design and analysis of simulated consumer choice or allocation experiments an approach based on aggregate data the authors integrate concepts in conjoint analysis and discrete choice theory in econometrics to develop a new approach to the design and analysis of controlled consumer choice or resource allocat

qualitative assessment of eco labels on fresh produce in flanders belgium highlights a potential intention performance gap for the supply chain abstract when it comes to making sustainable food purchasing choices consumers trust on information provided to them by eco labels this article studies the labels for fresh produce available to consumers in flanders belgium concluding that the existing labelling landscape fails at enabling consumers to make adequate decisions for purchasing environmentally sound food a consumer survey supports the need for additional information on the sustainability of fruits and vegetables a potential intention performance gap is found for producers and in the wider sense for the entire supply chain since current labels found on fresh produce are input or practice based labels farmers adhering to those labels can be considered as having the intention to produce sustainably however this intention alone cannot guarantee good environmental performance in order to close the potential intention performance gap for the supply chain and provide more adequate information to consumers we conclude that performance based labels covering the entire food chain of fresh produce using the life cycle assessment approach lca and including situational parameters such as time of consumption origin and production and distribution mode are indispensable

green market expansion by reducing information asymmetries evidence for labeled organic food products abstract we investigate how the provision of objective information about the environmental and health impact of organic labels by policy makers can influence the willingness to pay of consumers for labeled organic apples in flanders belgium using a stated choice experiment we initially find that flemish consumers are willing to pay a positive price premium of some 33 eurocent per kilogram for labeled organic apples after the provision of information on the actual environmental and health effects of organic apple production this price premium becomes even more pronounced and increases to 57 eurocent per kilogram using a conditional logit model with covariates and a mixed logit model we find evidence of preference heterogeneity also the effect of information provision is more pronounced for certain groups of consumers such as non vegetarians infrequent buyers of organic products and members of a nature protection organization as such this paper illustrates that there is a role for policy makers and csr producers in providing more accurate and reliable information about socially responsible production processes moreover it is important to take the observed preference heterogeneity into account and tailor policies to specific consumer groups

the resurgence of inflation in brazil 1974 1986 abstract this paper examines various factors which contributed to the resurgence of inflation in brazil in the 1970s and 1980s and the reasons for the failure of ortodox austerity programs to control it the evidence seems to black the school of thought which considers the best explanation for the recent inflationary experience to lie with the spread of formal and informal indexing leading to an inertial type of inflation the latter has led some economists to recommend heterodox methods of inflation control an epilogue briefly describes brazil s recent attempt to apply such methods

valuing the attributes of renewable energy investments increasing the proportion of power derived from renewable energy sources is becoming an increasingly important part of many countries s strategies to achieve reductions in greenhouse gas emissions however renewable energy investments can often have external costs and benefits which need to be taken into account if socially optimal investments are to be made this paper attempts to estimate the magnitude of these external costs and benefits for the case of renewable technologies in scotland a country which has set particularly ambitious targets for expanding renewable energy the external effects we consider are those on landscape quality wildlife and air quality we also consider the welfare implications of different investment strategies for employment and electricity prices the methodology used to do this is the choice experiment technique renewable technologies considered include hydro on shore and off shore wind power and biomass welfare changes for different combinations of impacts associated with different investment strategies are estimated we also test for differences in preferences towards these impacts between urban and rural communities and between high and low income households

design of a climate tax on food consumption examples of tomatoes and beef in sweden abstract this study examined appropriate design of efficient climate taxes on consumption of food by constructing a simple theoretical model and exemplifying the results using the examples of tomatoes and beef in sweden the theoretical results showed that for the tax to be efficient i existing taxes on greenhouse gases ghgs should be considered when calculating the climate impact in order to avoid double taxation and ii taxes should be differentiated between ghg here carbon dioxide co2 methane ch4 and nitrous oxide n2o because of their differing climate impacts the calculations of climate taxes on tomatoes and beef in sweden indicated considerable differences in the tax level depending on whether conditions i and ii were considered or not the commonly applied approach in the literature on climate taxes on food i e taxing carbon dioxide equivalents co2e using global warming potential over 100 years gwp100 and neglecting existing taxes on ghg emissions results in a tax that is 1 4 2 8 times higher than the efficient tax for tomatoes and a tax that is between 30 lower and 20 higher than the efficient tax for beef despite the relatively low variations in the climate tax on beef estimated reduction in emissions from beef ranged between 23 and 35 depending on choice of tax the price increases on food due to a climate tax and associated effects on emissions can thus show large variation depending on the tax calculation method

