Exploring the mediating role of financial inclusion in the relationship between economic policy uncertainty and CO2 emissions: A global perspective.

This study examines the connection between economic policy uncertainty (EPU), CO2 emissions, and financial inclusion in developed and developing countries. Using the data from 2004 to 2021, advanced statistical techniques are employed, including Sobel test, to explore the mediating effect of financial inclusion on the relationship between economic policy uncertainty (EPU) and CO2 emissions. There is a dearth of research examining these three variables together in a single study. Similarly, using financial inclusion as a mediator in the relation of EPU and CO2 emissions is a novel concept. This article employs a multi-indicator approach to measure key variables like CO2 emissions and financial inclusion. The results indicate that uncertainties in economic policies contribute in practices that lead to higher CO2 emissions in overall panel data of 44 countries. In addition, when considering the relationship between EPU and FI, the results indicate a significant and negative relationship between EPU and FI. If there is uncertainty in economic policies, it may lead toward challenges and hurdles in financial inclusion. When the mediating affect was checked, it was found financial inclusion acts as a significant mediator in the relationship between EPU and CO2 emissions, depicting that financial inclusion fosters the environmental quality and mitigates the potential harmful effects of environmental aspects of economic policy uncertainty. Therefore, policies that promote financial inclusion should be given top priority by governments, particularly in emerging nations. Financial literacy and bank service accessibility should be promoted. These measures would lessen the impact of staggering economic policies on CO2 emissions. It is necessary for policymakers to include environmental factors, specifically those relating to carbon emissions, into economic strategies. This requires encouraging industries to adopt eco-friendly practices and coordinating economic strategies with sustainability objectives.

Switzerland and the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations from the youngSCS Perspective.

Switzerland's commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations is showcased in this article with concrete examples of actions taken so far in the private and public sector. To further highlight the involvement of the chemical scientists in the implementation of the SDGs in Switzerland to date, the young-SCS also interviewed various individuals.

Population modifiable risk factors associated with neonatal mortality in 35 sub-Saharan Africa countries: analysis of data from demographic and health surveys.

Background: Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has the highest burden of neonatal mortality in the world. Identifying the most critical modifiable risk factors is imperative for reducing neonatal mortality rates. This study is the first to calculate population-attributable fractions (PAFs) for modifiable risk factors of neonatal mortality in SSA. Methods: We analysed the most recent Demographic and Health Surveys data sets from 35 SSA countries conducted between 2010 and 2022. Generalized linear latent and mixed models were used to estimate odds ratios (ORs) along with 95% confidence intervals (CIs). PAFs adjusted for communality were calculated using ORs and prevalence estimates for key modifiable risk factors. Subregional analyses were conducted to examine variations in modifiable risk factors for neonatal mortality across Central, Eastern, Southern, and Western SSA regions. Findings: In this study, we included 255,891 live births in the five years before the survey. The highest PAFs of neonatal mortality among singleton children were attributed to delayed initiation of breastfeeding (>1 h after birth: PAF = 23.88%; 95% CI: 15.91, 24.86), uncleaned cooking fuel (PAF = 5.27%; 95% CI: 1.41, 8.73), mother's lacking formal education (PAF = 4.34%; 95% CI: 1.15, 6.31), mother's lacking tetanus vaccination (PAF = 3.54%; 95% CI: 1.55, 4.92), and infrequent antenatal care (ANC) visits (PAF = 2.45; 95% CI: 0.76, 3.63). Together, these five modifiable risk factors were associated with 39.49% (95% CI: 21.13, 48.44) of neonatal deaths among singleton children in SSA. Our subregional analyses revealed some variations in modifiable risk factors for neonatal mortality. Notably, delayed initiation of breastfeeding consistently contributed to the highest PAFs of neonatal mortality across all four regions of SSA: Central, Eastern, Southern, and Western SSA. Interpretation: The PAF estimates in the present study indicate that a considerable proportion of neonatal deaths in SSA are preventable. We identified five modifiable risk factors that accounted for approximately 40% of neonatal deaths in SSA. The findings have policy implications. Funding: None.

Estimating carbon and water footprints associated with commercial milk formula production and use: development and implications of the Green Feeding Climate Action Tool.

