Nowadays, when the economic development of countries is more and more influenced by knowledge-based, innovative entrepreneurship, particular attention is paid to the application and protection of intellectual property. Enterprises can acquire intellectual property rights in various ways externally and such rights can also be generated by enterprises internally: they launch and subsequently produce new or improved products and services (research and development) and ensure the protection of intellectually intensive products (patents, trademarks, computer software, etc.). Thus, it is important to study the valuation and accounting of intellectual property rights. The aim of the research is, on the basis of the studies of intellectual property rights accounting policy in Latvia, to identify the shortcomings related to the valuation and accounting of intellectual property rights and to develop recommendations for their elimination. The following research tasks are subject to the aim: to study IPRs concept, regulatory framework and statistical data, to valuate accounting policy for IPRs; to identify shortcomings related to the valuation and accounting of IPRs; to develop recommendations for the elimination of identified shortcomings. The results of research enable to draw a conclusion that the requirements of the laws and regulations of Latvia do not prevent from the capitalization of intellectual property rights as intangible assets; however, it is necessary to revise and improve some requirements. In the conclusion of research, the authors have elaborated recommendations for the elimination of identified shortcomings.

Digital progress in the European Union is a catalyst for economic development. The COVID-19 pandemic significantly accelerated the pace of digitalization, thereby creating not only challenges for the European Union but also new opportunities for economic development in Europe. The present research focuses on an analysis of digital economy and society index scores for Latvia and Lithuania, comparing the performance of both countries with the European Union average. The research aims to identify the critical areas that hinder digital progress in Latvia and Lithuania. Accordingly, the digital economy and society index was analysed for the period from 2018 to 2023. The empirical part of the research includes a sociological survey, and the survey data were analysed in order to identify population needs for and experience in using digital technologies in Latvia and Lithuania. The survey involved 146 respondents. The research results allowed us to identify the critical areas for Latvia and Lithuania to focus on for further digital progress. Latvia and Lithuania both show high scores, well above the EU average, in the ‘digital public servicesʼ component, indicating that both countries have a high level of e-government users and widespread access to digital public services. The results of the sociological survey further confirm this, showing that a large majority of 84.25% of respondents in both Latvia and Lithuania use digital solutions in their daily lives.

Cooperation and financial stability of agricultural companies, especially small and medium ones, is very significant for the development of agricultural sector. In Latvia, cooperatives represent different sizes and industries: dairy, grain, fruit and vegetable, forest, agricultural services and home production. The research aim is to assess financial distress in agricultural cooperatives in Latvia by applying the prevention system indicators. The evaluation of financial indicators is based on the methodology developed by Deutscher Raiffeisenverband e.V. (DRV) – the leading association of agricultural and food industry cooperatives and cooperative-oriented companies in Germany. This system prescribes reporting and monitoring requirements for cooperatives to perform the preventive case analysis to ensure a successful operation of a cooperative or to prevent financial problems, if any. Therefore, financial indicators of cooperatives in Latvia were analysed adapting the DRV analysis methodology to the situation of Latvia to identify cooperatives requiring support to ensure viability. The evaluation of cooperatives by the number of employees, assets, sales and other financial indicators convincingly demonstrates that the largest and most financially strong cooperatives in Latvia operate in the grain sector, followed by the dairy sector. The assessment of financial distress reports that 10 out of 51 analysed cooperatives experience risk of operation. The most common threat to a cooperative in Latvia is related to its equity; however, it is recommended to evaluate this indicator in line with other indicators, for example, changes in equity in recent years and length of a cooperative’s operation.

The global character of sustainable development has made agritourism a popular phenomenon in both developed and developing countries, as it is advantageous from the standpoint of local economic and social development. Sustainability criteria play a vital role in controlling the quality of agritourist services of leader countries in agritourism. However, the development of agritourism in Uzbekistan has very different characteristics and development levels compared to other countries, especially countries in Western Europe. This article explores the integration of sustainability principles within the quality of agritourism services in Uzbekistan. As Uzbekistanʼs agritourism industry continues to grow, the importance of sustainability criteria in ensuring the quality of agritourist services becomes increasingly evident. A survey was conducted to investigate the importance of sustainability in the quality of agritourism services in Uzbekistan. The research findings indicate that there is a growing interest in agritourism in Uzbekistan. However, there is a need to improve the quality and sustainability of agritourism services in order to meet the expectations of tourists. This, in turn, enhances the overall visitor experience and contributes to the long-term sustainability of the industry. This article, relying on quantitative method, reveals the assessment of quality of agritourism services in Uzbekistan from the sustainability point of view. In the context of Uzbekistan, the article emphasizes the nationʼs strategic initiatives to promote sustainable resource management, water efficiency, conservation, and environmental preservation in its agricultural and agritourism sectors ensuring the delivery of high-quality services and products while contributing to environmental preservation.

Newly constructed buildings are subject to stricter requirements – the building must not harm the environment, they must be energetically and economically efficient, comfortable, ecological, etc. One such green energy-saving idea is green roofs and walls of buildings. The purpose of this study is to determine the dynamics of rainwater runoff under real natural conditions, in a typical green roof construction, compared to runoff from a roof covered with bituminous tiles. The study was conducted in the year 2022–2023 by installing two 1 m² stands, which are affected by real climatic conditions. One stand was covered with traditional bituminous tiles, but the other was covered with a ‘green roof’ coating. Meteorological data were obtained from the Kaunas City meteorological station. During the first months of observation, it was possible to record the tendency that rainwater runoff is slow in the case of a green roof, but it continues even after the intense rain has ended. Analyzing the data, it was found during the research that the regression coefficients are very small in assessing the relationship between average daily temperatures and runoff in individual months, R2 – 0.0453 to 0.0553. The study showed that under certain meteorological conditions, a green roof can accumulate up to 35–45 percent more water than a roof covered with bituminous tiles. This means that the water is accumulated and then slowly drains into the rain collection systems.

