Issue 51 – Winter 2021

Research and innovation strategies for smart specialisation (RIS3) has played a key role in the European Union regional policy in the 2014-2020 programing period.
Regional benchmarking exercises are encouraged by the European Commission to provide a better vision of the position of the region and detect its strengths and weaknesses.
In our work we intend to reinforce the SWOT analysis included in the RIS3 strategy of Andalusia 2014-2020 using the benchmarking methodology proposed by the European Commission. This exercise allows us to outline new proposals for action and a cualitative methodology that could be useful in the design of RIS3 strategies in the period 2021-2027.

This paper analyses the influence of agglomeration on economic growth in the Argentinian provinces for the period 1981–2007 using fixed effects and GMM estimation for panel data. The choice of the estimation approach is crucial. After controlling for potential simultaneity bias, there is evidence of a link between agglomeration and growth in the Argentinian provinces, suggesting that the Williamson hypothesis is in place.

Globally, many public policies seek to improve the results in participation, employment, and unemployment of the youth in the labor market. Evidence shows that education, age, sex, income conditions of the household, and working conditions affect labor market participation. However, how the behavior of the closest individuals affects the decision of the younger individuals to labor participation in a developing country is a matter of discussion. Using GPS location for 1094 young people, I estimate a spatial model for individual decisions to participate in the labor market in Colombia. Results show that the nearby individual’s similar decision regarding labor participation affects the youth’s decision to participate or social effects in youth labor participation.

The objective of this paper is to if there are differences in the core economic indicators of the special employment centers depending on, if they were created to obtain profit, or with social goals. We have created a database with 166 financial statements of the special employment centers from the Region of Murcia for the period 2012-2016. We have done a descriptive and explicative analysis of these data using the core economic and financial ratios. The obtained results have allowed us to conclude that the different orientation of the special employment centers doesn´t have direct effects on the profitability, but there are significant differences in their liquidity and solvency depending on the CEE type.

The technological revolution has shaped a renewed tourism scenario characterised by an intensive use of technology throughout the travel cycle, which is evolving towards a context of smart management in which technologies associated with social media stand out, due to their influence on the strategy and operations of online marketing at the destinations. The new patterns of behaviour of supply and demand associated with social media now determine the image of destinations and influence their competitiveness, thus placing social media at the centre of marketing management of the entities responsible for promoting and managing the destination. Social media and the technologies that support it represent the main way to bring destinations closer to the smart destination model. This research approaches the current tourism scenario in order to understand its influence on the online marketing processes developed by tourist destinations. Specifically, and for a group of destinations in the Valencian Community, an applied analysis is carried out based on a social media measurement index.

Governance systems, when addressing post-disaster action, play an important role in minimizing the community’s vulnerability in future disruptive events. The literature describes how post-disaster actions towards resistance-resilience measures are often implemented, shifting to adaptive-resilience approaches as a second concern, and disregarding resilience-transformative strategies. Two consecutive wildfires in the Centro Region (Portugal), in 2017, cut off access to the Services of General Interest (SGIs) and knocked off-balance the socioeconomic territorial structure and identity (the main impact was 116 mortal victims). In this paper, the media coverage of the phenomena during the 12 months following the disaster is analysed using a sample of 150 news articles published in two newspapers. The public discourses are indicative of the overall importance given to the impact and to the responses based on resistance-resilience measures. Moreover, the theoretical and practical challenges for the policy design and organization of the governance systems in post-disaster contexts is discussed.

Forestry industry macroeconomic assessments typically concentrate on the production, harvesting, and earliest processing of wood products, underestimating the full range of forests impacts in regional economies.
This work proposes a broader concept – forestry products value chain – that ponders the contribution of the downstream activities relying (directly and indirectly) on Silviculture and Forestry products.
The paper adopts a methodology based on a Multi-Regional Input-Output framework. We apply this approach to the Portuguese economy. Results clarify the role of eucalyptus in “Pulp”, “Paper and Cardboard” and “Paper and Cardboard Articles”. Finally, the projected wider macroeconomic consequences from a reduction of these productions is evaluated.

This article analyzes the concept of value capture, the typologies of existing instruments and it examines the opportunities and regulatory and operational restrictions of “participation in capital gains” as one of the main bets in regards in Colombia. Using qualitative and quantitative tools, the results of the regulation and implementation of the instrument are shown in 20 years of formal existence for 444 municipalities in the country. It is evident that although a significant number of municipalities incorporate the tax in their territorial regulations, despite its potentialities this instrument has not been consolidated as an important source of financing. Small and medium municipalities have most mobilized such participation in the context of their urban growth transformations and the territorial planning decisions.

The Social Explorer is a free and open access platform that allows an agile and interactive approach to geo-referenced data from Spain of sociodemographic, economic, political and environmental interest. In this review a brief presentation of it is made.