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on Environmental Economics |
| By: | Stéphane Hallegatte; Fanny Henriet; Jan Corfee-Morlot |
| Abstract: | Climate change has become a priority issue in global environmental governance and cities are important players. For over three decades, the OECD has been actively supporting member and non-member countries to design environmental policies that are both economically efficient and effective at achieving their environmental objectives.1 Through peer reviews of policy implementation, the OECD helps governments to improve their collective and individual environmental performance, through sound economic and policy analysis and dialogue on how to establish and to achieve climate change goals. Climate change has been on the agenda since the late 1980s at the OECD, where we provide a forum for countries to, discuss and develop a shared understanding of the key policy challenges as well as to assess performance and identify good practice in the design and implementation of climate policies. Today the OECD is actively working with governments to highlight the role of cities to deliver cost-effective policy responses to climate change. A number of projects at the OECD are advancing the understanding of the roles that cities can play to respond to efficiently and effectively to climate change. This report is one in a series under the OECD Environment Directorate’s project on Cities and Climate Change. The project aims to explore the city-scale risks of climate change and the local benefits of both adaptation policies and (global) mitigation strategies. |
| Keywords: | sustainable development, government policy, climate change, global warming, natural disasters, regional economics, General Macroeconomics, Regional, Urban and rural Analyses |
| JEL: | Q01 Q51 Q54 Q56 Q58 R00 |
| Date: | 2008–12–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oec:envaaa:4-en&r=env |
| By: | Francesco Testa (Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna of Pisa); Fabio Iraldo (Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna of Pisa & IEFE – Institute for Environmental and Energy Policy and Economics, Bocconi University; Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna of Pisa & IEFE – Institute for Environmental and Energy Policy and Economics, Bocconi University) |
| Abstract: | The EMAS Regulation (Reg 761/01 EC) is an EU scheme for the implementation of an Environmental Management System (EMS) by any organization, implemented by the European Commission since the year 1993. The EMS has been originally proposed both by the European Commission and by ISO as the frontrunner of a series of policy tools that were conceived to enable companies to simultaneously pursue environmental objectives and competitive targets (in a synergetic way). Based on the unique dataset of the EVER project, this paper investigates whether or not an EMS implemented within the EMAS Regulation has an effect on firm performance both from an environmental and a competitive point of view. The econometric analysis shows a positive impact of well-designed environmental management system on environmental performance and, as a consequence, on technical and organizational innovations. Effects on other competitive variable as market performance, resource productivity and intangible asset are not strongly supported |
| Date: | 2008–12–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sse:wpaper:200804&r=env |
| By: | Sartzetakis, Eftichis; Xepapadeas, Anastasios; Petrakis, Emmanuel |
| Abstract: | The present paper examines, within a dynamic framework, the use of information provision as a policy instrument to supplement environmental taxation. We assume that at least a fraction of consumers do not posses the required information to make the optimal choices, and that their behavior at each time period depends on the accumulated stock of information. We show that, as the accumulated stock of information provision increases, both the optimal level of information provided at each period of time and the optimal tax rate decline over time. Our results provide strong evidence in support of information campaigns as a policy instrument to supplement traditional environmental policies. Information provision can sift the demand towards environmentally friendly products over time and thus, reduce the required level of the tax rate. |
| Keywords: | Information provision; environmental taxes; policy instruments |
| JEL: | Q50 H21 |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:12083&r=env |
| By: | OECD |
| Abstract: | Broadband and networked ICTs are important in meeting health, demographic and environmental challenges, and policy plays an important role in expanding their use and enhancing their impact. |
| Date: | 2008–06–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oec:stiaab:148-en&r=env |
| By: | Thompson, Wyatt |
| Abstract: | To develop this report, Farm Foundation drew on the insights of leaders from business, government, non-governmental organizations and academia. We began with a small group of individuals whose discussions defined the 30-year challenge in six broad categories: 1. global financial markets and recession, 2. global food security, 3. global energy security, 4. climate change, 5. competition for natural resources, and 6. global economic development. Farm Foundation then invited a broader group of leaders to explore each of the six categories, identifying critical strategic problems, alternative strategies and potential policies. Those discussions are the basis of this report. The topics and options presented here are not intended to be inclusive; rather they are a template from which to expand discussion and debate. This is not a consensus document and it does not make recommendations. It does reflect the diverse opinions expressed by project participants, their analysis of the problems which must solved to meet the 30-year challenge, and their assessment of some potential options to deal with those problems. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, Agricultural Finance, Environmental Economics and Policy, Food Security and Poverty, International Development, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy, |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:ffispa:45719&r=env |
| By: | Green, Kesten C; Armstrong, J Scott; Soon, Willie |