the non monetary nature of gifts this paper addresses the prevalence of non monetary gifts over more highly valued and e cient monetary transfers in social relationships we demonstrate that under a wide variety of circumstances ine cient non monetary gifts will be o ered by a donor in lieu of cash in order to signal the donor s quality of information about the recipient s preferences this result emerges because gift giving is ine cient relative to cash and not because of any arbitrary assumptions regarding communication in particular the donor has available the strategy of o ering cash and saying what he would have purchased nonetheless there is still an important equilibrium role for buying gifts 2001 elsevier science b v all rights reserved jel classixcation a13 d10 d64 d82 z1

how to identify trust and reciprocity this paper uses a three games or triadic design to identify trusting and reciprocating behavior a large literature on single game trust and reciprocity experiments is based on the implicit assumption that subjects do not have altruistic or inequality averse other regarding preferences such experimental designs test compound hypotheses that include the hypothesis that other regarding preferences do not affect behavior in contrast experiments with the triadic design do discriminate between transfers resulting from trust or reciprocity and transfers resulting from other regarding preferences that are not conditional on the behavior of others decomposing trust from altruism and reciprocity from altruism or inequality aversion is critical to obtaining empirical information that can guide the process of constructing models that can increase the empirical validity of game theory

finnish consumer perceptions of carbon footprints and carbon labelling of food products abstract the aim of this study was to explore how finnish consumers perceive the communication of carbon footprints for food products the study comprised five semi structured focus groups and an online survey of 1010 respondents the study showed that the term product carbon footprint is familiar to many but there is substantial misunderstanding of its meaning only 7 of the respondents linked product carbon footprint spontaneously to greenhouse gas emissions associated with the product and an additional 5 of the respondents linked it to climate change there are positive attitudes towards carbon labels 90 stated that a carbon footprint would have at least a little impact on their buying decision but the information became meaningful only when many other purchasing criteria such as price and taste were satisfied furthermore 86 preferred carbon labels that allow comparisons of carbon footprints to be made among food products but there is divergence on perceived needs for carbon label content

inflation and dollar accounts in peru s banking system 1978 1984 abstract since 1978 peru has permitted dollar denominated deposits in its banking system over this period peru s inflation rate increased and the exchange rate was flexibly adjusted peru therefore had two units of account in its monetary system a transaction unit and a purchasing power unit any economy that has a purchasing power unit particularly within the banking system may have a stronger inflation feedback mechanism that is a given inflationary shock may produce more inflationary pressure the peruvian experience appears to support this view

gift giving and the evolution of cooperation gift giving is a practice common to many societies in an evolutionary model the social custom of giving gifts at the beginning of a relationship can lead to trust and cooperation the evolutionary approach makes predictions about the character of the goods that can be used as gifts for example gift goods may have little use value even at low levels of consumption although the gifts themselves are useless the institution is not

predicting consumer demand responses to carbon labels abstract providing carbon footprint labels for all food products is a daunting and potentially infeasible project knowing how consumers substitute away from high carbon goods and what they choose as substitutes is essential for understanding which goods are likely to result in meaningful reductions in carbon emissions this paper proposes a model to systematically estimate how consumers will respond to information from a carbon footprint label our model uses consumers value of their individual carbon footprint with own and cross price elasticities of demand data on carbon emissions from life cycle analysis to simulate shifts in consumer demand for 42 food products and a non food composite and subsequent changes in carbon emissions from different labeling schemes our simulation results have several findings including 1 carbon labels can reduce emissions but labeling only some items could lead to perverse impacts where consumers substitute away from labeled goods to unlabeled goods with a higher carbon footprint 2 carbon labels can inform consumers such that their previous beliefs about carbon footprints matter and 3 carbon labels on alcohol and meat would achieve the largest decreases in carbon emissions among the 42 food products studied

price information and bidding behavior in repeated second price auctions examining panel data on bidding behavior in over forty second price auction markets with repeated trials we observe that i posted prices influence the behavior of the median naive bidder ii posted prices do not affect the behavior of the median experienced bidder or the bidder for familiar goods and iii anticipated strategic behavior wanes after two trials the results suggest that while affiliation might exist in auctions for new goods the repeated trial design with nonprice information removes the correlation of values and provides the experience that bidders need to understand the market mechanism

