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The preparation of sustainability reports, which a negligible number of organisations had been doing until recently, will soon be the new reality for many more organisations. This research aims to present changes during the COVID-19 pandemic in the ecosystem of sustainability reporting pronouncements, especially those used by organisations. In our research, we compare important information about two different periods and the content demands in reporting on sustainability. Changes in the ecosystem are fundamental and unique. Based on the analysis of events and documents, the current research shows the changes in the ecosystem and the future dynamics in the ecosystem, including the principle standard setters (i.e., International Sustainability Standards Board and European Financial Reporting Advisory Group, EFRAG). The research shows that although the changes occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic, they did not significantly impact the ecosystem's development or slow down or stop their development. The COVID-19 pandemic did not affect the speed or dynamics of changes. In the last few years, EFRAG and the European Union established their position and gained a significant influence in sustainability reporting, with EFRAG at the forefront. The European Sustainability Reporting Standards will be mandatory for organisations doing business in the European Union. At the same time, we do not expect that the IFRS Sustainability Disclosure Standards will be directly endorsed for use in the European Union. The paper presents a new perspective on examining sustainability via developing organisations' reporting demands within the framework of the uncertain environment caused by COVID-19. In this context, our research also contributes to the literature. The study also has a potential practical impact on organisations and management since it illuminates a wide range of selected sustainability viewpoints and their reporting.
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Conflicts across the globe affect food security and also have a heavy toll on food safety. Many of the areas affected by conflict are breadbaskets for multiple countries. When the production of staple crops is compromised by diverse conflicts, it becomes necessary to grow them somewhere else to satisfy local, regional, and/or international requirements. However, if that production is done in tropical and subtropical zones, it must be done incorporating strategies to prevent mycotoxin contamination, which has negative health, social, and economic impacts. Otherwise, increased production of susceptible crops in mycotoxin-prone areas may augment the already occurring negative impacts, which are severe in the global south.
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The NTT Group is participating in the international standardization activities in the International Telecommunication Union - Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) Study Group (SG) 5 to protect telecommunication facilities from electromagnetic interference and lightning surges, assess the impact of information and communication technologies on climate change, address the issue of a circular economy that enables sustainable development, and contribute to improving the reliability of telecommunication services and reducing the environmental impact of its business activities. In this article, we introduce the study structure of ITU-T SG5 for the new study period (2022–2024), which has finally started due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the latest discussion trends at the first meeting held in June 2022. © 2022 Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp.. All rights reserved.
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The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has increased the demand for antiviral technologies to mitigate or prevent the risk of viral transmission. Antiviral treated textiles have the potential to save lives, especially in healthcare settings that rely on reusable patient-care textiles and personal protective equipment. Currently, little is known about the role of textiles in cross-contamination and pathogen transmission, despite the wealth of information on hard surfaces and fomites harboring viruses that remain viable in certain circumstances. In addition, there is no international standard method for evaluating residual viral activity on textiles, which would allow a thorough investigation of the efficacy of antiviral textile products. Therefore, this pilot study aims to develop and refine a standardized protocol to quantitatively evaluate residual viral activity on antiviral textiles. Specifically, we focused on general textiles, such as bed linens, commonly used in healthcare settings for patient care. The Tissue Culture Infectious Dose 50 (TCID50) method is frequently used to quantitatively evaluate viral infectivity on textiles, but has not been established as a standard. This procedure involves observing the cytopathic effect of a given virus on cells grown in a 96-well plate after several days of incubation to determine the infectivity titer. We used HCoV-229E and Huh-7 human liver cancer cells for this investigation. We worked to improve the TCID50 method through variations of different steps within the protocol to attain reproducible results. Our proposed optimized hybrid protocol has shown evidence that the protocol is technically simpler and more efficient, and provides successful, consistent results. The analysis showed a significant difference between the treated fabric compared with controls.
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The international shipping industry is unique and important. The negative list related to the opening up of the shipping industry is an important part of the reform and innovation of China's pilot free trade zones. In recent years, as countries around the world continue to promote the process of opening up in the fields of trade and services, the negative list system has been used more in international investment and trade agreements. In the field of International Shipping, how to correctly grasp and apply the negative list system is an important topic. Starting with the general concept of the negative list system of shipping market access, this paper reviews and summarizes the developmental processes of the negative list of foreign capital market access in the shipping field since the establishment of Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone. It compares and analyzes the international contracting practice of the European Union and the United States as reflected in the negative list of shipping market access. It equally points out that the system connection between the negative list still existing in China's shipping field and the international high standard negative list is not enough. It argues that the transparency of the negative list still needs to be further strengthened as the rules behind the list and the awareness of its risk prevention are weak. In view of these hitches, this paper makes some suggestions that are tilted towards improving the negative list system of China's shipping market access. It also continues the optimization of the negative list of shipping market access, and the improvement of a conscious awareness aimed at avoiding the possible risks of the negative list. Finally, it makes a strong argument for a continuous improvement of China's international shipping competitiveness.
