Javier Mendoza Jiménez

This article explores the impact of international student mobility on tourist destinations, specifically examining Erasmus students at Universidad de La Laguna in Tenerife. Recognizing the growing competition among Higher Education Institutions and the increasing economic importance of international students, this study addresses three main aspects: the factors influencing international students’ destination choice, their economic contribution, and their subsequent loyalty to host destinations. Through a comparative analysis of survey responses from 432 Erasmus students across two cohorts (2008–2012 and 2013–2019), the research finds that while academic reputation remains influential, students increasingly value the cultural characteristics, leisure opportunities, and affordability of the destination. Economically, international students provide substantial contributions to local economies via accommodation, food, and leisure expenditures, demonstrating broader regional economic benefits through their travel activities. The study also identifies high loyalty levels, revealing strong intentions among students to revisit their host locations, particularly as tourists, highlighting long-term economic and promotional advantages. These findings underline the dual importance of international students as both educational participants and valuable economic agents. The study contributes to the academic tourism literature by integrating the educational and tourism perspectives, highlighting the strategic need for enhanced collaboration between HEIs and destination managers. It emphasizes the importance of international students as economic actors and potential ambassadors, thereby providing a novel theoretical contribution by suggesting that strategies targeting international student attraction and retention should explicitly consider both academic and tourism-related factors.

The integration of teacher-designed audiovisual tools in education has gained significant prominence, with podcasting emerging as a powerful pedagogical resource. While its benefits in enhancing learning flexibility and knowledge acquisition are well-documented, limited research examines the impact of student-generated podcasts. This study addresses that gap by investigating whether student-produced content enhances learning, improves academic performance, and enriches the classroom environment. A total of 190 students from the Tourism and Pedagogy degrees at the Universidad de La Laguna (Tenerife, Spain) participated by actively engaging in podcast creation as part of their coursework. They subsequently completed a survey assessing various aspects of the activity. Hypothesis testing revealed that student-generated podcasts not only improve academic outcomes but also cultivate a more dynamic and engaging learning experience. Findings suggest that beyond reinforcing subject mastery, podcasting yields intangible educational benefits, fostering deeper engagement and a more enriched classroom atmosphere. These results underscore the pedagogical value of student-driven content creation, positioning podcasting as an innovative instructional strategy that transcends conventional learning paradigms.

The literature on water use in hotels has identified numerous determinants of water consumption, but a consensus has yet to be reached on the influence of some of these factors. This article aims to enhance the current research framework on water use in the hotel sector by presenting a case study of one hotel in Tenerife, Canary Islands. The conceptual framework of water consumption in hotels is presented based on the previous literature. Starting from that, basic statistical analysis and bivariate correlations were performed on water consumption data from 2007 to 2019 to determine the significant factors affecting both total water consumption and consumption per guest night. Special attention was paid to water usage in gardens and the impact of weather conditions, as there is a lack of research focused on them. Additionally, the water management actions of the hotel were classified according to the business’ themes proposed for the Sustainable Development Goals, using an internationally recognized guide, thus addressing one of the gaps identified in the literature. The results generally support previous research findings, but some discrepancies were noted regarding the number of guest nights and the effectiveness of implementing water-saving measures. This raises new questions about the characteristics of various water-saving measures, such as room renovation, and their influence on customer behavior, which may alter the intended impact on water consumption. Therefore, the findings of this study can provide an insight into unclear aspects in this area. They could also benefit hotels in terms of sustainability communication by allowing them to position their actions with an internationally recognized framework.

Direct (or low value) procurement can foster the participation of SMEs in public procurement. However, although they all come from the same Directive, a review of the national legislations shows that there is not a common model for this type of procedures. The thresholds in the national legislations vary without a visible explanation for it. To assess if countries can be grouped a hierarchical analysis was performed. Meanwhile, to research whether economic and social factor can influence the establishment of different conditions for direct public procurement in each Member State a regression model was applied. The results contradict the widely proclaimed intention of promoting SMEs in public procurement, since there is not direct relation between the percentage of SMEs in the economic fabric and the thresholds for the contracts. The limitations on direct procurement have probably more to do with cultural reasons and legislative traditions than with economic and social factors. Higher thresholds and specially the differentiation for, social services that present some Member States could be an opportunity for social entities. The legislative modifications of several countries point in the direction of favoring a minimum number of competitors. The study shows that noticeable divergences can be found in the way Member States regulate direct procurement, contrary to the convergency that can be observed generally in the field of public procurement.

It is essential to find a balance between tourism development and sustainable consumption of water resources. To achieve this goal, a Sustainable Balanced Scorecard connected to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) is proposed for optimal water resource management in the hotel sector. The Scorecard is based on four perspectives: customer, internal processes, learning and improvement, and financial. The key variables were agreed on with stakeholders in the sector, and the Sustainable Balanced Scorecard was tested empirically on a sample of 70 hotels in island tourism destinations in the Macaronesia region. The results revealed that though more and more hotels have tried to implement strategies to save water, they were still a long way from reaching the international standard of 140 L per guest night. In addition, there were significant differences concerning water consumption according to hotel category. The Sustainable Balanced Scorecard in this paper adds to the existing works about materiality in sustainability. It can also support business decision making about the SDGs and help potential investors.

It is essential to understand the variables that explain and predict the behaviour of starting up a new company in a regional context. This study aims to analyse the theoretical basis and predictive potential of the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) data, considering the concerns and suggestions of other authors. In addition to an extensive literature review, a PLS-SEM methodology and data on variables and countries from the latest GEM report are used in this study. The results show that GEM reports have a sufficient theoretical foundation for quality studies in this field. In addition, a valid and reliable causal model is designed that includes all personal and contextual GEM variables. The hypotheses of the proposed model are based on the existing causal relationships in the literature, using GEM data in its formulation. The model is comprehensive and practical because it significantly predicts entrepreneurial behaviour, particularly entrepreneurial intention and action. The usefulness of this study is high, both for researchers, practitioners and institutions wishing to understand better and further promote entrepreneurial behaviour at a regional (country) level.

Urban food markets can promote sustainable development through the generation of social value in the spaces where they are located and contribute to sustainability on a global scale. To measure this, indicators are required to evaluate and monitor these markets. Studies in this regard are scarce and often developed according to top-down schemes. This study seeks to remedy this relative deficiency and aims to design specific social sustainability metrics for these organizations from a bottom-up perspective. The Integrated Social Value model is used. This social accounting system is considered appropriate in this study due to the phenomenological approach on which it is based and is applied to a service cooperative located in the Canary Islands. The main contribution of this work is that new social sustainability indicators are obtained and applied to the analysis of an entity, and they are relevant and understandable to stakeholders. This would provide, in future developments, a system of sustainability indicators for similar organizations in Spain.