Carbon offset frameworks like the UN Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) have largely overlooked interventions involving food, health, and care systems, including breastfeeding. The innovative Green Feeding Climate Action Tool (GFT) assesses the environmental impact of commercial milk formula (CMF) use, and advocates for breastfeeding support interventions as legitimate carbon offsets. This paper provides an overview of the GFT's development, key features, and potential uses. The offline and online GFT were developed using the DMADV methodology (Define, Measure, Analyze, Design, Verify). The GFT reveals that the production and use of CMF by infants under 6 months results in annual global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of between 5.9 and 7.5 billion kg CO2 eq. and consumes 2,562.5 billion liters of water. As a national example, in India, one of the world's most populous countries, CMF consumption requires 250.6 billion liters of water and results in GHG emissions ranging from 579 to 737 million kg CO2 eq. annually, despite the country's high breastfeeding prevalence among infants under 6 months. The GFT mainly draws on data for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), as many high-income countries (HICs) do not collect suitable data for such calculations. Despite poor official data on breastfeeding practices in HICs, GFT users can input their own data from smaller-scale surveys or their best estimates. The GFT also offers the capability to estimate and compare baseline with counterfactual scenarios, such as for interventions or policy changes that improve breastfeeding practices. In conclusion, the GFT is an important innovation to quantify CMF's environmental impact and highlight the significance of breastfeeding for planetary as well as human health. Women's contributions to environmental preservation through breastfeeding should be recognized, and breastfeeding interventions and policies should be funded as legitimate carbon offsets. The GFT quantifies CMF's carbon and water footprints and facilitates financing breastfeeding support as a carbon offset initiative under CDM funding facilities.

Revolutionizing indoor air quality monitoring through IoT innovations: a comprehensive systematic review and bibliometric analysis.

Indoor air quality (IAQ) in the built environment is significantly influenced by particulate matter, volatile organic compounds, and air temperature. Recently, the Internet of Things (IoT) has been integrated to improve IAQ and safeguard human health, comfort, and productivity. This review seeks to highlight the potential of IoT integration for monitoring IAQ. Additionally, the paper details progress by researchers in developing IoT/mobile applications for IAQ monitoring, and their transformative impact in smart building, healthcare, predictive maintenance, and real-time data analysis systems. It also outlines the persistent challenges (e.g., data privacy, security, and user acceptability), hampering effective IoT implementation for IAQ monitoring. Lastly, the global developments and research landscape on IoT for IAQ monitoring were examined through bibliometric analysis (BA) of 106 publications indexed in Web of Science from 2015 to 2022. BA revealed the most significant contributing countries are India and Portugal, while the top productive institutions and researchers are Instituto Politecnico da Guarda (10.37% of TP) and Marques Goncalo (15.09% of TP), respectively. Keyword analysis revealed four major research themes: IoT, pollution, monitoring, and health. Overall, this paper provides significant insights for identifying prospective collaborators, benchmark publications, strategic funding, and institutions for future IoT-IAQ researchers.

Nickel augmented biochar for sustaining produced water treatment to decarbonize oil and gas industrial waste using anaerobic-aerobic granular cylindrical periodic discontinuous batch reactors.

