Assessment Of Sustainable Development Research Articles

Investigating Health Impacts of Natural Resource Extraction Projects in Burkina Faso, Ghana, Mozambique, and Tanzania: Protocol for a Mixed Methods Study.

BackgroundNatural resource extraction projects offer both opportunities and risks for sustainable development and health in host communities. Often, however, the health of the community suffers. Health impact assessment (HIA) can mitigate the risks and promote the benefits of development but is not routinely done in the developing regions that could benefit the most.ObjectiveOur study aims to investigate health and health determinants in regions affected by extractive industries in Burkina Faso, Ghana, Mozambique, and Tanzania. The evidence generated in our study will inform a policy dialogue on how HIA can be promoted as a regulatory approach as part of the larger research initiative called the HIA4SD (Health impact assessment for sustainable development) project.MethodsThe study is a concurrent triangulation, mixed methods, multi-stage, multi-focus project that specifically addresses the topics of governance and policy, social determinants of health, health economics, health systems, maternal and child health, morbidity and mortality, and environmental determinants, as well as the associated health outcomes in natural resource extraction project settings across four countries. To investigate each of these health topics, the project will (1) use existing population-level databases to quantify incidence of disease and other health outcomes and determinants over time using time series analysis; (2) conduct two quantitative surveys on mortality and cost of disease in producer regions; and (3) collect primary qualitative data using focus groups and key informant interviews describing community perceptions of the impacts of extraction projects on health and partnership arrangements between the projects and local and national governance. Differences in health outcomes and health determinants between districts with and without an extraction project will be analyzed using matched geographical analyses in quasi-Poisson regression models and binomial regression models. Costs to the health system and to the households from diseases found to be associated with projects in each country will be estimated retrospectively.ResultsFieldwork for the study began in February 2019 and concluded in February 2020. At the time of submission, qualitative data collection had been completed in all four study countries. In Burkina Faso, 36 focus group discussions and 74 key informant interviews were conducted in three sites. In Ghana, 34 focus group discussions and 64 key informant interviews were conducted in three sites. In Mozambique, 75 focus group discussions and 103 key informant interviews were conducted in four sites. In Tanzania, 36 focus group discussions and 84 key informant interviews were conducted in three sites. Quantitative data extraction and collection is ongoing in all four study countries. Ethical approval for the study was received in all four study countries prior to beginning the fieldwork. Data analyses are underway and results are expected to be published in 2020 and 2021.ConclusionsDisentangling the complex interactions of resource extraction projects with their host communities requires an integrative approach drawing on many methodologies under the HIA umbrella. By using complementary data sources to address the question of population health in project areas from several angles, bias and missing data will be reduced, generating high-quality evidence to aid countries in moving toward sustainable development.International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID)DERR1-10.2196/17138

Digital transformation of obtaining data for an express assessment of regional sustainable development

Sustainable development of the Russian Federation is impossible without the sustainable development of its regions. To make managerial decisions aimed at sustainable development of the regions, it is necessary to carry out appropriate monitoring. It is proposed to use the methodology and tools of an express assessment, which are based on the dynamics of wages at the enterprises of the region, as operational control over the processes taking place in the economy of the regions. This is due to the fact that in a market economy there is a clear direct relationship between the timeliness and size of wages paid to employees and the state of corporate businesses. The aim of this study is to select the optimal data acquisition scheme for an express assessment of the sustainable development of the regions. For this purpose, a comparative analysis of three schemes for obtaining paper-based data was applied, using personal accounts on the Internet and the information system of the Federal State Statistics Service using the system of interdepartmental electronic exchange in terms of the following indicators: completeness, delay and discreteness of the wages reflection and the number of enterprises in the region in the digital spatio-temporal model and complexity of organizational measures. It has been established that in the near future, it will the most effective to use the scheme for obtaining data from the Internet, which provides high completeness of reflection of the source data and minimizes the delay time of an express assessment relative to the real state of the regional economy. This creates objective conditions for the rapid identification of trends in the regional economy and contributes to the timely formation of legislative initiatives and the adoption of managerial decisions by the regional legislative and executive authorities to improve the legal framework conducive to business development in the region. The data collected by state statistics bodies as per the form No. P-4 “Information on the wages and number of employees” can also serve as a source for an express assessment. However, the federal law currently prohibits state statistics from providing access to this information to regional executive bodies.