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Since its inception in 2020, EMETconferences (International Conference on Energy Material and Energy Technology) were successfully held for last three years, online (2020, 2021, 2022), attracted delegates from a lot of countries and regions including China, Australia, Poland, Slovenia andJapan. As an annual international conference, EMET aims at being a fast and efficient platform for researchers and scholars worldwide to discuss recent developments in the area of Energy Material and Energy Technology.The Third International Conference on Energy Material and Energy Technology (EMET 2022) was scheduled to be held in Sanya, China. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the meeting had to be changed from onsite to online during December 9-10, 2022 for academic exchanges & discussions.There were about 30 experts and scholars attending the conference. Three sessions were included: keynote speeches, oral presentations and poster presentations, covering a wide range of Energy Material and Energy Technology. There were 3 keynote speakers, 6 oral presenters and 13 poster presenter sharing their latest research results and ideas with the audience. Details about the presentations can be found in the Conference Overview part.This conference proceeding included 17 accepted articles selected from 33 submissions, all the papers have been through rigorous review and process to meet the requirements of International publication standard. We would like to express our gratitude to the reviewers of these manuscripts, who provided constructive criticism and stimulated comments and suggestions to the authors.We are extremely grateful as organizers, technical program committee and editors and extend our most sincere thanks to all the authors for their excellent contribution and work. Our sincere gratitude also goes to the IOP Publishing editors and managers for their helpful cooperation during the preparation of the proceeding.On behalf of the Organizing Committees of EMET2022.List of Technical Program Committee are available in this pdf.
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1. Preface/IntroductionWe are pleased to share with you the scholarly papers that were presented during the 2nd International Conference on Environmental Sustainability and Resource Security (IC-ENSURES 2022), which was held virtually on March 8 and 9 in Johor, Malaysia, at Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. This conference was held concurrently with the International Seminar on Science and Technology (ISSTEC) 2022.Centre for Environmental Sustainability and Water Security (IPASA) organises the IC-ENSURES conference series every two years. To foster information and knowledge exchange on resource security and environmental sustainability, this conference series intends to establish a global forum for professionals and academics. This time around, the theme of the conference is "Green Technology for Sustainable Future: The Next Step”. This theme is pertinent to environmental issues, disaster preparedness, and water security.With the global pandemic happening around the world, we are particularly interested to see how COVID-19 would affect our water and environment. Additionally, natural catastrophes, particularly those associated with climate change, have become more common and severe in recent years due to anthropogenic activities. Putting that in mind, the themes and topics of IC-ENSURES this year were carefully designed so that they associated with the ongoing pandemic and climate change.Engineering-related sessions including discussions on the following two major topics: environmental sustainability and resource security were carried out. These manuscripts were subjected to a rigorous review in compliance with international publication standards. We anticipate that the collection of accepted manuscripts will benefit numerous academicians, researchers, and experts in a given topic.List of Conference or sponsor logo, committees are available in this pdf.
