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on Environmental Economics |
| By: | Fernando Carriazo; Ana María Ibañez; Marcela Garcia |
| Abstract: | El Sistema de Parques Nacionales Naturales provee servicios ambientales a la economía del país que, debido a su naturaleza de bienes públicos, no se equiparan con la asignación presupuestal destinada a su manejo y administración. La protección de extensas áreas territoriales con ecosistemas naturales valiosos contribuye a la conservación del recurso hídrico, al ecoturismo y al secuestro de carbono. Hoy el Sistema está compuesto por 49 áreas protegidas, cubre 10 millones de hectáreas y comprende nueve por ciento del territorio nacional. El objetivo de esta estudio es valorar los servicios provistos por el SPNN a la economía nacional. El estudio aproxima los beneficios económicos del consumo doméstico de agua potable en $32 mil millones de pesos mensuales. Los beneficios totales anuales por ecoturismo oscilan en un rango entre $2.3 y $6.9 mil millones de pesos. La venta de carbono por la conservación de sumideros de carbono significaría para Colombia beneficios por hectárea protegida entre $556.449 y $1.669.406, es decir US$297 y US$891 por hectárea. |
| Keywords: | transferencia de beneficios |
| JEL: | Q25 |
| Date: | 2003–10–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:col:000138:001055&r=env |
| By: | Ana María Ibáñez; Eduardo Uribe |
| Abstract: | Durante los noventa, el sector ambiental sufrió importantes cambios institucionales y un incremento sin precedentes en la inversión ambiental. La crisis fiscal de finales de los noventa revirtió esta tendencia y provocó un descenso de la inversión ambiental en los últimos cuatro años. Además, el gobierno nacional enfrenta una complicada situación pues está abocado a contraer su gasto con necesidades de inversión ingentes para frenar el desempleo, disminuir la pobreza y controlar la violencia. Es necesario, por ende, buscar que la gestión ambiental contribuya a mitigar la pobreza y a promover el desarrollo económico. El objetivo de este estudio es realizar una evaluación cualitativa de los efectos de las inversiones ambientales en Colombia sobre el alivio de la pobreza y sobre el desarrollo económico. Los resultados muestran cómo las inversiones ambientales tienen la capacidad de contribuir al alivio de la pobreza y al desarrollo económico. Sin embargo, esas contribuciones son, en general, poco frecuentes; y cuando ellas ocurren lo hacen generalmente de manera indirecta y su impacto es bajo. |
| Keywords: | Inversión ambiental |
| JEL: | D61 |
| Date: | 2003–11–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:col:000138:001062&r=env |
| By: | Joanna Noelia Kamiche |
| Abstract: | La pobreza ha sido una de las causas principalmente esgrimidas para explicar el deterioro ambiental; sin embargo existen pocos estudios que exploren empíricamente la relación entre pobreza y degradación ambiental. Para tratar de contribuir a esta discusión, este estudio incluye de manera explícita diferentes formas de medición de la condición de pobreza (Línea de Pobreza, Índice de Calidad de Vida y Pobreza de Inversión) para determinar si éste es un factor que influye en la decisión de uso de fertilizantes químicos y/u orgánicos. La investigación toma en cuenta que estos últimos tienen un impacto positivo en la acumulación de materia orgánica y por ende, contribuyen a mejorar la calidad del suelo. Los resultados indican que la pobreza, medida bajo distintos indicadores, incrementa la probabilidad de utilizar fertilizantes orgánicos frente a los químicos, con lo cual las políticas de lucha contra la pobreza deben ser complementadas con políticas de conservación del medio ambiente, en particular del suelo, para evitar o por lo menos reducir, la degradación ambiental. |
| Keywords: | Pobreza |
| JEL: | I32 |
| Date: | 2005–03–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:col:000138:001070&r=env |
| By: | Levent, Tuzin Baycan (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Faculteit der Economische Wetenschappen en Econometrie (Free University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics Sciences, Business Administration and Economitrics); Nijkamp, Peter |
| Abstract: | Urban green spaces play a key role in improving the liveability of our towns and cities. The quality and viability of cities depend largely on the design, management and maintenance of urban green as well as on open and public spaces that make up an important social constellation and offer a visual representation of urban quality. Actually, urban green spaces may be seen as an important contribution to a sustainable development of cities. However, the full potential of green spaces is not always realized, so that current management practices are sometimes sub-optimal. From a policy perspective, the results of several case studies have highlighted critical policy needs and priorities for the development and management of urban green spaces. It is, therefore, of strategic importance to compare and evaluate urban green space policies for identifying the best practices with a view to proper policy recommendations and guidance for urban society and planning authorities in order to improve the quality of life in modern cities. Against this background, the present study investigates urban green spaces from a policy evaluation perspective and analyses in a comparative sense European cities in order to obtain strategic and policy relevant information on the key features of urban green. The study aims to compare and evaluate the current management practices in various European cities on the basis of the actual performance of urban green space policies. The data and information used for comparison and evaluation are based on extensive survey questionnaires filled out by relevant departments or experts of municipalities in European cities which aim to share their experience in innovative green space policies and strategies. As a rather novel methodological contribution, a recently developed artificial intelligence method, i.e. rough set analysis, is deployed to assess and identify the most important factors that are responsible for successes and failures of urban green space policies. Our approach is able to reveal the most critical policy variables |