the energy efficiency of local food systems a comparison between different modes of distribution abstract the possible contribution of local sales chains to the reduction of energy consumption has been hotly debated in recent years some authors establish a link between the reduction of distances traveled by food and lower energy consumption due to transportation while others hold that local supply chains have a poor energy performance this article engages this debate by comparing the rates of energy consumption attributable to different modes of distribution of fruits and vegetables in a region of france by studying actors actual practices we show that the establishment of local food systems leads to organizational efforts at the local level or in the form of geographically centralized networks which allow energy expenditures linked to distribution to be minimized the studied chains performances are variable from 13 5 to 44 8 goe gram of oil equivalent per euro of product bringing them close to long chains in the best examples comparison with other research underscores the diversity of methods which are put in place they also show that energy performance remains very dependent on where the study was conducted ultimately this study invites us to better analyze the ways in which actors collaborate to optimize energy expenditures relative to the distribution of food products in local sales chains

altruism reciprocity and health a social experiment in restaurant choice abstract we used an experimental game to determine whether people imitate restaurant choice reciprocate food gifts and thus spread health choices we randomly paired 138 subjects and recorded their decision to give or keep restaurant vouchers and their choice of restaurant the majority 83 3 chose an unhealthy restaurant if their randomly assigned partner chose an unhealthy restaurant similarly 77 8 chose a healthy restaurant if their partner did p 0 005 the altruistic were more likely to choose a healthy restaurant p 0 017 in sum restaurant choice is influenced by reciprocity a cycle of projection gifting and reciprocation may explain the social dynamics of food choice we propose policies that capitalize on people s tendency towards altruism and imitation

can ecolabels survive in the long run the role of initial conditions abstract this paper analyzes the interaction between three environmental strategies within a population of firms brown green and certified green strategies we first present a restricted version of an evolutionary game where only brown and green strategies are possible next the model is extended to allow green firms to certify their environmental strategies by joining an ecolabel our analysis shows that when it survives the ecolabel tends to fully replace other uncertified environmental initiatives and to increase the proportion of firms implementing voluntary abatement nevertheless the long run survival of the ecolabel is not a necessary outcome of the model although it can be facilitated via policies that reduce abatement or certification costs increase consumer s environmental concerns or improve the credibility of the certifier whereas it may be reduced by green wash news about the sector an ecolabel s survival may also depend on how and when it is launched in those common situations where the model has two stable equilibria initial conditions play a key role in determining the ecolabel s survival specifically important determinants are the degree of adoption of voluntary abatement when the ecolabel is launched and the amount and composition of firms that participate in the creation of the ecolabel

consumer demand for fair trade evidence from a multistore field experiment abstract we provide new evidence on consumer demand for ethical products from experiments conducted in a u s grocery store chain we find that sales of the two most popular coffees rose by almost 10 when they carried a fair trade label as compared to a generic placebo label demand for the higher priced coffee remained steady when its price was raised by 8 but demand for the lower priced coffee was elastic a 9 price increase led to a 30 decline in sales while consumers attach value to ethical sourcing there is significant heterogeneity in willingness to pay for it

ten years of five a day policy in the uk nutritional outcomes and environmental effects abstract this paper estimates the impact of policy measures aimed at increasing fruit and vegetable f v consumption in the uk over more than a decade evaluating changes in purchased quantities and estimating the corresponding greenhouse gas emissions ghges we use a counterfactual scenario analysis to isolate the effects of the policy from the influences of evolving prices incomes and socio demographic factors our estimates suggest that the positive effects of the promotion campaigns on f v purchases about half a portion per adult equivalent per day still persist 10 years after the start of the policy implementation and we find no evidence of a wearout effect we also provide suggestive evidence that the dietary adjustment which accompanies the increase in f v intakes translates into a relevant reduction in ghges by an average amount of 3 3kg of co2e per adult equivalent per month

gifts as economic signals and social symbols gift giving has often puzzled economists especially because efficient gifts like cash or giving exactly what a person asks for seem crass or inappropriate it is shown in a formal game theoretic model that gifts serve as signals of a person s intentions about future investment in a relationship and inefficient gifts can be better signals other explanations for the inefficiency of gift giving are advanced and some stylized facts about gift giving practices are described many of which are consistent with the signaling view of gifts

the effects of information on willingness to pay values of endangered species the contingent valuation method cvm has been employed in several research studies to measure the economic value of environmental commodities brookshire kramer and mercer loehman park and boldt lohr battard and bath the use of cvm allows for flexibility and for application to a wide range of environmental amenities not only those that can be measured in conjunction with some marketable goods however because of its hypothetical character the validity of cvm is often disputed a structural element that might have an especially strong influence on cvm valuation is the contingent market information structure bergstorm stoll and randall information content and presentation in contingent markets are controlled by the researcher the design of an information structure can influence a participant s cognitive valuation process and in turn final revealed valuations information is thus conceptualized as an input into the cognitive decision process of which stated valuations are the final result the role of information in a contingent valuation methodology is extremely important because it conveys the knowledge of an environmental issue with which the respondent will assimilate and base value judgment on this research study proposes that information disclosure can influence an individuals reported willingness to pay wtp values for the preservation of an endangered species the means by which information is disclosed by the researcher is critical in the valuation process new information disclosed about an ecological good might affect the wtp behavi r of the individuals kula

