Bioenergy competency centre: study of the bioenergy potencial in the centre region of Portugal.

Dissertação apresentada como requisito parcial para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Ciência e Sistemas de Informação Geográfica

Heritages, Identities, and Policy in the Metropolitan Area of Lisbon

In a world that has moved away from narratives based on the idea of progress, the past has established itself as a place of reference: confirming to ourselves that what we were is indispensible for sustaining what we think we are. The recovery of the past is thus one of the most common symbolic instruments used in negotiating identities. The cultural practices that have recourse to representation mechanisms that call on the past in order to consider the present always end up translating themselves, insofar as they fragment, reorganize and interpret it in their transformation, or, to use a formula that has become unavoidable, in their “invention”. Patrimonialization is one such practice. It associates the notion of heritage – which is not a given fact, but rather a socially constructed classification, and therefore one that is constantly being negotiated – with specific objects that come to serve as cultural representations of the groups who consider themselves to be their rightful owners. In the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, as in other ethnographic contexts, patrimonialization encompasses things as diverse as landscapes, monuments, popular architecture, handicrafts, local feast days/processions/pilgrimages and people; all things that can, once transformed into material representations of the past, serve as arguments for the identity fictions of the people who inhabit them.

Stops and bonanzas in the EU: Does being part of the Euro Area make a difference?

In this paper, we investigate whether being part of the euro area influences the conditional probability of going through a sudden stop or a bonanza of capital flows. Our sample period is from 1995 until 2014. We identify these two phenomena and we evaluate which push and pull factors help predict the conditional probability of experiencing one of them. We find that most countries had significant capital inflows until 2008 and that there were more sudden stops during the recent financial crisis than in any other moment in our sample. The factors that better help forecast the conditional probability of a sudden stop are global uncertainty (represented by the push factor “Volatility Index”), and the domestic economic activity (pull factors “GDP growth” and “consumer confidence”). An indicator of country risk (pull factor “change in credit rating”) is the most significant one for predicting bonanzas. Ultimately, we find no evidence that being part of the euro area influences the conditional probability of going through a sudden stop or a bonanza.

Optimization of export support systems: How to promote exports from Portugal to Germany in the area of information technology and electronics

This work project focuses on developing new approaches which enhance Portuguese exports towards a defined German industry sector within the information technology and electronics fields. Firstly and foremost, information was collected and a set of expert and top managers’ interviews were performed in order to acknowledge the demand of the German market while identifying compatible Portuguese supply capabilities. Among the main findings, Industry 4.0 presents itself as a valuable opportunity in the German market for Portuguese medium sized companies in the embedded systems area of expertise for machinery and equipment companies. In order to achieve the purpose of the work project, an embedded systems platform targeting machinery and equipment companies was suggested as well as it was developed several recommendations on how to implement it. An alternative approach for this platform was also considered within the German market namely the eHealth sector having the purpose of enhancing the current healthcare service provision.