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The Burmese military has been ruling Burma (Myanmar) since Burma's independence from the British in 1948. With increased militarization has come increased ethnic conflicts and the creation of armed ethnic groups. For instance, the Burmese military has been fighting with the Karen armed ethnic group since 1957, making it the longest conflict in the world. The recent coup in 2021 escalated the civil war in Burma. This conflict and war have led to devastation and destruction in ethnic regions, resulting in many ethnic people fleeing to neighboring countries for safety and security. It has also led to increased incidences of gender-based violence and human trafficking. This chapter will examine the history of military rule and ethnic conflicts in Burma. It will explore the impact of war on women's lives including their security, migration, and sustainability. This chapter will also highlight the importance of women's roles in the recent movement against the coup and the importance of women's involvement in social and political movements for peace, democracy, security, and sustainable development.

Based on the knowledge-based view (KBV) and theory of planned behavior (TPB), the study aims to investigate the impact of sustainable leadership (SL) on knowledge management processes (KMPs) and the direct influence of KMPs on sustainable competitive advantage (SCA). Additionally, it aims to explore the mediating role of knowledge worker social responsibility (KWSR) in the relationship between KMPs and SCA. Furthermore, this study aims to evaluate the moderating effect of knowledge sabotage behavior (KSB) on the relationship between KMPs and KWSR.

The sample frame consisted of 354 academic and administrative workers from Pakistan’s higher education institutions. The hypothesized relationships were tested using the PLS-SEM approach.

The study found a significant positive effect of SL on KMPs as well as KMPs on SCA. Partial mediation of knowledge worker social responsibility between knowledge management processes and sustainable competitive advantage was confirmed. Furthermore, our findings indicate the negative moderating effect of knowledge sabotage behavior on the relationship between KMPs and KWSR.

The outcomes of this research strengthen the universities’ experience of Leadership and recommend how academics and administrators of higher education institutes can value knowledge management, which improves competitive advantage.

The originality of the study lies in elucidating the direct relationship of SL & KMPs with the moderating role of KSB in the link between KMPs and KWSR and the mediating effect of KWSR on the relationship between KMPs and SCA in the setting of higher education institutions (HEIs) in Pakistan. Furthermore, this study provides in-depth insights into the existing body of knowledge on the KBV and TPB about SL, KMPs, and SCA.

The higher education (HE) sector in Myanmar is currently in a fragile, backward-looking state. Its fragility is due to the 2021 coup with its consequent civil disobedience movement, continued conflict between the military and people’s defence force, the junta’s spurious delivery of a post-Covid and post-coup education system, and the junta’s apparent abandoning of the previous civilian government’s progress with the National Education Strategic Plan. It is backward-looking because the current junta, like previous juntas in Myanmar, use education as a tool for military propaganda and to populate the education system with civil servants that are loyal, or at least supine, to the military. The task of this chapter is to provide an overview of HE in Myanmar and how its current condition aligns with Sustainable Development Goal 4.3. This task is contextualised by considering the role of universities in the history of socio-political uprisings in Myanmar. Universities as theatres of communicative action have been and continue to be spaces of public resistance. This resistance and its accompanying vertical tension continue to shape the physical constitution of universities and the delivery of HE in Myanmar.

Climate change is an undeniable reality that threatens people’s livelihoods. Flooding and saltwater intrusion, along with the rising sea levels, are affecting agricultural and aquaculture livelihoods in Myanmar’s coastal areas. Although climate change adaptation is gaining popularity as a resilience strategy to cope with the negative effects of climate change, both agriculture- and aquaculture-farmers are more often deterred from implementing climate change adaptation strategies due to practical availability and socioeconomic barriers to adaptation. This study aims to evaluate the barriers and factors that influence farm household’ choice of climate change adaptation measures.

This study was conducted with 599 farm households (484 rice-farmers and 115 fish farmers) based in the coastal areas of Myanmar during 2021–2022 to explore the farmer’s choice of climate change adaptation measures and the determining factors. The multinomial logit regression (MLR) model was used to examine the factors influencing the farmers’ choice of climate change adaptation strategies.

The study found out that farm households use a variety of adaptation methods at the farm level, with building embankment strategy (23.4%) in agriculture and net-fencing measure (33.9%) in fish farming being the most popular adaptation strategies. Farmers’ decisions to adopt climate change adaptation strategies are influenced by factors such as distance to market, education level of the household head, remittance income and the availability of early warning information, among others. The study also discovered that COVID-19 has had an impact on the employment opportunities of household members and the income from farming as well had a consequential effect on the adoption of climate change adaptation measures. Furthermore, lack of credit (42.4%), labor shortage (52.8%), pest and disease infestation (58.9%), high input costs (81%) and lower agricultural product prices (73%) were identified as major barriers to the adoption of climate change adaptation measures by both agriculture and aquaculture farm households.

This study demonstrates that the COVID-19 pandemic and farm-level barriers are the major factors influencing farm households’ choice of climate change adaptation measures, and that removing practical farm-level barriers and encouraging the adoption of adaptation techniques as potential COVID-19 recovery actions are required. This study also highlighted that the adaptive capacity of agriculture and aquaculture farm households should be strengthened through formal and informal training programs, awareness raising, the exchange of early warning information and the development of proper credit scheme programs.