effect of eating seasonal on the carbon footprint of swedish vegetable consumption abstract the advice on climate smart food consumption given by authorities and ngos includes the recommendation to eat seasonal foods however no clear definition of seasonality is given in the literature this study investigated how the carbon footprint of yearly per capita consumption of tomatoes and carrots in sweden was affected by seasonal consumption according to interpretations of seasonality found in communications from swedish ngos and authorities the results showed that the carbon footprint of carrot and tomato consumption was strongly affected by consuming according to either a strict definition of seasonality which excluded both production in heated greenhouses and long distance transport or a definition which only allowed swedish produce the reduction potential was approximately 60 but the consumption pattern was also highly restrictive with e g tomatoes only being consumed during three months according to the strictest definition the reduction from eating only swedish products was not due primarily to characteristics commonly associated with seasonal production shorter transport or low energy demand in cultivation but to the use of renewable fuel instead of fossil energy the methodology chosen in this study resulted in carrots having a more distinct season than tomatoes since the energy use for heating greenhouses which are needed all year round in cold climates was evenly allocated across all tomatoes harvested during one year while the carbon footprint of carrots was assumed to increase with time due to increased energy demand for storage and storage losses hence modern production techniques challenge the traditional concepts of seasonality on an absolute scale including the whole food sector the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from eating seasonal is limited as emissions from vegetable production make up a minor proportion of the total emissions from food consumption

ecolabeling consumers preferences and taxation abstract ecolabeling is a means of reducing the information gap between consumers and producers we study the implication of ecolabeling a supposedly green good for a consumer s allocation of income between a dirty and the supposedly green good in the model the role of the ecolabel is to help product differentiation to give reliable information and to reduce informational asymmetries we show that a conscious consumer someone with a stronger green attitude or quality concerns demands more ecolabeled goods price oriented consumers demand fewer ecolabeled goods a subsidy resp tax on the price of the ecolabeled resp dirty good leads to a larger consumption of the ecolabeled resp dirty good whereas it may increase or decrease the demand for the dirty resp ecolabeled good depending on whether the consumer views both goods as gross substitutes or complements we then use a cross individual dataset of 22 568 consumers and show that the demand for ecolabeled goods increases strongly with the consciousness of the consumer but decreases for price oriented consumers ecolabel oriented consumers feel more informed more conscious consumers prefer a subsidy on green goods and a tax on dirty goods price oriented consumers do not care about the green subsidy but would vote against a tax on the dirty goods

consumers motivational associations favoring free range meat or less meat abstract the present paper analyzed the motivational orientations of consumers who choose to eat 1 small portions of meat or 2 ethically distinctive meat such as free range meat in relation to the motivational orientations of their opposites going beyond the conventional approach to consumer behavior our work builds on recent insights in motivational psychology about the ways in which people may approach matches or avoid mismatches to the desired end state of getting enough nourishment by eating the right food consumers who tend to approach matches are often focused on choosing the best alternatives from their choice set chronic promotion focus consumers who tend to avoid mismatches are often focused on rejecting unacceptable alternatives from their choice set chronic prevention focus distinguishing these two motivational orientations provides a scientific basis for the aim to foster more sustainable food consumption and production patterns our approach involves a systematic analysis of consumers goal orientations regarding meat choices we examined how a sample of dutch consumers n 939 described their chronic motivational orientations regarding food their own meat choices and about two weeks later their promotion and prevention oriented associations favoring either small portions of meat and free range meat or their opposites largely in line with our hypotheses we found that consumers with a chronic prevention orientation avoided the mismatch of large portions also those of them who paid the premium price of free range meat considered eating meat produced by intensive farming a mismatch conversely if consumers with a chronic promotion orientation paid the premium price of free range meat they considered this the best alternative from their choice set accordingly choosing a small portion of meat was often approached with a prevention orientation and choosing free range meat with either a prevention or a promotion orientation these differences in motivational orientation underline that the pursuit of sustainability requires careful consideration of not just undesirable but also of desirable alternatives

sustainability labels on coffee consumer preferences willingness to pay and visual attention to attributes abstract sustainability labels are important tools that help consumers assess the sustainability aspects of food while past studies have focused on visual attention to nutrition information no study has investigated the visual attention paid by consumers to the sustainability information on food our study contributes to the need to better understand consumers attention to sustainability information when making food choices the objective was to explore the importance that consumers attach to sustainability attributes and investigate how this relates to the visual attention paid to these attributes during the choice decision and to willingness to pay wtp visual attention during the decision making process was measured in terms of fixation time and fixation count which were then analyzed in relation to the stated attribute importance our results suggest that consumer segments with differences in stated attribute importance visually attend differently to these attributes higher valued attributes also exhibited higher visual attention our results suggest that consumers who spend more time attending to and fixate more on sustainability attributes value them more

