forest dependence and income distribution in a subsistence economy evidence from india abstract we examine an area of northern india where forestry acts to ameliorate the incidence of poverty and destitution though it does not otherwise contribute significantly to the reduction of income inequality the poor would be doubly disadvantaged without common property access to forest products conservation measures entailing curtailment in the right to common access pose a dilemma this issue is explored here

global valuation of ecosystem services application to the pantanal da nhecolandia brazil in costanza et al s famous nature paper costanza r d arge r de groot r farber s grasso m hannon b et al the value of the world s ecosystem services and natural capital nature 15 387 253 260 a value for the world s ecosystem services is posited as a point of departure for further discussion these calculations were re estimated and qualitatively assessed in application to the pantanal sub region nhecolandia the original study was re estimated to evaluate the sensitivity of the original study to more detailed and accurate data and to better understand the potential for the people of the pantanal to benefit from environmental stewardship refocusing the analysis to the regional watershed level using locally derived data provided an opportunity to explore appropriate local policy alternatives and recognize regional biophysical heterogeneity which is largely impractical at the global hemispheric or perhaps national scale a value of more than us 15 5 billion or us 5 million per resident was derived an annual per hectare value of approximately 1 2 of costanza et al s calculations more biophysically diverse but largely drier regional conditions indicated by our data explain this discrepancy water supply and disturbance regulation contribute close to 2 3 of the total calculated value waste treatment cultural value and water regulation each contribute substantially 6 9 to the total nutrient cycling recreation and habitat values play more minor roles 1 5 3 in the total valuation the concepts of imperfect substitutes and comparative advantage are applied within the broad category of natural capital in order to evaluate the potential of alternative economic development strategies for the region 2000 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

no price like home global house prices 1870 2012 how have house prices evolved in the long run this paper presents annual house price indices for 14 advanced economies since 1870 based on extensive data collection we are able to show for the first time that house prices in most industrial economies stayed constant in real terms from the 19th to the mid 20th century but rose sharply in recent decades land prices not construction costs hold the key to understanding the trajectory of house prices in the long run residential land prices have surged in the second half of the 20th century but did not increase meaningfully before we argue that before world war ii dramatic reductions in transport costs expanded the supply of land and suppressed land prices since the mid 20th century comparably large land augmenting reductions in transport costs no longer occurred increased regulations on land use further inhibited the utilization of additional land while rising expenditure shares for housing services increased demand

firm level ecosystem service valuation using mechanistic biogeochemical modeling and functional substitutability increasingly private firms are focusing on environmental sustainability however such entities continue to experience difficulty in operationalizing sustainable practices in management decisions for firms that own natural ecosystems part of the difficulty stems from their inability to balance the environmental value of conserving these ecosystems against potential profits that could be captured through their development to overcome this we present a new comparative framework for natural and engineered systems which allows for a rigorous valuation of ecosystem services based on functional equivalence with engineered systems this framework allows for the opportunity of such value to be represented within international accounting standards thus aligning biological ecosystem service valuation with current rigorous accepted accounting norms looking specifically at the removal of phosphorus via wetland we characterize an ecosystem service using a mass balance mechanistic biogeochemical model we then simulate the ecosystem performance under various loading conditions to determine the limit state for which the wetland can perform the service of phosphorus removal in the long term finally using functional substitutability we apply an appropriately scaled price of the engineered equivalent system to determine a market based value of the ecosystem service as a demonstration we apply this methodology to an estuary located in southern california

the ambiguous impact of inequality on local resource management abstract the impact of inequality on the ability of human groups to undertake successful collective action is investigated with special reference to overexploitation of common property resources in voluntary provision problems on the one hand inequality has an ambiguous impact on the feasibility of the efficient outcome even though better endowed agents contribute more to collective action in regulated settings on the other hand inequality tends to reduce the acceptability of available regulatory schemes and therefore to make collective action more difficult

