Giusy Sica (p), Maria Palazzo, Maria Antonella Ferri, Alessandra Micozzi

Mamoru Fujita

This abstract presents an example of community-led project which started from a neighbourhood regeneration activity and led to the creation of a peri-urban street art park that enhanced sustainable and cultural tourism in a rural area of Sicily. The contribution is structured in three parts. In the first part, an introduction describes the theoretical framework of rural and inner areas. The second part presents the topic of participation as a tool for the empowerment of rural and inner areas. Finally, the third part gives a practical example of community-led territorial regeneration project: Badia Lost and Found. The objectives, methodologies and strategies of this approach are briefly described, as part of a larger funded research project, the WELLTS project (Work Employment Labor Logic Talent Scope), which aims to analyse the main changes that technology is creating in terms of workplace and socio-cultural innovation.

Martin Faulques (p)

Giusy Sica

Questions relating to the siting factors for biogas units have become increasingly important in the scientific literature in recent years (Ferrari et al., 2022); certain characteristics seem essential to the emergence of biogas units, such as methanogenic potential or operator characteristics. Due to structural differences between countries (Schumacher and Schultmann, 2017), installation criteria may vary from country to country or even from area to area. We will focus on new biogas units in western France. The aim of the article is to analyze the factors affecting the presence of biogas units in a given area and the impact on neighboring territories. To do this, we use a Spatial Durbin Model (SDM) (Coll-Martínez,2022) to identify the criteria for installing biogas units in a territory, based on a database containing numerous explanatory variables. Among other things, our paper focuses on the different methanogenic potentials of each municipality as explanatory factors for the presence of units in a territory.
The second objective of the article is to study the impact of the presence of nearby units on the presence of units in a territory. The literature on the subject suggests that the emergence of a new technology - the biogas unit - in a territory can have positive effects on individuals living close to the adoption of this technology (Bollinger and Gillingham, 2012). The location of biogas units over time depends not only on their methanogenic potential, but also on the spatial dispersion of other biogas units. By integrating the results of the first part, we compare and measure how a biogas unit can affect the emergence of new units on a territory. These spatial diffusion effects of biogas units can help us better understand the mechanisms by which biogas units are established, and enable public policies to target territories for the deployment of new biogas units.

Iza Gigauri (p)

Martin Faulques

Social and ecological entrepreneurship has the power to foster sustainable development encouraging sustainable entrepreneurship. In this regard, innovativeness plays an essential role in leading to sustainable entrepreneurship. This paper aspires to discuss how sustainable development can be achieved through entrepreneurship and explores best practices of sustainable value creation. A path towards sustainability requires complex approaches and innovative solutions. To accomplish its aims, the paper seeks to investigate the challenges faced in implementing social, economic, and ecological goals simultaneously in order to achieve sustainability. For this reason, the main goal of this research is to unveil practical approaches of social entrepreneurs to contribute to sustainable development goals. It identifies best practices and drivers of social entrepreneurship in Georgia (country). The paper illustrates examples and cases of social enterprises promoting sustainability through their activities. The research contributes to understanding the key factors and elements of social entrepreneurship through which it creates sustainable values and builds a sustainable future. Although we have identified the potential of social entrepreneurship for sustainability, there is a need for future studies to define the methods and tools for measuring the contribution of social entrepreneurship to sustainable development. In particular, the performance measurement system should be in place to measure enterprises’ accomplishments. Future research should describe performance measurement tools for various sustainable enterprises and explore the most relevant approaches for this end.

Mamoru Fujita (p), Eiji Ohno, Ryuta Mori

Iza Gigauri

The GET system developed by the Meijo University Faculty of Agriculture is a technology that utilizes rice straw from rice cultivation to obtain methane gas (biomethane). This is a type of biogas power generation, and combustion of the methane gas generated in this system produces high-output electrical energy. Furthermore, this power generation system can efficiently recover and utilize methane gas, which has a high greenhouse effect and would normally be released directly into the atmosphere. In an experiment, the GET system was able to produce 300 liters of biogas with a methane concentration of 60% from one kilogram of rice straw. The system was also modified to generate biogas not only from rice straw but also from mowed grass generated by cleaning activities, etc., and the final output was 800W. Therefore, the GET system is being considered for use for various purposes as a method of power generation with a low environmental impact.
However, the supply of rice straw and mowed grass as biofuel for the GET system is limited. In addition, the collection and transportation of biofuel, as well as the maintenance and management of the system, requires a large amount of labor cost. The authors (2023) focused on mowed grass from daily community cleanup activities as a source of biofuel and attempted to construct a model to estimate the participation rate of local residents in community cleanup activities. This was calculated based on a web-based survey about community cleaning activities, assuming the introduction of biogas power generation in the future. In Japan, community cleanup activities are based on the voluntary participation of local residents, which is expected to significantly reduce the labor costs for obtaining biofuels. Thus, identifying the factors that contribute to their participation will enable the efficient collection of biofuels. In such a case, local residents will demand a value commensurate with their labor, and the cost-benefit criterion must be met in order for such a community-participatory project to be established.
In this study, it was assumed that the GET system would be introduced as one of the power generation projects with local community participation in an actual community where daily community clean-up activities are conducted. The relationship between community cleaning activities and the assumed amount of electricity generated was clarified, and the quantitative power output was obtained.