Sustainable socio-economic development can be looked upon from multiple perspectives, but no longer without considering the roles of urban planning, smart cities and eco-innovative entrepreneurial initiatives. In the context of the COVID-19 crisis, ensuring sustainable socio-economic development is definitely challenging, but not impossible if adopting appropriate measures. This research aimed at analyzing the multidimensional facets of entrepreneurial resilience during times of crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in Romania, while focusing on the effects experienced in the wealthiest areas, specific to urban agglomerations. The research method consisted of constructing a composite indicator comprising appropriate components for assessing the level of wealth and “happiness” of all the Romanian counties. Through the lens of this composite indicator, entrepreneurial resilience was approached in multiple manners according to its diverse forms. Research findings highlight that entrepreneurial resilience tends to be stronger qualitatively and quantitatively in less developed areas than in those that are well developed, mainly due to the lack of entrepreneurial initiatives. Despite being less entrepreneurially resilient, qualitatively, the wealthiest Romanian counties can economically reinvent themselves quicker.

Based on recent findings of the economic literature on the implications of entrepreneurial innovation for recycling municipal waste, this paper aims to examine the main factors of recycling municipal waste at the European Union (EU) level. In this study, the authors developed a linear regression model to analyze the relationship between business expenditure on research and development (R&D), private investments, gross domestic product (GDP) expenditures on R&D, resource productivity, and environmental taxes on the recycling rate of municipal waste (RRMW). In our analyses, we used data from the Statistical Office of the European Union (EUROSTAT) and five statistical hypotheses were validated through a multiple regression model with panel data using the statistical software EViews 11. The study was conducted in 27 European Union countries between 2010 and 2017. Our results indicate that business expenditure on R&D, private investments, GDP expenditures on R&D, and resource productivity have a direct and significant impact on the RRMW, while environmental taxes have a significant and inverse impact on the RRMW. These findings underline that public policies should be focused on increasing the use of private and public investments on R&D for recycling municipal waste.

This research explores the systemic nature of competitiveness within the cereal sector of the European Union (EU) and addresses the structural interdependencies among key competitiveness drivers through a network-based model. The goal of this research is to offer policy alignment solutions based on the empirical findings derived from a sparse Gaussian graphical model that was operationalized to identify conditional dependencies, synergies, and decouplings across five dimensions: factor endowments, self-sufficiency, trade strategy, resource productivity, and environmental impact. The results showed systemic vulnerabilities, including the decoupling of factor endowments from strategic trade specialization, a pronounced East–West productivity divide, and the asymmetry between the economic valorization of harvested land and its environmental impact, reflected in land management practices. Research findings underscore the need for synergy-driven strategies to coherently align agricultural competitiveness outcomes with the economic and structural potential of each EU country. A critical policy incongruency has been identified: the current prioritization of ecological performance under the Common Agricultural Policy overlooks essential agricultural infrastructural disparities, thereby perpetuating competitiveness asymmetries across the Union. In response, this study introduces a systemic amelioration framework designed to reconcile environmental priorities with agricultural infrastructure development, fostering cohesive and resilient competitiveness throughout the EU cereal sector.

Trade competitiveness can coexist with structurally fragile value chains. When chain feasibility fractures from trade competitiveness, competitiveness without coherence becomes sustainability’s opposite. This paper proposes revisiting the concept of sustainability in agri-food systems, through the lens of structural coherence, understood as the alignment between trade competitiveness, export-destination diversification, and value chain capacity. The research goal is to design and operationalize a diagnostic instrument for structural coherence testing through the triangulation of constant market share analysis (CMSA), the Herfindahl–Hirschman Index (HHI), and physical structural input–output analysis (I-OA). CMSA measures two elements: demand- and competitiveness-driven export dynamics. Export patterns are further explored to verify if there are any destination-market concentration risks (HHI). I-OA closes the loop by linking trade outcomes to internal value chain capacity and efficiency. With clear upstream–downstream segmentation, the sunflower oilseed value chain of the European Union (EU) represents an empirically fertile ground, relevant in the context of the geopolitical disruptions of Black Sea trade corridors and double-cropping dynamics with food-fuel and land-use trade-offs. Focusing on Bulgaria, France, Hungary, Romania, and Spain, which collectively account for more than 85% of EU sunflower seed production, this paper benchmarks post-2013 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) programming effects, utilized as a proxy for a period of stability, against the post-2020 window, marked by a sequence of crises. Diagnosis is facilitated through findings triangulation, enabling deriving CAP-relevant policy recommendations, aligned with country-specific binding constraints. Results show heterogeneous structurally incoherent profiles: Bulgaria suffers from growth-induced stress, France’s chain efficiency is eroded, the Hungarian chain lacks competitiveness, Romania is raw-export dependent with value-added leakage, and Spain is structurally constrained by physical limits. Policy recommendations target reorienting market-driven low value-added trade behaviors toward structurally sustainable value chain trajectories.

The global socio-economic and sanitary crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has generated many different effects on the links of the global agri-food value chains regarding the production and consumption behaviors of agri-food products. Depending on the link, these effects can be positive, negative, or even a mix of both. However, all these sudden changes, beneficial or not, they result in deepening the economic tensions existing along the agri-food value chains. In this context, the aim of this research was to explore the rising tensions along the Romanian agri-food value chains during the different stages of the COVID-19 crisis in Romania, while bringing the HoReCa industry in the spotlight of this study, and, more specifically, the food service component. This paper brings contribution to the literature concerning the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic at the level of the agri-food value chains based on a statistical analysis carried out with the data available from two open access sources: Google Trends and the Romanian National Institute of Statistics. A short bibliometric analysis was also elaborated on the papers tackling the topic of the rising tensions along the agri-food value chains during the pandemic. Research results show that the Romanian HoReCa industry has been subject to various challenges emerged from the need to limit the spread of the COVID-19 disease. This has generated a lot of concern – not only from the food security perspective, but also from the perspective of the entrepreneurs active in the agri-food value chains. Food-ordering companies with homedelivery have been of high interest during the COVID-19 pandemic, as they connect two major links in the food chain: restaurants and consumers. While consumers have become more dependent than ever on digital solutions to purchase food, a lot of pressure is put on indoor restaurants.