choice modelling approaches a superior alternative for environmental valuation in this paper we examine some popular choice modelling approaches to environmental valuation which can be considered as alternatives to more familiar valuation techniques based on stated preferences such as the contingent valuation method a number of choice modelling methods are consistent with consumer theory and its focus on an attribute based theory of value permits a superior representation of many environmental management contexts however choice modelling surveys can place a severe cognitive burden upon respondents and induce satisficing rather than maximising behavioural patterns in this framework we seek to identify the best available choice modelling alternative and investigate its potential to solve some of the major biases associated with standard contingent valuation we then discuss its use in the light of policy appraisal needs within the eu an application to the demand for rock climbing in scotland is provided as an illustration

habit spillovers or induced awareness willingness to pay for eco labels of rice in china abstract the willingness to pay wtp for eco labeled rice is investigated for chinese consumers using choice experiments with information interventions the mixed logit model shows preference heterogeneities and the latent class model unveils two sources pro environmental behaviors with spillover effects which are defined as catalyst behaviors and the awareness about imperatives of ecological farming which is defined as induced awareness classification results identify that using bp bags and sorting waste are catalyst behaviors as the multivariate ordered probit model implies consumers with higher educational attainment and family income levels are more likely to adopt these behaviors instead of creating the preference for eco labels the induced awareness is only found to strengthen preferences that already exist the results of this study provide policy implications for the design of proper strategies to develop the eco labeled food market especially in developing economies

the transmission of disturbances under alternative exchange rate regimes with optimal indexing the paper develops a general stochastic macroeconomic model that can be used to study the international transmission of disturbances under four alternative exchange rate systems uniform flexible exchange rates uniform fixed exchange rates and two versions of two tier exchange rates the analysis makes two general points first one cannot assume stability of structure when assessing the consequences of alternative exchange rate regimes for example the slope of the aggregate supply curve and the rationally formed expectations in the asset markets can respond dramatically to the government s choice of exchange rate regime second exchange rate regimes that provide full insulation from foreign disturbances may nevertheless be inferior to other regimes in terms of their ability to maximize social welfare

valuing wetland attributes an application of choice experiments abstract the interest for wetlands is increasing not only because of the possibility of a cost efficient uptake of nutrients but also because wetlands can be designed to provide other services what values that are supplied depend largely on the design there are numerous different design options and different actors may promote different alternatives whether we want to design a wetland for nutrient retention alone or one that also serves other interests policy makers need information about the value of different options conducting a choice experiment we are able to identify attributes that increase and decrease citizens perceived value of wetlands using a random parameter model we find that biodiversity and walking facilities are the two greatest contributors to welfare while a fenced waterline and introduction of crayfish decrease welfare

food labeling and eco friendly consumption experimental evidence from a belgian supermarket using an incentive compatible framed field experiment we investigate whether consumers food consumption is more eco friendly when the information about a product s environmental impact is more easily accessible through an online survey we identify a food label that is perceived to be the most easily accessible for assessing a product s eco friendliness among six alternatives these alternatives vary on multiple dimensions including whether a standardized score of the overall environmental impact is added this new food label is subsequently tested in an experimental food market embedded in a belgian supermarket we find that the presence of the new label that was preselected in the online survey leads to more eco friendly food consumption relative to either the label currently used in the supermarket or the label that contains the raw information of the environmental impact in our experimental food market the use of an easy to interpret but comprehensive environmental information label increases the overall eco friendliness of our subjects food consumption by about 5 3 relative to the default label used in current markets

sustainability labels on food products consumer motivation understanding and use this study investigates the relationship between consumer motivation understanding and use of sustainability labels on food products both environmental and ethical labels which are increasingly appearing on food products data was collected by means of an online survey implemented in the uk france germany spain sweden and poland with a total sample size of 4408 respondents respondents expressed medium high to high levels of concern with sustainability issues at the general level but lower levels of concern in the context of concrete food product choices understanding of the concept of sustainability was limited but understanding of four selected labels fair trade rainforest alliance carbon footprint and animal welfare was better as some of them seem to be self explanatory the results indicated a low level of use no matter whether use was measured as self reported use of different types of information available on food labels or as use inferred from the results of a choice based conjoint analysis hierarchical regression indicated that use is related to both motivation and understanding and that both motivation understanding and use are affected by demographic characteristics human values as measured by the schwartz value domains and country differences the results imply that sustainability labels currently do not play a major role in consumers food choices and future use of these labels will depend on the extent to which consumers general concern about sustainability can be turned into actual behaviour

