Our paper investigates the microfoundations of sustainable entrepreneurship and aims to shed light on trade-offs made in decisions about social, ecological and economic sustainability. Balancing the three dimensions of sustainability (social, ecological and economic) inherently requires choices in which one dimension or another has less optimal outcomes. There is not much known about the rationale that sustainable entrepreneurs use for making such trade-offs. Thus, we ask how does entrepreneurial orientation affect decisions and trade-offs on sustainability impact? Our study is an exploratory, qualitative study of 24 sustainable entrepreneurs. We collected data about entrepreneurial orientation and sustainability trade-offs and held in-depth interviews with a subsample of six firms. We conducted a cluster analysis based on four entrepreneurial orientations (innovativeness, proactiveness, riskiness and futurity) and three sustainability trade-off dimensions (environmental, social and economic). From the findings, we derive a typology of three types of sustainable entrepreneurs: green-conflicted, humanitarian-oriented and holistically-oriented. We uncover salient characteristics and aspects of entrepreneurial orientation in relation to trade-off decisions. We find that the entrepreneurs accept slower economic growth or lower performance in order to maintain the integrity of their social and ecological principles and values.
Cut, cooled, packed, transported and traded all over the world, flowers represent a showcase of a worldwide integrated trade-logistics system. As one of the most perishable, vulnerable and time-critical products, speed is everything in harvesting, moving and trading of flowers. In the international trade of flowers and logistics of florticulture products, the Netherlands is the largest center of trade and logistics of flowers, taking a share of more than 40% in global cut flower export volume. When COVID-19 hit the world, this ever-moving system came to a full stop. What did this mean for the trade and logistics system? Which players were hit most? Did the crises change the system, just interrupt it or has it set the stage for developments already under way to strengthen and accelerate? This chapter presents and discusses the international position of the Dutch trade-logistics system as the most dynamic part of a worldwide flower industry. It sketches key trends in the industry over the last decade and draws a line towards possible post-COVID-19 scenarios for the worldwide flower industry and the international position of the Netherlands. The Dutch flower industry has shown incredible resilience to the external shock of COVID-19, but the crisis also has uncovered some weaknesses of the international flower industry. However, the chapter concludes that it is unlikely that these weaknesses will change the direction of developments in the sector, some of which already started to take shape in the 1970s. The chapter is based on pre-COVID-19 research and literature on the trade-logistics hub of the Netherlands, an analysis of trade and logistics data from around 2000 up to the first months of 2021, and existing economic scenarios for the flower industry and world trade.
This article will analyze how blockchain technology is applied tomanage and track cargo movement across the globe. First, thedistribution of goods, as well as the bill of lading and quality assurance,the shipping time with the lowest cost, is always a problem for logisticscompanies. The cost of securing goods during transit or long time tocomplete customs procedures also affects the delivery results. This studywill provide problems for the company as well as the impact of the useof blockchain technology developed by IMB in Maersk 's logisticsmanagement system. Thereby the management of goods as well asguarantee orders to win the trust of customers as well as bringenormous profits for themselves Maersk company and provide a newdirection for Indo-Trans Logistics, Vietnam.
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Alle auto's, windmolens en o.a. houten kozijnen hebben één ding gemeen. Ze moeten gecoat worden om het materiaal te beschermen. Alleen al in Nederland wordt ruim 1 miljard euro omzet gerealiseerd met coatings. Er is dringend behoefte aan verduurzaming en innovatie. Aan het einde van de levensduur wordt de coating meestal verbrand, dit leidt tot meer CO2 omdat coatings veelal van fossiele grondstoffen zijn gemaakt. Het maken van een biobased coating is daarom essentieel. Echter, één belangrijk ingrediënt mist, de aromaat. Het zijn de aromaten die de coating glanzend, krasvast en uv-bestendig maken. De coatingindustrie heeft geprobeerd het fossiele ingrediënt ftaalzuuranhydride (PA) in de hars te vervangen, maar er is tot op heden geen goede oplossing gevonden. Relement ontwikkelde als eerste bedrijf wereldwijd een bio-aromaat, te weten biobased 3-methylftaalzuuranhydride (bio-MPA). Een showmodel van een coating gebaseerd op bio-MPA ontbreekt en dat is precies wat samen met Fontys Hogeschool onderzocht gaat worden in dit KIEM Go-Chem project. Het doel van het project Alchemist is om een biobased alkyd coating showmodel te realiseren gebaseerd op bio-MPA i.p.v. fossiel PA. De eigenschappen van de coating worden getest en vergeleken met een alkyd coating gebaseerd op fossiel PA. Er worden betere eigenschappen verwacht door het vervangen van PA door MPA.