Assessment of Sustainable Development on Territories under the Impact of Different Genesis Disasters

At present, neither international nor Russian literature sources propose any index to assess safety level of disasters that occur everywhere throughout the world. No one doubts the fact that the number of natural, man-made and social disasters, as well as resulting economic losses have increased several times over the past thirty years. In response to this trend, the study aims to develop a disaster safety level index (DSLI). The study presents methodological tools for calculating the Disaster Safety Level Index (DSLI) and calculation of the global DSLI for the 1998–2011 period. The proposed method for calculating the Disaster Safety Level Index has three advantages. Firstly, it is relatively simple. Secondly, everyone can get access to input data for calculations. Thirdly, different indicators used in the index are reduced to units of power, added together and expressed as a single number, which is very important in case of incomparable (heterogeneous) indicators. The proposed Disaster Safety Level Index (DSLI) can be used in practice to prevent disasters of various origins.

Edited by Ephraim Nkonya, Alisher Mirzabaev and Joachim von Braun: 『Economics of Land Degradation and Improvement: A Global Assessment for Sustainable Development』

Edited by Ephraim Nkonya, Alisher Mirzabaev and Joachim von Braun: 『Economics of Land Degradation and Improvement: A Global Assessment for Sustainable Development』

Assessment of Sustainable Socioeconomic Development in European Union Countries

There are still debates in the scientific literature about the factors influencing countries’ sustainable socioeconomic development. Therefore, the current article aims at determining the factors of sustainable socioeconomic development and assessing its level in the EU countries. The following methods were employed for the research: an evaluation based on distance from average solution (EDAS) and hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA). EDAS was used to reveal which countries have the highest level of sustainable socioeconomic development, and which have the lowest. The ranking was done based on the appraisal score, which is an outcome of EDAS. Hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) was used for clustering the countries based on the appraisal scores in order to distinguish groups of countries having a similar level of sustainable socioeconomic development. The results revealed that the highest level of sustainable socioeconomic development is in Germany, and the lowest in Portugal. Based on HCA, the countries were divided into three groups. The first cluster’s countries have the weakest sustainable socioeconomic development, and countries assigned to the third cluster have the best. In the current research, the third cluster consists of one country, Germany, which supports the results obtained with the EDAS method, i.e., Germany is the country with the highest level of sustainable socioeconomic development in the EU.

Transportation Factors in the Selected Methods of Sustainable Development Assessment Tools

The interests focus on the tools, used in the case of evaluating the sustainability in the mobility structures. In the present is sustainable development regular part of planning in every scale. According to growing development and innovations, it was necessary to ensure a sustainable framework of progress or traffic performance. Sustainable development goals were founded as a reaction to limited natural sources and also as a response to the human impact on nature. Evolution of those goals started with the environmental base and then had also been added social and economic aspects. A study wants to find sophisticated tools for the evaluation of sustainable development in urban structures. As was located, in Europe exist methods for assessment of sustainability (EIA, SEA, LCA, EF, ER, GP, CBA, CEA, MCDA, EA, SIA, SEIA, etc.). Although even their large amount, they are mostly based on just one section of SD. Other tools which are used, are methods for evaluation sustainability (BREEAM, CASBEE-UD, GBI, LEED, IGBC, SB tool, DGNB, etc.), where are also included other sections (environmental, economic, social). Assessment tools were described and preliminary compared in the context of the factors’ coverage.

