Towards Green Pilgrimage: A Framework For Action in Makkah, Saudi Arabia

The great Islamic pilgrimage (Hajj) to the Holy places in Makkah, Saudi Arabia, is considered one of the largest annual mass confluences of people in the world. Hajj takes at least four-days and attracts more than three million pilgrims who perform specific steps to fulfil the requirements of this unique journey. However, Hajj presents an extraordinary challenge to the Saudi government for ensuring safety during such a large-scale mass gathering, and stakeholders are overwhelmed by managing the logistics of this event. Despite prior studies’ efforts to explore attitudes towards pilgrimage safety, and to investigate ways to minimise carbon footprints on the environment, research on how to move towards greening this massive event is scarce. Hence, this paper provides a holistic overview of the challenges facing the Saudi government and involved stakeholders towards achieving the greening of this pilgrimage. This exploratory study uses a qualitative approach; data were collected via a semi-structured interview, six focus groups, and participant observation (on-site observation) in the city of Makkah during the Hajj season of 2018. Results show that the Ministry of Hajj and Umrah put various elements in place, such as recycling, solid waste management, and environmental protection. However, limited communication among stakeholders involved in the event makes it difficult to go further in achieving green goals. In this study, opportunities and challenges for green pilgrimage are divided into seven main groups: initiatives towards green pilgrimage, waste management, energy efficiency and transportation, greening water resources, greening food, green rituals, and promoting green awareness. A framework of action for developing sustainable green pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia is suggested and also, implications for the Saudi government and stakeholders are discussed in the light of extant literature. Recommendations are provided for better application of green pilgrimage initiatives in Saudi Arabia, with a particular focus on the Holy City of Makkah

Exploring the Major Trends and Emerging Themes of Artificial Intelligence in the Scientific Leading Journals amidst the COVID-19 Era

Artificial intelligence (AI) has recently become the focus of academia and practitioners, reflecting the substantial evolution of scientific production in this area, particularly during the COVID-19 era. However, there is no known academic work exploring the major trends and the extant and emerging themes of scientific research production of AI leading journals. To this end, this study is to specify the research progress on AI among the top-tier journals by highlighting the development of its trends, topics, and key themes. This article employs an integrated bibliometric analysis using evaluative and relational metrics to analyze, map, and outline the key trends and themes of articles published in the leading AI academic journals, based on the latest CiteScore of Scopus-indexed journals between 2020 and 2021. The findings depict the major trends, conceptual and social structures, and key themes of AI leading journals’ publications during the given period. This paper represents valuable implications for concerned scholars, research centers, higher education institutions, and various organizations within different domains. Limitations and directions for further research are outlined.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Religious Servicescape: Does Convenience Matter for Revisit Intentions and Positive Word of Mouth?

Umrah is an optional holy ritual that is highly rewarded when performed in the month of Ramadan. Hence, managing such an event is a challenging mission facing stakeholders. However, limited studies have examined the quality of services provided in the Umrah site (i.e., the Holy Mosque in the city of Makkah, Saudi Arabia) from the pilgrims’ perspective. The current study examines the influence of religious servicescape on service convenience and investigates whether service convenience matters to pilgrims. Further, the study tests the role of religious attractiveness (i.e., of the Kaaba) on pilgrims’ behavioural outcomes (i.e. intention to revisit and Positive Word of Mouth (PWOM). A Mixed-method approach is followed to collect rich data (i.e., quantitative and qualitative). The findings demonstrate that religious servicescape has a critical impact on service convenience. The results also show that service convenience is also a significant mediator between servicescape and PWOM. However, service convenience does not mediate the relationship between religious servicescape and intention to revisit. Consequently, service convenience in the religious context matters to pilgrims and the service provider. Further, Kaaba attractiveness creates a ‘halo’ effect

Greenhushing: the deliberate under communicating of sustainability practices by tourism businesses