Collaborative networks for sustainability are emerging rapidly to address urgent societal challenges. By bringing together organizations with different knowledge bases, resources and capabilities, collaborative networks enhance information exchange, knowledge sharing and learning opportunities to address these complex problems that cannot be solved by organizations individually. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the apparel sector, where examples of collaborative networks for sustainability are plenty, for example Sustainable Apparel Coalition, Zero Discharge Hazardous Chemicals, and the Fair Wear Foundation. Companies like C&A and H&M but also smaller players join these networks to take their social responsibility. Collaborative networks are unlike traditional forms of organizations; they are loosely structured collectives of different, often competing organizations, with dynamic membership and usually lack legal status. However, they do not emerge or organize on their own; they need network orchestrators who manage the network in terms of activities and participants. But network orchestrators face many challenges. They have to balance the interests of diverse companies and deal with tensions that often arise between them, like sharing their innovative knowledge. Orchestrators also have to “sell” the value of the network to potential new participants, who make decisions about which networks to join based on the benefits they expect to get from participating. Network orchestrators often do not know the best way to maintain engagement, commitment and enthusiasm or how to ensure knowledge and resource sharing, especially when competitors are involved. Furthermore, collaborative networks receive funding from grants or subsidies, creating financial uncertainty about its continuity. Raising financing from the private sector is difficult and network orchestrators compete more and more for resources. When networks dissolve or dysfunction (due to a lack of value creation and capture for participants, a lack of financing or a non-functioning business model), the collective value that has been created and accrued over time may be lost. This is problematic given that industrial transformations towards sustainability take many years and durable organizational forms are required to ensure ongoing support for this change. Network orchestration is a new profession. There are no guidelines, handbooks or good practices for how to perform this role, nor is there professional education or a professional association that represents network orchestrators. This is urgently needed as network orchestrators struggle with their role in governing networks so that they create and capture value for participants and ultimately ensure better network performance and survival. This project aims to foster the professionalization of the network orchestrator role by: (a) generating knowledge, developing and testing collaborative network governance models, facilitation tools and collaborative business modeling tools to enable network orchestrators to improve the performance of collaborative networks in terms of collective value creation (network level) and private value capture (network participant level) (b) organizing platform activities for network orchestrators to exchange ideas, best practices and learn from each other, thereby facilitating the formation of a professional identity, standards and community of network orchestrators.
Events:Project meetings & trainings with the COMMITTED partners•Kick-off meeting at Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Groningen, 5 April 2022•Partner meeting & training at Technical University of Applied Sciences Würzburg-Schweinfurt, Wurzburg, 12- 14 Dec. 2022•Partner meeting & training at Moravian College Olomouc, 31 May – 2 June 2023•Partner meeting at Lappeenranta-Lahti University of Technology LUT, Kouvola, 18 Sept. 2023•Final partner meeting at Budapest Business University, Budapest, 18 March 2024Trainings for university staff and SMEs:•Deemed export compliance pilot training for university staff,1 Feb. 2024, IBS Hanze. •Deemed export compliance pilot training for SMEs, 12 Feb. 2024, IBS Hanze.Conference presentations:Project pitch at Conference of the Centre of Expertise Entrepreneurship, Hanze, May 21, 2024Workshops:Deemed export workshop at the annual Enterprise Europe Network (EEN) consortium day on June 27, 2024The proposed project will help companies, policy makers and university researchers and students involved in international projects for which export compliance is applicable, recognize the risks related to the dissemination/use of data, R&D results and other products of international cooperation. Such items regulated by export control regimes require preparedness and understanding what is necessary to comply with the rules, in order to prevent infringement, which can have profound negative consequences for all parties involved. EU calls for tailored guidance to address those distinct challenges (2021/821 Regulation) and the proposed project is inline with this need.