spatial cost benefit thinking in multi functional forestry towards a framework for spatial targeting of policy interventions abstract many countries now actively encourage land use change for the provision of multiple benefits specifically including non market benefits often such policies have been poorly designed because of a lack of understanding of the spatial distribution of the potential costs and especially non market benefits from land use change as with market goods the potential yield of non market goods and services from land use can be highly spatially variable in recent years more and more studies on the economic aspects of natural resources have started to make use of geographical information systems gis what is yet lacking is the systematic adoption of a framework for the spatial targeting of policy interventions which can be used to improve decision making in terms of effectiveness efficiency equity or public acceptability this paper uses existing studies in forestry to present such a framework and discusses its potential uses and limitations as a new standard tool to inform multi functional land use decisions

applying contingent valuation in china to measure the total economic value of restoring ecosystem services in ejina region abstract this paper reports an attempt to apply the contingent valuation method cvm in rural china the cvm was used to obtain estimates of willingness to pay for restoring ejina ecosystem services in our survey we used a payment card format and a 12 page survey booklet with maps depicting the reasons why ejina ecosystem deteriorated the means by which ecosystem services could be restored from their current level we used an in person interview along with the survey booklet we employed a parametric model to estimate the benefits of restoring ejina ecosystem results from 700 in person interviews indicate that households would pay an average of 19 37 rmb per year with 20 78 per household for the main river area and 16 41 per household for the rest of hei basin the aggregate benefit to residents of the hei basin is 8 84 million annually for 20 years taking into account an environmental discount rate calculated by using respondent s equivalent utility between periodical payments and lump sum payments the present value of aggregate benefit of restoring ejina ecosystem is 55 33 million these results suggest that the general public in hei valley would be willing to pay to restore the ejina ecosystem although this amount is substantially less than the estimated costs of restoration

interest rates and equity extraction during the housing boom credit record panel data from 1999 2010 indicates that the likelihood of home equity extraction borrowing on average about 40 000 against one s home peaked in 2003 when mortgage rates reached historic lows we estimate a 27 percent rise in extraction in response to a 100 basis point rate decline and that house price growth amplifies this relationship differential responses to interest rates and home price appreciation by borrower age and credit score provide new evidence of financial frictions finally equity extractions are associated with higher default risk consistent with the use of borrowed funds for consumption or illiquid investment

endogenous gentrification and housing price dynamics in this paper we begin by documenting substantial variation in house price growth across neighborhoods within a city during citywide housing price booms we then present a model which links house price movements across neighborhoods within a city and the gentrification of those neighborhoods in response to a citywide housing demand shock a key ingredient in our model is a positive neighborhood externality individuals like to live next to richer neighbors this generates an equilibrium where households segregate based upon their income in response to a citywide demand shock higher income residents will choose to expand their housing by migrating into the poorer neighborhoods that directly abut the initial richer neighborhoods the in migration of the richer residents into these border neighborhoods will bid up prices in those neighborhoods causing the original poorer residents to migrate out we refer to this process as endogenous gentrification using a variety of data sets and using bartik variation across cities to identify city level housing demand shocks we find strong empirical support for the model s predictions

integrating demand side options in electric utility planning a multiobjective approach this paper proposes simultaneous integration of dsm options in a multiobjective framework using a compromise programming technique for electric utility planning the two distinct advantages of this method are i explicit consideration of all associated benefits of dsm options viz cost reduction emissions reduction and improvement of supply system reliability and ii consideration of the integration method s specific characteristics of various types of dsm options depending upon the control of the utility on their application the methodology is applied to an indian electric utility maharashtra state electricity system mses for its integrated resource planning for the period 1990 2000 to illustrate the methodological issues various methodological issues related to the specific nature of dsm options and multiobjective framework are also discussed in the context of mses