Greenhushing selectively communicates fewer pro-sustainability actions by businesses than are practiced; based on a perception of customers’ rights to consumerism. We first studied the gap between the communication of sustainability practices in the audits and websites of 31 small rural tourism businesses in the Peak District National Park (UK). The analysis showed that businesses only communicate 30% of all the sustainability actions practiced. Their websites emphasised customer benefits, using explicit, affective, experiential and active language that legitimises the customers’ hedonistic use of the landscape, while downplaying complex issues and normalising sustainability to reduce customer guilt. Just one website mentioned climate change. We found that greenhushing results from a low moral intensity, masking potentially negative consequences of perceived lower competence, whilst protecting business from more cynical consumers who may interpret their statements as hypocritical. Subsequent textual analysis and interviews were used to understand how communication constitutes these organisations. We propose that greenhushing reshapes and constitutes tourism businesses through their communications. Moreover, greenhushing is a form of public moralisation that adopts communication practices similar to greenwashing, reflecting the social norms expected from a business; however, in this case, located in a moral muteness, rather than moral hypocrisy, that businesses accept but resent

The Antecedent of the Sustainable Purchasing Attitudes among Generation Z: A Terror Management Theory Perspective

Sustainable purchasing attitudes have been a topic of increasing research interest; however, to date, limited studies have investigated its antecedents, particularly within Generation Z in developing countries. In this paper, we empirically explore the factors that affect young consumers’ attitudes to purchasing sustainably within the holistic approach of terror management theory (TMT) by qualitatively exploring how the TMT constructs of death salience and self-esteem influence sustainability attitudes within Gen Z in Saudi Arabia, while considering the role of religion in the proposed TMT framework. Using purposive sampling, qualitative rich data were collected from 18 interviews with young consumers (Gen Z). Our findings revealed insights that help to understand the attitudes that influence sustainable purchasing judgments among young consumers in Saudi Arabia. This contributes to a better understanding of the holistic literature on sustainable purchasing attitudes and may have several implications for sustainable brand management in addition to opening up new research avenues for further investigation

Entrepreneurs’ Responses to COVID-19 Crisis: A Holistic Dynamic Capabilities Perspective in the Saudi Food and Beverage Sector

The COVID-19 pandemic has been an active crisis for businesses around the globe. This paper adopts the Dynamic Capabilities (DC) theory to investigate factors that may account for differences in entrepreneurial marketing (EM) adoption and entrepreneurial marketing opportunities during two stages of the recent COVID-19 pandemic, namely the full and partial closure. The existing study provides useful insights into the functioning of entrepreneurial marketing that make the related opportunities and challenges visible. Additionally, the paper explores entrepreneurial marketing strategies employed by Saudi entrepreneurs within the Food and Beverage sector (F&B) to mitigate the uncertainty and challenges posed by the pandemic. Since the nature of the research inquiry is exploratory, semi-structured interviews with seventeen restaurant and cafe owners were conducted to explore the phenomena under investigation and confirm the constructs used for the model development. Under exceptional circumstances, restaurants and cafés representing the F&B sector have been forced to respond quickly, become innovative and make compromises. Findings revealed that converting to survival mode with short time frames was the only solution for entrepreneurial marketing within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic

Entrepreneurs’ Responses to COVID-19 Crisis: A Holistic Dynamic Capabilities Perspective in the Saudi Food and Beverage Sector

The COVID-19 pandemic has been an active crisis for businesses around the globe. This paper adopts the Dynamic Capabilities (DC) theory to investigate factors that may account for differences in entrepreneurial marketing (EM) adoption and entrepreneurial marketing opportunities during two stages of the recent COVID-19 pandemic, namely the full and partial closure. The existing study provides useful insights into the functioning of entrepreneurial marketing that make the related opportunities and challenges visible. Additionally, the paper explores entrepreneurial marketing strategies employed by Saudi entrepreneurs within the Food and Beverage sector (F&B) to mitigate the uncertainty and challenges posed by the pandemic. Since the nature of the research inquiry is exploratory, semi-structured interviews with seventeen restaurant and cafe owners were conducted to explore the phenomena under investigation and confirm the constructs used for the model development. Under exceptional circumstances, restaurants and cafés representing the F&B sector have been forced to respond quickly, become innovative and make compromises. Findings revealed that converting to survival mode with short time frames was the only solution for entrepreneurial marketing within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic