Demand for Wildlife Hunting in British Columbia

We present estimates of the demand for hunting licenses by residents and nonresidents in British Columbia for the period 1971–2000. We obtain estimates of both short-run and long-run price elasticities and discuss their revenue implications for future fee increases. We find the demand by nonresidents to be strongly correlated with U.S. income variation over the business cycle, but find no such role for cyclical income variation for resident hunters. The ability of the government to increase revenues from resident hunters turns out to be limited, particularly in the long run, while greater opportunities exist for raising revenues from U.S. hunters as short- and long-run price elasticities of demand are quite inelastic. We argue that conservation surcharges on foreign hunters are one way of capturing more of the resource rent.     

The effect of foreign capital inflow on domestic savings in developing countries

Journal of Economics -     

Bookkeeping conventions and the micro-macro link

The formal accounting logic of the national accounts and other macroeconomic statistics is not always well understood. In addition, the relation between macro statistics and micro accounting data often is not clear. This paper starts out by summarizing the main bookkeeping conventions at the macro level. A distinction is made between vertical and horizontal double-entry bookkeeping, which, if applied simultaneously, result in quadruple-entry bookkeeping. Vertical bookkeeping refers to the double-entry bookkeeping used in business practice. Horizontal bookkeeping requires that the transactions and other economic relationships between agents answer strict consistency rules regarding valuation, timing, and classification. At the micro level, this consistency is not guaranteed. The article reviews three options to reinforce the micro-macro link (proposals by Nancy and Richard Ruggles, proposals by Harry Postner, and the intermediate accounts in France), and concludes with a few suggestions that could be used in the upcoming revisions of the international statistical manuals.     

Estimating the impact of regional policy: A review of applied research methods

This paper provides a critical review of the methodological approaches that have been used to estimate the impacts of regional economic policies. A considerable variety of approaches are examined, ranging from questionnaire studies through single- and multiple-equation regression models to cost-benefits analysis, and attention is focused on the pros and cons of these approaches and the reliability of the impact assessments derived. The paper concludes with some suggestions for further research in this field.     

Carbon offsets and agriculture: Options,obstacles, and opinions

While carbon offsets in agriculture can play a role in addressing climate change, they are not a perfect substitute for direct emission reductions. As shown in this paper through various arguments and case studies, climate policies in Canada have avoided the use of offsets to be sold in carbon markets, preferring instead to incentivize adoption of best management practices (BMPs) that provide environmental benefits along with climate mitigation benefits. We argue that this is a preferred policy option due to the perils and pitfalls inherent in the measurement and monitoring required to identify offset credits. While an appropriate approach might be to penalize Canadian farmers for any emissions their activities cause, this may do more harm than good. Canadian agricultural production is highly efficient and technologically advanced; therefore, reductions in Canada's contribution to the global food supply will result in less-efficient production occurring elsewhere (i.e., leakage) that increases global greenhouse gas emissions.     

Reply to the commentary

Our conclusion that econometric market share models may not be consistently more accurate than naive models was not surprising to the commentators. The comments they made help clarify the research that is needed to identify when econometric market share models are likely to be useful for forecasting.     

Downward sloping demand for environmental amenities and international compensation: elephant conservation and strategic culling

Conventional wisdom holds that monetary compensation for positive transboundary externalities will promote conservation of resource amenities. We demonstrate that, in the case of elephant conservation, international transfers may also result in strategic behavior by host countries, with adverse implications for global welfare and in situ stocks.     

Climatic Change and Canada's Boreal Forest: Socio-economic Issues and Implications for Land Use

This paper reviews the effect of climatic change and policies to sequester carbon on forest land use. Efficient mitigation strategies often require the conversion of agricultural land to forestry in order to sequester carbon, but such strategies could be wrong for Canada's boreal forest region if global warming is inevitable. It is argued that, from both an economic and a social perspective, conversion of the southern boreal forest to grassland or agriculture might be a better policy.
L'article passe en revue l'effet des changements climatiques et des politiques utilisées pour capter le gaz carbonique, sur l'utilisation des terres forestières. Pour être efficace, les stratégies d'atténuation nécessitent souvent la reconversion des terres agricoles à l'exploitation forestière afin de capturer le bioxyde de carbone mais, cette stratégie pourrait se révéler mauvaise pour la forêt boréale canadienne advenant l'inévitabilité d'un réchauffement planétaire. L'auteur estiment qu'autant dans la perspective économique que dans la perspective sociale, une meilleure solution serait plutôt de reconvertir le sud de la forêt boréale à la prairie ou à l'agriculture.