Developing energy conservation and carbon reduction indicators for the hotel industry in Taiwan

This study develops and weights energy conservation and carbon reduction (ECCR) indicators for the hotel industry in Taiwan to create an instrument to help address climate change. Eighteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with senior hotel managers, environmental specialists, and government officials to identify the preliminary ECCR framework. An expert panel then was invited to review the structure of ECCR criteria and the compiled criteria in a structure for item modification. An analytic network process questionnaire survey was employed to determine the relative weights of the criteria. The data analysis reveals seven categories in the ECCR framework: communication and participation, top management commitment, energy, water, waste, building, and purchasing. A total of 32 indicators were identified and prioritized in terms of their relative importance to ECCR contributions. The results of this study suggest that the success of ECCR implementation depends primarily on management support and staff engagement. Hotel operators can improve their environmental management by initiating ECCR practices based on the proposed ECCR indicators.     

Agriculture and global climate stabilization: a public good analysis

The stabilization of global climate presents one of the most complex problems in public good provision the world has faced. Continuation of “business as usual” policies, leading to warming of more than 2 degrees over the next year, will produce significant damage to agricultural systems and catastrophic damage to the natural ecosystems that ultimately support agriculture. The best solution to the public goods problem is a “contract and converge” agreement in which the ultimate outcome is a common global entitlement to CO₂ emissions per person.     

Integrating local ecological services into intergovernmental fiscal transfers: The case of the ecological ICMS in Brazil

Local conservation efforts are often related to benefits at higher governmental levels. On the one hand, these efforts are strongly connected to local land-use decisions. On the other hand, activities such as sustainable water management or biodiversity conservation are associated with regional, national or even global public goods. Therefore, spatial externalities or spillovers exist, which—if not adequately compensated for—lead to an underprovision of the public goods and services concerned. This article investigates intergovernmental fiscal transfers as an innovative instrument for compensating local jurisdictions for the ecological goods and services they provide across local boundaries. From a public finance perspective, fiscal transfers are a suitable instrument for internalising spatial externalities. However, most federal states use this instrument predominantly for social and economic public sector functions rather than for ecological ones. This article investigates the case of the ecological “ICMS” that was first introduced by a few states in Brazil during the 1990s. Part of the revenue from this value-added tax is redistributed to the local level on the basis of ecological indicators. In this way, the state level uses fiscal transfers to compensate municipalities for the existence of protected areas and other ecological services provided within their territories. The Brazilian experience illustrates that such fiscal transfers can represent both a compensation for land-use restrictions and an incentive to value and engage in more conservation activities at the local level.     

Ecological integrity as an economic variable: An application to forested landscapes in the southern United States

Ecological integrity is important to fully describe the development of an economy. We calculated an aggregate index that quantifies the closeness of a forested region to a natural state. This naturalness index was based on the diversity of native tree species and sizes for ecological subregions in a seral condition. The index used the spatial–temporal array of sample plots from the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) database of the USDA Forest Service. In the 70 survey units of the southern US between 1961 and 2005 the naturalness of forests generally improved with per capita personal income and population. The increase with income was consistent with the hypothesis of an environmental Kuznets curve for forested landscapes.     

美国生态修复政策及其对我国林业重点工程的借鉴

美国自20世纪30年代以来,为遏制由于大规模土地开发导致的土壤表层侵蚀等生态退化,实施了一系列政策保护生态,防止水土流失,其中影响较大的包括土地休耕保护计划(CRP)、环境质量激励计划(EQIP)和保护支持计划(CSP)。通过分析三个计划的具体运作和实施成效,并结合我国林业重点工程的实施现状,提出一些政策建议。     

环境污染治理与经济增长:模型与中国的经验研究

通过建立一个人力资本内生增长模型,将环境及环境污染治理引入内生增长框架下进行分析,其中重点探讨了在达到均衡增长路径过程中经济增长、环境污染与环境污染治理的关系,同时考察了维持可持续发展需要具备的条件。在此基础上,运用中国的数据对理论模型的一些结果进行了计量检验。结果表明,清洁要素以及技术的使用是可持续发展的关键,中国对环境污染一直以来缺乏足够的重视,目前仍然需要加大环境污染治理力度,提高环境污染治理的效率,地方政府的行为在其中会起到重要作用。     

我国上市公司债务融资治理效应研究

债务融资,同股权融资一样,也是企业的一种重要融资方式;同时,作为一种重要的治理结构,债务融资在减少股东与经营者之间的代理成本等方面发挥着积极的作用.我国上市公司的债务融资治理现状不容乐观;存在5个方面的问题,在分析这些问题的基础上提出了改善我国上市公司债务融资治理效应的政策建议.     

基于可交易排污许可证的中小企业环境规制工具分析

本文构建一个基于可交易排污许可证的环境规制政策工具分析模型,探究许可证价格的决定机制,分析许可证市场的短期均衡和长期均衡,探讨可交易排污许可对中小企业利润和产量的影响,并引入创新机制,考察加入补贴的环境规制工具对中小企业的影响。研究表明,初始免费可交易排污许可证+补贴(特别是差额补贴)的工具组合能够以较低的规制成本激发中小企业创新,而且在长期内,创新收益能够弥补规制成本。     

全球化背景下中国人才流失的环境因素——基于全球58国的比较分析

在经济全球化背景下,发展中国家人才流失问题突出。中国同样面临着这个问题的严峻考验。本文从考察人才流失的环境角度进行分析,建立了人才环境三级指标体系并计算出生活环境指数、工作环境指数和宏观环境指数。通过建立回归方程,我们发现人才流失和环境指数有很强的相关关系,说明改善人才环境能很好解决当前人才流失问题。文章最后根据我国实际情况,给出了相关的政策建议。     

省域环境技术效率空间视角分析

通过构建环境污染综合指数,本文首先采用SBM非期望产出模型测度了我国29个省（市）2000—2009年环境技术效率。在此基础上运用探索性空间数据分析,结果发现省域间环境技术效率存在显著的空间依赖性,其自相关性已不容忽视。通过进一步利用空间面板数据模型对其影响因素进行实证分析后的研究结果表明：一个地区的环境技术效率与其所处位置及周边环境密切相关,并且受到邻近省份结构性差异误差冲击,这体现为各省份在经济发展水平、FDI、对外开放度和治理投资额等空间影响因素的差异。经济发展水平、外商直接投资和对外开放度均显著提升了各省份环境技术效率,而产业结构、环境治理投资额与环境技术效率负相关,环境治理投资效果并不显著。