership

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to analyse cooperation in R&amp;D in the automobile industry in Spain. It first examines to what extent firms cooperate with external actors in the field of technological innovation, and if so, with what type of cooperation partner, paying special attention to the differentiation according to the size of the firms. Second, it aims to study how the firm’s size may affect not only the decision of cooperating but also with which type of partner.Design/methodology/approachThe data in this study came from the surveys done in 2010 and 2013 by the Technological Innovation Panel (PITEC) for firms in the automotive industry. The paper estimates a bivariate probit model that takes into account the two types of cooperation mostly present in such an industry, vertical and institutional, explicitly considering the interdependencies that may arise in their simultaneous choice.FindingsThe empirical study confirms that small firms cooperate less frequently than big firms and that giving more importance to information publicly available and having public financial support from local and national governments are important determinants of collaboration agreements, mainly in the case of customers and suppliers.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the understanding of the motivations of the automotive industry for engaging in R&amp;D cooperation agreements. The authors study how the firm’s size may affect not only the decision of cooperating but also with which type of partner.

Innovativeness in the context of technological and market dynamism

PurposeInnovativeness is a critical aspect for the survival and success of the company in the long term. The purpose of this paper is to study how the density of the network in which the company is immersed influences the relationship between environment, dynamism and innovativeness. More specifically, the authors analyse whether the network density acts in a heterogeneous way, worsening or improving the effects of technological and market dynamism on innovativeness, respectively.Design/methodology/approachThe empirical study was conducted on a sample of 292 companies in the agri-food industry in Spain. In order to test the proposed model, the authors used partial least squares.FindingsThe results show that technological dynamism has a positive effect on the generation and development of a firm’s innovativeness. However, market dynamism does not influence innovativeness. The authors also observe that the interactive effects between network density and dynamism are significant, but in a divergent way. Whereas the interactive effect between density and technological dynamism is negative, the interaction between density and market dynamism is positive.Originality/valueThe main contribution of the study is to show how the level of network density alters the effect of technological and market dynamism on innovativeness. The authors highlight the relevance of network theory to explain the contextual background to innovativeness. The authors also stress the importance of differentiating between the market and technological components of dynamism to further elucidate their effects.

Aproximación a la distribución de la industria de servicios informáticos en España

La reciente explosión en número y la dispersión geográfica de la Industria de Servicios Informáticos en España (ISI), han ido acompañadas de continuos procesos de reestructuración de las relaciones territoriales de producción (redeploiment), manifestadas en un posible reparto de tareas entre las empresas en virtud de su localización, en tendencias a la polarización y bifurcación según el tamaño empresarial, a la vez que en el seno de las ISIs se producen reajustes organizativos y funcionales que afectan, en consecuencia, a la cualificación de los trabajadores.