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Based on the comprehensive definition of accounting of Carnegie et al. (2021a, 2021b), this study examines how visual imagery can expand and enhance accountability to stakeholders and create room for more human-centric accounts. This study aims to understand how this use can elucidate and prompt interpretations of rhetorical features aimed at envisioning legitimacy and being perceived as accountable.

Following a methodological interpretative approach, this paper draws on a qualitative case study based on a Portuguese charity, the Santa Casa da Misericordia do Porto, from 2019 to 2021, including the COVID-19 crisis period, analysing visual rhetoric in annual and sustainability reports.

The study illuminates how the visual images interact and evoke shared cultural understandings, shaping meanings that can symbolically foster organisational legitimacy and envisions accountability. These symbolic and emotive elements capture and make visible social impacts and reflect broader societal concerns.

The study of visual images within the accounting context can enrich the understanding of accounting as a technical, social and moral practice, while expanding the scope of accountability and promoting a more human-centred approach to accounting. It also adds to the literature on the persuasiveness and rhetoric of accounting and reporting visualisations and on charities’ accountability in crisis period.

The purpose of this paper is to overview the literature about the environmental performance of additive manufacturing (AM) and to evaluate the use of life cycle assessment (LCA) on these studies.

This study was based on the systematic literature review.

The investigation found that most authors were concerned about the energy consumption of the AM equipment, which is the subject studied by 87% of articles. In addition, 25% of the studies used LCA at least in some level, making a global environment assessment to evaluate the environmental impacts of AM. By analyzing research studies, it was possible to find signs that AM could be a lower environmental impact process, when compared with traditional manufacturing. However, this assumption is not valid in all cases because there are many variables that may affect environmental results.

Due to the increase on the usage of this type of technology by industries, studies on the environmental performance of this process became relevant.

Today’s young people were born and raised in a digitally dominated world, therefore they quickly and intuitively navigate the web, which brings them undeniable advantages in the search for health information, but at the same time posing some risks. The authors conducted a narrative review of Portuguese and international scientific publications using the MeSH terms [Health literacy], [digital], [young people], [education] and [social media]. Among the various solutions presented, and considering the ease and speed to which young people are accustomed to when accessing digital information, the paths to be taken towards safe and effective navigation are related to solutions that promote a greater health literacy (HL). To bet on the promotion of HL in the younger generations is to invest in the improvement of their health and well-being, considering the ACCESS Young people are more likely to search and have access to health information through the digital environment, therefore it is important to reach them by means of interactive and appealing online content (e.g. short videos); COMPREHENSION, it is essential to disseminate reliable information and to involve their close social networks, including parents/legal guardians, social workers, teachers, among other community members; USE ensuring a correct and responsible use of health resources requires involving young people in the process of creating HL programs since its early steps. Results show that the digital promotion of HL as a valuable tool to reach younger generations, who are avid consumers of social media and many other online platforms.

To identify and analyze the relevant themes in the literature on digital transformation and internationalization, revealing opportunities for future studies.

A systematic literature review was developed using the Scopus and Web of Science databases. Initially, 156 publications were identified. Based on inclusion/exclusion criteria, a final sample of 74 articles was reached. A bibliometric and qualitative analysis were developed.

Eight main themes related to internationalization, such as internationalization strategy, internationalized companies, marketing-related issues, export, global supply chain, entrepreneurship and new ventures, SMEs internationalization and internationalization of educational institutions, were identified. Eight main themes related to digital transformation were also identified, including internationalization drivers, digital technologies, business model innovation, digitalization, Industry 4.0, digital platforms and e-commerce, people and digital transformation and digital institutional environment.

In recent years, the term digital transformation has become part of the daily lives of many organizations and of life in society itself. For internationalized companies, this discussion has also become present. Although a relationship between digital transformation and internationalization is often presented, the dimensions of analysis of this relationship are still very fragmented, and this study presents a systemic view of the themes. These themes represent opportunities for future studies.

Climate change places significant pressure on the tourism sector by altering environmental and socio-economic conditions that influence tourist behaviour and the attractiveness of destinations. Rising temperatures, changing precipitation patterns and the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events affect tourism supply and demand. On the supply side, climate change threatens tourism infrastructure, natural attractions, recreational opportunities and accessibility of destinations. Coastal destinations are particularly vulnerable to sea-level rise and coastal flooding, which can damage tourism assets. On the demand side, changing climatic conditions alter visitor comfort levels, health risks and the seasonality of destinations, influencing tourists' choice of destinations. In addition, small island destinations face unnecessary risks due to their economic dependence on climate-sensitive activities such as beach and nature tourism. Adapting the tourism sector to climate change requires reducing vulnerability through diversification, green infrastructure, ecosystem conservation, community-based adaptation and policy support. Mitigating tourism's contribution to climate change requires minimising energy use, switching to renewable energy, improving efficiency, reducing long-haul flights and promoting sustainable consumption and production. Collective and concerted efforts by all stakeholders are needed to transition to a climate-resilient and low-carbon tourism sector that continues to provide socio-economic benefits while minimising its environmental footprint.

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the implementation of a web‐based platform integrating benchmarking and data envelopment analysis (DEA) for the Portuguese secondary schools.

The benchmarking platform is designed around a set of key performance indicators that are displayed using benchmarking graphs. These indicators are also aggregated through the methodology of DEA to provide a summary measure of performance.

The benchmarking platform developed enables schools to perform internal and external evaluation through a standard model that is based on indicators of school activities. It encourages schools' efforts of continuous improvement and increases society awareness regarding schools' context and results obtained.