the ghost of extinction preservation values and minimum viable population in wildlife models abstract the inclusion of a minimum viable population in bioeconomic modeling creates at least two complications that are not resolved by using a modified logistic growth function the first complication can be dealt with by choosing a different depensational growth function the second complication relates to the inclusion of the in situ benefits of wildlife into the analysis knowledge about the magnitude of the in situ benefits provides no guide for policy about conservation management simply knowing that people are willing to pay a large amount each year to protect a species says nothing about whether one should manage habitat to protect or enhance the species numbers unless the species is in imminent danger of extinction if willingness to pay is to be a guide it needs to be better tied to population numbers especially the minimum viable population

the cost of carbon abatement through community forest management in nepal himalaya this paper estimates the economic returns to carbon abatement through biological sequestration in community managed forest under future redd policy and compares these for three possible management scenarios for the estimation the research relies on forest inventory data together with other socio economic and resources use data collected from forest users in three sites of nepal himalaya the paper estimates the incremental carbon from forest enhancement on a yearly basis over a five year period using the value of 1 and 5 per tco2 for conservative analysis the results based on the three sites indicate that community forest management may be one of the least cost ways to abate carbon with a break even price under scenario 2 which ranges from 0 55 to 3 70 per tco2 however bringing community forests into the carbon market may entail high opportunity costs as forests provide numerous non monetary benefits to the local population who regard these as the main incentive for conservation and management an important finding of the research is that if forest resources use by local communities is not permitted then carbon trading will not be attractive to them as revenue from carbon will not cover the cost foregone by not harvesting forest resources

pilot project on sustainability management accounting with the styrian automobile cluster abstract the paper is based on a project with the styrian automobile cluster in austria and selected member companies in six companies the environmental management costs as well as further costs for health and safety risk management and other social issues were assessed less tangible items and external effects are addressed starting with the efforts to assess the financial effects of the sustainability performance indicators provided by the global reporting initiative gri for sustainability reporting the un dsd united nations division for sustainable development method for environmental management accounting ema was enlarged by several other cost categories this paper describes these and the experiences from the pilot projects the two major cost drivers are the purchase costs of non product output and the costs related to lost working days because of sick leave and accidents and the overtime pay to make up for these lost working days the work of the environmental health and safety ehs department helps to reduce these costs the cost assessment scheme allows one to better understand the relationships between costs for treatment of undesired effects due to unimplemented protection measures and lost material purchase value in comparison to the prevention costs which mainly consist of the internal management departments and related external consultants the assessment of sustainability management costs is of interest for organisations which already publish a sustainability report and want to more accurately assess the financial effects of such aspects addressed via ema it is also useful for small and medium sized companies which use the assessment as a starting point to shape their ehs system the main benefits are more accurate data and better arguments for investment appraisal or performance indicators as well as improved consistency of information and management systems that should help them to improve their environmental social and economic performance

different ways of knowing a communicative turn toward sustainability abstract despite the urgency of the ecological crisis the steady continuation of environmental degradation suggests that new ways of interpreting problems and acting with environmental integrity may need to be considered this paper draws on a broad range of contemporary theory to argue that the conventional conceptualization of environmental problems has remained a largely disciplinary based exercise that has relied on abstracting the environmental issues from their real world complexity a practical articulation of the main environmental narratives reveals self referential discourses whose disciplinary based practices have insulated these approaches from a broad range of contemporary theorising and different ways of knowing the dominance of these approaches in environmental policy development has led to the continued acceleration of environmental degradation despite widespread political and social interest in its abatement this paper provides a critique of methodologies derived from the assumptions of instrumental rationalism and contemplates the potential for alternative communicative approaches and strategies for dealing with environmental policy development and implementation it is argued that a communicative approach to planning for sustainability represents a more appropriate strategy for mobilising a currently impotent environmental movement a communicative approach by explicitly dealing with the assumptions and motivations of contested positions in the sustainability debate it is argued offers the most pragmatic way of developing change strategies to deal with the complex issues surrounding environmental policy development and implementation

