Adoption of safer irrigation technologies and cropping patterns: Evidence from Southern Ghana

The new irrigation technologies introduced in sub-Saharan Africa aim at ensuring safer vegetable production when untreated waste water is used as irrigation water. This paper examines the adoption of safer irrigation technologies and crop choices among vegetable farmers, using cross-section data from urban Kumasi in Ghana. The study employed a two-stage conditional maximum likelihood approach to examine the impact of crop choices and farm-level characteristics on the adoption of safer irrigation technologies. The empirical results indicate that apart from household and farm characteristics such as access to extension agents, belonging to a farmer's organization and education, cropping patterns tend to influence adoption of irrigation technologies for safer vegetable production.     

Optimal combination of pollution prevention and abatement policies: The case of agricultural drainage

The adoption of pollution prevention and abatement practices is examined in the context of a model of exhaustible resource use with a backstop technology. For the sake of concreteness, the paper focuses on the problem of water-logging caused by the subsurface accumulation of agricultural drainwater. In modelling this problem, a region's underground capacity to store drainwater is considered an exhaustible resource, while the installation of subsurface drainage is viewed as the corresponding backstop technology (or abatement practice). The exhaustible resource is typically over-exploited due to common access problems, which forces a suboptimally fast adoption of the abatement practice. Conservationist irrigation technologies, such as drip and sprinkler systems, tend to reduce drainwater generation, and their adoption could increase social welfare by delaying the abatement stage. Public policies are suggested to increase the adoption of such conservationist technologies. Data from California is used to illustrate the results and to demonstrate the efficacy of the model for policy purposes. While the setting used for the analysis in this paper is quite specific (i.e., water-logging), the same general modelling ideas may be applied to many other problems of environmental degradation.     

Adoption of navigation technologies: Five historical and contemporary cases

Five navigation technologies are studied with the aim of discovering why some of them have more difficulties and take longer time than the others to develop and reach the users. The case histories of their development are presented and compared according to their technological antecedents, their applications and the organizations involved. The analysis shows that multiple stakeholders with different agendas coupled with technological uncertainties and ambiguities have a negative impact on adoption. It also shows that entrepreneurs can play a significant role in accelerating the diffusion of technological innovations if the technological system allows for the parallel development of complements or new markets. The paper also highlights the need for deeper understanding of how complex products and systems should be managed in an environment marked by interconnectedness and multiple influential stakeholders.     

Adoption of health information technologies: the case of a wireless monitor for diabetes and obesity patients

This paper explores what determines the adoption of health information technologies through the use of a case study of a wireless service prototype developed for patients with diabetes and obesity. A technology acceptance model was used as the basis for developing the theoretical framework, which was later tested through a field study. Results indicated that the usefulness of an e-health service was affected by the quality of service, its compatibility with users’ lifestyle, the quality of support, the quality of information presented in the service, usage time, image, accessibility, and ease-of-use characteristics of the service. Designers should develop services that do not require much usage time as users do not want to spend much time using the service. In addition, users should be able to access data presented in the service quickly and easily when they need it. Customisable menu items and short cut keys can be used to make data access quick and easy.     

Global environment and dynamic games of environmental policy in an international duopoly

This paper examines a differential game model of international pollution control in which polluting oligopolists compete in a third country market. Two alternative policy instruments (emission taxes and command-and-control regulations) are considered. A tougher emission policy in the home country enhances the foreign firm’s competitiveness because of the static “rent-shifting” effect. The foreign country also enjoys a future improvement of the global environmental quality by “free riding” on the home country’s emission reduction effort. Because of these strategic effects, the levels of environmental policy determined in the noncooperative policy game are distorted away from the socially optimal level. Moreover, the emission tax game produces a more distortionary outcome than that in the command-and-control game; it generates more pollution and lower welfare.      

经济增长背景下浙江省城乡工业污染转移特征及动因

利用2012年7月我国环境保护部公布的重点环境整治行业信息数据及2001—2010年《浙江统计数据》,对浙江省城乡工业污染转移存在的问题及动因进行系统考察。研究结果表明:浙江绝大部分重点污染企业都分布在乡村,且呈分散独立经营状态,这增加了工业污染源整治的难度;政府对乡村地区的环保投入较少,导致城乡工业污染转移态势加剧、农村生态环境持续恶化;以污染密集产业为主导的经济增长模式与城乡二元结构下的污染天堂效应是浙江城乡工业污染转移的最根本原因。     

Optimal combination of innovation and environmental policies under technology licensing

Under what conditions will a carbon tax encourage environmental innovation? Can a regulator design an optimal environmental policy to reduce emissions and to promote clean technologies? This paper studies optimal environmental policy in the situation where a monopoly innovator develops and licenses clean production technologies to downstream polluting firms. We find that (i) a higher emission tax will encourage innovation when the burden of the tax payment in the polluters' costs and/or the price-elasticity of the demand for polluting goods are small, (ii) the innovation-inducing effects of emission tax are inversely related to the emission-reduction (Pigouvian) effects of the tax, and (iii) the social optimum can be achieved by the mix of tax and subsidy. We also show that if the policy instrument is limited to the tax, the second-best tax rate would lie between the marginal damage and the first-best rate. By performing numerical simulations, we also demonstrate that the optimal mix of the emission tax and R&D subsidy can have “double dividend” benefits.     