The benchmarking platform can be useful for schools and general public. For the general public, there is a tool that allows the construction of user‐defined rankings online and benchmarking tools that allow the comparison of performance of a specific school with others. In addition to these features, schools have in the BESP platform a repository of historical data, and the possibility to see a set of graphs that show for some indicators their evolution over time.

This paper describes a breakthrough in the Portuguese education context. The BESP platform is the first in this context to combine DEA and benchmarking tools in a web‐based environment, designed to enable real‐time performance assessments.

In a context of international economic crisis the improvement in the efficiency and productivity of public services is seen as a way to maintain high-quality levels at lower costs. Increased productivity can be promoted through benchmarking exercises, where key performance indicators (KPIs), individually or aggregated, are used to compare health units. The purpose of this paper is to describe a benchmarking platform, called Hospital Benchmarking (HOBE), where hospital’s services are used as the unit of analysis.

HOBE platform includes a set of managerial indicators through which hospital services’ are compared. The platform also benchmarks services through aggregate service indicators, and provides an aggregate measure of hospital’s performance based on a composite indicator of the service’s performances. These aggregate indicators were obtained through data envelopment analysis (DEA).

Some results are presented for Portuguese hospitals for the trial years of 2008 and 2009, for which data is publicly available. Details for the service-level analysis are provided for a sample hospital, as well as details on the aggregate performance resulting from services performances.

HOBE’s features and outcomes show that the platform can be used to guide management actions and to support the design of health policies by administrative authorities, provided that good quality and timely data are available, and that hospitals are involved in the design of the KPIs.

The platform is innovative in the sense that it bases its analysis on hospital’s services, which are in general more comparable among hospitals than indicators of hospital overall performance. In addition, it makes use of DEA to aggregate performance indicators, allowing for user choice in the inputs and outputs to be aggregated, and it proposes a novel model to aggregate service’s efficiencies into a single measure of hospital performance.

This paper investigates whether and to what extent operating in inner areas affects the profitability of innovative Italian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) over 2012–2018.

Guided by the National Strategy for Inner Areas and the “Investment Compact,” this study distinguishes between inner and core innovative SMEs. It employs various econometric models to estimate a regression for the return on assets of SMEs, differentiating between firms operating in inner and non-inner areas of northwest, northeast, centre and south Italy.

Findings reveal that innovative SMEs in inner areas generally exhibit lower profitability compared to those in non-inner municipalities. However, huge heterogeneity in results is observed across the country. Specifically, innovative SMEs in the inner areas of the south register lower profitability than those operating in non-inner zones. Conversely, innovative SMEs located in the inner municipalities of northwest and northeast Italy show higher profitability than their peers in non-inner areas. The results imply that targeted policies for inner areas are crucial. However, due to the diversity of local impacts, a differentiated approach, depending on the geographic context, is necessary.

The study aims to explore the relationship between inner areas and the performance of innovative SMEs in Italy. More precisely, it examines the effect of operating in a municipality located within an inner area on the profitability of innovative SMEs. This issue has been overlooked in existing literature. Importantly, we aim to determine whether there is a heterogeneous impact based on geographical localisation, specifically in the Northwest, the Northeast, the Centre and the South of the country. Therefore, this paper contributes to the literature by investigating the factors influencing the performance of innovative SMEs and suggesting new policy recommendations for developing inner areas in Italy.

Tourism in Coimbra today is influenced by the fact that the Univer(s)city was distinguished as a World Heritage Site in 2013. The number of visits has grown very significantly in recent years, but the diversification of the tourist offer is still weak and unable to take advantage of existing resources. This paper aims to present genealogy tourism as an alternative urban cultural tourism in Coimbra.

Methodology involved mapping the Jewish culture elements in the city of Coimbra, and a route was outlined and proposed.

Genealogy tourism resources are identified in the historic centre of the city. These alternative spaces need urban rehabilitation and (re)functionalisation, which allowed the authors to rethink tourism in Coimbra. They are the motivation to visit for all urban cultural tourists, especially Israelis/Jews, and provide contact with places where the experiences of ancestors combine with the history and memory of places, with recent discoveries and the elements of Jewish culture in the city.

It is concluded that the quantity, diversity, authenticity and singularity of the heritage resources that bear witness to the Jewish presence in Coimbra are sufficient assets to create a route, to enrich the tourist experience in the city and to include the destination in the Sephardic routes.

The first aim of this study is to show the impact of global warming on temperature and precipitation changes in Algeria. The second objective is to exhibit the strategy planned by the country to mitigate these effects on water resources in the future.

This research assesses the expected changes in temperature, precipitation and SPEI index, over Algeria (16 weather stations), between two horizons (2030, 2050), by using an ensemble of 16 general circulation models under RCP2.6 and RCP8.5 scenarios.

More warming and drought will be experienced under RCP8.5 than RCP2.6 scenario. The highest warming is observed at the Southern stations. However, the lowest precipitation is projected in the western stations. The results of SPEI calculation indicate that the severity of drought spread progressively across time and space. The highest values were observed over 2050 with values varied between 0.15 and −2.08 under RCP2.6 scenario, and range from −0.73 to −2.63 under RCP8.5. These results indicate that Algeria is highly vulnerable to the impact of climate change on water resources, which stressed the need to develop a strategy against this situation.

This study is one of the first to simulate the future climate changes over 16 Algerian weather stations by using an average of 16 general circulation models data, under two RCP scenarios. This study shows the 2030 water development strategy to mitigate the effect of drought and water scarcity on different sectors.