Yes / Drawing from 645 microfinance institutions across 56 countries, this paper examines the deposit-borrowing dynamic of microfinance institutions’ source of capital. We find that deposits and borrowings are substitutes rather than complements. We further find that the degree of substitutability is more pronounced among microfinance institutions operating in a developed financial sector where the level of information asymmetry is lower. Our findings represent novel contribution in understanding microfinance institutions’ funding behaviour that supports its quest for further growth and long-term sustainability. / Research Development Fund Publication Prize Award winner, April 2023.

The pursuit of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) requires a transformative approach to energy systems, focusing on cleaner, reliable, and affordable energy services. This pursuit of achieving the SDG 7 goal of universal access to affordable and clean energy, can have numerous positive and negative implications on all other SDGs and their targets. This thesis project explores and addresses these interlinkages between SDGs and energy projects, highlighting the synergies and trade-offs of energy projects to contribute to achieving the SDGs. In this project, we propose a methodology and framework to facilitate the integration of the SDGs into the energy project planning and implementation phase. This framework is implemented into a tool called SDGs-PROPEL (Sustainable Development Goals - PROject Performance Evaluationand Learnings) that is tailor-made to help energy practitioners identify potential trade-offs and synergies, and develop strategies to maximize positive impacts and minimize negative ones by prioritizing the SDGs that are relevant to their projects. The proposed methodology also takes into consideration the growing importance of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) reporting, ensuring that energy projects align with sustainable practices and societal expectations. Three case studies - one Wind energy projectand two district heating projects, all in France, are utilized to test the SDGs-PROPEL tool. It also incorporates feedback from technology experts working in District Heating and Cooling(DHC) and wind energy in energy companies and academia. The tool was also tested by studentsat the master’s level at KTH Royal Institute of Technology. The proposed methodology in the SDGs-PROPEL tool can be used by any energy practitioner for building a robust testing process for their tools and, in turn, help address some of the challenges of integrating SDGs with energy projects by providing a structured approach to incorporating the SDGs into theplanning and implementation phase of the energy projects. In conclusion, this paper emphasizes the significance of incorporating the SDGs into energy projects as a means to drive sustainable development. By enabling companies to assess the environmental, social, and economic impacts of their energy initiatives, this integration plays a crucial role in addressing critical global issues like climate change, poverty reduction, and energy access. / Strävan efter hållbara utvecklingsmål (SDG) kräver ett transformativt förhållningssätt till energisystem, med fokus på renare, pålitliga och överkomliga energitjänster. Denna strävan efter att uppnå SDG 7-målet om universell tillgång till hållbar energi, kan ha många positiva och negativa konsekvenser för alla andra SDG och deras mål. Detta avhandlingsprojekt utforskar och tar upp dessa kopplingar mellan SDG och energiprojekt, och belyser synergierna och avvägningarna mellan energiprojekt för att bidra till att uppnå SDGs. I det här projektet föreslår vi en metod och ett ramverk för att underlätta integrationen av SDGs i energiprojektets planering och genomförandefas. Detta ramverk är implementerat i ett verktyg som kallas SDGs-PROPEL (Sustainable Development Goals - PROject Performance Evaluation and Learnings) som är skräddarsytt för att hjälpa energiutövare att identifiera potentiella avvägningar och synergier, och utveckla strategier för att maximera positiva effekter och minimera negativa. genom att prioritera de SDG som är relevanta för deras projekt. Den föreslagna metoden tar också hänsyn till den växande betydelsen av miljö-, social- och styrelserapportering (ESG), vilket säkerställer att energiprojekt överensstämmer med hållbar praxis och samhälleliga förväntningar. Tre fallstudier - ett vindenergiprojekt och två fjärrvärmeprojekt, alla i Frankrike, används för att testa SDGs-PROPEL-verktyget. Den innehåller också feedback från teknikexperter som arbetar med DHC och vindenergi i energiföretag och akademi. Verktyget testades även av studenter på masternivå vid Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan. Den föreslagna metoden i SDGs-PROPEL-verktyget kan användas av alla energiutövare för att bygga en robust testprocess för sina verktyg och i sin tur hjälpa till att hantera några av utmaningarna med att integrera SDGs med energiprojekt genom att tillhandahålla ett strukturerat tillvägagångssätt för att införliva SDGs in i planerings- och genomförandefasen av energiprojekten. Sammanfattningsvis betonar detta dokument betydelsen av att införliva SDGs i energiprojekt som ett sätt att driva hållbar utveckling. Genom att göra det möjligt för företag att bedöma de miljömässiga, sociala och ekonomiska effekterna av sina energiinitiativ, spelar denna integration en avgörande roll för att ta itu med kritiska globala frågor som klimatförändringar, fattigdomsminskning och tillgång till energi.