stepping into formal politics women s engagement in formal political processes in irrigation in rural india summary gender quotas decentralization of irrigation management and reliance on mgnrega for labor provision challenge the traditional patriarchal canal management system by institutionalizing women as formal decision makers and members of the irrigation labor force in northern india based on a survey of 592 women in rural himachal pradesh this paper quantitatively analyses how these policies affect women s engagement in formal political processes results indicate that factors from the private and individual domains influence female participation in formal political processes most importantly india s gender inclusive policies provide women with the opportunity to legitimately engage in formal political processes governing resource management

electricity generation from renewables in madagascar opportunities and projections climate change is the greatest challenge of our time for development adaptation to this change combined with the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions can help to boost the economic transformation which stimulates growth fills the energy gap and reduces poverty this paper focuses on the potential of renewable energy sources res for electricity generation in madagascar which is a lower income country a large accessibility to electricity could be a driving force for the economic development of this fourth worldwide island the electricity mix is currently heavily dependent to fossil fuel imports indeed most of the electric demands are fulfilled by diesel power plants an overview of the power situation and renewable energy potential of madagascar is first presented then different scenarios for the evolution its electricity mix are proposed

a nation of gamblers real estate speculation and american history the great housing convulsion that buffeted america between 2000 and 2010 has historical precedents from the frontier land boom of the 1790s to the skyscraper craze of the 1920s but this time was different there was far less far less real uncertainty about fundamental economic and geographic trends making the convulsion even more puzzling during historic and recent booms sensible models could justify high prices on the basis of seemingly reasonable projections about stable or growing prices the recurring error appears to be a failure to anticipate the impact that elastic supply will eventually have on prices whether for cotton in alabama in 1820 or land in las vegas in 2006 buyers don t appear to be irrational but rather cognitively limited investors who work with simple heuristic models instead of a comprehensive general equilibrium framework low interest rates rarely seem to drive price growth under priced default options are a more common contributor to high prices the primary cost of booms has not typically been overbuilding but rather the financial chaos that accompanies housing downturns

economic factors in farmer adoption of agroforestry patterns observed in western kenya abstract a study of agroforestry adoption by 3 000 project participants in siaya and south nyanza districts in kenya supports three hypotheses 1 1 historical increases in tree domestication and management intensity are responses to declining supply of uncultivated tree resources increased subsistence and commercial demand for tree products and perceived risks of ecological degradation adoption of agroforestry is most likely where consistent with economic incentives for land use change 2 2 high variability in individual farmers tree growing strategies reflects differences in resources and livelihood strategies and household level returns to agroforestry relative to alternative options for meeting specific objectives 3 3 farmers reduce risks associated with new agroforestry practices through incremental adoption and adaptation and cost and risk reducing modifications in technology design

optimal climate policy is a utopia from quantitative to qualitative cost benefit analysis abstract the dominance of quantitative cost benefit analysis cba and optimality concepts in the economic analysis of climate policy is criticised among others it is argued to be based in a misplaced interpretation of policy for a complex climate economy system as being analogous to individual inter temporal welfare optimisation the transfer of quantitative cba and optimality concepts reflects an overly ambitious approach that does more harm than good an alternative approach is to focus the attention on extreme events structural change and complexity it is argued that a qualitative rather than a quantitative cba that takes account of these aspects can support the adoption of a minimax regret approach or precautionary principle in climate policy this means implement stringent ghg reduction policies as soon as possible

investment planning for hydro thermal power system expansion stochastic programming employing the dantzig wolfe decomposition principle this paper presents an application of the dantzig wolfe decomposition principle to the problem of investment planning in the electric power sector the formulation of the capacity planning problem incorporates uncertainties in long term load growth and in fuel supply availability in addition the formulation permits the inclusion of such demand side investment decisions as conservation as well as conventional and renewable supply investments and it allows flexibility in modeling system reliability reliability targets can be incorporated as constraints or reliability can be optimized by minimizing customer outage costs in addition to investment costs and operating costs results of an application to the pacific northwest involving problem sizes up to 30 000 rows and 54 000 columns are reported

