Measuring and forecasting regional environmental and economic efficiency in Italy

Environmental and economic efficiency has being receiving growing attention among researchers. In general terms, this concept is related to the capability of the economic systems to employ natural resources efficiently, so as to increase economic and human wealth. This clearly implies that both the economic and ecological aspects of decisions ought to be considered. Bearing this in mind, this article considers economic and ecological performance together, by applying data envelopment analysis and the Malmquist productivity index to investigate the efficiency of the 20 Italian regions from 2004 to 2011. The results reveal that the northern regions have been more efficient than the southern ones, highlighting the strong geographical differences between the two. Furthermore, this article uses the grey system theory to forecast regional, economic and environmental efficiency. The results of the forecasting analysis show that the north–south duality remains strong and will possibly increase since the regions in the south get worse in term of environmental and economic efficiency.     

THE OPPORTUNITY COSTS OF REDWOOD NATIONAL PARK: COMMENT AND ELABORATION

In a recent issue of this journal, Walker (1984) emphasized the need for good economic analysis in public evaluation of national park expansions. We support this but would like to show that a possible reason the economic analysis referred to in Walker's paper was ignored may be the very narrow way in which his analysis was performed. In particular, the opportunity cost per visitor day of Redwood National Park may have been overstated by a factor of 10 by implying the sole benefits of the park expansion were associated with only 10 percent of the park's use days. More importantly, substantial literature on off-site economic benefits arising from preservation of natural environments is completely ignored. Since the legal purpose of the national parks is not solely related to recreation, this omission reflects a large error in the analysis. This paper's purpose is to apply sensitivity analysis to the opportunity costs per visitor day and illustrate some policy analysis tools commonly used by natural-resource economists, in and out of government, for evaluating the economic efficiency benefits of preserving unique natural environments. Applying these tools indicates the cost of Redwood National Park may have been as low as 90 cents per household in the United States.     

政府教育支出的经济增长效应研究

政府教育支出的经济增长效应是经济学界研究的重要问题。文章首先建立一个包含政府教育支出的两部门内生增长模型,对中国政府教育支出的经济增长效应进行分析,实证结论是:长时期内中国政府教育支出的经济增长效应是正。因此,应进一步增加政府教育支出,并通过改进投资结构和进度,使之对长期经济增长起到更为重要的促进作用。     

天然气分布式冷热电联供系统节能减排技术经济分析模型

分析了我国天然气能源供需情况及能源价格情况,构建了天然气分布式冷热电联供系统的经济效益分析模型。利用相关数据,分析了该系统的经济效益,并对影响经济效益的主要因素进行了敏感性分析,构建了天然气分布式冷热电联供系统节能减排效益分析模型,并对该系统的减排效益进行分析。结果表明:天然气分布式冷热电联动系统具有显著的经济效益,可大大降低污染物的排放量。     

自然资源与区域经济增长:一个文献综述

自然资源是影响区域经济增长的重要因素,但是一直以来资源问题却没有引起主流经济学界的重视,包含有自然资源因素的增长模型是对区域经济增长模型的扩展。经验数据表明自然资源在某种程度上会挤出物质资本,并影响效率,从而形成区域经济增长过程中的"资源陷阱"现象,西方学者对此做出了理论上的解释。     

On economic efficiency under non-convexity

This paper investigates economic efficiency under non-convexity. The analysis relies on a generalization of the separating hyperplane theorem under non-convexity. The concept of zero-maximality is used to characterize Pareto efficiency under non-convexity. We show the existence of a separating hypersurface that can be used to provide a dual characterization of efficient allocations. When the separating hypersurface is non-linear, this implies that non-linear pricing is an integral part of economic efficiency. Implications for the decentralization of economic decisions under non-convexity are discussed.     

The material basis of the global economy: Worldwide patterns of natural resource extraction and their implications for sustainable resource use policies

Material flow accounting and analysis (MFA) has been established as an influential framework for quantifying the use of natural resources by modern societies. So far, however, no reference data for overall scale and trends of global extraction of natural resources and their distribution between different world regions has been available. This paper presents the first comprehensive quantification of the material basis of the global economy, i.e. used domestic extraction in a time series from 1980 to 2002. We analyse time trends for major material groups (fossil fuels, metals, industrial and construction minerals, and biomass) disaggregated into seven world regions. This allows for (a) an illustration of the global economy's physical growth driven by worldwide processes of economic integration over the past decades, and (b) an indication of the worldwide distribution of environmental pressures associated with material extraction. The results show that annual resource consumption of the world economy increased by about one third between 1980 and 2002. This indicates that scale effects due to economic growth more than compensated for other effects, such as the relative increase of the service sectors' contribution to GDP (structural effect) and the use of new production technologies with higher material and energy efficiency (technology effect). The observed growth of natural resource extraction is unevenly distributed over the main material categories, with metals showing the highest growth rate. The regional analysis shows the increasing importance of Asia and Latin America in global resource extraction. On the global level, material intensity, i.e. resource extraction per unit of GDP, decreased by about 25%, indicating relative decoupling of resource extraction from economic growth. The paper concludes with policy recommendations for a more sustainable use of natural resources.     