| Keywords: | urban society; green spaces; european cities; comparison |
| Date: | 2004 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:vuarem:2004-22&r=env |
| By: | Maïder SAINT-JEAN (E3i, IFReDE-GRES) |
| Abstract: | Based on a model of industrial dynamics, this paper examines the impact of polluting emissions standards on trajectories of clean technologies implemented by firms subject to competitive selection and supply chain pressure. The model incorporates a few stylised facts on the relationships between environmental regulation, innovation and diffusion. The main objective is to highlight the forces influencing the long term dynamics of an industry faced with evolving emissions standards in a ‘history-friendly’ way. The paper gives guidance to the conditions of dynamic efficiency of emissions standards taking into account the coevolution of technology, user requirements and market structure. We show that emission standards not only play a significant role in orienting research and innovation activities of supplier firms, but they are also likely to support the diffusion of environmental innovation in the supply chain. In some cases, emission standards lead to prevent both a situation of lock-in on the supply side and a situation of behavioural inertia on the user side. Standards may thus lead to preserve a certain form of technological and behavioural diversity. Based on the computer simulations, it will be shown that the efficiency of standards depends on the nature of performance standards (process or product), on the market structure and on the timing of intervention. |
| Keywords: | environmental innovation; industrial dynamics; environmental supply chain pressure; emission standards |
| JEL: | O33 Q55 Q58 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:grs:wpegrs:2005-16&r=env |
| By: | Alexandre Tangerini (IDHEAP); Nils Soguel (IDHEAP) |
| Abstract: | The aim of this project is to quantify in monetary terms the value of the landscape in the Alps for both residents and tourists. To do this, we selected the hedonic price method from the holistic quantitative methods for landscape evaluation. This method assumes that the cost of a good – as can be observed on a market – does not reflects the utility of the good itself, but the utility its characteristics in the eyes of the consumer. Thus, we put forward the hypothesis that one of these characteristics may be an environmental attribute, such as the quality of the landscape. Seen from this perspective, the price of the good (in the case in question the rent paid by tourists and residents for apartment accommodation) results from the juxtaposition of implicit prices, for example the price of the landscape. A sample comprising 510 apartments, distributed at the rate of 403 for tourists and 107 for residents, was selected in six Alpine stations in the Swiss canton of Valais. Among the 80 characteristics adopted for the purpose of the analysis, the characteristic «landscape» was understood in two ways: quality of the natural and built landscape at each station and access to the landscape from each apartment. The main challenge of this research resided in obtaining quantitative values that enable the representation of the qualitative dimension of the landscape. This was made possible using the MACBETH approach. Leaving aside certain “conventional” characteristics that influence the rents paid by residents and tourists, the implicit prices revealed by the hedonistic functions show that for a relative improvement in the quality of the natural landscape of 0.1 points, the estimated rent varies by around 2% for tourists. The same applies for residents. With regard to the quality of the built landscape, a relative increase of 0.1 points gives rise to a positive variation in rent for tourists estimated at 0.2%. Conversely, a relative increase in the quality of the built landscape is perceived negatively by residents and thus gives rise to a depreciation of 0.8%. Thus, it may be suggested that both tourists and residents have similar preferences with regard to the quality of the natural landscape, however their preferences differ in regard to the built landscape. Variations in rent prices can also be explained by access to the landscape. Finally, our analysis reveals that both groups of actors value the fact of being located at a distance from the station’s main infrastructure; this is expressed in a positive willingness to pay for locations away from the centre of the station, the ski lifts and food shops. Furthermore, and as assumed, the implicit price for an increase in the length of ski slopes and hiking trails is positive for tourists, whereas it is negative for residents. |
| Keywords: | Cardinal data, hedonic prices, landscape quality, landscape value, MACBETH |
| JEL: | R |
| Date: | 2005–07–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpa:wuwpur:0507002&r=env |
| By: | John C. Whitehead; Richard Aiken |
| Abstract: | The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's National Survey of Fishing, Hunting, and Wildlife Associated Recreation has been a source of information on wildlife-related recreation since 1955. The contingent valuation method has been used to estimate willingness to pay for recreation trips in the 1980, 1985, 1991, 1996 and 2001 surveys. However, relatively little comparative analysis over time has been performed. Similar value elicitation formats were used in the 1991 and 1996 surveys for bass and trout fishing, deer hunting, and nonconsumptive wildlife recreation. We statistically analyze these data to assess the temporal reliability of the willingness to pay. We control for the effects of trip quality and socioeconomic variables and find that willingness to pay is significantly lower in 1996 for each activity. A subtle, but important, change in the 1996 question format may drive the result of lower willingness to pay. |
| Date: | 2004 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:apl:wpaper:04-23&r=env |