costing an international public good the case of the baltic sea abstract the paper discusses an economically efficient and internationally equitable provision of a specific public good the good in question the baltic sea satisfies a number of needs but economic values implied may be different in various countries polluting and using the sea the level of eutrophication has been identified as a key characteristic of the baltic sea relevant for its value the chander tulkens model of cost sharing is used to determine a hypothetical allocation of abatement costs across the countries around the sea the application of the model is based on estimates of national abatement costs as well as national willingness to pay for reduced eutrophication estimating willingness to pay in a collection of countries some of which undergo a transition from centrally planned systems has been the main challenge of this study the results were derived from a coordinated series of contingent valuation surveys in lithuania poland and sweden combined with benefit transfer studies to cover the rest of the region predictions of cost sharing schemes obtained from the chander tulkens model are confronted with actual data on abatement expenditures and international assistance several recommendations on how to optimize the baltic wide programmes conclude the paper

economic valuation of biodiversity sense or nonsense this paper critically evaluates the notion and application of economic monetary valuation of biological diversity or biodiversity for this purpose four levels of diversity are considered genes species ecosystems and functions different perspectives on biodiversity value can be characterized through a number of factors instrumental vs intrinsic values local vs global diversity life diversity vs biological resources etc a classification of biodiversity values is offered based on a system of logical relationships among biodiversity ecosystems species and human welfare suggestions are made about which economic valuation methods can address which type of biodiversity value the resulting framework is the starting point for a survey and evaluation of empirical studies at each of the four levels of diversity the contingent valuation method is by far the most used method an important reason is that the other valuation methods are unable to identify and measure passive or nonuse values of biodiversity at first sight the resulting monetary value estimates seem to give unequivocal support to the belief that biodiversity has a significant positive social value nevertheless most studies lack a uniform clear perspective on biodiversity as a distinct concept from biological resources in fact the empirical literature fails to apply economic valuation to the entire range of biodiversity benefits therefore available economic valuation estimates should generally be regarded as providing a very incomplete perspective on and at best lower bounds to the unknown value of biodiversity changes 2001 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

valuing nature lessons learned and future research directions this paper critically reviews the literature on environmental valuation of ecosystem services across the range of global biomes the main objective of this review is to assess the policy relevance of the information encompassed by the wide range of valuation studies that have been undertaken so far published and other studies now cover most ecosystems with aquatic and marine contexts attracting the least attention there is also a predominance of single function valuation studies studies valuing multiple functions and uses and studies which seek to capture the before and after states as environmental changes take place are rare by and large it is the latter types of analyses that are most important as aids to more rational decision taking in ecosystem conservation versus development situations involving different stakeholders local national and global aggregate global scale estimates of ecosystems value are problematic given the fact that only marginal values are consistent with conventional decision aiding tools such as economic cost benefit analysis in general valuation data provide prima facie support for the hypothesis that net ecosystem service value diminishes with biodiversity and ecosystem loss balmford et al 2002 science 297 p 950 future research effort should include complementary research on multiple ecosystem services that seeks to capture the temporal disturbance profile and its causal factors the explicit recognition of multiple interdependent ecosystem services and values poses both conceptual and empirical research challenges it would serve to transform the practice of research in this sub field via the a priori assumption of multiple and inter dependent use instead of independent single use this line of reasoning can then be extended to the institutional arrangements that determine which values are captured new institutional processes and arrangements are probably required in order to best realise benefit streams from multiple ecosystem use and non use provision across a range of different stakeholders

power distribution the external environment and common property forest governance a local user groups model abstract this paper presents a recursive model that links power distribution imbalances with collective benefits and costs related to local common property forest governance using cross sectional analysis of 38 local common property forest user groups ejidos and comunidades in la sierra tarahumara mexico we test the impacts of power inequalities on different common property forest governance outcomes three measures of power inequality are used intra group power disparities links between the ejido authority and external political forces and asset disparities between the authority and the group average the proxies of power were found to be a key determinant of forest change and other collective action related variables the findings provide evidence in favour of the hypothesis that with greater power inequalities within the group agents with more power are able to impose higher costs on those with less power powerful leaders may provide positive externalities to the group in the form of norms however results indicate that greater power inequality tends to lead to more illegal logging and more forest degradation