Challenges for the European steel industry: Analysis, possible consequences and impacts on sustainable development

The steel industry in the European Union (EU), important for the economy as a whole, faces various challenges. These are inter alia volatile prices for relevant input factors, uncertainties concerning the regulation of CO2-emissions and market shocks caused by the recently introduced additional import duties in the US, which is an important sales market. We examine primary and secondary effects of these challenges on the steel industry in the EU and their impacts on European and global level. Developing and using a suitable meta-model, we analyze the competitiveness of key steel producing countries with respect to floor prices depending on selected cost factors and draw conclusions on the impacts in the trade of steel on emissions, energy demand, on the involvement of developing countries in the value chain as well on the need for innovations to avoid relocations of production. Hence, our study contributes to the assessment of sustainable industrial development, which is aimed by the Sustainability Development Goal “Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation countries”. By applying information on country-specific Human Development Indexes (reflecting aspects of life expectancy, education, and per capita income), we show that relocating energy-intensive industries from the EU may not only increase global energy demand and CO2-emissions, but may also be to the disadvantage of developing countries.

Investigation of multi-criteria method for the assessment of sustainable development: The case of Lithuania

The process of implementing sustainable development started at the end of the 20th century with the aim to balance economic, social and environmental development and minimize damage to humans and the environment. Nowadays, when new economic problems emerge social interest groups lobby, environmental standards are raised, sustainable development becomes an integral part of democratic society and is a particularly relevant object of scientific investigations. Taking into consideration the aspect of sustainable development complex assessment, the research problem can be formulated as follows: how to assess sustainable development comprehensively? This research, according to statistical data analysis (Lithuania’s case), identifies multi-criteria method (SAW) as the best method of analyzing sustainable development from the approach of different dimensions (economic, social and environmental).
 According to the results of SAW method, it can be noted that when a country is improving economic indicators, environmental indicators usually decrease, which in turn determines the characteristics of the social dimension slight decrease.

Spatial Absorbency Assessment for Sustainable Land Development

Sustainable land use development requires a smart decision‑making process based on appropriate spatial design patterns. However, the pro‑investment policy of many municipalities often results in disproportions between the de‑mand and supply of investment areas, which means that spatial development is not realized in a sustainable way. In order to avoid the overconsumption of land for investment purposes, central government in Poland introduced a requirement to assess land balance, which includes the calculation of spa‑tial absorbency at the level of local urban planning. The aim of this work is to develop the concept of spatial absorbency assessment. In order to select best practices, document reviews of local spatial policies in Kalisz, Łódź, Toruń and Gdańsk were performed. Based on the review, a method for spatial absorbency assessment was presented. The applicability of the proposed solution is pre‑sented by its use on the case of the Racibórz municipality. The visualization shows what kind of geoinformation is required to perform an assessment by means of the developed method. The results of the calculations present the final feedback that is received by local authorities. The work was carried out us‑ing ArcGIS software. The obtained results may constitute the basis for further multi‑dimensional analyses as part of sustainable land development planning at the local level.

The main purpose of the research was to present gentrification as a diverse phenomenon that cannot be explicitly qualified as negative or positive. In order to illustrate the problem, literature studies were carried out regarding urban regeneration, urban revitalization, gentrification and urban development. Then a case study was presented indicating two extremely different examples. The Walnut Hills Estate in Cincinnati

The article addresses the theoretical aspects of sustainable development; the content of methodological approaches to the assessment of sustainable city development is determined, the system of evaluation of sustainable city development is characterized, the dynamics of economic, social and ecological development of Kremenchuk are analyzed and recommendations for improving the sustainable development of the city are developed. The purpose of the research was to develop measures to improve the economic, social, environmental components of sustainable development of the Ukrainian industrial city of Kremenchuk