This study assessed the efficacy of granular cylindrical periodic discontinuous batch reactors (GC-PDBRs) for produced water (PW) treatment by employing eggshell and waste activated sludge (WAS) derived Nickel (Ni) augmented biochar. The synthesized biochar was magnetized to further enhance its contribution towards achieving carbon neutrality due to carbon negative nature, Carbon dioxide (CO2) sorption, and negative priming effects. The GC-PDBR1 and GC-PDBR2 process variables were optimized by the application of central composite design (CCD). This is to maximize the decarbonization rate. Results showed that the systems could reduce total phosphorus (TP) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) by 76-80% and 92-99%, respectively. Optimal organic matter and nutrient removals were achieved at 80% volumetric exchange ratio (VER), 5 min settling time and 3000 mg/L mixed liquor suspended solids (MLSS) concentration with desirability values of 0.811 and 0.954 for GC-PDBR1 and GC-PDBR2, respectively. Employing four distinct models, the biokinetic coefficients of the GC-PDBRs treating PW were calculated. The findings indicated that First order (0.0758-0.5365) and Monod models (0.8652-0.9925) have relatively low R2 values. However, the Grau Second-order model and Modified Stover-Kincannon model have high R2 values. This shows that, the Grau Second Order and Modified Stover-Kincannon models under various VER, settling time, and MLSS circumstances, are more suited to explain the removal of pollutants in the GC-PDBRs. Microbiological evaluation demonstrated that a high VER caused notable rises in the quantity of several microorganisms. Under high biological selective pressure, GC-PDBR2 demonstrated a greater percentage of nitrogen removal via autotrophic denitrification and a greater number of nitrifying bacteria. The overgrowth of bacteria such as Actinobacteriota spp. Bacteroidota spp, Gammaproteobacteria, Desulfuromonas Mesotoga in the phylum, class, and genus, has positively impacted on granule formation and stability. Taken together, our study through the introduction of intermittent aeration GC-PDBR systems with added magnetized waste derived biochar, is an innovative approach for simultaneous aerobic sludge granulation and PW treatment, thereby providing valuable contributions in the journey toward achieving decarbonization, carbon neutrality and sustainable development goals (SDGs).

SDGs Managers' Assessment Bias and Their Implications for Preventing Violence Against Women in Companies.

This study explores the role of managers' perceptions of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in preventing violence against women in companies. Surveying 673 managers in Lima, Peru, it found gender-based discrepancies in SDG priorities, with men leaning toward industry goals and women toward well-being and gender equality. Socially ingrained gender biases influence prevention strategies: men often comply with mandatory measures, while women opt for noncompulsory strategic actions. Notably, a high valuation of SDG-5 (gender equality) correlates with diverse prevention efforts. The findings highlight the importance of addressing gender bias in company practices and improving business school formation.

Assessing the Progress toward a Water-Efficient Economy in the United States from 1985 to 2015.

United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6 tackles the long-neglected economic dimension of water utilization by monitoring nations' water use efficiency (WUE). However, it is imperative to emphasize the need for consistent spatial-temporal subnational WUE estimates, rather than relying solely on recent national trends, which can obscure crucial water use concerns and improvement opportunities. Here, a time series analysis of national, state, and sectoral (e.g., industrial, service, and agriculture) WUE from 1980 to 2015 was developed by compiling the most comprehensive and disaggregated water and economic data from 3243 US counties and 50 US states. The US total WUE increased by 181% from 16.2 (1985) to 45.6 USD/m3 (2015), driven by service sector WUE enhancements. The increased industry and service WUEs in most states were more strongly correlated with decreased per capita water withdrawal than with economic growth. Simultaneously, reductions in agriculture WUE were observed in 18 states potentially because of the complicated interaction of diverse factors specific to local communities. Expanding WUE gaps between affluent and less affluent states, and persisting WUE gaps between water-abundant andwater-scarce states highlight the need to advance policies to support under-resourced communities in effective water planning and water pricing for advancing equitable development.

Setting a shared development agenda: prioritizing the sustainable development goals in the Dominican Republic with fuzzy-LMAW.

The sustainable development goals (SDGs) were established by the United Nations as an international call to eradicate poverty, safeguard the environment, and guarantee that everyone lives in peace and prosperity by 2030. The SDGs aim to balance growth and sustainability in three dimensions: social, economic and environmental. However, in the post-pandemic era, when resources for public development policies are scarce, nations face the problem of prioritizing which SDGs to pursue. A lack of agreement is one of the determinants of low performance levels of the SDGs, and multicriteria decision analysis tools can help in this task, which is especially relevant in developing countries that are falling behind in achieving the SDGs. To test the feasibility and appropriateness of one of these tools, the Fuzzy Logarithm Methodology of Additive Weights, we apply it to prioritize the SDGs in the Dominican Republic, to see if the priorities established are consistent. Seventeen experts were surveyed, and the main result was that Decent work and economic growth was the most important goal for the country. Our findings, consistent with the literature, show the path to similar applications in other developing countries to enhance performance levels in the achievement of the SDGs.

