investment in cleaner technology and signaling distortions in a market with green consumers abstract i analyze the pricing and investment behavior of a firm that signals the environmental attributes of its production technology through its price to uninformed environmentally conscious consumers i then analyze the effect of change in environmental regulation on the signaling outcome and the firm s ex ante incentive to invest in cleaner technology when regulation is weak a firm signals cleaner technology through higher price in this case the firm earns lower profit when it has cleaner technology and thus has no incentive to invest in cleaner technology the price charged by the clean firm declines sharply beyond a critical level of regulation when regulation is sufficiently stringent the firm with cleaner technology charges lower price but earns higher signaling profit and ex ante the firm has positive incentive to invest in cleaner technology with weak regulation the incentive of the firm to directly disclose its environmental performance rather than signal it through price is increasing in the level of regulation the opposite holds when regulation is sufficiently stringent

eco labeling in commercial office markets do leed and energy star offices obtain multiple premiums this paper investigates the effect of eco labeling on rental rates sale prices and occupancy rates the consensus emerging from previous studies appears to be that investors in and occupiers of eco labeled buildings obtain a bundle of benefits related to lower operating costs reputation benefits and productivity higher in this study a hedonic model is used to test whether the presence of an eco label has a significantly positive effect on rental rates sale prices and occupancy rates of commercial office buildings in the us the results suggest that office buildings with energy star or leed eco labels obtain rental premia of approximately 3 5 dual certification produces an additive effect with rental premia estimated at 9 respective sale price premia for energy star and leed labeled office buildings are 18 and 25 the sale price premium for dual certification is estimated at 28 29 an occupancy premium could not be confirmed for leed labeled office buildings and only a small positive occupancy premium was found for energy star

on electricity consumption and economic growth in china abstract the invention and application of the electric power technology triggered the second industrial revolution in human history which marked the human society entered the age of electricity electricity provides the sustainable power for economic and social development with the rapid development of economy the electricity consumption is also increasing the increase of electricity consumption has further promoted the progress of the industrial economy in order to achieve the goal of improving the level of economic development while reducing energy consumption it is necessary to reveal the relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth this study is an extensive overview of the literature surrounding this topic in this paper we focus on the relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth in china we first analyze the general situation of china s electricity consumption and economic development then we explore the relationship between china s electricity consumption and economic growth from three dimensions i e the time dimension the regional dimension and the industrial dimension finally we study the key issues in the research of the relationship between electricity consumption and economic growth including variable selection model construction and results discussion this work suggests that the nature of the nexus in china should and can be explored from a wider perspective by developing a suitable integrated methodological framework

fair trade towards an economics of virtue over the past 10 years the sales of fair trade goods particularly those carrying the fair trade labelling organizations international flo certification mark have grown exponentially academic interest in fair trade has also grown significantly over the past decade with researchers analysing the model from a wide range of theoretical perspectives whilst fair trade is generally acknowledged as a new supply chain model it has tended to be studied at the micro organisational level rather than at the macro systems level as a consequence its wider impact as institutional innovation at the field level appears to have been under theorised so far in order to address this research gap this article uses a neo institutionalist perspective to analyse fair trade not simply as a new exchange model working within existing organisational and economic structures but rather as an agent of institutional entrepreneurship at and beyond the field level from this latter perspective fair trade brings a new set of transformational meanings to extant exchange and consumption models and reforms fields of economic exchange by disrupting and then re assembling key institutional elements around modern consumption to roll back commodity fetishism and reconnect consumers and producers the type of institutional change driven by fair trade can be seen as a form of social entrepreneurship

fair trade standards corporate participation and social movement responses in the united states this article examines the development of and contestation over the standards for certified fair trade with particular attention to the u s context it charts fair trade s rapid growth in the united states since the 1999 advent of formal certification explores the controversies generated by the strategy of market mainstreaming in the sector and focuses on five key issues that have generated particularly heated contention within the u s fair trade movement it offers a theoretical framework based in the literatures on agrifood systems social movements and public choice economics for understanding the corporate response to alternative markets such as fair trade the article suggests a typology of responses by social movement actors to this increased corporate participation and assesses the relevance of the u s case for the future prospects of fair trade both in other national contexts and as an international movement

environmental quality competition and eco labeling abstract a three stage game of investment environmental quality provision and price competition is developed to study the impact of green technology investment eco labeling in a duopoly model of vertical product differentiation the firms incentives to invest in green technologies depend on their relative cost structure when firms are identical with respect to fixed costs both firms will always invest but if one firm is more efficient in investing then the other firm may or may not invest depending on the level of unit cost of investment quality competition will be tighter when the low quality firm is more efficient and looser when the high quality firm is more efficient in investing socially optimal investment for both firms is always positive but lower than in the duopoly solution in the absence of environmental externalities the quality dispersion chosen by profit maximizing firms may be too high or too low while environmental externalities increase the possibility low quality dispersion that is too low within the market solution finally and importantly ecolabeling can be used as a means of reducing excessive investment and increasing environmental quality that is too low