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We are glad to introduce you the proceedings of the first Annual Conference on Health and Food Science Technology (ACHOST) 2021. The 2nd ACHOST 2021 addresses challenges and innovations the field of Food Science and Health, Environmental Science and Issue, Earth Science and Technology. It also provides a premier interdisciplinary platform for researchers, educators and practitioners to present and discuss the most recent innovations, trends, and concerns as well as practical challenges encountered and solutions adopted in the fields of of applied science, technology, and engineering.As we may aware, the World Health Organization officially declared the novel coronavirus COVID-19 a pandemic. Governments around the world are now issuing restrictions on travel, gatherings, and meetings in an effort to limit and slow the spread of the virus. The health and safety of the author and reseacher community is our first priority and we are supporting these efforts. Therefore, the ACHOST conference was held virtually on 20 November 2021.The ACHOST conference is hosted by PT. Kresna Acitya Nusantara Mediatama and co-hosted by Universitas Muhammadiyah Sidoarjo, Relawan Jurnal Indonesia. This year, we held this flexible online conference to gather experts and scholars around the globe with the aim to continue disseminating the latest advanced research in the field of Food Science and Health, Environmental Science and Issue, Earth Science and Technology. The conference was held from Yogyakarta as the host of the event. The ACHOST 2021 event is virtually implemented with a model that all invited speakers are given time to present their material for about 30-45 minutes each. It then followed by a question and answer by the participants with a direct questioning system, through chat forums and Q&A forums provided by the zoom application. Overall, the conference took 6 hours.The number of participants who joined the zoom room was recorded around 341 participants. The authors or participants are came from 5 countries, namely Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei Darussalam, Philippine and India. Indonesian Participants are come from 19 Provinces of 33 Provinces.The committee of the conference are honored to have invited following renowned experts as our keynote speakers. ASSOC. PROF. IR. TS. DR. MUZAMMIL BIN JUSOH (C.ENG), PhD from Universiti Malaysia Perlis;DR. YUDHI NUGRAHA from Spanish National Cancer Research Center (CNIO).We are glad to share with you that around 89 pre-registered authors are submitted their work in the conferences. However, its about 54 papers are selected and accepted for the conferences. All the papers have been through rigorous review by a panel of reviewers who provide critical comments and corrections, and have contributed subtantially to the improvement of the quality of the papers to meet the requirements of International publication standard and IOP EES Scope.We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the Chairman, the distinguished keynote speakers, as well as all the participants. We also want to thank the publisher for publishing the proceedings. May the readers could enjoy the gain some valuable knowledge from it. We are expecting more and more experts and scholars from all over the world to join this international event next year.List of Chair of the Organizing Committee, Editors, Host Organizer, Committee are available in this Pdf.
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While Rwanda is aiming at environmental pollution resilience and green growth, some industries are still discharging untreated effluent into the environment. This study gives a general overview of the compliance level of industrial effluent discharge in Rwanda and the linked negative environmental impacts. It comprises qualitative and quantitative analyses of data obtained from wastewater samples collected from five selected industries in Rwanda. The selected industries had previously been audited and monitored by the Rwanda Environment Management Authority (REMA), due to complains from neighboring residents. The study found that the effluent discharge from wastewater treatment plants (WWTP) for all concerned industries failed to comply with (i) oil and grease (O&G) national and international tolerable parameter limits or the (ii) fecal coliforms national standard. In addition, a compliance level of 66.7% was observed for key water quality monitoring parameters (pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), chemical oxygen demand (COD), total suspended solids (TSS), and heavy metals (i.e., lead (Pb), cadmium (Cd), and chromium (Cr)). Following these study findings, one industry was closed by the REMA for deliberately discharging untreated effluent into an adjacent river. This study recommends the adoption of the best available technology for effluent treatment, installation or renovation of existing WWTPs, and the relocation to industrial zones of industries adjacent to fragile environments.
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As a global platform, the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have reinforced country’s institutional capacity to meet the international standard compliance. Creative city concept is one among those linking the SDGs targeting agenda to the local development policy. This study investigates if the implementation of creative city concept may succeed the fulfilment of SDGs targets. We selected three cities in Indonesia for comparative study: Pekalongan, Yogyakarta, and Surakarta. Our observation completed during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020. We combined targeted questionnaire to academics, business, community, and government (ABCG) stakeholders with content analysis of the government publications and regulations. The result shows that Pekalongan City Government has managed well in actualising creative city concept from the policymaking to program implementation. The Yogyakarta City Government seems inconvenience in specifying targeted creative industry to promote local economy. For the Surakarta case, the targeted creative industry has little support in the local development policy. Lack of institutional capacity and trained staffs might be the main reasons for slow implementation of these ideas into local government context. Consequently, creative city concept and SDGs agenda are more favoured as a short- to medium-term project rather than a long-lasting city development vision.
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Speed read Six African countries to get technology for manufacturing COVID-19 vaccines Only 12 per cent of the African population are fully vaccinated Countries should secure markets for the home-produced vaccines, experts say [KAMPALA] Six African countries are to receive technology that will enable them to manufacture COVID-19 vaccines, in an effort to reduce reliance on producers outside the continent, the World Health Organization (WHO) has announced. The rollout is part of a global initiative aimed at helping low- and middle-income countries to access the technology for producing mRNA vaccines at scale and to international standards in order to stem the COVID-19 pandemic. “Diversifying mRNA vaccine manufacturing capacity to low- and middle-income countries should be a global health priority,” said Doctors Without Borders (MSF), in response to the WHO announcement.
