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The purpose of this study is to measure the technical efficiency of Japanese national universities over the period 2010–2016. In addition, the authors also sought to identify the determinants of efficiency, especially those amenable to public policy intervention.

First, the authors ran a global intertemporal data envelopment analysis to understand the trends in efficiency for national universities over the relevant period. Following this, the authors conducted a second-stage regression using a double-bootstrapped truncated regression model to identify the possible determinants of efficiency.

The authors found no evidence to suggest that technical efficiency of national universities systematically decreased or increased in response to either structural reform or a reduction to government grants. Moreover, the share of government grants, the size of universities and disciplines of study offered by the universities were statistically significant determinants of efficiency.

The study results suggest that efficacious public policy remedies might include inter alia measures to reduce the reliance on public funding, efforts to attract more foreign students, the execution of mergers among small universities and consolidation of inefficient departments.

This research fills an important gap in the scholarly literature with respect to Japanese national universities and identifies possible determinants to efficiency, which are amenable to remedial public policy interventions.

This paper aims to facilitate the joint assessment of issues related to the agricultural systems, i.e. agriculture, aquaculture and climate change (CC) response strategies, in the coastal districts with a panel of stakeholders; and to evaluate the level of agreement on the topics under consideration and potentially identify the most promising approaches to assessing CC affecting agricultural systems in the area and identify relevant and adequate response strategies.

Stakeholder Delphi technique – its assessment is an interactive method of qualitative research used to facilitate the interactive participation of varied and conceivably hierarchical and antagonistic stakeholder groups.

The most important result for the province is that the impact of climate change on agro-ecological landscapes (poverty and near river areas) is the duration of cold weather, more frequent and extreme. Moreover, Kendall’s W test gave a score of 0.547, which indicates a “strong” stakeholder agreement and the “confidence in ranks” being “high” in Thai Binh (Vietnam).

The scientific results in this study are intended to serve as relevant knowledge-inputs and direct contributions to capacity-building for the local partners (stakeholders and local authorities). These local partners are engaged in policy-making and effective planning and implementation of climate response measures in the districts in the province of Thai Binh.

This article traces the transformation of hát bội, a form of traditional opera in Southern Vietnam, from its primary role as entertainment into a religious activity after the Reform (Đổi Mới) were enacted in 1986.

This research is based on ethnological fieldwork complemented by a review of historical documents and of the available literature on hát bội, cultural policies and on data collected from interviews with artists and spectators at the festival at the shrine to the Lady of the Realm.

Before 1986, hát bội was performed either as a stand-alone entertainment during the fair portion of community festivals or as part of religious ceremonies. The Reform and the accompanying relaxation of state control over religion and culture promoted the resurgence of popular religious fairs across the nation. New opportunities for hát bội to revive opened, artists left state-sponsored troupes to join private companies that catered to religious festivals. But almost exclusive involvement in religious rites has led to artistic stasis for private hát bội troupes.

This research constitutes novel insights of how the Reform in Vietnam affects the transformation of a traditional performance form.

This study aims to focus on exploring the construction productivity of building projects under the influence of potential factors. The three primary purposes are (1) determining critical factors affecting construction productivity; (2) identifying causal relationship and occurrence probability of these factors to develop a Bayesian network (BN) model; and (3) validating the accuracy of predictions from the proposed BN model via a case study.

A conceptual framework that includes three performance stages was used. Twenty-two possible factors were screened from a comprehensive literature review and evaluated through expert opinions. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire-based survey and case-study-based survey. The sampling methods were based on non-probability sampling.

Worker characteristic-related factors significantly affect labour productivity for a construction task. Construction productivity is dominated by the working frequency of workers (overtime), complexity of the task, level of technology application and accidents. Labour productivity is defined as nearly 50% of the baseline productivity using the BN model created by the caut 2sal relationship and probability of factors. The prediction error of the BN model was 6.6%, 10.0% and 9.3% for formwork (m²/h), reinforcing steel (ton/h) and concrete (m³/h), respectively.

The evaluation or prediction of productivity performance has become a necessary topic for research and practice.

Managers and practitioners in the construction sector can utilise the outcome of this study to create good productivity management policies for their prospective projects.

Worker-related characteristics are dominant among critical factors affecting labour productivity for a construction task; the proposed BN-based predictive model is built based on these critical factors. The BN approach is highly accurate for construction productivity prediction. The findings of this study can fill gaps in the construction management body of knowledge when modelling construction productivity under the effects of multiple factors and using a simple probabilistic graphic tool.

This study offers an empirical framework for how hotel employees CSR perceptions affect their job satisfaction by incorporating the parallel mediating roles of organizational identification and psychological contract fulfillment. In addition, it examines the moderator effects of employees' CSR-induced attributions on the constructed mediated model, providing a powerful lens through which to evaluate when and how employees' CSR perceptions influence organizational identification and psychological contract fulfillment.

The study use PLS-SEM techniques to analyze a sample of 520 employees from 49 luxury hotels with 4–5 stars in Khanh Hoa province, Vietnam.

The results show that CSR positively influences job satisfaction through the mediating role of psychological contract fulfillment and organizational identification. Besides, attachment styles also play moderator role in the relationship between CSR and psychological contract fulfillment/organizational identification.