The geographical area Eastern Vätterbranterna has since its initiation as a biosphere reserve according to UNESCO's appointment in 2012 worked towards being a model area in which sustainable development can evolve. This has been done from five sustainability perspectives: the ecological, social, economic, the perspective with broad cooperation and the learning perspective. In 2015, the UN General Assembly adopted Agenda 2030 with its seventeen global sustainability goals and associated 169 sub-goals, which the biosphere association Eastern Vätterbranterna then woven into its work. This qualitative interview study has, with the focus on the biosphere association's seven active focus areas, investigated the biosphere association of Östra Vätterbranternas work with Agenda 2030 in collaboration with the Municipality of Jönköpings and its County Government, within the association, and other community actors. Cooperation has stood as a constant point through both interviews and through one of the questions of issue, conclusions can be established that the Östra Vätterbranterna had served to perform better cooperation within themselves. The Municipality of Jönköping and its County Government looks up to the biosphere association's work with Agenda 2030 and raises collaboration between them as a major success factor, but cooperation between the focus areas in the biosphere association has not achieved its full potential. Furthermore, not all of Agenda 2030's global sustainability goals have been included, but it is something that the biosphere association is constantly working on, which continues to develop all the time, and which can be achieved with the help of other community actors. Cooperation is the concept Agenda 2030 advocates for to achieve the goals and the concept that permeates the biosphere association Eastern Vätterbranterna. / Det geografiska området Östra Vätterbranterna har sedan uppstarten som ett biosfärområde enligt UNESCOs utseende 2012 arbetat mot att vara ett modellområde där hållbar utveckling kan rota sig. Detta har de gjort utifrån fem hållbarhetsperspektiv: det ekologiska, sociala, ekonomiska, perspektivet med bred samverkan och det lärande perspektivet. 2015 antog FNs generalförsamling Agenda 2030 med dess sjutton globala hållbarhetsmål och tillhörande 169 delmål, som biosfärföreningen Östra Vätterbranterna därefter har vävt in i sitt arbete. Denna kvalitativa intervjustudie har, med inriktning på biosfärföreningens sju verksamma fokusområden undersökt biosfärföreningen Östra Vätterbranternas arbete med Agenda 2030 i samverkan med Jönköpings kommun och länsstyrelse, inom föreningen, samt andra samhällsaktörer. Samverkan har stått som en stadig punkt genom både intervjustudien och genom frågeställningar har slutsatser kunnat etableras som att Östra Vätterbranterna hade tjänat på att utföra bättre samverkan inom sig själva. Jönköpings kommun och länsstyrelse ser upp till biosfärföreningens arbete med Agenda 2030 och lyfter samverkan som sker mellan dem som en stor framgångsfaktor, men samverkan mellan fokusområdena i biosfärföreningen har inte uppnått dess fulla potential. Sedan har inte alla av Agenda 2030 globala hållbarhetsmål inkluderats, men det är någonting biosfärföreningen ständigt arbetar med, som fortsätter att utvecklas hela tiden och som med hjälp av andra samhällsaktörer kommer kunna uppnås. Samverkan är det koncept Agenda 2030 förespråkar för att kunna nå målen och det koncept som genomsyrar biosfärföreningen Östra Vätterbranterna.

