PurposeClimate change increases systematic risk for firms, especially those in the agricultural industry. Therefore, the need to examine the consequences of climate-related risks on agribusiness companies' financial performance across the globe and emerging markets has risen. In this context, the paper aims to investigate the effects of climate change risks on the financial performance of agriculture listed firms in Vietnam.Design/methodology/approachThe study sample includes 77 Vietnamese listed firms in the agricultural industry in the period of 2015–2019. The authors chose temperature, wind, rainfall and humidity proxies to measure climate change. The OLS regression, random regression and sub-sample analysis have been used to examine the impacts of climate risks on firms' financial performance.FindingsEmpirical results show that rain and temperature have positive impacts on financial performance of Vietnamese agriculture listed firms, while wind and humidity have insignificant impacts on financial performance.Research limitations/implicationsThe research helps researchers, businesses, practitioners and policymakers interested in the agricultural industry, especially those in developing and emerging countries, to develop a deep understanding of the impact of climate change risks on firm performance and therefrom prepare necessary measures to reduce the negative impacts.Originality/valueThis study adds to the literature stream on the impacts of climate change on financial performance. It is the first study to investigate this impact in Vietnam, a country which depends mainly on agriculture.

The UK Government and many of the key sectors are increasingly focusing on growth, sustainability, and diversity. The paper explores the impact of a national programme to help the small business community (including micro and SMEs) to grow their businesses, with particular focus on the entrepreneurial mindset and businesses' capabilities to adopt technology and innovation.The paper aims to: (1) Understand SMEs' current mindset and capabilities, and their future expectations towards the adoption of technology and innovation and; (2) Explore the relative influence and impact of the "Help to Grow: Management programme" on the leaders' mindset and business capabilities of Hertfordshire businesses. Two surveys were conducted with different sizes to supplement information and make the analysis more accurate. The first survey was taken in 2019 and 2020 with 425 SMEs in Hertfordshire and in 2022, the second survey (and interviewed) were typically selected from the group of enterprises that were initially surveyed (n = 20) to see more insight into the research issue. The initial analysis (Hertfordshirewide business community) and follow-on analysis (attendees of the Help-to-Grow: Management programme) highlight the value of these short-intensive business leader skills programmes focused on developing the leadership and management skills of these business entrepreneurs and their small businesses capabilities. The research results have important implications for SMEs in identifying, evaluating and changing their mindsets as well as capabilities towards technological improvement and innovation. In addition, the research also provides more evidence and practical basis for the government and related agencies to improve such programs to better support SMEs.

Along with the trend of applying business governance in Vietnamese public higher education institutions, agency problems become an important issue that the public higher education institutions have to face. There are many ways to reduce agency problems, and one of them is to take advantage of the internal audit system. The paper reviews the literature on the relationship between agency theory and internal audit in public higher education institutions, which is quite rare. This study analyzes the case of Vietnam, a country where university governance system has had a lot of changes in recent times with the development of autonomy mechanism. The research raises the importance of internal audit function in university governance and provides policy implications for regulators and university administrators by adopting internal audit to reduce agency problems.