response bias in a conjoint analysis of power outages abstract a methodology is proposed for estimating status quo effects resistance to change and loss aversion willingness to pay is less than willingness to accept from consumer survey data conjoint data on israeli households attitudes to electricity outages reveal that both of these effects are pronounced and that they depend on the interviewees characteristics ordered conditional logit estimation indicates that while the estimates are rank sensitive the suggested methodology continues to be applicable finally the conjoint estimates are compared with those obtained by applying the method of contingent valuation

sustainable food consumption among young adults in belgium theory of planned behaviour and the role of confidence and values abstract this study investigates determinants of sustainable food consumer behaviour in belgium to gain a better insight in sustainable consumption a study was conducted in which attitudes and behaviour as well as the role of individual characteristics like confidence and values related to sustainable products are analyzed the focus of the analysis is on exploring the influence of determinants as hypothesised by the theory of planned behaviour tpb attitudes perceived behavioural control social norms on sustainable consumption intention in general and specifically depending on consumer s perceived confidence and personal values the empirical research builds on a survey with a sample of 456 young adults using a questionnaire and showing an advertisement for hypothetical sustainable dairy products stepwise multiple regression models showed that 50 of the variance in intention to consume sustainable dairy was explained by the combination of personal attitudes perceived social influences perceived consumer effectiveness and perceived availability in addition different levels of confidence and value orientation yield different strengths of the determinants the findings yield public policy and marketing recommendations for stimulating sustainable food consumption among young adults

the impact of climate information on milk demand evidence from a field experiment it has been suggested that carbon labelling of food on voluntary or non voluntary basis could reduce emissions of greenhouse gases however there is limited empirical evidence on the influence of such labels on consumer purchases the purpose of this study was to investigate whether voluntary carbon labelling affects the demand for milk a randomized field experiment was conducted in 17 retail stores in sweden where a sign provided consumers with qualitative information about the carbon impact of climate certified milk the results suggest that the sign increased the demand for the climate certified milk by approximately 6 8 and the result is robust to alternative model specifications the effect is entirely driven by large stores such as supermarkets we find no statistically significant impact on total milk sales and the dataset is too small to verify the consequences for other milk brands the effect on the demand for the labelled milk is short lived

carbon labelling of grocery products public perceptions and potential emissions reductions abstract public perceptions of a uk carbon labelling trial were assessed via three focus groups the public found it very difficult to make sense of labelled emissions values without additional information there was also little evidence of a willingness to use labels for product selection there is a strong case for using carbon reduction labels to indicate a programme of on going emissions reductions rather than expecting consumers to incentivise emissions reductions by actively choosing the lower carbon variant of two or more products the normalisation issues and emissions reduction potential of carbon labelling are discussed

consumption patterns and their effects on land required for food abstract vast amounts of land are required for the production of food but the area suitable for growing crops is limited in this paper attention is paid to the relationship between food consumption patterns and agricultural land requirements land requirements per food item that were determined in a previous study are combined with data on the per capita food consumption of various food packages varying from subsistence to affluent leading to information on land requirements for food large differences could be shown in per capita food consumption and related land requirements while food consumption expenditure and the physical consumption of specific foods change rapidly over time a difference of a factor of two was found between the requirements for existing european food patterns while the land requirement for a hypothetical diet based on wheat was six times less than that for an existing affluent diet with meat it is argued that in the near future changes in consumption patterns rather than population growth will form the most important variable for total land requirements for food trends towards the consumption of foods associated with affluent lifestyles will bring with them a need for more land lifestyle changes changes in consumer behavior on a household level can be considered as powerful options to reduce the use of natural resources such as agricultural land

designing choice sets for stated preference methods the effects of complexity on choice consistency abstract we vary the complexity of choice sets used in stated preference methods to evaluate the impact on choice consistency we define five measures of complexity that capture either the amount of information or the correlational structure of information in a choice set using these measures as randomly assigned treatments in a large experiment we analyze the consistency of respondents choices using a heteroskedastic multinomial logit model we find that i all of our measures of choice set complexity affect choice consistency ii changes in the correlational structure of information have the largest impact on choice consistency and iii choice complexity significantly distorts welfare estimates our results confirm economists initial worry that moving from contingent valuation to conjoint methods will increase complexity induced choice inconsistency however our analysis also shows that these negative impacts may be mitigated if precautions are taken at the design and estimation stages of stated preference methods

