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The geopolitical issues related to the war between Russia and Ukraine had dramatically highline the energy price crisis. Russia is by far the main European Union supplier of crude oil, natural gas and solid fossil fuels and replacing its energy supply to the European Union would be a major challenge in the short-term. Europe’s industrial sector depends heavily on natural gas as an input factor. When energy prices raised, industrial employment in the European Union had actually increased, both in terms of people employed and hours worked, compared to the same period in the last year. With energy bills rising to unaffordable levels, companies all over Europe have already registered for a temporary unemployment system with gloomy predictions regarding the loss of a significant number of jobs.

The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly affected the energy sector. The new behavior of industrial and non-commercial consumers changes the energy consumption model. In addition, the constraints associated with the coronavirus crisis have led to environmental effects from declining economic activity. The research is based on evidence from around the world showing significant reductions in emissions and improved air quality. This situation requires rethinking the energy development strategy, particularly the construction of smart grids as a leading direction of energy development. Evaluating the efficiency of smart grids is a vital tool for disseminating successful experience in improving their management. This paper proposes an approach to a comprehensive assessment of smart grids based on a comparative analysis of existing methods, taking into account the changes that need to be considered after the experience gained from the COVID-19 pandemic. The approach provides an accurate set of efficiency indicators for assessing smart grids to account for the direct and indirect effects of smart grids’ implementation. This evaluation approach can be helpful to policymakers in developing energy efficiency programs and implementing energy policy.

The primary objective for deploying renewable energy in India is to advance economic development, improve energy security, improve access to energy, and mitigate climate change. Sustainable development is possible by use of sustainable energy and by ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for citizens. Strong government support and the increasingly opportune economic situation have pushed India to be one of the top leaders in the world’s most attractive renewable energy markets. The government has designed policies, programs, and a liberal environment to attract foreign investments to ramp up the country in the renewable energy market at a rapid rate. It is anticipated that the renewable energy sector can create a large number of domestic jobs over the following years. This paper aims to present significant achievements, prospects, projections, generation of electricity, as well as challenges and investment and employment opportunities due to the development of renewable energy in India. In this review, we have identified the various obstacles faced by the renewable sector. The recommendations based on the review outcomes will provide useful information for policymakers, innovators, project developers, investors, industries, associated stakeholders and departments, researchers, and scientists.

PurposeThis paper links supply chain risk management to medicine supply chains to explore the role of policymakers in employing supply chain risk management strategies (SCRMS) to reduce generic medicine shortages.Design/methodology/approachUsing secondary data supplemented with primary data, the authors map and compare seven countries' SCRMS for handling shortage risks in their paracetamol supply chains before and during the first two waves of the COVID-19 pandemic.FindingsConsistent with recent research, the study finds that policymakers had implemented few SCRMS specifically for responding to disruptions caused by COVID-19. However, shortages were largely avoided since multiple strategies for coping with business-as-usual disruptions had been implemented prior to the pandemic. The authors did find that SCRMS implemented during COVID-19 were not always aligned with those implemented pre-pandemic. The authors also found that policymakers played both direct and indirect roles.Research limitations/implicationsCombining longitudinal secondary data with interviews sheds light on how, regardless of the level of preparedness during normal times, SCRMS can be leveraged to avert shortages in abnormal times. However, the problem is highly complex, which warrants further research.Practical implicationsSupply chain professionals and policymakers in the healthcare sector can use the findings when developing preparedness and response plans.Social implicationsThe insights developed can help policymakers improve the availability of high-volume generic medicines in (ab)normal times.Originality/valueThe authors contribute to prior SCRM research in two ways. First, the authors operationalize SCRMS in the medicine supply chain context in (ab)normal times, thereby opening avenues for future research on SCRM in this context. Second, the authors develop insights on the role policymakers play and how they directly implement and indirectly influence the adoption of SCRMS. Based on the study findings, the authors develop a framework that captures the diverse roles of policymakers in SCRM.

In this article, we present a Monte Carlo simulation (MCS) to estimate the total cost required to control the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic by financial incentives. One of the greatest difficulties in controlling the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic is that most infected people are not identified and can transmit the virus to other people. Therefore, there is an urgent need to rapidly identify and isolate the infected people to avoid the further spread of COVID-19. To achieve this, we can consider providing a financial incentive for the people who voluntarily take the COVID-19 test and test positive. To prevent the abuse of the financial incentive policy, several conditions should be satisfied to receive the incentive. For example, an incentive is offered only if the recipients know who infected them. Based on the data obtained from epidemiological investigations, we calculated an estimated total cost of financial incentives for the policy by generating various possible infection routes using the estimated parameters and MCS. These results would help public health policymakers implement the proposed method to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the incentive policy can support various preparations such as hospital bed preparation, vaccine development, and so forth.