Abstract Sustainability has been one of the most discussed topics among the business world and society for the last decade. The globally growing concern about sustainability related issues has led to businesses and non-businesses meet the demand of their stakeholders by producing a sustainability report to demonstrate their work and development in sustainability and how they have measured it. There has been a fast-growing trend of sustainability reporting in few years and there are a number of different initiatives and requirements that define what kind of sustainability reports are produced. From the different sustainability initiatives, the largest principle-based initiative is the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC) with almost 13 000 signatories and the largest reporting-based initiative is the Global reporting initiative (GRI). These two initiatives entered in to a partnership in 2010 with the aim of the GRI providing guidance for the signatories on how to disclose information from different areas in sustainability in their sustainability reports. There has been previous research that criticized the UNGC to be too broad and the principles difficult to translate in to sustainability reporting despite the existing partnership with the GRI. These previous studies expressed the lack of qualitative studies about the subject especially from the signatories’ perspective and the importance of approaching the topic from a practical point of view. The purpose of our research study was to create an understanding of the practicalities in UNGC signatories’ sustainability reporting, the challenges they face in the progress and how are they approaching those challenges. The thesis focuses on the Nordic region and the two research questions are:   How are the UNGC signatories practically translating the 10 principles into their sustainability reporting? What challenges do UNGC signatories find in sustainability reporting in general and how have they approached these challenges?   To answer these research questions the authors conducted a qualitative study by semi-structured interviews with company representatives from different Nordic UNGC signatories. The research study identified how do they practically identify what to report about the principles which is determined by materiality assessment provided by the GRI framework. This determines what is material for the company and its industry and focus on those areas in their sustainability report. Legal requirements, internal regulations and other commitments were also identified guiding sustainability reporting. The main challenges related to the sustainability reporting were mainly about data related issues, satisfying the stakeholders and the high number of different frameworks and regulations that are not necessarily interrelated. Majority of the participants approached these challenges by carrying out the materiality assessment as accurate and clear as possible in order to avoid data related difficulties. Some participants offer their different stakeholders with sustainability related information by different forms in order to make the sustainability reporting easier to read and understand. For the high number of frameworks and regulations, the participants have expectations for alignment among them in the future in order to make the reporting easier for everyone involved with sustainability reporting. The results of our findings were supported by theories and concepts such as the stakeholder’s theory, signalling theory and the CSR concept. Previous studies about sustainability reporting and UNGC were also compared to our findings in the analysis.

Small Island Developing States are known to be extra sensitive to environmental changes due to their geographical location and characteristics, and many are known as luxurious tourist destinations. This study explores how Mauritius and the Seychelles are affected by and deal with climate change and the negative impacts of tourism. The study connects to globalisation and sustainable tourism frameworks while analysing vulnerability and resilience in both countries, as well as how the countries work towards the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The method used is a mixed qualitative method with interviews and a text analysis of websites and official documents. The result indicates that both Mauritius and the Seychelles are highly vulnerable to climate change, especially in their coastal zones, which is further increased by tourism practices and development of tourism facilities. The study also highlights that both countries lack resilience to environmental changes. Both Mauritius and the Seychelles strive to work towards the 2030 Agenda, through policymaking on state level and through non-governmental organisations aligning their projects to the Sustainable Development Goals. The result also shows that there is a need to create a more sustainable tourism sector in each country to protect both the environment and the countries’ economies. This study aims to be a contribution to the research field of Small Island Developing States and to increase the understanding of Mauritius and the Seychelles’ particular characteristics and vulnerabilities.

In September 2015, all member states of the United Nations signed upon the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), constituting the core of the 2030 Agenda. The 2030 Agenda form an integrated policy agenda, with the SDGs characterised as inherently interlinked. Policy integration and coordination across customary boundaries are assumed as fundamental when attempting to implement the indivisible and interlinked objectives. The public sector has, however, shown insufficient capabilities of such, characterised by increasing specialisation and fragmentation following from unforeseen effects of New Public Management (NPM) reforms. To facilitate necessary policy integration and coordination, significant alterations to policies and institutions are assumed to be necessary, and post-NPM approaches that seeks to join up the governmental apparatus have surfaced as counter-movements.  Building on the above, the thesis set out to examine policy integration and coordination as cornerstones when attempting to implement the 2030 Agenda, as well as organisational key capabilities and/or barriers for such. The thesis’ theoretical point of departure builds on the fields of organisation theory and public administration, and the longstanding deliberation between the two dichotomies specialisation and coordination. Such dichotomy is elaborated on through the NPM perspective contrasted against the post-NPM perspective. The thesis’ central theoretical concepts are policy integration, coordination and specialisation. The thesis was carried out as a qualitative case study, researching the experiences and opinions of 16 civil servants, from 14 Swedish municipalities, operating strategically within sustainable development on the municipal level, through semi-structured interviews.  Research findings indicate deficient policy integration in the majority of municipalities, with the 2030 Agenda being treated in separate programmes for social, environmental and economic sustainability respectively. Further, is vertical coordination, within the organisation as well as between governmental levels, appearing as insufficient. Identified organisational key factors include: the role of organisation; the role of the budget; the role of the ordinary municipal structure; the role of the leaders; the role of the center; the role of the individual civil servant; and, the role of communication. Many of the organisational key factors are described as capabilities as well as at the same time being barriers, and, hence, constituting contradictory practices for the civil servants and the organisations. The budgetary process especially stands out as one such contradiction. Similarly, are signs of the NPM perspective and the post-NPM perspective surfacing as simultaneous logics, practices and contradictions the civil servants must relate to. To strengthen policy integration and coordination, as well as the advancements of the 2030 Agenda, some practices may have to be modified.