Risk allocation schemes between public and private sectors in green energy projects.

In this research, we analyse how project risk allocation strategies impact the volume of private investment in renewable energy projects with the participation of both the public and private sectors. To this purpose, we analyse a sample formed by 2215 projects performed in 73 developing countries in the period 1997-2019 involving the following technologies: solar, hydro, wind, waste, biogas, biomass, and geothermal. Our findings reveal that those projects performed through governance schemes in which the private partner takes more project responsibilities attract more private money. Additional drivers for attracting private investment at the project level and institutional level are found. Furthermore, we reveal that the transference of project risks to the private partner emerges as a very relevant project feature that interacts with some of the project and institutional factors, revealing both complementary and substitution effects. The significance of this research extends beyond academia, since there are factors influencing private investment that can be controlled by various stakeholders in projects (such as policymakers, private investors, and project managers). Understanding their impact, significance, and interaction effects-factors that sometimes moderate or accentuate private investment-is crucial. The identified patterns illuminate optimal risk allocation practices, offering practical insights to enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of projects.

Agrochemical-free genetically modified and genome-edited crops: Towards achieving the United Nations sustainable development goals and a 'greener' green revolution.

Sustainable farming on ever-shrinking agricultural land and declining water resources for the growing human population is one of the greatest environmental and food security challenges of the 21st century. Conventional, age-old organic farming practices alone, and foods based on costly cellular agriculture, do not have the potential to be upscaled to meet the food supply challenges for feeding large populations. Additionally, agricultural practices relying on chemical inputs have a well-documented detrimental impact on human health and the environment. As the available farming methods have reached their productivity limits, new approaches to agriculture, combining friendly, age-old farming practices with modern technologies that exclude chemical interventions, are necessary to address the food production challenges. Growing genetically modified (GM) crops without chemical inputs can allow agricultural intensification with reduced adverse health and environmental impacts. Additionally, integrating high-value pleiotropic genes in their genetic improvement coupled with the use of modern agricultural technologies, like robotics and artificial intelligence (AI), will further improve productivity. Such 'organic-GM' crops will offer consumers healthy, agrochemical-free GM produce. We believe these agricultural practices will lead to the beginning of a potentially new chemical-free GM agricultural revolution in the era of Agriculture 4.0 and help meet the targets of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Furthermore, given the advancement in the genome editing (GE) toolbox, we ought to develop a new category of 'trait-reversible GM crops' to avert the fears of those who believe in ecological damage by GM crops. Thus, in this article, we advocate farming with no or minimal chemical use by combining chemical-free organic farming with the existing biofortified and multiple stress tolerant GM crops, while focusing on the development of novel 'biofertilizer-responsive GE crops' and 'trait-reversible GE crops' for the future.

Food-Energy-Water Nexus in compliance with Sustainable Development Goals for integrating and managing the core environmental verticals for sustainable energy and circular economy.

Food, energy, and water resources are intricately interconnected, and nexus provides a holistic approach for addressing these complex links to minimize inefficiencies and waste. Nexus approach and circular economy are considered as effective solutions for sustainability. Quantification of these relations is the first step towards incorporating nexus modeling which helps sustainable production and consumption. For achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, understanding and effectively managing the FEW nexus becomes imperative. With an integral performance perspective, there is a need to address the interdependencies and trade-offs among food, energy, and water systems and challenges of economic, social and environmental sustainability. The aim of this study is to provide a comprehensive analysis of the FEW nexus, identify key opportunities and challenges, and propose integrated strategies for managing these core environmental verticals sustainably. The study addresses the accomplishment of these goals through nexus approaches and outlines the need for technological advancements for shared benefits among resources, contributing to conceptual development of nexus and circular economy. The results highlight the critical importance of adopting a nexus approach to advance sustainable development goals, enhance resource efficiency, and promote synergistic solutions across food, energy, and water systems.

A Neoteric Paradigm to Improve Food Security: The Predictors of Women's Influence on Egocentric Networks' Food Waste Behaviors.

