Promoting sustainability on Instagram: How sponsorship disclosures and benefit appeals affect the credibility of sinnfluencers

Purpose When promoting sustainable products on Instagram, influencer marketing can be an effective tool when they are perceived as credible because consumers usually cannot verify the sustainability of products themselves. However, when they disclose their posts as an ad, their credibility might be weakened which can lead to less interest in the product. Moreover, influencer marketing strategies usually focus on personal benefits and experiences, while advertisements for sustainable products emphasize altruistic motives. The purpose of this study is to investigate if the interest in the product and the credibility might be affected by such different benefit appeals. Design/methodology/approach A 2 (sponsorship: no disclosure vs disclosure) × 2 (benefit: ecological vs personal) between-subjects experiment with influencer posts promoting a sustainable travel accommodation was conducted to investigate how ad disclosures and benefits appeals affect the credibility of sustainability influencers and the interest in sustainable products among young consumers. Findings Disclosures and benefits appeals have no direct impact on the interest in further information about the product but on the credibility of the influencer. If an Instagram post for a sustainable accommodation was labeled as sponsored, the perceived expertise and likeability of the influencer were diminished. However, highlighting personal benefits instead of ecological benefits increased the influencers’ credibility compared to appeals emphasizing benefits for the environment. Originality/value In addition to sponsorship disclosures, other strategies of advertising literacy might be required to show young consumers how to cope with influencer advertising. Furthermore, it seems to be more important that influencers are popular and liked by their followers than that they are trusted.

Biostimulants in Viticulture: A Sustainable Approach against Biotic and Abiotic Stresses

Climate change and disproportionate anthropogenic interventions, such as the excess of phytopharmaceutical products and continuous soil tillage, are jeopardizing viticulture by subjecting plants to continuous abiotic stress. One of the main physiological repercussions of abiotic stress is represented by the unbalanced redox homeostasis due to the overproduction of reactive oxygen species (ROS), ultimately leading to a state of oxidative stress (detrimental to grape quality). To these are added the direct and indirect damages caused by pathogens (biotic stresses). In light of this scenario, it is inevitable that sustainable techniques and sensitivity approaches for environmental and human health have to be applied in viticulture. Sustainable viticulture can only be made with the aid of sustainable products. Biostimulant (PB) applications (including resistance inducers or elicitors) in the vineyard have become interesting maneuvers for counteracting vine diseases and improving grape quality. These also represent a partial alternative to soil fertilization by improving nutrient absorption and avoiding its leaching into the groundwater. Their role as elicitors has important repercussions in the stimulation of the phenylpropanoid pathway by triggering the activation of several enzymes, such as polyphenol oxidase, lipoxygenase, phenylalanine ammonia-lyase, and peroxidase (with the accumulation of phenolic compounds). The present review paper summarizes the PBs’ implications in viticulture, gathering historical, functional, and applicative information. This work aims to highlight the innumerable beneficial effects on vines brought by these products. It also serves to spur the scientific community to a greater contribution in investigating the response mechanisms of the plant to positive inductions.

Production Scheduling of Personalized Fashion Goods in a Mass Customization Environment

The COVID-19 pandemic has put fashion manufacturers’ needs for optimization in the spotlight. This study argues that mass customization is becoming increasingly instrumental for offering consumers individualized solutions and that suppliers of fashion have to look for more sophisticated solutions in order to face the increasing demand for more sustainable products. With the deduction of a mathematical model derived from production sequencing it became evident that sustainability can be associated with a level production schedule and that cost-based production optimization is useful in achieving holistic sustainability in the fashion industry. The flexibility in the conceived mathematical model specifications allows for a generalizable approach, not limited to a single branch of the fashion industry. This paper additionally delivers a cost-based optimization approach which fashion companies, operating in a mass customization production layout, can easily implement without extensive know-how. The proposed two-stage algorithm is based on the concept of level scheduling. In a first stage, the algorithm determines a feasible production sequence in a time-efficient way while, in the second stage, it further advances the efficiency of the solution. Thus, it offers a framework to optimize a production in a mass customization environment and can contribute to a company taking major steps towards a holistic sustainable orientation as available resources are used more (cost) efficiently.

Young Social Entrepreneurs and Social Challenges

The chapter is focused on social entrepreneurship and, after providing a comprehensive literature review on the topics, aims at providing evidence of the decision-making process of social entrepreneurs and of the strategies they implement by focusing on a single case study, namely “Parallelo.” Parallelo was founded in 2017 by four young Italian social entrepreneurs with the aim of promoting social inclusion of fragile categories and foreign people. Their “formula” is the “social lab” involving creative craftsmen that collaborate in the design and creation of sustainable products based on recyclable/discarded materials. By implementing a narrative approach, the case study is developed following step by step the social enterprise establishment and development. In doing so, the study aims at contributing to the social entrepreneurship field of research and at providing insights for practitioners about how decisions are made and strategies implemented within social entrepreneurial teams.