The discoveries elucidated within this research endeavor proffer actionable discernments to be earnestly contemplated by professionals entrenched in the hotel industry, earnestly aspiring to ameliorate the contentment of their workforce and, concomitantly, augment the overarching efficacy of their organizational operations.

This study provides human resource departments with insights and suggestions for maximizing the efficacy of CSR implementation in the hotel industry.

This study aims to investigate the impact of AI chatbots on customer trust in AI chatbots for hotel services.

The probability sampling method was employed to develop a research sample. The research uses correlation analysis and structural equation modeling to analyze the data of 413 valid observations collected in the structured questionnaire survey in Vietnam.

The paper reports that empathy response, anonymity and customization significantly impact interaction. Empathy response is found to be the strongest influence on interaction. Meanwhile, empathy response and anonymity were revealed to indirectly affect customer trust. This paper also contributes several implications for hotel providers in emerging economies.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to shed light on the role of AI chatbots in explaining customers’ behavior. The results provide an enhanced understanding of how the AI chatbot system influences customers’ decision-making. It has been used to plan the chatbot application and highlight which implementation issues need the most attention in the hospitality industry.

Purpose: This study aims to explore the efforts of several Asian countries adopting blockchain-enabled letter of credit (LC) processes and highlight the key challenges hindering blockchain adoption into the entire LC system.

Need for the study: As trade volume among countries grows, nations should agree on the technology’s application mechanism to prevent disputes over discrete practices. As blockchain is a borderless approach, the global context of the applications should be considered, incorporating the cases of Asia, the hub of intraregional collaboration in trading.

Methodology: This chapter has surveyed the existing literature to identify the dichotomy between blockchain-enabled LC and traditional LC. Ten Asian countries were selected considering their adaptation motivations, number of use cases, and economic outlook. The case-study method was applied to compare the counties.

Findings: Countries reported blockchain-enabled LC as time-efficient, less costly, and secure. Interoperability, scalability, the absence of legal and administrative infrastructure, stress for new skills, and cyber security concerns are the most cited challenges among users. Instances of regulatory sandbox and collaborative effort were found among some countries, although some countries have yet to publish application guidelines.

Practical implication: The study provides comparative pictures of blockchain-enabled LC systems adopted by several Asian countries. This will contribute to future collaboration between Asian countries to create a unified and standardised trade financing platform. The study will also contribute to the future formulation of guidelines for administrative methodologies of the permissioned blockchain application in the trade finance section.

Climate change increases systematic risk for firms, especially those in the agricultural industry. Therefore, the need to examine the consequences of climate-related risks on agribusiness companies' financial performance across the globe and emerging markets has risen. In this context, the paper aims to investigate the effects of climate change risks on the financial performance of agriculture listed firms in Vietnam.

The study sample includes 77 Vietnamese listed firms in the agricultural industry in the period of 2015–2019. The authors chose temperature, wind, rainfall and humidity proxies to measure climate change. The OLS regression, random regression and sub-sample analysis have been used to examine the impacts of climate risks on firms' financial performance.

Empirical results show that rain and temperature have positive impacts on financial performance of Vietnamese agriculture listed firms, while wind and humidity have insignificant impacts on financial performance.

The research helps researchers, businesses, practitioners and policymakers interested in the agricultural industry, especially those in developing and emerging countries, to develop a deep understanding of the impact of climate change risks on firm performance and therefrom prepare necessary measures to reduce the negative impacts.

This study adds to the literature stream on the impacts of climate change on financial performance. It is the first study to investigate this impact in Vietnam, a country which depends mainly on agriculture.

This essay examines a common assertion among middle-class shoppers in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, that place of manufacture, rather than brand markers, largely determines the quality of goods. For shoppers in Ho Chi Minh City, unity of place, people, raw materials, and trade secrets at the source – a corporation’s home country – is essential to the production of high quality goods. This stands in contrast to the brand logic through which corporations outsource their production presumably without compromising product quality. By privileging production sites over brands, shoppers in Ho Chi Minh City interpret the recent increase of famous foreign brand name goods in Vietnam as an increase of domestic, rather than foreign goods.

The purpose of this paper is to trace the way in which a popular ritual became one of Vietnam’s most important festivals, elevated as a celebration of national heroism and charts its gradual transformation in modern society.

This research focuses on the combination of a fertility rite and narratives of St Gióng based on nationalism or heroism created a special festival reflecting many traditional cultural characteristics of Vietnam and the Việt people and the transformation of St Gióng from a mythological to a national symbol of heroism in anti-invader history was recorded in texts.

The paper casts light on the mythologization and historicization of St Gióng in Vietnam’s particular historical context by decoding the Gióng symbol as a core element of the folktales and myths about St Gióng to understand the formation and development of St Gióng in the cultural history of Vietnam.

The paper is not exploring the Gióng symbol within a larger cultural context of nationalism and ethnosymbolic approach in a comparison of national symbolism and heroism.

The paper includes implications for advised scholars to conduct further exploration of the symbol and myth of not only St Gióng in Vietnam but also Kubera in India and Vaisravana in China to connect Kubera, Vaisravana and St Gióng under the connection of literal myth and heroic symbol.

The paper shows how processes of historicizing myth and mythologizing history are important features of Vietnamese socio-historical research.

The paper shows how a fertility rite became a historical festival and the figure of St Gióng became a symbol of patriotic heroism.