Traffic Impact Assessment for Sustainable Development in Urban Areas

Since long, Traffic Impact assessment (TIA) has been recognized as an integral and mandatory part of Environmental Impact assessment in developed countries. Accordingly, it is mandated that any proposed development expected to generate 100 or more additional / new trips during peak hours should undergo a TIA However, in developing countries like India, TIA has gained importance only during the last decade spearheaded by the need to develop sustainable solutions to the congestion problem. In this paper we discuss the findings of two case studies one being an official complex coming up close in the Central Business District (CBD) area of New Delhi, India and the other being the assessment of the impact due to proposed extension of an Information Technology (IT) Park located at the Special Economic Zone at a distance of 4 Kms from the corporation limits along the eastern periphery of city of Madurai, Tamilnadu, India. The case studies highlight the importance of TIA and bring out the need to make TIA an integral and mandatory requirement in the case of new as well as capacity augmentation.

Scientific and methodological aspects of assessment of sustainable development of urban ecosystems

Scientific and methodological aspects of assessment of sustainable development of urban ecosystems

Influence of Land Use Change on Ecosystem Service Value Based on GEE in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Region from 1998 to 2018

In sustainable development assessment of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the ability to dynamically estimate the value of ecosystem services is of great significance. This study considers the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region as the research area, based on the google earth engine (GEE); the classification and decision tree (CART) classification algorithm was adopted to supervise and classify the Landsat Thematic Mapper/Operational Land Imager (TM/OLI) images in the study area in 1998, 2003, 2008, 2013, and 2018, and land use types in these five periods were obtained. Quantitative analysis of the dynamic changes of land use in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region from 1998 to 2018 was carried out. Then, the ecosystem service value (ESV) equivalent estimation method was used to quantitatively estimate the ESV in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and combine it with a 15 km×15 km scale grid to detect its temporal and spatial dynamics. The main results were as follows. ① From 1998 to 2018, the area of construction land (increased by 16.67%) and grassland (reduced by 13.73%) in the six land use types in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region was the largest, and the change in the proportion of water bodies (0.2%) was the smallest. ② The total value of ESV in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region experienced a short-term increase from 1998 to 2003 (an increase of 91.97×108 yuan), and continued to decrease from 2003 to 2018 (a decrease of 239.07×108 yuan), mainly related to the expansion of construction land area in the other three time periods excluding 1998 and 2003. Among the six land use types, the forest provides the highest value of ecosystem services, and the construction land and unused land provide the lowest value of ecosystem services. ③ The ESV time-space analysis based on the 15 km×15 km scale grid showed that the ESV medium area in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region gradually decreased from 1998 to 2018, the ESV lower area and the higher area gradually increased, and the ESV lower-area growth rate was higher than for the higher area. ④ The revised value of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region (sensitivity coefficient range 0-0.83) has good significance and reliability. In future economic development, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region should rationally optimize the land use pattern and strengthen the protection of forest land, grassland, water bodies and cultivated land.

Practical implementation of Data Envelopment Analysis technology to assess the innovative sustainability of resource-type regions

The article is devoted to the modification of the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) method to conduct a comparative assessment of the innovative sustainability of resource-type regions. The theoretical basis for the study was the results of the analysis of accumulated foreign experience and current Russian practice on the assessment of sustainable innovative development at the federal and regional levels. Based on the approaches studied, taking into account the identified advantages and disadvantages, the authors proposed a modification of the DEA method, which allows to evaluate the effectiveness of innovative development of regions from a position of sustainability, with subsequent interpretation of the assessment results and identification of factors that have a negative impact. The results of the study can be used by regional and federal government bodies to monitor risks and threats in the innovation sphere of the regions of the Russian Federation, as well as to adjust existing regulatory, strategic documents and improve mechanisms to stimulate innovation in resource-type regions.