ἐμπάθɛια empatheia and caritas the role of religion in fair trade consumption there is much still to learn about the nature of fair trade consumers in light of the pope s encyclical caritas in veritate this article sought to advance the current understanding by investigating the role of religion in fair trade consumption in this study fair trade consumers and non consumers across many religions as well as the non religious described their consumption of fair trade products as well as the use of their religious beliefs in their purchase behavior it appears that the non religious are slightly more inclined toward buying fair trade products of the religious observers studied buddhists have a greater propensity to buy fair trade the relationship between religion and fair trade consumption is complex in that religious affiliation group membership alone is not enough to encourage members to buy fair trade rather it is the use of religious beliefs as a criterion in consumption behavior that linked religion to fair trade consumption

energy management and environmental awareness in china s enterprises abstract by virtue of the country s size population and heavy dependance on coal china s situation should be of particular interest to all with a concern both for energy conservation and the environment efforts to conserve energy in china s enterprises must be carried on alongside rapid development and the transition from a command economy to a more hybrid market socialist economy this transition may in the longer term offer opportunities for energy conservation but in the meanwhile can be seen as imposing constraints this paper is the result of field work undertaken in china over the period 1994 1997 the paper begins by outlining the contradictory context for energy conservation in china the international concern about climate change and acid rain and the domestic imperatives of modernization and transformation of the economy then setting out briefly the position with regard to energy supply and consumption and measures for conservation and enforcement it reports the views of managers at three important industrial plants on energy and related environmental matters and more generally of some of the most senior officials and experts in china concerned with forming policy on energy conservation in china s enterprises because little is known of the views of such practitioners outside china these views are presented in some detail and analyzed against the background of the broader changes taking place in china today the paper concludes with a number of specific recommendations to aid progress on conservation as they have been put forward by chinese experts

why people don t take their concerns about fair trade to the supermarket the role of neutralisation this article explores how neutralisation can explain people s lack of commitment to buying fair trade ft products even when they identify ft as an ethical concern it examines the theoretical tenets of neutralisation theory and critically assesses its applicability to the purchase of ft products exploratory research provides illustrative examples of neutralisation techniques being used in the ft consumer context a conceptual framework and research propositions delineate the role of neutralisation in explaining the attitude behaviour discrepancies evident in relation to consumers ft purchase behaviour providing direction for further research that will generate new knowledge of consumers ft purchase behaviour and other aspects of ethical consumer behaviour

willingness to pay for environmental practices implications for eco labeling consumer survey data collected in former west and east berlin after the unification of germany are used to address the issue of willingness to pay wtp for foods produced with techniques consistent with environmental stewardship results show differences in the wtp between residents of the two former german states attributed to area of residence residents of eastern city districts were generally less willing to pay a premium for foods produced with environmental friendly methods which suggests that marketing of such foods will be more successful in western districts unless educational efforts can be used to bridge the gap in the stated wtp

can ecolabeling schemes preserve the environment a three stage game of production technology signal and price competition is developed to study the impact of eco labeling in a duopoly model of vertical product differentiation the production technology and the subsequent pollution level are non observable by consumers the only way to inform consumers about the environmental quality of the product is to stick an ecolabel on it however a polluting firm may also usurp the ecolabel by incurring a certain cost by assuming that consumers are altruistic and willing to pay for environmental quality we show that ecolabels can reduce the pollution level finally and importantly under restrictive conditions on labeling cost ecolabeling can constitute to some extent an environmentally effective and economically efficient policy however ecolabeling cannot alone internalize the whole negative externality until the optimum point

the fair trade movement parameters issues and future research although fair trade has been in existence for more than 40 years discussion in the business and business ethics literature of this unique trading and campaigning movement between southern producers and northern buyers and consumers has been limited this paper seeks to redress this deficit by providing a description of the characteristics of fair trade including definitional issues market size and segmentation and the key organizations it discusses fair trade from southern producer and northern trader and consumer perspectives and highlights the key issues that currently face the fair trade movement it then identifies an initial research agenda to be followed up in subsequent papers

