Your Thoughts Matter

Sustainability

Is "going green" unmanly? Gender stereotypes and perceptions of environmentally friendly behaviors

Source: JournalistsResource.org

The issue: Green labels that promise consumers their purchases are eco-friendly appear on all sorts of goods these days, from yogurts to urinals. The label can mean many things: The item has sustainable packaging. It’s organically grown. It’s locally made. Or it is just a little less damaging to the planet. With growing concern from government officials and others about pollution and climate change, going green is a hot marketing strategy.

Human appropriation of global production in the 20th century

Source: JournalistsResource.org
 

“Sustainability” is a term that is frequently thrown around rather loosely, but its use tends to be restricted to specific practices or areas — sustainable urbanism, agriculture or energy, for example. While there has long been concern over rising human population levels and resource consumption, the larger question of where the ultimate limits might be — the Earth is a fixed size, after all — has been subject to as much rhetoric-charged debate as considered research.

Peer effects in the diffusion of solar photovoltaic panels

Source: JournalistsResource.org

A home solar panel system is a consumer product like few others. Because the alternative choice — electricity from the grid — is almost universally available, relatively inexpensive and has no up-front cost, potential buyers of solar systems require other incentives. These can range from government rebates to credit for energy sold back to the grid to the warm feeling one gets for doing a good deed — in this case, for the environment.

U.N. report: Findings on e-Waste problems in Africa

Source: JournalistsResource.org
 

Information communication technology (ICT) such as computers and cell phones has proliferated throughout the world, and many developing nations are consuming them at an increasing rate. Moreover, as such goods become technologically outdated in wealthier nations, they are often shipped to developing countries for refurbishment, recycling or disposal. However, such countries are sometimes ill-equipped to deal with the parts found in many products in an ecologically sound manner.

Oil revenues for public investment in Africa: Targeting urban or rural areas?

Source: JournalistsResource.org
 

In the study of economic development, there is a general consensus that public infrastructure investments supporting private sector-led economic activities are essential for growth. However, questions remain about how countries with newly found natural resources such as oil might best spend revenues on infrastructure and avoid the “resource curse” — the tendency of economies focused on such resources to see slower, and narrower, growth.

Drug-resistant infections and their surging economic costs

Source: JournalistsResource.org

The issue: Since penicillin was introduced in the 1940s, antibiotics have saved countless lives. But we have used these drugs so much for so long that the diseases they once killed have adapted and developed immunity. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 23,000 Americans now die each year from infections by bacteria that are impervious to antibiotics.