Rank dynamics and club convergence of sustainable development for countries around the world

Assessment of country-level sustainable development is a critical research topic entrenched in the global battle against climate change. This study employs the frontier approach, combined with convergence analysis, to assess the sustainable development for a set of 121 countries over 1990–2014, focusing on analyzing the countries’ rank dynamics and convergence behavior. The levels of the countries’ sustainable development are captured by data envelopment analysis, a nonparametric frontier approach that can jointly assess a country’s economic and environmental performance. Reflecting the divergent views on the importance of economic and environmental objectives in the pursuit of sustainability, the proposed approach generates the countries’ sustainability scores by prioritizing either economic or environmental criterion. This study finds that developed countries have significantly outperformed developing countries if environmental criterion takes precedence over economic criterion in performance assessment. Moreover, regardless of the model employed, there is strong evidence of club convergence, i.e., convergence in subgroups of countries to different steady states rather than convergence in full sample. We analyze the pattern of convergence paths and discuss policy implications obtained from our empirical findings.

Microcrystalline cellulose production from sugarcane bagasse: Sustainable process development and life cycle assessment

Sugarcane bagasse (SCB), a major and abundantly available byproduct of sugarcane processing industries is presently being used for energy generation. However, its rich resource content makes it a perfect feedstock for the production of various value-added products. In this communication, Microcrystalline Cellulose (MCC), a partially depolymerized cellulose is in vogue due to its versatile physical properties which holds substantial applications in the pharmaceutical industries, was produced from the surplus available SCB. Experiments were designed to optimize MCC production from SCB using three different chemical methods namely MCC1, MCC2 and MCC3 by varying the reaction conditions. Relatively higher yield of cellulose (0.34 g/g SCB) and MCC (0.32 g/g SCB) were observed with MCC2 method, followed by MCC3 (cellulose 0.32 g/g SCB; MCC 0.31 g/g SCB) and MCC1 (cellulose 0.30 g/g SCB; MCC 0.28 g/g SCB). Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) showed good correlation with commercial grade MCC for the presence of characteristic functional groups. X-ray diffractograms (XRD) showed 79.8%, 84.1% and 87.4% crystallinity for MCC1, MCC2 and MCC3, respectively. The morphological analysis of all the three MCC samples correlated well with the standard MCC. EcoScale analysis awarded scores greater than 75 for the three MCC methods, in which MCC2 scored the maximum (84). Life cycle analysis depicted the impacts of MCC production methods on various environmental impact categories, where MCC3 method showed relatively less environmental impact in terms of global warming (27% less than MCC2). MCC3 further characterized with X-Ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy, Thermogravimetry analysis (TGA), Differential thermal analysis (DTA) and Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) depicted its characteristic properties. Additionally, the sustainability analysis functioned as a valuable tool to assess the environmental impact of the process, prior to scaling up.

Green trade assessment for sustainable development of Chinese ferrous metal industry

China has been the world’s largest ferrous metals producer for decades. Since China’s ferrous metal industry is resource- and pollution-intensive, the increasing export of ferrous metals leaves a large amount of domestic environmental damage. This paper aims to provide implications for the sustainable green trade of China’s ferrous metals in the 21st century by assessing the Green Trade index, in which the potential embodied environmental damages/costs are considered. The combination of material accounts and value accounts was adopted to obtain policy implications from both amount control and cost reduction. The results showed that: 1) China’s ferrous metal industry achieved overall green trade from 2001 to 2015, with signs of deviation from green trade after 2011; 2) the expansion of export trading and the increase in environmental damage were the main reasons for the deterioration of green trade in China’s ferrous metal industry after 2011; 3) based on the material assessment, 98% of the environmental damage embodied in imports of this industry comes from iron ore consumption and waste-water emission, while 99% of that embodied in exports comes from coal consumption, wastewater, and CO2 emissions; and 4) according to the value assessment, 80% of the environmental damage cost embodied in the imports of this industry comes from iron ore, wastewater, and waste solid, while 90% of that embodied in exports comes from coal, waste-water, waste gas, and CO2 emissions. Based on the above results, policy implications were provided for the sustainable development of Chinese ferrous metal industry.