inflation indexing and economic development abstract recent analyses have established that there are significant costs as well as benefits to issuing indexed bonds an assessment of the desirability of indexing hasproven to be clusive perhaps because of the complexity involved in formulating the presumably government preferences by which indexing is to be evaluated and in ascertaining the optimal government policy with which to accompany indexing this paper develops a general framework for examining indexed bonds the envelope theorem is exploited to derive a convenient representation of the effects of indexing the crucial elements in evaluating indexed bonds are the relative desirabilities of transferring purchasing power to the government and reducing consumer liquidity the greater is the relative importance placed on the former the more likely are the effects of indexed bonds to be favorably evaluated

using a choice experiment to account for preference heterogeneity in wetland attributes the case of cheimaditida wetland in greece abstract this paper aims to assist policy makers in formulating efficient and sustainable wetland management policies in accordance with the ramsar convention and the european union water framework directive 2000 60 ec by providing results of a valuation study on the cheimaditida wetland in greece a choice experiment is employed to estimate the values of changes in several ecological social and economic functions that cheimaditida wetland provides to the greek public in addition to the conditional logit model a random parameter logit model a random parameter logit model with interactions and a latent class model are estimated to account for heterogeneity in the preferences of the public for the various functions of the wetland the results reveal that there is considerable preference heterogeneity across the public and on average they derive positive and significant values from sustainable management of this wetland the estimated economic benefits of sustainable wetland management are weighed against the costs of alternative wetland management scenarios results of this cost benefit analysis can aid in the design of socially optimal policies for sustainable management of the cheimaditida wetland with possible implications for other similar wetlands in greece and the rest of europe

determinants of participation versus consumption in the nordic swan eco labeled market abstract this paper analyzes the determinants of demand for nordic swan eco labeled paper products and whether the factors determining the discrete decision to buy a swan labeled product are different from those that determine the quantity purchased using observed consumer purchase data from denmark we find that prices and socio demographic characteristics have a strong impact on the decision to purchase a swan labeled good the quantity consumed of swan labeled goods on the other hand is strongly affected by the availability of swan goods discounts and household size

indexing exchange rate policy and inflationary feedback effects in latin america abstract this paper examines inflationary adjustment processes in argentina brazil chile ecuador peru and uruguay with time varying estimation techniques to determine the relationship between inflationary inertia or feedback effects from past to current inflation and the degree of indexation of wages and exchange rates to past inflation rates the results show that reductions in the degree of exchange rate linkage to past inflation have not been particularly helpful in larger or relatively more diversified economies such as argentina brazil or chile while reductions in wage linkages to past inflation rates have had strong but short lived effects

effects of different descriptions of the ecological good on willingness to pay values abstract the contingent valuation cv method is a survey based method that is used to put a price on ecological goods due to its hypothetical character the validity of the cv method forms part of an ongoing debate this article deals with one aspect of this validity viz the proper description of the ecological good of interest the question is whether and if so to what extent different descriptions meant as representations of the same good influence respondents willingness to pay wtp do different descriptions of the ecological good result in the same representation of that good or will these descriptions result in different images of the good and consequently in different values if the latter occurs a validity problem arises a field experiment was conducted to study the effects of three descriptions of the good a clean environment around the year 2015 the results of this experiment show that rather large differences in the description of this good have a significant effect on wtp values as well as on the number of protest bidders smaller differences in the description however do not show such an effect it seems as if certain information thresholds have to be overcome in order to affect wtp values

an assessment of greenhouse gas emissions and material flows caused by the finnish economy using the envimat model abstract an environmentally extended input output ee io analysis environmental impacts of material flows caused by the finnish economy was carried out in order to improve data on production and consumption in finland the study resulted in the envimat model which can be used to analyze the relationship between material flows environmental impacts and the economy the model is based on monetary and physical input output tables and an environmental life cycle impact assessment this article summarizes the main methodological aspects and findings regarding the material flows and climate impacts caused by the finnish economy in 2002 and 2005 the finnish model has relatively detailed input data with 150 industries and 918 products and the data on imports was assessed according to a mixed approach with the help of life cycle inventory data the results of the model showed that the finnish economy uses imported material resources as much as domestic resources life cycle greenhouse gas ghg emissions caused by imports were equivalent to 70 80 of domestic emissions the ghg emissions embodied in imports emissions abroad and exports emissions within finland were of the same magnitude the analysis showed that the service sector accounted for 44 of ghg emissions caused by the domestic final use of products analysis of the results also showed that the indicator of total material requirement tmr should not be used for environmental impact comparisons of products and services in the future the aim is to use the envimat model for assessing temporal changes in the economy for monitoring sustainable development for planning climate change mitigation and for identifying important factors in the economy and assessing their impacts