Environmental issues have gained global prominence, prompting extensive global efforts toward sustainability. Within this landscape, multiple criteria decision aiding (MCDA) emerges as a pivotal tool, intricately intertwined with policy and decision-making processes to navigate uncertainties. This paper rigorously investigates application of MCDA in environmental decision-making processes and policy-making, shedding light on challenges and limitations in its practical implementation. While acknowledging MCDA's potential to address complex issues, the study critically examines its real-world utility in environmental policy-making. Drawing insights from 80 review papers and 9 related papers, the research underscores MCDA's evolving adaptability in managing diverse objectives and assessment criteria. It emphasises MCDA's value for policy makers by facilitating the implementation of effective policies, offering clarity for future policy directions, and assessing trade-offs among multiple goals. Despite these merits, the study identifies key challenges, including method selection influenced by expertise. Inherent uncertainties, varying stakeholder participation levels, and the delicate balance between expert-driven and collaborative approaches also present significant hurdles. Addressing subjectivity in evaluations, providing clear options in complex scenarios, and applying MCDA to dynamic problems are also identified as challenges. Additional obstacles include formulating criteria, integrating uncertainty, managing long-term perspectives, and ensuring practical and enduring benefits in policy decision-making. The paper highlights the lack of methodological guidance for the application of MCDA in environmental policy-making, emphasises the shortcomings of stakeholder engagement, and acknowledges data limitations as additional barriers. Consequently, given the uncertainties surrounding environmental issues, the study underscores the need for adjustments to effectively employ MCDA in such complex situations.

Gifted education is gaining popularity in non-western contexts such as Arab countries, including the United Arab Emirates (UAE) due to its potential to drive innovation and national development. However, globally, there are lapses in the current efforts towards the implementation of gifted education. This has culminated in discussions on effective ways to reform education systems for effective implementation of gifted education. The current paper generally focuses on the theoretical framework of the special issue about 'Gifted Education in Arab Countries: Analyses from a Learning-Resource Perspective' with a brief reference to the context of the UAE as an example of the participating countries. The framework developed by Zieger and his colleagues on the basis of the Actiotope concept, has been widely accepted as a useful model to guide gifted education in various contexts. The current paper presented the Actiotope model; developing a conceptual lens which could be used by policymakers who are in the process of reforming their education systems. At the heart of the Actiotope model is achievement of excellence which is considered as an interrelationship between individual, environment, and action. The study operationalized each of the tenets of the Actiotope model. Lastly, the study concluded with practical suggestions for integration of the tenets of the Actiotope model in the education system in Arab countries.

Background: Improving food and nutrition literacy is fundamental to tackling the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region’s enormous challenges, including malnutrition and food insecurity. To direct initiatives, it is crucial to assess the region’s food and nutrition literacy. Thus, we aimed to review studies on food/nutrition literacy status in the MENA countries and illuminate the region’s research gaps in these areas, in terms of assessment, policy, and program implementation. Methods: PubMed and Google Scholar databases were searched between 18 December and 8 May 2022, to identify relevant articles published up to 2022 in the MENA region. Results: Twelve studies were included in this review. Lebanon, Palestine, and Iran are the only three MENA countries where nutrition and/or food literacy were assessed. People in these countries mostly had inadequate food and/or nutrition literacy levels, especially in the skills rather than the cognitive domain. Food and/or nutrition literacy showed associations with food habits, food-label use, food-consumption patterns, school performance, food security, dietary diversity, and nutrient adequacy. The MENA countries developed no policies or programs to address food and nutrition literacy. Conclusion: This review is a wake-up call for researchers and policymakers to develop a robust approach to combat food and nutrition literacy concerns in the MENA region.

Political representation and democracy in several European countries have faced considerable challenges in recent decades. Especially worrying are the decline in electoral turnout and party membership, along with the decline in political trust and growing dissatisfaction with the functioning of representative democracy. These are all linked to the quality of democracy. Many scholars believe that a possible solution to such problems is democratic innovations, largely due to their participatory nature. Although in recent times democratic innovations have been put into practice, and analysed from multiple perspectives in multiple European countries, this has not happened with regard to Central and Eastern European countries. Based on face- to- face interviews conducted in 2024 with policymakers as well as representatives of civil society organisations in four Central and Eastern European countries, exploratory analysis reveals (different) views, rhetorical stances, sentiments and narratives concerning the meaning and importance of democratic innovations, including for maintaining/increasing political trust. The analysis points not only to differences among countries, but also between the groups of respondents.