In planning active leisure areas, the main emphasis is placed on the elements used in the infrastructure of childrenʼs playgrounds and recreational sports areas, their functionality, and compliance with various safety requirements in the public outdoor space. However, there are no uniform requirements for the aesthetics of the elements or the visually coherent inclusion of such infrastructure in the surrounding environment and existing infrastructure. The study aims to evaluate the impact of the infrastructure of active leisure areas on the visual quality of the public outdoor space and possible improvements by choosing alternative elements with a different visual design but similar functionality and to distinguish the main characteristic features for determining the visual quality of elements and characterize the impact on the surrounding environment. The research uses the descriptive or monographic method to collect and analyse the elements and functionality included in the surveyed territories in the summer and autumn of 2022, evaluating the aesthetic quality of the elements in active leisure areas in the public outdoor space of Riga and Tallinn. The studyʼs main results reflected several problems related to integrating active recreation areas into the surrounding environment. They highlighted issues related to the quality of the existing environment, which can be described as insufficient or low and which characterizes the planned development as coming into conflict with the existing environmentʼs aesthetic qualities or their absence.

Stakeholders and involved parties are crucial in a proper management of forest areas, more so in nature park areas. Urban nature areas and more remote peri-urban areas have objectively the most complex management issues due to the potentially high density of visitors and a diverse range of stakeholders. Such areas can also be valuable nature conservation and biodiversity hotspots, further making stakeholder interactions more complex. In this research, we conduct stakeholder identification for two case study areas – an urban forest nature park and a peri-urban forest nature park, with the aim of developing detailed lists of involved parties, including both public and private entities. We identified three main blocks of stakeholders (regulatory, usage, management), and detailed each group and sub-group for the case study areas. Our main results and conclusions include the identification of minor differences particularly explained by geographical and socio-economic contexts for each of the areas, with the regulatory stakeholder group overlapping the most between the two areas. The potential use of such analysis can improve or develop cooperation between previously unobserved stakeholders, and in research contexts, allow for a greater input from various parties that could have been missed in a more detailed analysis of a research area.

Robotic process automation (RPA) is relatively new software technology that is quickly being adopted by companies around the globe to free office workers from routine, monotonous and rule-based tasks letting them invest their time in higher complexity and value tasks. While big companies have money, time and workforce resources to implement RPA, small and medium enterprises (SME) fall behind in their effort to start using RPA despite the fact that for this segment of organizations RPA would be useful as it presents the opportunity to re-arrange their limited resources and delegate part of work to software. To address this situation, the aim of this paper is to conduct systematic review of literature regarding RPA appliances in enterprises in order to find out how to implement RPA successfully, what processes to give to RPA, and how SMEs can implement RPA better. During the review main guidelines on how to implement RPA in enterprise in general and which processes to delegate to RPA in particular were identified as well as challenges RPA implementation might bring to company. It was also noted that there is missing research on how to adopt RPA specifically in SMEs segment. The conclusion is that SMEs aimed RPA implementation guidelines are missing.

This study investigates the distribution and carbon content of organic soils in Latvia, leveraging machine learning techniques alongside remote sensing and National Forest Inventory (NFI) data to enhance the precision of organic soil mapping. Our approach integrates data from various sources, including airborne laser scanning (ALS) data, digital elevation models (DEM), depth-to-water (DTW) and wet area maps (WAM), and historical organic soil data. By classifying over 24,000 soil probing measurements across Latvia into distinct peat layer thickness categories, we develop a machine learning model that categorizes the thickness of the organic layer with notable accuracy. Our findings indicate that the model, particularly when employing the xgbTREE algorithm and over-sampling method, successfully identifies areas with peat layers thicker than 40 cm, demonstrating a significant improvement over traditional mapping methods. The study reveals an underestimation of organic soil coverage in Latvia by previous estimates, suggesting a broader distribution than recognized, with the model achieving an accuracy of 0.86 and a kappa value of 0.67. This research not only underscores the efficacy of integrating machine learning and remote sensing for soil mapping but also highlights the critical role of accurate data and models in determining organic soil distribution. The insights gained from this study are vital for policy-making and environmental planning, offering a more detailed understanding of Latviaʼs peatland resources and their conservation needs.

Students experienced various challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic, e.g., distance learning, which caused limited faceto-face socialization opportunities with peers, leading to loneliness and anxiety. Loneliness and anxiety are known to be associated with psychological difficulties such as depression or lack of motivation, feelings of anxiety and difficulty concentrating on work, etc. COVID-19 also had an impact on the physical health of young people, such as back pain when sitting at the computer, eye pain and other difficulties. Although COVID-19 is no longer an issue, young people studying remotely during the pandemic are now our learners. Therefore, the aim of this study is to identify the emotional state of school youth at the moment and the impact of COVID-19 on their mental health, as researches show that three-quarters of all mental disorders appear before the age of 24. At this age, there are rapid changes in the body as well as the formation of personal identity. Based on these considerations, the Nordplus project ‘Methods for working with young people to ensure learning process resilienceʼ was initiated, in which surveys of students and teachers were organized, and six different educational institutions from three Baltic states participated in the study. Results show that students feel tired, anxious, and angry and have too heavy workload. Teachers think that physical activity, sports and help with studies could reduce the mental health problems of students, but for students, it is most important to spend more time with friends.