a dynamic approach to voluntary environmental contributions in tourism abstract in an evolutionary game theoretical model of tourism firms that use an endogenous natural common pool resource cpr we show that stable equilibria with voluntary environmental initiatives may coexist with other equilibria where voluntary abatement is absent the basins of attraction of the equilibria are identified and a bifurcation analysis is carried out producing two results with policy implications first there is a highly non linear relationship between the cost of abatement required to be green and the share of green firms second increases in the number of the cpr s users will ultimately dissipate the incentives to make abatement beyond regulation

energy development in china the need for a coherent policy abstract china the world s third largest consumer of primary energy remains in relative terms a poor developing country ambitious modernization plans exemplified by the goal of quadrupling per capita gnp by the year 2000 will require considerable attention to long range energy planning yet the past developments including the most recent guidelines have been marked by abrupt changes and outright reversals leaving china without any coherent energy policy the most durable strategies which emerged during the late 1970s are the stress on coal as the principal fuel building of mine mouth power plants accelerated construction of large hydro stations massive diffusion of small biogas digesters and widespread energy conservation measures

when one size does not fit all a problem of fit rather than failure for voluntary management standards voluntary management standards for social and environmental performance ideally help to define and improve firms related capabilities these standards however have largely failed to improve such performance as intended over emphasis on institutional factors leading to adoption of these standards has neglected the role of firms existing capabilities external pressures can drive firms to adopt standards more than their technical capacity to employ them this can lead to problems of fit between institutional requirements and a firm s existing capabilities we describe a conceptual model that considers the impact of an interaction between a firm s institutional requirements and its existing capabilities on standards failure we suggest solutions that align institutional requirements to appropriate governance forms as a means to improve standards success we contribute to theory by describing the role of firms internal capabilities to the success of voluntary management standards and the reliability of self regulation generally

china s ongoing energy efficiency drive origins progress and prospects abstract in 2004 china s government launched a vigorous programme to reverse the trend of rising national energy intensity and to reduce intensity by 20 over the period 2006 2010 the aim of this paper is to examine this programme in the context of nearly 30 years of measures to enhance energy efficiency in china and thus to evaluate the likelihood that today s policies will yield improvements over a longer period the country achieved a sustained decline of energy intensity in the period 1980 2001 but this trend was reversed in 2002 this reversal arose from a shift in the structure of the economy to more energy intensive industries and from a decline in the rate of technical innovation the measures taken since 2003 have been directed principally at energy intensive industries but have also addressed other sectors of the economy though the energy intensity target for the year 2010 may be achieved greater efforts will be needed to address a number of constraints which include the reluctance to use economic and financial instruments the dependency of energy policy on industrial and social policies the nature of political decision making and of public administration a shortage of skills and social attitudes to energy

the production of eco labels eco labeling is a market based technique for conveying information about consumers demands for environmental protection most criticisms of eco labeling have concentrated on demand side issues the potential for firms or countries to use eco labels to manipulate market power and the difficulty of creating credible labels in this paper we argue that fundamental problems also arise on the production side specifically we argue that both increasing returns to scale and complexities in production imply that it will be possible to market only a small percentage of environmental attributes through the use of eco labels we present evidence for our hypotheses from a detailed survey of 100 randomly selected consumer products

the missing link between corporate social responsibility and consumer trust the case of fair trade products this paper investigates the link between the consumer perception that a company is socially oriented and the consumer intention to buy products marketed by that company we suggest that this link exists when at least two conditions prevail 1 the products sold by that company comply with ethical and social requirements 2 the company has an acknowledged commitment to protect consumer rights and interests to test these hypotheses we conducted a survey among the clients of retail chains offering fair trade products the results show that socially oriented companies can successfully leverage their reputation to market products with high symbolic values

imperfect certification in a bertrand duopoly abstract a label that imperfectly signals product quality is analyzed in a bertrand duopoly with differentiated products considering strategic firms when certification is imperfect has some important implications a separating equilibrium can be sustained with a free test due to price strategic complementarity when the certifier s objective is welfare and the test cost is sufficiently small the most appropriate test is that which is subject to a low rate of false negatives