incidence of forest income on reduction of inequality evidence from forest dependent households in milieu of joint forest management abstract this study suggests that there is a narrower scope to expand income inequality with the increase in forest source of income to total income relative to non forest income irrespective of the type of forest fringe villages the addition of forest income after joint forest management jfm reduces measured income inequality by about 12 all else equal in the jfm involved households but no such perceptible decrease has been found for non jfm households during this period categorically forest income plays the dominant role in reducing measured income inequality for those households who are relatively asset poor and that also live below poverty line the study also shows that the non involvement in jfm programme by the non jfm households might bring about a major environmental shirking because illegal timber income constitutes the major part in total income for non jfm households even after jfm scenario

joint production and consumption in traditional households fuelwood and crop residues in two districts in nepal forest conversion by agricultural households is the leading cause of deforestation yet we know little about agricultural household use of forest and tree products this article measures household production of and demand for fuelwood and fuel substitutes in two districts in nepal women play a larger role in collection in the district dependant on production from common forestlands men and agricultural capital are more important inputs in the district dependant on production from private lands the article also measures demand elasticities for fuelwood combustible agricultural residues and improved stoves a technological substitute each by household income group all price and income demand elasticities are less than one the substitution elasticities between residues and fuelwood are less than one residues are more important substitutes for low income households and improved stoves are more important substitutes for high income households

from ecological macroeconomics to a theory of endogenous money for a finite planet abstract this paper takes stock of the achievements and gaps of the emerging field of ecological macroeconomics which has brought insights from specific schools of macroeconomics most notably post keynesian to ecological economics with a strong emphasis on the endogeneity of money ecological macroeconomics has proposed fiscal monetary and prudential reforms to boost green investments and developed new modeling frameworks to explore the interactions between the financial macroeconomic and biophysical spheres while these proposals open a broader range of possibilities to engage in a socio ecological transition than those offered by the current paradigm of a financialized global economy they paradoxically suffer from similar limitations by placing much faith in green investments they impose a vision of the transition that presents strong technical and institutional limitations the field also fails to revisit its own understanding of macroeconomics and of specific phenomena e g financial instability through a biophysical lens in spite of increasing transdisciplinary evidence supporting this approach we suggest overcoming these limitations through institutionalist perspectives that understand money as a language through which value is created and legitimized those perspectives seem essential to re embed the governance of money within a worldview that acknowledges the finiteness and incommensurable values of earth s life support systems

commons as insurance and the welfare impact of privatization abstract it is shown here that despite the efficiency gains from privatization when markets are incomplete all individuals may be made worse off by privatization even when the resource is equitably privatized such market incompleteness is common in the developing world and can explain the often encountered resistance to efficiency enhancing privatizing reforms especially in the case of village level landholdings and forests the advantage of common held property arises because of its superior insurance properties which tend to provide income maintenance in low states sufficient conditions are established under which any feasible insurance scheme under private property cannot ex ante pareto dominate allocations under the commons

determinants of smallholder commercial tree cultivation abstract this article contains a discussion of how output prices tenure information credit technology government policies and labor availability affect smallholder commercial tree cultivation output prices play the key role in smallholder commercial tree cultivation even in the face of insecure tenure output prices however are a necessary but not a sufficient condition to induce smallholders to undertake commercial fuelwood cultivation

wages rents and the quality of life this study focuses on the role of wages and rents in allocating workers to locations with various quantities of amenities the theory demonstrates that if the amenity is also productive then the sign of the wage gradient is unclear while the rent gradient is positive the theory is extended to include the housing market and nontraded goods these extensions require little modification of the conclusion the empirical work on wages shows that the regional wage differences can be explained largely by these local attributes with the use of site price data implicit prices are estimated and quality of life rankings for the cities are computed

