scholarly journals Increased labor losses and decreased adaptation potential in a warmer world

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Luke A. Parsons ◽  
Drew Shindell ◽  
Michelle Tigchelaar ◽  
Yuqiang Zhang ◽  
June T. Spector
Keyword(s):  
Global Warming ◽  
Heat Exposure ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Early Morning ◽  
Reanalysis Data ◽  
Worker Productivity ◽  
Adaptation Potential ◽  
Productivity Losses ◽  
Continuous Work ◽  
Health And Well Being

AbstractWorking in hot and potentially humid conditions creates health and well-being risks that will increase as the planet warms. It has been proposed that workers could adapt to increasing temperatures by moving labor from midday to cooler hours. Here, we use reanalysis data to show that in the current climate approximately 30% of global heavy labor losses in the workday could be recovered by moving labor from the hottest hours of the day. However, we show that this particular workshift adaptation potential is lost at a rate of about 2% per degree of global warming as early morning heat exposure rises to unsafe levels for continuous work, with worker productivity losses accelerating under higher warming levels. These findings emphasize the importance of finding alternative adaptation mechanisms to keep workers safe, as well as the importance of limiting global warming.

What the Science Tells Us about Climate Change

2020 ◽  
pp. 19-42
Author(s):  
Janis Sarra
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Food Security ◽  
Climate Adaptation ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Negative Impacts ◽  
Current Science ◽  
Health And Well Being ◽  
Impacts Of Climate Change

Chapter 2 offers an analysis of the state of science and its direct implications for business. It explores how the physical impacts of climate change are already evident, discussing impacts on human health and well-being; on food security and food production systems; on the ecosystems of oceans, lands, and wetlands; and impacts on freshwater resources and on the cryosphere. The chapter examines the concept of climate tipping points and the implications for businesses. It also explores why mitigation is crucially important to reversing the negative impacts of climate change and discusses why climate adaptation is important and necessary, but not, in itself, sufficient to change the current trajectory of global warming. The chapter focuses particularly on what companies need to know about the current science on climate change.

scholarly journals Warming from tropical deforestation reduces worker productivity in rural communities

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yuta J. Masuda ◽  
Teevrat Garg ◽  
Ike Anggraeni ◽  
Kristie Ebi ◽  
Jennifer Krenz ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Rural Communities ◽  
Adaptive Capacity ◽  
Heat Exposure ◽  
Worker Productivity ◽  
Outdoor Workers ◽  
Productivity Losses ◽  
Behavioral Adaptations ◽  
Heat Effects ◽  
Work Breaks ◽  
Negative Impacts

AbstractThe accelerating loss of tropical forests in the 21st century has eliminated cooling services provided by trees in low latitude countries. Cooling services can protect rural communities and outdoor workers with little adaptive capacity from adverse heat exposure, which is expected to increase with climate change. Yet little is still known about whether cooling services can mitigate negative impacts of heat on labor productivity among rural outdoor workers. Through a field experiment in Indonesia, we show that worker productivity was 8.22% lower in deforested relative to forested settings, where wet bulb globe temperatures were, on average, 2.84 °C higher in deforested settings. We demonstrate that productivity losses are driven by behavioral adaptations in the form of increased number of work breaks, and provide evidence that suggests breaks are in part driven by awareness of heat effects on work. Our results indicate that the cooling services from forests have the potential for increasing resilience and adaptive capacity to local warming.

scholarly journals Working from home and productivity under the COVID-19 pandemic: Using survey data of four manufacturing firms

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (12) ◽  
pp. e0261761
Author(s):  
Ritsu Kitagawa ◽  
Sachiko Kuroda ◽  
Hiroko Okudaira ◽  
Hideo Owan
Keyword(s):  
Well Being ◽  
Manufacturing Firms ◽  
Productivity Losses ◽  
Work From Home ◽  
Working From Home ◽  
Communication Difficulties ◽  
Individual Productivity ◽  
Time Invariant ◽  
Health And Well Being ◽  
Better Than