The environmental Porter hypothesis: theory,evidence, and a model of timing of adoption

The Porter hypothesis postulates that the costs of compliance with environmental standards may be offset by adoption of innovations they trigger. We model this hypothesis using a game of timing of technology adoption. We will show that times of adoption will be earlier if the non-adoption tax is higher. The environmental tax will turn the preemption game with low profits into a game with credible precommitment generating higher profits (pro-Porter). If there is a precommitment game without environmental taxes, the introduction of a tax will lead to lower profits (anti-Porter). An evaluation of the empirical literature indicates that the Porter hypothesis will hold even for profit-maximizing firms under multiple market imperfections such as imperfect competition, X-inefficiency, and agency costs. These are more likely to be present in sectors with large firms. In many case studies that we have evaluated, though, we detected an element of explicit or implicit subsidies for environmentally friendly behaviour, which is in line with Pigovian policies.     

Timing and Commitment of Environmental Policy,Adoption of New Technology,and Repercussions on R&;D

We investigate the interplay between environmental policy, incentives to adoptnew technology, and repercussions on R&D. We study a model where a monopolistic upstream firm engages in R&D and sells advanced abatement technology to polluting downstream firms. We consider four different timing and commitment regimes of environmental tax and permit policies: ex post taxation (or issuing permits), interim commitment to a tax rate (a quota of permits) after observing R&D success but before adoption, and finally two types of ex antecommitment before R&D activity, one with a unique tax rate (quota of permits), the other one with a menu of tax rates (permit quotas). We study the second best tax and permit policies and rank these with respect to welfare. In particular, we find that commitment to a menu of tax rate dominates all other policy regimes.     

能源与环境约束下的经济增长

本文通过协整分析和脉冲响应函数分析了GDP、能源消费量增长和环境污染之间的关系,发现三者之间存在长期稳定的关系,GDP和能源消费量增长是环境恶化的成因,并进一步分析了它们之间长短期内所存在的均衡关系.     

策略性环境政策:环境税和减排补贴的比较分析

文章把战略性贸易政策模型扩展到环境领域,策略性环境政策认为政府有动机通过降低环境标准补贴出口企业,以达到利润转移的目的.文章分析了策略性环境政策中比较受忽视的一部分--环境技术补贴,本国政府结合使用环境税和减排补贴,我们验证了政府使用策略性环境政策的动机,得到了最优的污染排放税率,认为虽然环境政策仍旧不能消除生产带来的环境损害,但是环境技术补贴提高了本国的环境标准,企业会更少地遇到绿色壁垒报复.     

技术突变下后发国家的企业自主创新环境及其优化

技术突变对后发国家的企业来说,是挑战,更是实现跨越式发展的大好机遇。分析了目前企业自主创新在技术产业化、国际产业转移、国家创新体系支持和知识产权保护等方面具有的特点,阐述了在技术突变下企业自主创新在资源保障、应对转换成本、消除文化障碍等方面应有的保证条件。在此基础上,分别从政府和企业主体两个层面,提出后进国优化企业自主创新环境、实现跨越式发展的对策。     

Technology diffusion and environmental regulation: the adoption of natural gas-fired combined cycle generating units

Even though environmental policy can affect the path of technology diffusion, the economics literature contains limited empirical evidence of this relationship. This paper provides insight into the technology adoption decisions of electric generating firms. Specifically, the diffusion of combined cycle (CC) generating units is examined. This technology is ‘environmentally friendly’ in that, it is cleaner and more efficient than alternative generating units. The empirical model explores the decision to adopt a CC generating unit and the extent to which the technology is adopted in response to environmental regulations imposed on producers. Zero-inflated models are used to evaluate adoption decisions at the plant-level as well as the firm-level. This research shows that environmental regulation has a significant effect on technology choice and the extent of adoption in this industry. Findings suggest that the stringency of regulations that control the building of new generating units is particularly influential for established power plants.     

Innovation and diffusion of environmental technology: Industrial NOx abatement in Sweden under refunded emission payments

We study the actual process of technical change in the case of NOx abatement from large stationary sources that have been regulated by very forceful policies in Sweden. Considerable progress has been made in lowering aggregate emissions and this paper seeks to disaggregate average industry improvements to study how much of it is due to innovations by first movers, and how much is achieved by adoption and diffusion of technology. We find both factors very important. Innovation has been rapid: the best firms have cut emissions on the order of 70%. In spite of this, reductions have actually been even more rapid for the majority of firms so that the median firms have caught up with best practice. We analyze various characteristics of the technological change observed.     

土壤污染防治法背景下的城乡绿地系统建设：趋势与对策

《中华人民共和国土壤污染防治法》的颁布标志着中国将形成完善的土壤污染防治法律体系,建立从污染土壤调查、修复、风险防控、监测到场地再利用,从环境标准到规划管理的全方位制度。生态文明制度建设的宏观背景,再加上中国土壤污染严重、规模大、修复难、成本高、周期长等特征,将导致大量污染场地转变为绿地或生态用地,最终对绿地系统的数量与规模、布局与功能、规划与管理、环境质量标准等多个维度产生实质性影响。分析这一趋势,对其影响提出预判,最终提出对策建议。