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To the Revised ANSI/ISEA Z308.1 Standard While the number of workplace nonfatal injuries reported by private industry employers ticked down in 2020 to 2.1 million from 2.7 million in 2019, according to the statistics released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) in November 2021, accidents can happen at any time in any type of work environment. Revised Standard ANSI/ISEA Z308.1-2021 was developed by the International Safety Equipment Association (ISEA) First Aid Product Group and approved by key stakeholders representing construction groups, technology corporations, testing laboratories, utility companies and others. Included in the updated standard is a more robust discussion to assist the employer in assessing risks, identifying potential hazards and selecting additional first-aid supplies relevant to a particular application or work environment, including mobile workstations or field offices.
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The management of the global energy resources has stimulated the emergence of various agreements in favor of the environment. Among the most famous are the Conference of Parties (COP) and Route 2030, which aim to limit global warming to 1.5 °C by reducing the energy consumption and global emission levels. In order to comply with the international standards for energy consumption and pollutant emissions, the Brazilian government has been promoting the expansion of biofuels in the national energy matrix. Considering this scenario, the development of a novel internal combustion engine for the exclusive use of ethanol as a fuel, equipped with state-of-the-art technologies and employing modern design concepts, consists of an innovative and promising pathway for future Brazilian mobility, from both environmental and technological outlooks. In this sense, this work presents a method to determine the main engine dimensions as part of the initial process for a new ethanol prototype engine development. The Brazilian biofuel was selected due to its physicochemical properties, which allow the engine to achieve higher loads, and also due to its large availability as a renewable energy source in the country. Furthermore, a port water injection system was fitted to the engine in order to assist the combustion process by mitigating the knock tendency. The predicted overall engine performance was obtained by carrying out a GT-PowerTM 1D-CFD simulation, whose results pointed to a maximum torque of 279 Nm from 2000 to 4000 rpm and an indicated peak power of 135 kW at 5500 rpm. With a maximum water-to-fuel ratio of 19.2%, the engine was able to perform its entire full load curve at the MBT condition, a fact that makes the WI approach along with the ethanol fuel a very attractive solution. As a result of the specific design and optimization of each geometric parameter for this unique ethanol engine, a maximum indicated fuel conversion efficiency of 45.3% was achieved. Moreover, the engine was capable of achieving over 40% of the indicated fuel conversion efficiency in almost its entire full load curve.
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Purpose>To achieve sustainable development to protect the environment and society, an increasing number of scholars have conducted in-depth research on sustainable and responsible consumption behaviors. The outputs demonstrate that consumers are increasingly concerned and aware of the issues associated with the excessive use of resources. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the validity and reliability of the Sustainable Consumption Scale (SC-S) in the Spanish context.Design/methodology/approach>The adaptation of SC-S to Spanish was carried out in accordance with international methodological standards. The Spanish version of this scale was applied empirically to the research sample was composed of 962 university students (49.1% male and 50.9% female) from 54 Universities in 15 regions of Spain that participated in the study.Findings>The analyses carried out to verify the psychometric properties retained 16 items from the original proposal, grouped equally in three factors: Cognitive – six items;Affective – seven items;and Conative – four items. The scale presented adequate adjustment indexes, as well as optimal values of the different measures of reliability, recommended by the literature.Originality/value>This instrument can be used by the Spanish academic community, which will contribute to the assessment and prediction regarding a sustainable consumption attitude. From these screenings, it will be also possible to understand the impact and development of the objectives outlined by Agenda 2030.
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[...]within financial risk, there are many forms such as investment risk, market risk, inflation risk, credit risk, business risk, liquidity risk and others (Sraders, 2019). In occupational safety, health and environmental standards, risk has generally been defined as the probability or likelihood of an occurrence, and its resulting severity of consequences. A third variation on the definition of risk is found among management systems standards including ISO 45001, Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems (OHSMS);ISO 14001, Environmental Management Systems;and ISO 9000, Quality Management Systems. An organization considering locating a new facility in such areas would likely assess the degree of risk for wind and flood damage based on a location's weather patterns, flooding and wind damage history, elevation, proximity to coastal waters, and other risk factors. The accepted proposal will involve a high-level committee of global experts with the goal of developing a consensus on meta-definitions (universal or base definitions) for risk and associated terms that would standardize their use in standards and reduce confusion to end users.