This study aims to use an additive process for the first time to develop a microfluidic device that uses centrifugal technique for precise and repeatable generation of microdroplets. Droplets have versatile applications in life sciences, but so far centrifugal devices for their production have been made mainly using standard subtractive techniques. This study focused on evaluating the applicability of 3D printing technology in the development of centrifugal microfluidic devices and investigating their properties and future applications.

First, the background of this interdisciplinary research, including the principle of droplet microfluidics and the centrifugal technique, is explained. The developed device has the form of a disc (similar to an audio CD), containing an integrated microfluidic system for droplet generation. The disc is rotated at a specific spin profile to induce controlled liquid flow and accurate production of oil-in-water microdroplets. The device was fabricated using material jetting technology. The design, operation principles, printing process parameters and post-processing steps are explained in detail.

The device was thoroughly characterised, including its mechanical properties, the impact of chemical treatment and the flow measurement of the liquids. The study confirms that the disc can be applied to produce various emulsions using centrifugal force alone. 3D printing technology enables potential mass production and other applications of the device.

The 3D printing process allowed for easy design, fabrication and duplication of the device. Compared to standard PMMA discs, a simpler fabrication protocol and a more flexible and monolithic structure were obtained. The device can be adapted to other microfluidic processes in a lab with high potential for point-of-care applications.

Over recent years, public health threats, economic losses and crises of confidence resulting from adverse events along the global food chains have pressured food traceability systems to operate more efficiently. Based on that, this paper aims to expand the body of knowledge on the connection between Industry 4.0 technologies and food chain traceability and how they have been integrated.

Before conducting a systematic literature review (SLR), we consulted academic experts in traceability and Industry 4.0 technologies to define the leading 4.0 technologies adopted. We then developed protocols and criteria for article selection. Based on the developed codebook, we performed a content analysis, refining it through discussions with experienced researchers.

This paper identified seven Industry 4.0 technologies applied in conjunction with support and device systems. These combinations hold promise for generating value for food chain traceability systems. Value for the food supply chain originates from five sources: trust, process improvement, data processing, security, sustainability and regulation. Besides, three barriers to implementing such traceability technologies were identified: resources, lack of structure, stakeholders and values.

While this study focused specifically on the food chain, the technology combinations, values, barriers and categories identified herein can inform analyses for other chains, e.g. the pharmaceutical chain. Moreover, due to the recent growth of this topic, some existing values and barriers may not have been fully explored and the technology combinations may vary slightly.

The results of this study provide food chain professionals with a comprehensive understanding of the values and corresponding barriers associated with employing Industry 4.0 traceability technologies. This knowledge can be leveraged to develop effective strategies and implement improvements in traceability, thereby benefiting society and addressing identified barriers.

This study expands the literature on using Industry 4.0 technologies for traceability in food chains, providing valuable directions to build safer, more efficient, transparent and potentially more sustainable food chains. Additionally, we provide promising avenues for future research.

Food sustainability is a world-acknowledged issue that requires urgent integrated solutions at multi-levels. This study aims to explore how food firms can improve their sustainability performance through digital traceability practices, considering the mediating effect of sustainability-oriented innovation (SOI) and the moderating effect of supply chain learning (SCL) for the food supply chain therein.

Hierarchical regression with a moderated mediation model is used to test the proposed hypotheses with a sample of 359 food firms from four provinces in China.

Digital traceability has a significant positive impact on the three pillars of sustainability performances among food firms. SOI (product innovation, process innovation and organisational innovation) mediates the relationship between digital traceability and sustainability performance. SCL plays moderating roles in the linkage between digital traceability and both product and process innovation, respectively.

This paper contributes as one of the first studies to develop digital traceability practices and their sustainability-related improvements for Chinese food firms; it extends studies on supply chain traceability to a typical emerging market. This finding can support food sustainability practice in terms of where and how to invest in sustainability innovation and how to improve economic, environmental and social performance.

The present study developed an integrated model to evaluate the relationship between service quality, brand image, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty in the context of Myanmar’s construction industry.

Data on the study variables were gathered from a cross-sectional survey of 210 client organizations that own private buildings in Myanmar. A factor analysis-validated structural equation model was developed to assess the research hypotheses and conceptual framework.

The results supported an integrated model in which brand image partly mediated the effects of service quality on customer satisfaction. Besides, the brand image and customer satisfaction fully mediated the impact of service quality on customer loyalty. Brand image exerted indirect effects on customer loyalty through customer satisfaction. The study further identified the direct effects of service quality on brand image and customer satisfaction, brand image on customer satisfaction and customer satisfaction on customer loyalty.

While prior studies have explored service quality in the construction industry, no integrated model has been developed to identify the relationship between service quality, brand image, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty in construction project settings. This study filled this critical gap in the literature by offering a unique perspective on the study variables and their interrelationships.

This study aimed to assess emotional intelligence (EI) among young adults across three Arab countries: Egypt, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates.

A total of 1884 university students participated from the three countries and completed the Schutte Self Report Emotional Intelligence Test (SSEIT). Data were validated by confirmatory factor analysis using SPSS AMOS version 29. Path analysis, t-tests and analyses of variance were performed to understand the influence of background variables on the EI of the study participants.

The results provide theoretical support for the SSEIT and the hypothesized relationship between managing personal and others' emotions. Although significant differences were found between participants in terms of gender and grade point average (GPA), no difference was found between participants based on nationality. The results of this study indicate the need to prioritize EI in young adults and other implications.

The importance of EI in individuals' daily lives cannot be overemphasized. However, scholarly insights into the state of EI in the Arab context are scarce.