On Impatience, Economic Growth and the Environmental Kuznets Curve: A Dynamic Analysis of Resource Management

The paper presents a dynamic analysis of natural resource management and investigates some key factors that affect optimal management and resource conservation.Using a recursive specification of time preferences, we show how endogenous discounting and impatience can affect the motivation for both capital investments and environmental preservation. We examine the relationships between economic growth and environmental quality. Endogenous discounting provides new insights in the economic dynamics underlying the environmental Kuznets curve. By treating growth as endogenous, we examine how externalities and economic growth interact with each other. We investigate how economic development can contribute to an increased demand for environmental preservation. As an important new result, we also show how poverty can contribute to environmental degradation.     

我国地方政府消费性支出对经济增长的影响——以广东为例

运用菲德两部类模型,以广东为案例分析了地方政府消费性支出对经济增长的影响。结果表明,广东省政府消费性支出对经济增长的贡献并不明显;广东省政府部门的外溢效应对经济增长起着积极的促进作用;广东省政府部门要素的边际生产力低。因此,要调整广东省政府消费性支出,做到支出结构合理化,支出使用高效化,以促进国民经济持续稳定快速发展。     

人力资本集聚对城市绿色经济效率的影响分析

提高绿色经济效率是中国经济高质量发展的重要任务。运用DEA-SBM模型测算2003—2017年中国262个城市的绿色经济效率,选取空间杜宾模型实证分析人力资本集聚对绿色经济效率的影响,结果表明,人力资本集聚有利于促进当地城市绿色经济效率,且这种影响存在一定的区域异质性。人力资本集聚对绿色经济效率的促进作用是通过创新能力促进和高质量FDI效应等途径起作用的。为了解决内生性问题,使用各城市地形起伏度作为工具变量,以二阶段最小二乘法进行估计,得到的结果与研究结果保持一致,证明研究结论具有稳健性。     

基于数据包络分析法的区域生态效率评价研究——以内蒙古为例

生态效率是衡量生态发展水平的重要指标,反映了经济发展中利用自然资源减轻环境压力的效率。将数据包络分析(DEA)方法运用到生态效率的实证研究当中,对内蒙古地区2001～2009年的生态效率进行测度和评价。结果表明CO2、工业固体废物、工业废气、工业废水等污染物的排放及能源的消耗成为影响内蒙古地区生态效率的主要因素。总之粗放型经济增长方式制约区域生态效率的改善,技术水平的提高和规模效益的达成是提高生态效率、实现节能减排的根本途径。     

基于能值分析的长株潭城市群生态经济系统演变态势分析

采用能值理论与分析方法,研究2000-2009年长株潭城市群生态经济系统的能值流量,社会经济自然子系统各能值指标和可持续发展指数的变化趋势。结果表明：长株潭城市群生态经济系统正处于中级发展水平,经济发展主要依赖本地资源,外界输入能值逐渐增加,经济开发强度不断扩大,工业化和信息化水平飞速提高,但能源生产和利用的效率呈现下降的趋势,环境负荷率不断增大,系统呈现不可持续的发展趋势。根据此结果提出了长株潭城市群生态经济系统的发展对策,以便转变经济发展方式,提高经济社会发展与自然生态环境的和谐程度,促进结构的稳定性,功能的高效性及发展的持续性的“三位一体”,使其进入良性健康的发展轨道。     

国有经济产业分布影响因素的面板协整模型分析

理论分析认为影响国有经济产业分布状况的经济因素主要有两个,一是国有经济本身的性质特点与制度优势;二是社会经济各部门的产业性质和特点。但在现实的经济运行中,国有经济产业分布问题涉及到包括经济效率和社会公平在内的多种复杂因素,具有明显的不确定性、非线性及非理性特征。利用1999～2010年制造业中20个产业的面板数据,建立面板协整模型,实证检验了自然垄断性、行业外部性、主导性产业、产业溢出效应对中国国有经济产业分布的影响。     

How efficient is the banking system of Asia’s next economic dragon? Evidence from rolling DEA windows

Vietnam is now widely regarded as a rising economic star and the next economic dragon of Asia. Its banking system has played a key role in this stellar economic performance. Since 1990, Vietnam’s banking system has undergone significant changes which saw its composition transformed from being state banks only to now being both state as well as private banks, and has performed generally well in terms of growth, profitability and stability. But is it efficient? We conduct a dynamic analysis of the level and trend of the cost and profit efficiency of the Vietnamese banking sector over the period 1995 to 2011 taking into account the Asian and Global Financial crises. We use the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) Windows Analysis approach and adjust for bank size in calculating the average efficiency score of the banking system. Our empirical findings show that the cost and profit efficiency of the Vietnamese banking system averaged around 0.90 and 0.75, respectively, with the state banks being more efficient than the private banks and with efficiency experiencing an upward trend over the analysis period. Moreover, we find that the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) and Asian Financial Crisis (AFC) did not significantly affect the efficiency of the whole Vietnamese banking system.     

