Federico Fantechi (p), Davide Furceri, Fabio Mazzola

Jose-luis Hervas Oliver

This paper delves into the issue of climate change and the ecological transition towards green technologies and Circular Economy (CE), a priority on several policy agendas, including the Next Generation EU recovery plan. The paper contributes to an expanding body of literature on the adoption of green transition technology and Circular Economy (CE) practice and policies which is concerned with understanding the potential environmental and economic impact of this shift.

In particular, the main objective of the paper is two-fold. The first is to construct measures of territorial exposure to CE activities at the firm and regional level. This is done by using firm-level data from the Orbis database—focusing on employment and businesses at a fine NACE classification—and by constructing concentration and entropy measures for Circular Economy aggregated at the NUTS-3 level. The second objective is to analyze the effect of CE public policies on EU regional labor markets. To this end, the study maps European public investments and policy programs for CE transition with the territorial indexes of exposure to CE activities and uses a Difference-in-Differences design to examine their effect on firm and regional employment.

Results of the study will contribute to the emerging literature on CE and help understanding the impact of CE activities, their growth, and diversification, on regional labor markets as well as the impact of EU transition policies. The study aims at providing evidence of the potential of CE activities, to understand whether they can be a key factor to trigger growth in European regional labour markets, this is especially relevant for lagging regions where public investments in CE activities could trigger new development paths.

The study would also have relevance for the policy discourse. The discussion on public investments in CE activities can be enhanced by providing evidence on the potential of these programs to sustain regional labour markets. In addition, the specific results of the study related to the concentration and diversification of CE activities in European regions can shape the discussion further and provide insights to improve the programming of public aids sustaining the CE transition in Europe. The study thus contributes to the discourse on sustainable development and green transition, providing valuable insights for policymakers and stakeholders in the field.

Marco Compagnoni (p), Marco Grazzi, Fabio Pieri, Chiara Tomasi

Federico Fantechi

In the debate on international waste trade, the focus on resource effi-
ciency and recycling has gradually begun to accompany the focus on neg-
ative environmental externalities. In this context, we examine the impact
of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) on the export of waste bat-
teries (WB). EPR is considered as a key policy for the “marketization of
waste”. WB are a hazardous waste that also contain a high concentration
of critical raw materials. As such, they are of strategic importance for the
recovery of critical resources, while at the same time requiring proper envi-
ronmental management. Therefore, it is crucial to understand where WB
are treated and how this is affected by related policies. Our results, based
on difference-in-difference models in a gravity framework, show a consistent
increase in WB exports after EPR implementation compared to the trend
for other wastes. This result is likely to be an indirect consequence of the
ability of EPR to support growth in waste collection rates, more accurate
tracking of transboundary waste flows, and specialization of national waste
management systems. In particular, WB exports appear to be directed to
countries with more advanced waste management systems, more stringent
environmental regulations, and limited endowments of the mineral resources
typically contained in batteries.

As a development of this paper, we are currently exploring E-PRTR data
on emissions from the waste management sector in Europe in order to assess possible environmental impacts connected to the rise in WB trade.

Juan Romero, Michael J. Seiler, Simon Thaler (p)

Marco Compagnoni

This study investigates the impact of incorporating Artificial Intelligence (AI) in real estate advertising by examining the influence of an AI system on the arrangement of advertisement images. The research collaborates with real estate brokerage institutions, comparing ads with images organized by human brokerage professionals to the same ads ordered by an AI predicting commercial attractiveness. The study evaluates metrics such as click-through rates, and phone inquiries, revealing that AI-ordered images have the potential to significantly enhance the effectiveness of real estate advertisements. The findings provide valuable insights into the practical applications of AI for optimizing visual content and improving user engagement in the real estate industry.

Jose-luis Hervas Oliver (p)

Simon Thaler

Considering that discontinuities in clusters and industrial districts (IDs) are only competence destroying and the local value system is usually dismantled constrain the perspective on the phenomenon and impede advancing it. I argue that discontinuities can: i) impact and destroy only specific capabilities without changing the entire value system, ii) drive simultaneously both competence-destroying and competence-enhancing and, iii) stimulate different responses by local incumbents, i.e. firm heterogeneity. Inducting from a longitudinal case study on an ID discontinuity by using mixed methods, results suggest that discontinuities can destroy local capabilities (competence-destroying) while preserving others in the value system (competence-enhancing), socially-thick networks as specialized complementary assets protect leading incumbents that show heterogeneously different responses, orchestrate local networks and drive them in different directions, even change. Collating different constructs (the local value system, local leading incumbents’ responses and the value of networks) radical changes in IDs can be better re-elaborated and understood.