the mystery of the vanishing benefits an introduction to impact evaluation this article provides an introduction to the concepts and methods of impact evaluation the author provides an intuitive explanation in the context of a concrete application the article takes the form of a short story about a fictional character s on the job training in evaluation ms speedy analyst is an economist in the ministry of finance in the fictional country of labas in the process of figuring out how to evaluate a human resource program targeted to the poor ms analyst learns the strengths and weaknesses of the main methods of ex post impact evaluation

prices and tree planting on hillside farms in palawan abstract this paper investigates determinants of tree planting decisions on low income farms in the philippines the analysis quantifies the extent to which agricultural prices price uncertainty and farm specific characteristics help to explain mango planting decisions on hillside farms regression analysis is applied to data on tree planting for 1981 94 results indicate tree planting is positively correlated with mango prices and negatively correlated with prices of competing crops relative price uncertainty and farm size also play important roles in explaining tree planting patterns implications for policies to encourage tree planting are discussed

clean and secure power supply a system dynamics based appraisal abstract across the world the electricity industry is changing with the advent of renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power as these are exposed to intermittency seasonality and global climate variation policy makers concerns are now shifting towards security of supply in fact the industry confronts three conflicting goals security of supply competitive prices to customers and environmental protection in this context and given the multiple uncertainties of technology transformation this paper uses modelling based scenario analysis to investigate different extreme and plausible futures simulation is used to analyse policies aimed at increasing the penetration of renewables and to explore how these energy sources may affect system reliability this paper explores the effect of incorporating renewables in colombia where a large hydroelectric component has led to insufficient electricity being available during droughts and to high electricity price volatility though not intuitive at first glance this paper shows that renewables may contribute to i increased security of supply through complementarity e g it does not rain when the sun shines ii reduced price volatility in the medium term and iii increased industry sustainability

savings at the periphery of markets evidence from forager farmers in the bolivian amazon abstractwe used survey and ethnographic data to study savings in a highly autarkic society of native amazonians in bolivia tsimane we equated savings with the amount of maize and rice in storage area planted with plantains and manioc and number of edible domesticated animals owned by a household or an adult we found no large inter annual change in savings possibly due to low income impulsivity and a bundle of institutions and norms such as borrowing theft and reciprocity norms the bundle attenuates the need for household formal savings at the periphery of markets

cost benefit analysis values wellbeing and ethics an indigenous worldview analysis abstract in cost benefit analysis cba values are often invoked to discuss maximization strategies that produce the highest state of social wellbeing expressed in terms of utility also the conception of preferences is what individuals reveal as contributing to their wellbeing however as cba ignores the empirically testable facts of how preferences are constituted practical question arises about the legitimacy of the values themselves in contributing to welfare maximization this paper seeks to uncover the meaning of wellbeing from lessons drawn from an extensive field study conducted with a group of indigenous people in malaysia between 2008 and 2011 it concludes that despite decades of conceptual and analytical refinement the price based cba is still limited in the practical world of evaluation because of the real difficulties it encountered in assessing the non use and indirect use components of environmental assets that are non subjectively distinguishable or are not traded in the market also in ignoring individuals value judgment and the various meanings of wellbeing from different socio cultural backgrounds cba tends to lead to welfare distortions to address these theoretical and practical deficiencies it is necessary to embrace the heterodox school of ecological economics focusing on the social cultural and biophysical aspects of valuation processes

participatory exclusions community forestry and gender an analysis for south asia and a conceptual framework abstract the idea of people s participation has long been part of development thinking but today the management of local natural resources by village communities is widely accepted as an institutional imperative it is therefore essential to examine how these institutions perform especially from the perspective of the more disadvantaged based on extensive fieldwork among community forestry groups in india and nepal and existing case studies this paper demonstrates how seemingly participatory institutions can exclude significant sections such as women it provides a typology of participation spells out the gender equity and efficiency implications of such exclusions and analyzes what underlies them it also outlines a conceptual framework to help analyze the process of gender exclusion and how it might be alleviated

