Responsible tourism that creates shared value among stakeholders

This paper maintains that responsible tourism practices can be re-conceived strategically to confer competitive advantage. It looks at the extant literature surrounding the notions of “responsible tourism” and “shared value”. A qualitative research involved in-depth, semi-structured interview questions to discover the tourism and hospitality owner–managers’ ethos for responsible tourism. Secondly, telephone interviews were carried out with tourism regulatory officials. The findings have revealed that discretionary spending in socially and environmentally sound, responsible policies and initiatives can create shared value among tourism enterprises and their stakeholders. In a nutshell, this paper indicates that responsible tourism led to improved relationships with social and regulatory stakeholders, effective human resources management, better market standing, operational efficiencies and cost savings, along with other benefits.peer-reviewe

Advancing the sustainable tourism agenda through strategic CSR perspectives

This paper links the corporate social responsibility (CSR) paradigms to the sustainability agenda. The objective is to sharpen the strategic base of responsible behaviour in tourism enterprises. The design follows a comprehensive literature review about sustainable tourism from a hospitality industry perspective. Theoretical underpinnings suggest that the tourism and hospitality industries are continuously witnessing changing attitudes on the part of both the consumers and the enterprises. This contribution provides some details about the sustainability agenda as it explains how it emerged following Brundtland's report. Afterwards, it identifies key contributors who raised the issue of sustainable tourism as well as CSR policies, including inter-governmental committees and non-governmental organisations. It is believed that synergistic and shared value approaches are relatively straightforward and uncomplicated. Therefore, such notions are more easily taken up by academics or by tourism and hospitality stakeholders. There is continuous discourse in many international fora, conferences, seminars and colloquia about sustainable tourism, responsible behaviour and the related subjects. However, the discussions are usually characterised by presentation of theories which define the concepts, rather than being practical workshops which identify the business case and how to trigger active participation in the tourism industry. Relevant literature indicates that value-driven approaches focus on improving tourism and hospitality business performance through effective and efficient practices in their workplace environments. This contribution suggests that long-term sustainability can be reached if industry practitioners successfully address their societal and community deficits.peer-reviewe

Future phosphorus: advancing new 2D phosphorus allotropes and growing a sustainable bioeconomy

With more than 40 countries currently proposing to boost their national bioeconomies, there is no better time for a clarion call for a “new” bioeconomy, which, at its core, tackles the current disparities and inequalities in phosphorus (P) availability. Existing biofuel production systems have widened P inequalities and contributed to a linear P economy, impairing water quality and accelerating dependence on P fertilizers manufactured from finite nonrenewable phosphate rock reserves. Here, we explore how the emerging bioeconomy in novel, value-added, bio-based products offers opportunities to rethink our stewardship of P. Development of integrated value chains of new bio-based products offers opportunities for codevelopment of “P refineries” to recover P fertilizer products from organic wastes. Advances in material sciences are exploiting unique semiconductor and opto-electrical properties of new “two-dimensional” (2D) P allotropes (2D black phosphorus and blue phosphorus). These novel P materials offer the tantalizing prospect of step-change innovations in renewable energy production and storage, in biomedical applications, and in biomimetic processes, including artificial photosynthesis. They also offer a possible antidote to the P paradox that our agricultural production systems have engineered us into, as well as the potential to expand the future role of P in securing sustainability across both agroecological and technological domains of the bioeconomy. However, a myriad of social, technological, and commercialization hurdles remains to be crossed before such an advanced circular P bioeconomy can be realized. The emerging bioeconomy is just one piece of a much larger puzzle of how to achieve more sustainable and circular horizons in our future use of P

The cardiomyocyte disrupts pyrimidine biosynthesis in non-myocytes to regulate heart repair

Various populations of cells are recruited to the heart after cardiac injury, but little is known about whether cardiomyocytes directly regulate heart repair. Using a murine model of ischemic cardiac injury, we demonstrate that cardiomyocytes play a pivotal role in heart repair by regulating nucleotide metabolism and fates of nonmyocytes. Cardiac injury induced the expression of the ectonucleotidase ectonucleotide pyrophosphatase/phosphodiesterase 1 (ENPP1), which hydrolyzes extracellular ATP to form AMP. In response to AMP, cardiomyocytes released adenine and specific ribonucleosides that disrupted pyrimidine biosynthesis at the orotidine monophosphate (OMP) synthesis step and induced genotoxic stress and p53-mediated cell death of cycling nonmyocytes. As nonmyocytes are critical for heart repair, we showed that rescue of pyrimidine biosynthesis by administration of uridine or by genetic targeting of the ENPP1/AMP pathway enhanced repair after cardiac injury. We identified ENPP1 inhibitors using small molecule screening and showed that systemic administration of an ENPP1 inhibitor after heart injury rescued pyrimidine biosynthesis in nonmyocyte cells and augmented cardiac repair and postinfarct heart function. These observations demonstrate that the cardiac muscle cell regulates pyrimidine metabolism in nonmuscle cells by releasing adenine and specific nucleosides after heart injury and provide insight into how intercellular regulation of pyrimidine biosynthesis can be targeted and monitored for augmenting tissue repair