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INTRODUCTION: D- Dimer levels from peripheral blood are increasingly used to assess various pathological conditions. Initially, an area for hematologists, now this analyte is evaluated more extensively from many specialties of medicine. Covid-19 infection has not only added a new dimension to D-Dimer level assessment in this disease but has also shed newer lights to the underlying pathophysiological mechanisms for its elevation in this disease. AREAS COVERED: Innate variability in measuring D- Dimer levels, Impact of various techniques in measuring D- Dimer, nonavailability of uniform controls and standards, molecular heterogeneity of the product, how it is produced. Reasons for raised D- Dimer in covid-19 infection. D- Dimer in other pathological states. Articles with relevant key words from 1990 searched in PubMed were utilized for review. EXPERT OPINION: : D-Dimer has important application in diagnosis, prognosis, management, and understanding various conditions. Its level can rise with increased coagulability of blood, sepsis, cytokine storm, snake bite, etc. Renal function, age influences its reference ranges. Units of measurement, its expression varies in different reports needing international standardization. In Covid-19 infection its levels correlate with stage of the disease, pathology, and complications.
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COVID-19 , COVID-19/diagnosis , Cytokine Release Syndrome/diagnosis , Fibrin Fibrinogen Degradation Products/metabolism , Humans , PrognosisABSTRACT
The 2nd International Conference on Energetics, Civil and Agricultural Engineering is an international event that has been successfully held in a hybrid mode (online and onsite) organized by the Tashkent Institute of Irrigation and Agricultural Mechanization Engineers (TIIAME), Tashkent, Uzbekistan. ICECAE is a privileged space to discuss current issues related to Energetics, Civil and Agricultural Engineering. This international event aims to explore emerging technologies and concepts in a collaborative way, bringing together scientists, researchers, engineers, students and professionals from different areas. ICECAE 2021 proceedings collected the latest research and results in the field of energetics, civil and agricultural engineering. All manuscripts published in the proceeding have been through rigorous review and process to meet the requirements of international publication standard. In the honorable and keynote speeches sessions, honorable speakers were each allocated 40 minutes and keynote speakers were each allocated 20-25 minutes to hold their speeches. We were honored to invite 3 honorable speakers (Professor Josep M. Guerrero, Professor Saifur Rahman, and Professor Mohammad Shahidehpour) and 10 distinguished experts as keynote speakers to present their insightful speeches. As honorable speakers, Professor Josep M. Guerrero (from Aalborg University – Denmark) talked about Space Microgrids – NanoSats, Lunar Bases and Closed Ecosystems, Professor Saifur Rahman (from Virginia Tech Advanced Research Institute - USA) delivered a speech on Global Electric Power Sector: Engaging with Environmental Issues, and Professor Mohammad Shahidehpour (from Illinois Institute of Technology - USA) held a speech on Blockchain for Transactive Energy Management in Renewable Energy Systems. As keynote speakers, Prof. Dr. Jan Wincenty Dobrowolski (AGH University of Science and Technology - Poland) shared his experiences related to his 50 years contribution to global cooperation on Sustainable Development 1971-2021 and innovative proposals for adaptation to climate change, COVID-19 and outer-space missions;Professor emeritus Dr. Davidas Belsare (from Bhopal University - India) made a speech about the effect of laser diode on oranges to other fruit crops like guava and papaya;Professor Justyna Kobylarczyk and Professor Michal Krupa (from Cracow University of Technology – Poland) held a speech on the topic of high quality of residential environment;Professor Jose Osvaldo B. Carioca (from Federal University of Ceara - Brazil) expressed his keynote address about synthesis of chitosan membranes to be used in dual system of dark fermentation and MEC-electrolyzers to produce high quality hydrogen;Professor Dominika Kusnierz-Krupa and Dr. Malgorzata Hryniewicz (from Cracow University of Technology -Poland) made their talk about a new functions in a historic buildings;Professor Alirza Mamedov (from Kyiv National University of Construction and Architecture - Ukraine) delivered his talk about historical city analysis;Professor Manoj Stephen Paul and Dr. Ritu Chaturvedi (from St. Johns College - India) made their speech on human health risk assessment associated with consumption of food containing heavy metals;Associate professor Pavel Navitski (from Oral Roberts University – USA) delivered his talk about drift control during field spraying;and Dr. Ulrich Berk (president of the German Association of Homatherapy - Germany) made his keynote speech about agnihotra and homa farming -tools for a sustainable development on planet Earth. List of ICECAE 2021 Committee are available in this pdf.