Working time reduction and employment in a finite world*

We study the consequences of a working time reduction (WTR) in a growth model with efficiency wages and an essential natural resource (natural capital), and in which technical progress cannot reduce the resource content of final production to zero. We show that if natural capital is scarce enough, a WTR increases the long-term levels of the hourly wage and employment. A numerical analysis of the transitory impacts of a WTR confirms that when natural capital is scarcer, a WTR increases employment more and the hourly wage less, with a less negative initial impact on output.     

A curse or a blessing? Natural resources in a multiple growth regimes analysis

The literature on the impact of an abundance of natural resources on economic performance remains inconclusive. In this article we consider the possibility that countries may follow different growth regimes, and test the hypothesis that whether natural resources are a curse or a blessing depends on the growth regime to which an economy belongs. We follow recent work that has used a mixture-of-regressions method to identify different growth regimes, and find two regimes such that in one regime resources have a positive impact on growth, while in the other they have a negative impact or at best have no impact on growth. Our analysis of the determinants of whether a country belongs or not to the blessed resources regime indicates that the level of democracy plays an important role while education and economic institutions have no effect.     

Club convergence analysis of regional ecological efficiency in China

This paper adopts a network data envelopment analysis (DEA) model combined with a window analysis approach to evaluate the ecological efficiency (eco‐efficiency) of 30 regions in China over 2000–2015. We also investigate the existence of eco‐efficiency convergence clubs among these regions and analyse the important factors that drive eco‐efficiency club formation. Our results reveal that, overall, Chinese regional eco‐efficiency deteriorated from 2000 to 2015. We find that there is a significant regional disparity in eco‐efficiency. Our convergence analysis indicates that Chinese regions converge into three eco‐efficiency clubs, suggesting that common economic and environment policies might have a limited impact on promoting regional eco‐efficiency and regionally‐tailored policies need to be designed. Finally, we find that forest coverage, R&D expenditure and pollution punishment are important determinants of convergence club membership.     

Climate threshold,financial hoarding and economic growth

We use an iterative finite difference method to establish theoretical models that reflect the relationships among climate threshold, financial hoarding and economic growth. We build a simultaneous equations model to conduct an empirical analysis based on China’s statistical data from 1979 to 2012. Our study yields the following results: China’s climate threshold has shown a zigzag-shaped rising trend since 1979; the main reasons for the rapid expansion of financial hoarding were high savings rate, savings leakage, higher marginal efficiency of financial hoarding compared to capital efficiency or higher internal creativity of the financial sector; there were positive cumulative effects between financial hoarding and economic growth, which were significantly inhibited by climate threshold; the climate threshold had discrepant influences on different industries. To achieve a balanced economy, more money should be invested in the real sector to appropriately reduce the rate of savings leakage; the financial sector should move from scale expansion to service efficiency improvements to increase its marginal contribution to the economy and to enhance capital efficiency; the real sector should improve technological innovation and speed up the adaptive adjustment in climate-sensitive industries to move from economic growth to advanced development.     

管理体制与中国开发区经济发展效率增长——基于Malmquist指数和GMM的实证分析

文章采用Malmquist生产率指数对2001-2008年30个国家级经济技术开发区的经济发展效率增长进行了测算,并采用广义矩估计对其影响因素进行了实证分析,重点考察了不同管理体制对开发区效率增长影响的差异。结果显示:开发区的经济发展效率整体上处于逐渐改善的过程,东部地区开发区的效率改善速度比较稳定,而西部地区开发区因缺少持续促进因素而效率变化波动很大;政区合一型管理体制对开发区经济发展效率的改善表现出积极影响,对外贸易、投资率、产业结构、政府干预以及科技含量等因素均有利于开发区效率的提高,政府规模的扩大则对其效率增长产生了负向效应;科技含量和政府规模对两类开发区的效率增长分别具有显著的积极影响和负向效应,对外贸易对政区合一型开发区的效率增长具有显著的正向影响而对管委会型开发区的影响并不显著。     

生态工业园区是发展循环经济的最好实现形式

循环经济是减少环境污染、保护自然资源的全新经济发展模式，生态工业园区是一种以追求更高物质利用率和能量转化效率，更少废物排放甚至零排放为目标的企业地域分布形式。具有环境保护意义和生态绿色概念的工业园区，是发展循环经济的最好实现形式。