fair trade three key challenges for reaching the mainstream after nearly 20 years of work by activists fair trade a movement establishing alternative trading organizations to ensure minimal returns safe working conditions and environmentally sustainable production is now gaining steam with increasing awareness and availability across a variety of products however this article addresses several major remaining challenges a a lack of agreement about what fair trade really means and how it should be certified b uneven awareness and availability across different areas with marked differences between some parts of europe and north america that reflect more fundamental debates about distribution c larger questions about the extent of the potential contribution of fair trade to development under the current system including limitations on the number and types of workers affected and the fair trade focus on commodity goods

green greener greenest eco label gradation and competition abstract this paper analyzes two common features of markets in which eco label programs certify that products are green gradation single programs offering multiple certification standards e g platinum gold silver and competition multiple programs vying to certify to their respective standards we find that depending on whether programs are sponsored by industry environmental groups or a government they have strikingly different incentives to grade or compete industry sponsors are indifferent about both environmentalist sponsors optimally grade or compete with other environmentalist sponsors only if consumer preferences for green consumption are skewed in a specific way and government sponsors decisions depend on the relative importance of private vs public benefits generated by the green market we find also that it is no accident that green markets frequently have an environmentalist program competing with an industry one for each of the cases examined our analysis is consistent with casual empirical evidence

mainstreaming and its discontents fair trade socially responsible investing and industry trajectories over time according to popular and academic accounts alternative trade initiatives such as fair trade organics forest certification and socially responsible investing sri almost invariably lose their oppositional stance and go mainstream that is they lose their alternative usually peripheral and often contrarian character in this paper i argue that this is not always the case and that the path to going mainstream is not always an unproblematic one i observe that while scholars have documented various aspects of specific alternative trade initiatives little comparative work has been done to theorize their different trajectories to advance the scholarship i compare two alternative trade movements fair trade and sri and develop three hypotheses the relation motivations hypothesis the material interests hypothesis and the organization of credibility hypothesis that explain why going mainstream has been so hotly contested in the fair trade movement but not the sri movement i articulate these hypotheses and evaluate their merits

too much of a good thing why altruism can harm the environment success of eco labeling schemes broadly defined varies among products and across countries based on a simple theoretical framework we show that the nature of environmental attributes among products i e private versus public and the consumer type i e egoist versus altruist shape the overall performance of such schemes in addition we demonstrate that altruistic consumers exhibiting a too high willingness to pay for the eco labeled product can inadvertently prevent egoistic consumers from purchasing it leading to a sub optimal outcome in terms of environmental performance several policy and managerial implications are drawn

a model for fair trade buying behaviour the role of perceived quantity and quality of information and of product specific attitudes in a sample of 615 belgians a model for fair trade buying behaviour was developed the impact of fair trade knowledge general attitudes towards fair trade attitudes towards fair trade products and the perception of the quality and quantity of fair trade information on the reported amount of money spent on fair trade products were assessed fair trade knowledge overall concern and scepticism towards fair trade and the perception of the perceived quantity and quality of fair trade information influence buying behaviour directly and indirectly through product attitudes interest in fair trade products price acceptability and product liking have a significant impact on fair trade buying behaviour product interest is the most important variable influencing buying behaviour implications for the campaigns of governments and for the marketing strategy of fair trade organisations are offered

a cross national investigation on how ethical consumers build loyalty toward fair trade brands although fair trade has recently experienced rapid growth around the world there is lack of consumer research that investigates what determines consumers loyalty toward fair trade brands in this research we investigate how ethical consumption values ecv and two mediating variables fair trade product beliefs ftpb and fair trade corporate evaluation ftce determine fair trade brand loyalty ftbl on the basis of two empirical studies that use samples from the u s and korea we provide evidence demonstrating that the manner in which ecv influence ftbl differs in the u s and korea in the u s ecv determine ftbl only indirectly via ftpb whereas in korea they determine ftbl directly as well as indirectly via ftce we discuss theoretical and managerial implications of these findings

shaping china s energy security the impact of domestic reforms this paper is a subsequent study of china s energy security situation which concludes that china s energy security has not improved over 30 years of economic reform the objective of the study is to explore qualitatively why the energy security situation has not improved to answer the why question the study opens up a new perspective by analyzing the relationship between energy security and energy policies from the macroeconomic reform perspective this study discusses major reforms that took place over 30 years it is found that china s macroeconomic reform has restricted the formation of china s energy policies and determined its energy security situation in essence china s energy policies are only a reaction to the macroeconomic measures in other words china s energy policies are not originally intended to improve energy security but passive reactions to china s macroeconomic reform this explains why china did not improve its energy security situation despite 30 years of reform