Religiousness as tourist performances: a case study of Greek Orthodox pilgrimage

The aim of this paper is to decipher ways of experiencing religiousness through tourist performances, intersecting textual approaches with the essential embodiment and materiality of the tourist world. Exploring the diversity of religious tourists’ practices within the Greek Orthodox context, two dimensions underpinning religious tourist experience are highlighted: institutional performances and unconventional performances. Focussing on the embodied experience and drawing upon theories of performance, the paper critiques the interplays of body and place to re-conceptualise current understanding of the pilgrimage/tourism relationship. In doing so, the paper proposes that tourism and religion are not separate entities but linked through embodied notions of godliness sensed through touristic performances

A chaos theory perspective on destination crisis management: Evidence from Mexico

a b s t r a c t It is recognised that tourism destinations are vulnerable to some form of crisis or disaster. Consequently, attention has long been paid to the nature and consequences of tourism crises and disasters, whilst, more recently, a number of tourism crisis management models have been proposed in the literature. Such models may, however, be criticised for their structured, linear and prescriptive approach to the management of crises, which tend to be unpredictable in their occurrence and evolution. Therefore, identifying the limitations of contemporary crisis management models, this paper proposes an alternative, chaos theory-based approach to crisis management. This is then considered within the context of the AH1N1 influenza crisis in Mexico. The research revealing not only that the unfolding of the crisis followed many of the tenets of chaos theory, but also that chaos theory provides a viable framework for the management of tourism crises

A chaos theory perspective on destination crisis management: Evidence from Mexico

a b s t r a c t It is recognised that tourism destinations are vulnerable to some form of crisis or disaster. Consequently, attention has long been paid to the nature and consequences of tourism crises and disasters, whilst, more recently, a number of tourism crisis management models have been proposed in the literature. Such models may, however, be criticised for their structured, linear and prescriptive approach to the management of crises, which tend to be unpredictable in their occurrence and evolution. Therefore, identifying the limitations of contemporary crisis management models, this paper proposes an alternative, chaos theory-based approach to crisis management. This is then considered within the context of the AH1N1 influenza crisis in Mexico. The research revealing not only that the unfolding of the crisis followed many of the tenets of chaos theory, but also that chaos theory provides a viable framework for the management of tourism crises

The Influence of Social Support on Psychological Distress in Older Persons: An Examination of Interaction Processes in Australia

Social support is proposed as a coping mechanism against anxiety and depression amongst older persons, but few data have examined how this occurs. This study assessed the contributions of two sub-components of social support as mediators against psychological distress - broadly defined as anxiety and depression. 1,560 men and 1,758 women from the Hunter Community Study (Australia) completed the Duke Social Support Scale and the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale. The Duke Social Support Scale examined the amount of social interaction and satisfaction with social interactions. Significant mediating effects of social support were found in the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale items measuring depression but not anxiety. Satisfaction with social support was a significant predictor of Kessler Psychological Distress Scale total score and Sadness items, but the amount of social support was not a predictor of stress. Social support may assist with symptoms of depression, i.e., specific sadness/depressed mood, but not necessarily with anxiety. Implications for policy and service delivery were discussed

Metabolic plasticity drives development during mammalian embryogenesis

Mammalian preimplantation embryos follow a stereotypic pattern of development from zygotes to blastocysts. Here, we use labeled nutrient isotopologue analysis of small numbers of embryos to track downstream metabolites. Combined with transcriptomic analysis, we assess the capacity of the embryo to reprogram its metabolism through development. Early embryonic metabolism is rigid in its nutrient requirements, sensitive to reductive stress and has a marked disequilibrium between two halves of the TCA cycle. Later, loss of maternal LDHB and transcription of zygotic products favors increased activity of bioenergetic shuttles, fatty-acid oxidation and equilibration of the TCA cycle. As metabolic plasticity peaks, blastocysts can develop without external nutrients. Normal developmental metabolism of the early embryo is distinct from cancer metabolism. However, similarities emerge upon reductive stress. Increased metabolic plasticity with maturation is due to changes in redox control mechanisms and to transcriptional reprogramming of later-stage embryos during homeostasis or upon adaptation to environmental changes