Evaluating social sustainability of bioeconomy value chains through integrated use of local and global methods

International audienceA bioeconomy is an economic system, which replaces fossil resources with renewable biological resources. As strategies are implemented, new bio-based value chains are created and others expand to replace fossil fuel based supply chains. Understanding the sustainability impacts of this development requires tools for assessing the impacts. The environmental impacts of bioeconomies have been studied through life cycle assessment, but the social impacts are poorly understood. Commonly applied social sustainability methods are local in scope and lack a life cycle perspective. The aim of this paper was to compare the priority setting in global and local approaches to social sustainability assessment and to explore possibilities for integrating them. A multi-region input-output model was used to estimate the social life cycle impacts of Finnish wood products. The main social issues were found in health and safety and gender inequality, with a large part of the impacts occurring outside the forest sector and outside Finnish boundaries. In contrast, local stakeholders views on social sustainability focused mostly on local conditions, employment and co-operation between companies. Ways to combine the contrasting results were explored and a framework for integrating the local and global approaches was outlined

The importance of institutions and policy settings for car sharing - Evidence from the UK, Israel, Sweden and Finland

The rapid growth of cities requires effective management of transport demand and restructuring of transport systems to address the needs of growing urban populations in an environmentally, socially and economically sustainable way. In recent years, car sharing has emerged as an alternative to owning cars in cities, which has potential to bring environmental gains and address social considerations. There is a sizeable academic inquiry about the social and environmental benefits of car sharing and the barriers to its introduction and provision in different empirical contexts. However, most research on the determinants of its uptake and the ease of provision remains limited to investigating consumer demand and how to realise the benefits of car sharing. Drawing on cases from the UK, Israel, Sweden and Finland, this paper focuses on the institutional and policy settings to understand the systemic barriers for car sharing services in diverse urban contexts to expand knowledge on the challenges to and the challenges that emerge from car sharing schemes