coherent arbitrariness stable demand curves without stable preferences economic theories of valuation generally assume that prices of commodities and assets are derived from underlying fundamental values for example in finance theory asset prices are believed to reflect the market estimate of the discounted present value of the asset s payoff stream in labor theory the supply of labor is established by the tradeoff between the desire for consumption and the displeasure of work finally and most importantly for this chapter consumer microeconomics assumes that the demand curves for consumer products chocolates cds movies vacations drugs and so forth can be ultimately traced to the valuation of pleasures that consumers anticipate receiving from these products because it is difficult as a rule to measure fundamental values directly empirical tests of economic theory typically examine whether the effects of changes in circumstances on valuations are consistent with theoretical prediction for example whether labor supply responds appropriately to a change in the wage rate whether compensated demand curves for commodities are downward sloping or whether stock prices respond in the predicted way to share repurchases however such comparative static relationships are a necessary but not sufficient condition for fundamental valuation e g summers 1986 becker 1962 was perhaps the first to make this point explicitly when he observed that consumers choosing commodity bundles randomly from their budget set would nevertheless produce downward sloping demand curves

design and development of a measuring method for environmental sustainability in food production systems abstract these days sustainability is a key issue for many private companies that address their sustainable corporate performance scp the perspective is essential for their license to operate and forms the basis for business principles and practices the lack of internationally accepted reporting standards on what when and where to report makes it difficult to assess sustainability however moreover measuring tools providing information on scp are only the first step towards sustainability to prevent negative effects of operations being transferred from one company to another the second step is the development of a system based approach for all companies that contribute to an end product this paper presents the findings of a study about the use of environmental indicators for food production and proposes a measuring method for environmental sustainability in food production systems the study shows that environmental scp often focuses on events at a local level the enormous number of indicators found in the literature generates too much data that often provide no additional knowledge on the environmental sustainability of a system moreover although environmental research has addressed many aspects of sustainability it has often ignored interactions overall environmental implications of food production are therefore poorly understood the proposed measuring method uses three indicators that address global environmental issues the use of energy from both fossil and renewable sources land and water the systemic approach can calculate trade offs along supply chains that make up a production system the use of the method implies an extension of environmental scp towards the overall performance of a production system the final outcome is expressed in three performance indicators the total land energy and water requirement per kilogram of available food for companies the data generated can be used to compare trends over time to compare results with targets and to benchmark a company against others for consumers data can be used to compare the environmental effects of various foods the method is also applicable to other business sectors the study is part of a multidisciplinary project on the scientific modeling and measuring of scp involving economic social and environmental dimensions acceptance of the measuring methods developed may be a powerful contribution towards creating sustainable business practices

respondent experience and contingent valuation of environmental goods abstract respondent experience i e a respondent s information set has long been suspected to influence contingent valuation estimates of environmental values we assess the influence of experience by explicitly modeling the relationship between respondent experience and both fitted individual resource values and the conditional variance of these estimated values using three different joint specifications for experience and wtp normal censored normal poisson censored normal and zero inflated poisson censored normal we find discrete jumps in resource values as experience increases from zero and that more experienced respondents have smaller conditional variances simulation of arbitrary levels of experience allows standardization of the amount of information when developing welfare estimates

environmental labeling and incomplete consumer information in laboratory markets abstract survey evidence suggests that consumers care about the environment and are willing to pay a higher price for a product that generates less environmental harm we induce buyer preferences over quality in a laboratory posted offer market to study sellers incentives to offer products of differing quality buyers are unaware of the product quality before purchase as is often the case for goods with differing environmental quality we first document the market failure that arises from incomplete information when no signaling or reputations are possible we then study various treatments that could remedy this failure seller reputations and unverified cheap talk signals sometimes increase the number of higher valued green goods the only reliable way to improve product quality in the experiment however is to use a third party that charges a fee to certify product quality claims

willingness to pay for natural organic and conventional foods the effects of information and meaningful labels vague food labels and distorted product claims have persisted in the natural food industry while organic claims can be certified by the u s department of agriculture usda using experimental methods and a sample of randomly selected subjects we test food label and information treatment effects on subjects willingness to pay wtp for organic natural and conventional foods random nth price auctions are used to elicit wtp after subjects received one of five randomly assigned information treatments we find large information effects including asymmetric cross market effects for natural and organic foods perhaps surprising is that organic premiums increase in response to subjects seeing the natural foods industry s perspective on its products demographics effects are also important the results have practical implications for natural and organic food marketing and valuing products where there are vague claims about their attributes