The United Nations originally established the term sustainable  development through the Brundtland commission and became a   frontrunner and global actor within the field. Information has initially  been described as an invaluable aspect of successfully achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by the UN itself. Therefore, the lack  of current references to information and communication in relation to  the execution of the SDGs has to be examined in an attempt to fill this research gap. Therefore, this thesis investigates in what way their   external communication, more specifically their press releases  regarding the SDGs, are executed in order to promote sustainability.  This is done by performing a qualitative text analysis on press  releases as empirical material. A question this thesis  attempts to answer is how the press releases of the UN have changed  after the evolved SDGs. Also, in obedience with their own strategic  documents, how are the UN concerned with making their public communication shed light on the implementation of the SDGs. These questions are relevant considering the growing interest for the issue of sustainable development. The analysis draws on theories of  organizational communication and strategic communication. The thesis reveals that the SDGs and sustainability are cohesively presented throughout the press releases. However, a change in inclusiveness of the audience was observed after the implementation  of the SDGs. This thesis indicates that there is potential for improvement in terms of how the UN communicates sustainability issues and promotes the SDGs.

In 2015, the United Nations (UN) put forward 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to beachieved by 2030. Each member state should spare no effort to fulfill the goals for better lives. Thefirst objective of this study was to explore how Big Data could be used to monitor the progress,including the opportunities and challenges that such novel technologies brought. Previous studieswere reviewed critically for the first objective. The second objective was to find out what datainfrastructures were helpful in monitoring the achievement of SDG 7. A systematic mapping studywas performed to accomplish the second objective. 53 SDG-related academic papers were obtained.Their research data and where they were sourced from were manually analyzed and categorized togenerate data infrastructures for SDG 7. Besides, the automated qualitative coding was conductedbased on the manual structure to verify the manually identified data infrastructures and comparetheir frequencies in the selected papers. The methodology of combining manual and automatedqualitative analysis proposed in this study helped find a list of SDG 7 related data infrastructures.Although there were differences between the manual and automated results, the World Bank, UNdatabases, Eurostat, and IEA were considered the most frequently referred data sources; electricitydata and satellite imagery were regarded as the most commonly used data types.

Sweden is a country that has made significant achievements regarding sustainable development through its implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Regardless of its efforts and leading position in global sustainability work, scholars have pointed out how other countries are negatively affected by its actions. Previous research also emphasized how nega- tive global spillover effects lead to adverse events affecting the world environmentally, socially, and economically. By conducting a qualitative content analysis through the lens of the theoret- ical framework, The Spillover Index, this study aims to shed light on the overlooked negative spillover effects stemming from Sweden's implementation of the SDGs. This paper recognizes the actions and acknowledgments made by Sweden on its negative spillover effects, along with unintended consequences and contradictions. The result of this thesis emphasizes the urgency for a more holistic understanding of sustainability and the SDGs, calling for countries to con- sider when implementing its sustainability work, not only national achievements, and gains but also the extensive impact of its actions in a global context.

The work for female empowerment is prominent on the Unguja island of Zanzibar. Governmental support and local and international organizations are investing in women to achieve gender equality. The government of Tanzania has added changes to the law to protect women and prevent gender-based violence, as well as strategic measures to assist the stakeholders of the Zanzibarian society. Simultaneously, the reports of gender-based violence (GBV) are increasing on the islands according to the Zanzibar Female Lawyer Association. The study explores the measures taken by the government to eliminate violence against women with a focus on the role of the man in these structural social and legal changes. The study also shows the challenges that the added laws have faced in practice, and the balance between culture and legal system in a society, when a change is to take place.