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has impacted the world economy in various ways. In particular, the drastic shift to telework has dramatically changed how people work. Whether the new style of working from home (WFH) will remain in our society highly depends on its effects on workers’ productivity. However, to the best of our knowledge, the effects of WFH on productivity are still unclear. By leveraging unique surveys conducted at four manufacturing firms in Japan, we assess within-company productivity differences between those who work from home and those who do not, along with identifying possible factors of productivity changes due to WFH. Our main findings are as follows. First, after ruling out the time-invariant component of individual productivity and separate trends specific to employee attributes, we find that workers who worked from home experienced productivity declines more than those who did not. Second, our analysis shows that poor WFH setups and communication difficulties are the major reasons for productivity losses. Third, we find that the mental health of workers who work from home is better than that of workers who are unable to work from home. Our result suggests that if appropriate investments in upgrading WFH setups and facilitating communication can be made, WFH may improve productivity by improving employees’ health and well-being.

scholarly journals How can health promotion contribute to pulling humans back from the brink of disaster?

2021 ◽  
pp. 175797592110440
Author(s):  
Fran Baum
Keyword(s):  
Complex System ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Health Promotion ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Urban Environments ◽  
The Third ◽  
Primary Focus ◽  
Health And Well Being

Health promotion has evolved over the last decades from a primary focus on behaviour change to establishing an ambitious goal of creating healthy, fair and sustainable environments in a manner which realises the rights of all people to health and well-being while protecting the health of our planet and its ecosystems. This paper argues that in order to contribute to this ambitious goal, health promotion must address three key tasks. The first is the need to take planetary health more seriously and move away from reductionist thinking to an approach that sees the planet as a complex system and values more harmony with nature, protects biodiversity and prevents global warming. The second task is to advocate and support governments to govern for health. The key to doing this is putting health and equity before profit, creating healthy urban environments, encouraging participatory decision-making, advocating for healthy economic models and assessing the ways in which corporate determinants of health operate. The third task is to ensure that moves to professionalise health promotion do not come at the expense of health promotion advocacy to powerful people and organisations. Health promotion is well placed to support civil society movements arguing for social and economic change that will benefit health such as the Black Lives Matter and environment movements.

Diet Quality, a Term Subject to Change over Time

2012 ◽  
Vol 82 (3) ◽  
pp. 144-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ibrahim Elmadfa ◽  
Alexa L. Meyer
Keyword(s):  
Diet Quality ◽  
Functional Foods ◽  
Disease Risk ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Industrialized Countries ◽  
Quality Factors ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Quality Diet ◽  
Important Quality ◽  
Health And Well Being

A high-quality diet is one of the foundations of health and well-being. For a long time in human history, diet was chiefly a source of energy and macronutrients meant to still hunger and give the strength for work and activities that were in general much harder than nowadays. Only few persons could afford to emphasize enjoyment. In the assessment of quality, organoleptic properties were major criteria to detect spoilage and oxidative deterioration of food. Today, food hygiene is a quality aspect that is often taken for granted by consumers, despite its lack being at the origin of most food-borne diseases. The discovery of micronutrients entailed fundamental changes of the concept of diet quality. However, non-essential food components with additional health functions were still barely known or not considered important until recently. With the high burden of obesity and its associated diseases on the rise, affluent, industrialized countries have developed an increased interest in these substances, which has led to the development of functional foods to optimize special body functions, reduce disease risk, or even contribute to therapeutic approaches. Indeed, nowadays, high contents of energy, fat, and sugar are factors associated with a lower quality of food, and products with reduced amounts of these components are valued by many consumers. At the same time, enjoyment and convenience are important quality factors, presenting food manufacturers with the dilemma of reconciling low fat content and applicability with good taste and appealing appearance. Functional foods offer an approach to address this challenge. Deeper insights into nutrient-gene interactions may enable personalized nutrition adapted to the special needs of individuals. However, so far, a varied healthy diet remains the best basis for health and well-being.

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