COVID-19, the most recent multi-dimensional global food crisis, challenged leadership and impacted individuals' personal networks. Two cross-sectional surveys were disseminated to women involved in their state's women's leadership committee to understand food waste behaviors. An egocentric network analysis was chosen as the methodology to better understand personal advice network characteristics and examine the impacts of Farm Bureau women's leadership committee members' advice networks on their food waste behavior. A multilevel model was conducted to identify factors related to respondents leading their network members toward positive food waste decisions. Independent variables included in the variables at the individual (e.g., each respondent's race, generation), dyadic (e.g., length respondent has known each member of her network), and network levels (e.g., proportion of the respondent's network that was female) were included in the model. Women were more likely to report connections with people they led to positive food waste behaviors and food security when: they had higher food waste sum scores, they were part of Generation X, the network member they led to more positive food waste behaviors was a friend, and if there were fewer women in their advice networks.

Conversion of locally available materials to biochar and activated carbon for drinking water treatment.

For environmental sustainability and to achieve sustainable development goals (SDGs), drinking water treatment must be done at a reasonable cost with minimal environmental impact. Therefore, treating contaminated drinking water requires materials and approaches that are inexpensive, produced locally, and effortlessly. Hence, locally available materials and their derivatives, such as biochar (BC) and activated carbon (AC) were investigated thoroughly. Several researchers and their findings show that the application of locally accessible materials and their derivatives are capable of the adsorptive removal of organic and inorganic contaminants from drinking water. The application of locally available materials such as lignocellulosic materials/waste and its thermo-chemically derived products, including BC and AC were found effective in the treatment of contaminated drinking water. Thus, this review aims to thoroughly examine the latest developments in the use of locally accessible feedstocks for tailoring BC and AC, as well as their features and applications in the treatment of drinking water. We attempted to explain facts related to the potential mechanisms of BC and AC, such as complexation, co-precipitation, electrostatic interaction, and ion exchange to treat water, thereby achieving a risk-free remediation approach to polluted water. Additionally, this research offers guidance on creating efficient household treatment units based on the health risks associated with customized adsorbents and cost-benefit analyses. Lastly, this review work discusses the current obstacles for using locally accessible materials and their thermo-chemically produced by-products to purify drinking water, as well as the necessity for technological interventions.

Linkages between the Sustainable Development Goals and health in Somalia.

BACKGROUND: The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted in 2015 compromises 17 universal and indivisible goals for sustainable development, however the interactions between the SDGs in Somalia is not known which is vital for understanding potential synergies and trad-offs between the SDGs. Hence, this study aims to identify and classify the linkages between the SDGs with a focus on health and well-being (SDG 3) in Somalia. METHODS: Following the SDG Synergies approach, 35 leading experts from the public and private sectors as well as academia and civil society gathered for a 2-day workshop in Mogadishu and scored the interactions between the individual SDGs on a seven point-scale from - 3 to + 3. From this, a cross-impact matrix was created, and network models were used to showcase the direct and indirect interactions between the SDGs with a focus on SDG 3 (good health and well-being). RESULTS: Many promoting and a few restricting interactions between the different SDGs were found. Overall, SDG 16 (peace, justice, and strong institutions) influenced the other SDGs the most. When second-order interactions were considered, progress on SDG 16 (peace, justice, and strong institutions) showed the largest positive impact on SDG 3 (good health and well-being). SDG 3 (good health and well-being) was heavily influenced by progress on other SDGs in Somalia and making progress on SDG 3 (good health and well-being) positively influenced progress on all other SDGs. CONCLUSION: The findings revealed that in Somalia, the interactions between the SDGs are mostly synergistic and that SDG 16 (peace, justice, and strong institutions) has a strong influence on progress on other SDGs as well as progress on SDG 3 (good health and well-being). This study highlights the need for a multisectoral strategy to accelerate progress on the SDGs in Somalia in general, and particularly SDG 3 (good health and well-being).

Policy vs. practice in sport and climate change: the perspectives of key actors in global sport and international development.