| Abstract: | We assessed three important criteria of forecastability—simplicity, certainty, and variability. Climate is complex due to many causal variables and their variable interactions. There is uncertainty about causes, effects, and data. Using evidence-based (scientific) forecasting principles, we determined that a naïve “no change” extrapolation method was the appropriate benchmark. To be useful to policy makers, a proposed forecasting method would have to provide forecasts that were substantially more accurate than the benchmark. We calculated benchmark forecasts against the UK Met Office Hadley Centre’s annual average thermometer data from 1850 through 2007. For 20- and 50-year horizons the mean absolute errors were 0.18°C and 0.24°C. The accuracy of forecasts from our naïve model is such that even perfect forecasts would be unlikely to help policy makers. We nevertheless evaluated the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 1992 forecast of 0.03°C-per-year temperature increases. The small sample of errors from ex ante forecasts for 1992 through 2008 was practically indistinguishable from the naïve benchmark errors. To get a larger sample and evidence on longer horizons we backcast successively from 1974 to 1850. Averaged over all horizons, IPCC errors were more than seven-times greater than errors from the benchmark. Relative errors were larger for longer backcast horizons. |
| Keywords: | backcasting; climate model; decision making; ex ante forecasts; out-of-sample errors; predictability; public policy; relative absolute errors; unconditional forecasts |
| JEL: | C53 O2 Q54 |
| Date: | 2008–12–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:12163&r=env |
| By: | Boriss Siliverstovs; Rainald Ötsch; Claudia Kemfert; Carlo Jaeger; Armin Haas; Hans Kremers |
| Abstract: | This study models maximum temperatures in Switzerland monitored in twelve locations using the Generalised Extreme Value (GEV) distribution. The parameters of the GEV distribution are determined within a Bayesian framework. We find that the parameters of the underlying distribution underwent a substantial change in the beginning of the 1980s. This change is characterised by an increase both in the level and the variability. We assess the likelihood of a heat wave of the Summer of 2003 using the fitted GEV distribution by accounting for the presence of a structural break. The estimation results do suggest that the heat wave of 2003 appears not that statistically improbable event as it is generally accepted in the relevant literature. |
| Keywords: | Climate change, GEV, Bayesian modelling, Great Alpine Heat Wave |
| JEL: | Q54 C11 |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwwpp:dp840&r=env |
| By: | Naude, Wim |
| Abstract: | Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has the highest growth rate in net international migration in the world. The reasons for this migration are investigated in this paper. First, a survey of the literature on the profile and determinants of international migration in SSA is given. Second, panel data on 45 countries spanning the period 1965 to 2005 are used to determine that the main reasons for international migration from SSA are armed conflict and lack of job opportunities. An additional year of conflict will raise net out-migration by 1.35 per 1,000 inhabitants and an additional 1 per cent growth will reduce net out-migration by 1.31 per 1,000. Demographic and environmental pressures have a less important direct impact, but a more pronounced indirect impact on migration through conflict and job opportunities. In particular, the frequency of natural disasters has a positive and significant effect on the probability that a country will experience an outbreak of armed conflict. Furthermore, there is no evidence of a ?migration hump? or of persistence in net migration rates in SSA, and no evidence that immigration is causing conflict in host countries. |
| Keywords: | international migration, conflict, natural disasters, environmental degradation, environmentally forced migration, Africa |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:rp2008-85&r=env |
| By: | Shuang Liu; David I Stern (CSIRO Entomology, Australia) |
| Abstract: | The ecosystem services provided by coastal and near-shore marine systems contribute significantly to human welfare. However, studies that document values of these services are widely scattered in the peer-reviewed literature. We collected 39 contingent valuation papers with 120 observations to conduct the first meta-analysis of the ecosystem service values provided by the coastal and near-shore marine systems. Our results show that over ¾ of the variation in Willingness to Pay (WTP) for coastal ecosystem services could be explained by variables in commodity, methodology, and study quality. We also used the meta-regression model to predict out-of-sample WTPs and the benefit transfer result showed that the overall median transfer error was 57%. Based on such results, one could argue that such meta-analyses can provide useful guidance regarding at least the general magnitudes of welfare effects. However, we also caution against the application of such a result in a broader context of benefit transfer as it is derived from a limited amount of data, and it may suffer from some degree of measurement error, generalization error, and publication selection error. Lastly, we discuss possible ways of minimizing these errors. |
| Keywords: | ecosystem services, valuation, meta-analysis, coastal |
| JEL: | Q25 Q51 Q57 |
| Date: | 2008–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cse:wpaper:2008-15&r=env |
| By: | Herani, Gobind M. |
| Abstract: | This study is about research methodology and procedures adopted for the primary data of agro-based industry of Tharparkar and barrage area of Sindh, and seventh chapter of the thesis of Ph.D submitted in 2002. In this study detail of the consolidated datta about the sample characteristics of this random sample survey are being given, collected through questionnaire, by poll questions about agro-based industry, and are analyzed by tabulation and charts. This data is primarily and is first ever study of Tharparkar on the subject. In giving the random sample characteristics, every attempt was made to give almost necessary information about the village farmers of the defined area out of which sampling was done. It is concluded from the study that in Thar livestock is sustainable source of income at first level and rangeland is at second level and crops are at third level. In barrage area crops are sustainable source of income at first level livestock is a at second level and rangeland is at third level this study will help to policy makers for further planning. |
| Keywords: | Methods and Procedures; Agro-Based Industry; Livestock; Rangeland Plantation; Tharparkar; Sample; Survey |
| JEL: | D18 P17 Q51 P48 D13 D31 Q56 C81 D24 B41 |
| Date: | 2008–12–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:12138&r=env |