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The world is experiencing profound and wide-ranging change, due to a transition to, and impact of, the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0) with its associated demands, new and emerging technologies, increasing focus on green growth, including challenges associated with climate change, urbanization, and the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. These changes have created major disruptions to the economic and social environment in many countries worldwide, which have important implications for education and schooling, and for the advancement of learning societies. This is no doubt an age of disruption. This introductory chapter provides an overview of six key themes covered in this volume. Using an evidence-based approach, this chapter describes the six parts of the volume that explore implications of these disruptions on education at all levels, and on advancement of learning societies. The book also outlines key issues, concerns, and prospects confronting education and training, and the challenges faced by countries, regardless of their level of economic or social development. An area of special emphasis is the disruptive impact of COVID-19 on powering learning societies.

PurposeAgriculture value chains (AVCs) have experienced unprecedented disruption during the COVID-19 pandemic, with lockdowns and stringent social distancing restrictions making buying and selling behaviours complex and uncertain. This study aims provide a theoretical framework describing the stakeholder behaviours that arise in severely disrupted value chains, which give rise to inter-organisational initiatives that impact industry sustainability.Design/methodology/approachA mixed-methods approach is adopted, in which uncertainty theory and relational governance theory and structured interviews with 15 AVC stakeholders underpin the initial conceptual model. The framework is empirically validated via partial least squares structural equation modelling using data from an online survey of 185 AVC stakeholders based in India.FindingsThe findings reveal that buyer and supplier uncertainty created by the COVID-19 lockdowns gives rise to behaviours that encourage stakeholders to engage in relational governance initiatives. Progressive farmers and other AVC stakeholders welcome this improved information sharing, which encourages self-reliance that positively impacts agricultural productivity and sustainability.Practical implicationsThe new framework offers farmers and other stakeholders in developing nations possibilities to sustain their AVCs even in dire circumstances. In India, this also requires an enabling ecosystem to enhance smallholders' marketing power and help them take advantage of recent agricultural reforms.Originality/valueResearch is scarce into the impact of buyer and seller behaviour during extreme supply chain disruptions. This study applies relational governance and uncertainty theories, leading to a proposed risk aversion theory.

The repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change - two major current global crises - are far-reaching, the parallels between the two are striking, and their influence on one another are significant. Based on the wealth of evidence that has emerged from the scientific literature during the first two years of the pandemic, this study argues that these two global crises require holistic multisectoral mitigation strategies. Despite being different in nature, neither crisis can be effectively mitigated without considering their interdependencies. Herein, significant interactions between these two crises are highlighted and discussed. Major implications related to the economy, energy, technology, environment, food systems and agriculture sector, health systems, policy, management, and communities are detailed via a review of existing joint literature. Based on these outcomes, practical recommendations for future research and management are provided. While the joint timing of these crises has created a global conundrum, the COVID-19 pandemic has demonstrated opportunities and lessons for devising sustainable recovery plans in relation to the climate crisis. The findings indicated that governments should work collaboratively to develop durable and adjustable strategies in line with long-term, global decarbonisation targets, promote renewable energy resources, integrate climate change into environmental policies, prioritise climate-smart agriculture and local food systems, and ensure public and ecosystem health. Further, differences in geographic distributions of climate change and COVID-19 related death cases revealed that these crises pose different threats to different parts of the world. These learnings provide insights to address the climate emergency - and potential future global problems with similar characteristics - if international countries act urgently and collectively.

A public awareness campaign is a tool of social marketing technique. The quality of awareness campaign is determined based on its effectiveness which is evaluated by its impact on the audience. To know the awareness related to major media campaigns, during the COVID-19 pandemic related to COVID-appropriate behaviour, a survey tool was designed and administered in online mode among 200 young respondents from Varanasi district of Uttar Pradesh, India. Data were collected through Google forms shared via various social platforms and snowball sampling technique with age and area related restrictions. The media campaign which made a great impact on the mind and heart of the respondents were “Do gaj doori mask hai jaroori (Mask and maintaining distance of two yards is necessary) ” and “Jab tak dawai nahi tab tak dhilai nahi (No carelessness till a medicine is recommended)” The sources which made people aware were "caller tune" followed by "family and friends" . Almost all components of COVID-19 appropriate behaviour were known to the respondents except, seeking COVID-19 related information from reliable sources and refraining from sharing unverified social media posts. This research throws light on the interventions that can be more impactful and will thus help in better designing and dissemination of awareness campaigns in future.

In this policy brief, we examine the impact of COVID-19 on sustainability initiatives in the fashion industry. We ask whether COVID-19 is likely to support the transition to a more sustainable fashion industry. In answering this question, we utilize a framework for examining sustainability along the fashion-supply chain, highlighting the opportunities and challenges for a sustainable transition with respect to design, production, retail, consumption, and end-of-life. At each step, we also consider socioeconomic dimensions with regard to social impacts, employment, and gender. In doing so, we argue that any meaningful shift toward sustainability and a just transition must recognize social and environmental challenges as interconnected, addressing structural inequalities.

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted most industries, including the hospitality and tourism industry. This is one of the first studies to investigate the impact of COVID-19 on the psychological well-being of individuals in the hospitality and tourism industry. With the help of the literature and theories, a theoretical model is developed, which is later validated through structural equation modeling, using a survey of 314 usable respondents from the hospitality and tourism industry. This study finds that coping has a significant mediating effect on individuals’ psychological well-being and that management support plays a considerably significant role in hospitality and tourism employees’ psychological well-being.

Open-plan office (OPO) layouts emerged to allow organizations to adapt to changing workplace demands. We explore the potential for OPOs to provide such adaptive capacity to respond to two contemporary issues for organizations: the chronic challenge of environmental sustainability, and the acute challenges emerging from the great COVID-19 homeworking experiment. We apply a socio-technical systems perspective and green ergonomics principles to investigate the relationship between an OPO environment and the occupants working within it. In doing so, we consider relevant technical and human factors, such as green technology and employee green behavior. We also consider how a green OPO might provide non-carbon benefits such as improving occupant well-being and supporting the emergence of a green organizational culture. Our investigation highlights several avenues through which an OPO designed with green ergonomic principles could benefit occupants, the organizations they work for, and the natural environment of which they are a part and on which they depend. We find reason to suspect that green OPOs could play an important role in sustainable development; and offer a research agenda to help determine whether it is true that OPOs can, indeed, exemplify how “going green” may be good for business.