Environmental concerns about the massive use of disinfectants during COVID-19 pandemic: an overview on aquatic toxicity

Many public health measures to mitigate the spread of SARS-CoV-2 were adopted worldwide, and particularly to the environmental measure of regular cleaning and disinfection of surfaces, the increased use of disinfectant products raises environmental concerns. Quaternary ammonium compounds (QACs), povidone-iodine (PVP-I), chloroxylenol (PCMX) and chlorhexidine (CHX) are the active ingredients of most disinfectant products due to their effectiveness against various microbiological agents. Although presenting antimicrobial efficacy, these biocides have been associated with impacts on aquatic life. For instance, QACs can induce toxicity to Aliivibrio fischeri and fish (different species). Gill and liver damages are verified in Cyprinus carpio after exposure to PVP-I. CHX induces toxic effects on algae, crustaceans, and fish embryos. PCMX can induce genotoxicity to rainbow trout and malformations on zebrafish embryos, as well as it can reduce the reproduction rate of Caenorhabditis elegans. Thus, the potential to cause negative consequences on human and environmental health has resulted in activities from the U.S. and European agencies to favor the use of safer and greener disinfectant products during the COVID-19 pandemic. This review article summarizes the main findings on the impacts of disinfectants (the most used) on aquatic life. This information may help prioritize disinfectants with lower impacts on the aquatic environment for daily use, and especially for high-frequency use as verified in the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, this review may help identify knowledge gaps on the aquatic hazard of disinfectants, which may drive future studies on this matter and, lastly, contribute to the development of sustainable products.

The Lack of Knowledge on the Microbiome of Golf Turfgrasses Impedes the Development of Successful Microbial Products

Golf courses have a significant environmental impact. High water demands and the intensive use of agricultural chemicals have been a concern for decades and are therefore in the focus of efforts to make golf courses more environmentally sustainable. Products based on modifying or using plant-associated microbiota are one of the fastest-growing sectors in agriculture, but their application on turfgrasses on golf courses is so far negligible. In this review, we summarize the limited knowledge on microbiomes of golf turf ecosystems and show that the lack of holistic studies addressing the structure and function of golf turf microbiomes, including their responses to intense turf management procedures, is currently the main bottleneck for development and improvement of reliable, well-functioning microbial products. We further highlight the endosphere of turfgrasses, which is easily accessible for microbial cultivation through constant mowing, as the most stable and protected micro-environment. Many grass species do possess endophytic bacteria and fungi that have been shown to improve the plants’ resistance towards microbial pathogens and insect pests, and several products using endophyte-enhanced grass varieties are commercially successful. We anticipated that this trend would tee-off on golf courses, too, once a more comprehensive understanding of golf turf microbiomes is available.

Effects of Selenium on the Chlorophylls, Gas Exchange, Antioxidant Activity and Amino Acid Composition of Lettuce Grown under an Aquaponics System

Aquaponics is a sustainable technique that is respectful to the environment, as it reuses products and minimizes the consumption of new materials. The combination of this technique with the foliar application of selenium (as Na2SeO4) could lead to healthier and more sustainable products, which are increasingly requested by consumers. Lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) plants were grown in an aquaponics system (fish water) as compared with a control (conventional soilless fertigation), and sprayed with different concentrations of selenium (0, 4, 8, and 16 µmol L−1). The results showed a reduction in the dry weight and N content of lettuce plants irrigated with the fish water mixture treatment. However, the application of Se relieved this stress, increasing the photosynthetic rate and ABTS, and reducing the content of chlorophylls, β-carotene, and several of the measured amino acids. The best results were observed with the highest concentration of Se (16 µmol L−1), as an increase in nitrogen content was observed, as shown by a greater weight of the plant. Furthermore, this treatment produced the greatest increase in ABTS and the least reduction in amino acid content. This novel study highlights the possibility of improving the efficiency of N utilization in lettuce by applying foliar selenium in combination with an aquaponics system.

Consuming to Conserve: A Multilevel Investigation of Sustainable Consumption

As the world grapples with the ever-worsening specter of climate change, it becomes important for various nations/governments to develop mitigating measures. One of the ways to ebb the march of climate decline is to educate the population in respective countries about sustainable consumption that reduces carbon emissions. While prior research has explored the key factors of sustainable consumption in several industries, such as consumer knowledge and personal norm, it has played relatively little attention to them macro-level variables such as level of post-materialism and innovation. To this end, we study the interplay between individual-level factors and national-level variables using a hierarchical linear model on consumers’ perceived value for sustainable products and subsequent sustainable behavior. We used a dataset from the World Value Survey, which includes over 34 thousand respondents covering 40 different nations. The finding suggests that differences in individual-level sustainable consumption are explained by national-level factors. Post-materialist societies were willing to make financial sacrifices for sustainable consumption. Our findings also emphasize that the national-level factor Green Innovation modifies the relationship between Preserved Value and Sustainable Consumption at the individual-level. The findings not only sharpen our sustainability knowledge from a hierarchical view, but also provide useful guidelines for policymakers to promote sustainable consumption. Our study emphasizes that sustainable behavior is the consequence of the interplay between multilevel factors.

The Effects of Organic Certification on Shoppers’ Purchase Intention Formation in Taiwan: A Multi-Group Analysis of Structural Invariance

Labeling products with organic certification logos is a means of indicating to consumers that those products are government certified. However, in Taiwan, organic certification is not required before a food product claims itself organic. Since previous research showed that the COVID-19 lockdown effected both Spanish and Romanian subjects’ intention to purchase more sustainable products, the aim of this study was to determine whether the perception of organic certification labeling makes a difference in how organic shoppers’ purchasing intentions toward organic produce were realized. Data from organic produce shoppers were used to identify organic certification labeling differences. One group of shoppers was asked about their purchase behaviors toward government-certified organic produce labeled with the certification logo (N = 468), while the other was asked about their purchase behaviors toward self-claimed organic produce without a government certification logo (N = 403). Multi-group structural equation modeling (SEM) techniques were employed as the main method of analysis in this study. The results indicated that the hypothesized model was validated. In addition, through this process, it was clarified that this government organic certification labeling significantly enhances the influence of organic produce shoppers’ behavioral beliefs regarding organic produce on their attitudes.