Can CSR help achieve sustainable development? Applying a new assessment model to CSR cases from Egypt

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to develop an assessment model for corporate social responsibility (CSR) that is interlinked to sustainable development and examine the model on CSR cases in Egypt, exploring whether CSR is embedded into the core agenda of the corporations. This analysis helps in understanding the state of CSR in Egypt and countries with a similar socio-economic background.Design/methodology/approachThe study presents a sustainable development assessment model for CSR, based on combining and modifying Archie Carroll’s model of Hierarchy of Corporate Responsibilities (1979, 2010) and Donna Wood’s Corporate Performance Model (1991) to include sustainable development imperatives. The proposed model analyzes two CSR practices of corporates. Qualitative analysis using in-depth interviews was conducted in the two case studies: a global multinational company represented in Egypt and a family business typical of many Egyptian corporates.FindingsGeneralizing from the results of the assessment in Egypt and countries with similar circumstances, most CSR practices in such a context still fall under philanthropy and few under human development or the business case. The lack of the formal institutional framework for organizing the role of the State in CSR promotion leads to missing the opportunity of linking CSR to the Sustainable Development Goals or similar strategies.Originality/valueThe paper presents a CSR assessment model adopted in developing countries, with a focus on incorporating sustainable development indicators since the 1990s. This methodological development since 2010 is timely and particularly useful for relating CSR to the recent global focus on sustainable development.

Assessment and optimization for regional sustainable development base on the human-land system

The human-land system is a complex and open giant system composed of two subsystems of geographical environment and human activities. Though the optimization of the relationship between two subsystems, we could realize the regional sustainable development. The regional sustainable development is the embodiment of the most optimization of human-land system. This paper revealed human-land system, in terms of connotation, structure, relation, mechanism and function. Based on the theory of human-land system, the paper proposed the regional sustainable development assessment model and carried out the empirical analysis in the township scale. We chose Haiyong Town as the study area. The results show that the study area is in a good level of regional sustainable development, but in a primary stage. The economic sub-system and the society sub-system have reached the good level of sustainable development, but the environment subsystem is always at a low level. The study area should put forward optimization strategies within the economic, social and environmental subsystems, such as ecological agriculture strategy, circular economy strategy, modern service industry strategy, environmental protection system strategy and so on, in order to promoting regional sustainable development. The research results can provide scientific reference for the assessment of regional sustainable development and the formulation of regional sustainable development strategy.

Sustainable Development of Large Cities in Strategic Planning Imperatives: Actualization of Approaches to Assessment

The purpose of this article is to prove the validity of the methodology of measuring the level (index) of sustainable city development by means of using the sociological survey of citizens on the basis of the retrospective analysis of existing approaches to measuring this index. In the contemporary economic literature there are discussions on the possibility of measuring the level (index) of sustainable city development, various lists of indicators and various mathematical formulas. The authors of these methodologies are united in one thing, i.e. in recognition that all known approaches are not ideal, although they complement each other. The diversity of cities in terms of size, geographical location, specialization and a number of other criteria makes it difficult to reach a common opinion in measuring this economic category. The article presents the main provisions of the authors’ method of measuring the level (index) of sustainable city development based on the perception of city inhabitants. The approbation of this approach was carried out using the example of the city of Volgograd (city with a population of 1 million or more) based on the sociological survey conducted in 2014 and 2018. The obtained results allow determining the degree of sustainable development of the city with reasonable accuracy without taking into account the errors of municipal statistics. The proposed approach can be considered universal and it can be used by city authorities at the stage of strategizing and later at the stage of implementing municipal reforms. The most accurate results for comparing the state of sustainable development will be observed in the cities of the same or similar typology. The article substantiates the expediency of the sustainable development assessment among individual cities belonging to the same type (city with a population of 1 million or more, medium-size cities, etc.), as well as the ability to track the dynamics of this state in different periods. The application of the proposed methodology will ensure their competitiveness in the market economic conditions.