green business and blue angels this paper presents a model of a monopolist svoluntary overcompliance with legal environmentalstandards under asymmetric information about thefirm s environmental impacts the key assumptions are the existence of quality premia for environmentalsoundness a positive but imperfect degree ofmonitoring and adaptive consumer expectations conditions necessary for overcompliance to arise in aprofit maximizing equilibrium are derived the effectsof a third party eco labeling system are analyzed itis shown that the existence of an independent labelingauthority increases the likelihood of overcomplianceto be profit maximizing moreover firms might have anincentive to lobby for the introduction of such asystem the effect of consumers risk preferences andan instrument for preventing greenwash companieslying about their environmental performance is alsodiscussed

the role of personal values in fair trade consumption research in the u s on fair trade consumption is sparse therefore little is known as to what motivates u s consumers to buy fair trade products this study sought to determine which values are salient to american fair trade consumption the data were gathered via a web based version of the schwartz value survey svs and were gleaned from actual consumers who purchase fair trade products from a range of internet based fair trade retailers this study established that indeed there are significant interactions between personal values and fair trade consumption and that demographics proved to be useless in creating a profile of the american fair trade consumer

fairtrade towns as unconventional networks of ethical activism the growing availability and consumption of fairtrade products is recognised as one of the most widespread ethically inspired market developments and as an example of activist driven change within the wider marketing system the fairtrade towns movement now operating in over 1700 towns and cities globally represents a comparatively recent extension of fairtrade marketing driven by local activists seeking to promote positive change in production and consumption systems this paper briefly explores the conventional framing of the role that ethically related activism plays in the operation of markets and in influencing market participants it then presents key insights gathered from a grounded theory exploration of fairtrade towns as activist driven marketing systems revealing the atypical nature of the activism involved the findings demonstrate how local activists leverage their social networks to exert pressure and generate support to promote ethical consumption the study suggests that fairtrade towns offer a new role for activists as fairtrade itself becomes more mainstream and considers the role they are fulfilling as informal local marketers the marketing dynamics revealed represent a complex and distinctive form of relational activism that seeks to build fairtrade markets and highlight their positive benefits with potential lessons for other local ethical market building efforts in future

competitive investment in clean technology and uninformed green consumers abstract in a market where consumers and the regulatory authorities are not fully informed about the actual production technology or environmental performance of firms that engage in strategic competition i study the effect of environmental consciousness of consumers on firms incentive to invest in cleaner technology firms compete in prices and may signal their environmental performance to uninformed consumers through prices i also analyze the effect of an expected liability on firms in this setting compared to full information incomplete information generates higher strategic incentive to invest in cleaner technology particularly when consciousness and or expected liability are not too high requiring mandatory disclosure of technology or environmental performance may discourage such investment even though consumers and the regulator are uninformed competition has a positive effect relative to monopoly on the incentive to invest

voluntary disclosure and investment in environmental technology abstract i examine the role of voluntary disclosure programs in creating market incentives for competing firms to invest in environmentally cleaner technology in an industry subject to environmental regulation such as emission taxes such programs may allow firms to credibly disclose their progress in achieving compliance cost reduction through investments in internal rd the outcome of the investment is private information i show that the ex ante incentive to invest is always higher in the presence of the voluntary disclosure program than without it in particular the opportunity to credibly disclose progress in cost reduction allows a successful firm to convey its true position of competitive advantage to the rival firm and realize higher market share and profit thus voluntary disclosure programs increase the efficacy of traditional forms of environmental regulation in creating incentives for green technological change even when buyers have no preference for greener technology i show that such programs generally increase social welfare

green markets eco certification and equilibrium fraud abstract consumers voluntarily pay significant price premiums to acquire unobservable environmental attributes in green markets this paper considers the performance of eco certification policy under circumstances where consumers cannot discern environmental attributes in goods but are able to form rational expectations regarding the extent of illicit activities in the green market the main results are i fraud is less prevalent in green markets when entry barriers limit the number of firms ii conventional environmental policies on polluting techniques increase the incidence of fraud and can even preclude the use of non polluting techniques which would otherwise emerge in green markets iii voluntary eco certification policies can decrease fraud increase output and raise profits per firm and iv in cases where the socially optimal resource allocation can be supported the optimal policy involves negative unit certification fees positive fixed certification fees and is revenue generating for the certifying agent

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