Despite widespread, scientifically supported recognition of the scope of the climate crisis, and policies in place connecting sport to sustainable development, there remain concerns that the environment and climate change are rarely acknowledged within SDP activity and that even when they are, it is unclear how such policies are implemented, and to what effect. This raises the question of how and why the climate crisis and the attendant relationships between sport and sustainable development are understood and operationalized (or not) by stakeholders within the SDP sector. In this paper, therefore, we explore various perspectives and tensions around the environment and climate crisis within the SDP sector. To do so, we draw on interviews with SDP policy-makers (primarily from the United Nations and the International Olympic Committee) and SDP practitioners living and working in the global South in order to gauge the place of the environment and climate change in their everyday SDP policy-making, programming and practices. Overall, the data shows that while SDP stakeholders recognize the urgency of the climate crisis, the need for action, and the policy agenda linking sport to sustainable development, significant barriers, tensions and politics are still in place that prevent consistent climate action within SDP. Policy commitments and coherence are therefore needed in order to make climate action a core feature of SDP activity and practice.

Global synergy of carbon and pollution emissions among countries with different income levels and development stages.

The world was drift away on the sustainable development goals (SDGs), whatever global countries claimed fighting for. It's thus essential to illustrate the status of development and environmental quality simultaneously. Resource consumption and energy consumption as the basic needs in supporting human societal development, are commonly used, because they come from the same source and are most directly observed in the open air. We thus examined nexus of carbon and pollution emissions, which also directly indicate residents' livelihood and lifestyle. The possibility of the nexus shifts among income levels with population stack analysis was further investigated. Our findings indicate that the diverse nexus is strongly correlated with development levels, with urban areas being the primary contributor to high carbon and/or pollution emissions despite occupying only 0.5% of global territory. We conclude that expecting leapfrog stages of the nexus is unrealistic, as cross-income-level change requires approximately 80% of the population to significant change its livelihood and lifestyle. Therefore, we recommend setting science-based targets for decoupling carbon and pollution emissions from development are necessary, but should be adapted and tailored to each country's local practice.

The critical role of corporate governance in sustainable development goals prioritisation: A 5 P s-based analysis for emerging economies.

The UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were developed in 2015 and serve as the main guide for achieving the 2030 Agenda. This paper analyses the impact of corporate governance (CG) and financial performance (FP) on SDG prioritisation, taking FP as a mediating variable and categorising the SDGs by the five pillars (5 Ps) commonly used for this purpose: People, Planet, Prosperity, Peace and Partnership. For this purpose, structural equations (PLS-SEM) were applied, using a sample of 312 Latin-American firms. The study results show there is a positive relationship between FP, CG and SDG prioritisation. Moreover, FP has a partial mediating role in the relationship between CG and SDG prioritisation. This study is innovative in the context of emerging Latin American economies and suggests paths for future research on this topic that would be of interest to academics, regulators and industry professionals. This paper highlights the important role of CG in helping achieve the objectives of the 2030 Agenda in Latin America. Furthermore, the study has implications for policymakers, showing that CG may enhance companies' FP and their commitment to the SDGs. Accordingly, regulators should establish minimum requirements for all companies regarding the structure and practices of CG. The study findings also have implications for stakeholders and responsible investors, suggesting that companies' level of sustainable development can be assessed via their CG policies.

Heavy metals/-metalloids (As) phytoremediation with Landoltia punctata and Lemna sp. (duckweeds): coupling with biorefinery prospects for sustainable phytotechnologies.

Heavy metals/-metalloids can result in serious human health hazards. Phytoremediation is green bioresource technology for the remediation of heavy metals and arsenic (As). However, there exists a knowledge gap and systematic information on duckweed-based metal phytoremediation in an eco-sustainable way. Therefore, the present review offers a critical discussion on the effective use of duckweeds (genera Landoltia and Lemna)-based phytoremediation to decontaminate metallic contaminants from wastewater. Phytoextraction and rhizofiltration were the major mechanism in 'duckweed bioreactors' that can be dependent on physico-chemical factors and plant-microbe interactions. The biotechnological advances such as gene manipulations can accelerate the duckweed-based phytoremediation process. High starch and protein contents of the metal-loaded duckweed biomass facilitate their use as feedstock in biorefinery. Biorefinery prospects such as bioenergy production, value-added products, and biofertilizers can augment the circular economy approach. Coupling duckweed-based phytoremediation with biorefinery can help achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and human well-being.