high value forests hidden economies and elite capture evidence from forest user groups in nepal s terai abstract this paper argues that the policy on decentralised forest management in nepal informed by experiences from the middle hills overlooks the complexity and conflictual potential of establishing effective and equitable user groups in the terai our case study evidence from west central terai suggests that the combination of high forest value and weak institutional control mechanisms create opportunities for local elites to siphon off substantial shares of the benefits generated by valuable local forests the rents created by autonomous fug policies give rise to stark distributional biases a scramble for control and institutional instability we estimate the extent of elite capture and argue that institutional reform needs are intimately linked to controlling what we call the hidden economy of forest user groups

governance land and distribution a discussion on the political economy of community based conservation abstract the effectiveness of community based conservation cbc has been under discussion through the review of cbc initiatives in developing countries we contribute to the debate by analysing how players influence different factors that determine the outcomes of cbc we highlight several points first the promise of benefits has been overshadowed by constraints on the extraction of natural resources along with the use of governmental schemes to extract partially the rents from cbc which has left little to share inside the communities second cbc design and implementation has often overlooked the asymmetries of power within the community and at the individual level which has produced unequal access to the design decision making and outcomes of this activity third while the elites have had a determinant role in shaping the governance of cbc external agents promotion of cbc has tended to reproduce the existent negotiating power at the community local and national levels fourth land contestation plays a key role in the dynamics of relationship and conflict between the governments corporate interests and the communities finally cbc adaptation to new scenarios depends critically on the process of community empowerment and the building of networks with external agents

do the poor benefit from devolution policies evidence from malawi s forest co management program do local people especially vulnerable households benefit from devolution of forest management the authors apply the propensity score matching and decomposition techniques on household data from chimaliro and liwonde forest reserves under the pilot forest co management program in malawi after controlling for selection bias they find that while the program raises forest income for participants in chimaliro it reduces revenue for participants in liwonde interestingly results indicate that the program raises forest income for female and low income participants although male and richer participants capture more benefits due to discrimination and endowment differences accounting for 100 and 60 of the inter group income disparity respectively

socioeconomic impacts of public forest policies on heterogeneous agricultural households nepal has a long history of returning public forests to local people as part of its community forestry programme in principle the community forestry programme is designed to address both environmental quality and poverty alleviation however concern has been expressed that forest policies emphasise environmental conservation and that this has a detrimental impact on the use of community forests in rural nepal where households require access to public forest products to sustain livelihoods to study the effect of government policies on forest use an economic model of a typical small community of economically heterogeneous households in nepal was developed the model incorporates a link between private agriculture and public forest resources and uses this link to assess the socioeconomic impacts of forest policies on the use of public forests socioeconomic impacts were measured in terms of household income employment and income inequality the results show that some forest policies have a negative economic impact and the impacts are more serious than those reported by other studies this study shows that existing forest policies reduce household income and employment and widen income inequalities within communities compared to alternative policies certain forest policies even constrain the poorest households ability to meet survival needs the findings indicate that the socioeconomic impacts of public forest policies may be underestimated in developing countries unless household economic heterogeneity and forestry s contribution to production are accounted for the study also demonstrates that alternative policies for managing common property resources would reduce income inequalities in rural nepalese communities and lift incomes and employment to a level where even the poorest households could meet their basic needs

use of multicriteria decision analysis methods for energy planning problems most decision making requires the consideration of several conflicting objectives the term multiple criteria decision analysis mcda describes various methods developed for aiding decision makers in reaching better decisions energy planning problems are complex problems with multiple decision makers and multiple criteria therefore these problems are quite suited to the use of mcda a multitude of mcda methods exists these methods can be divided in three main groups value measurement models goal aspiration and reference level models and outranking models methods from all of these groups have been applied to energy planning problems particularly in the evaluation of alternative electricity supply strategies each of the methods has its advantages and drawbacks however we cannot conclude that one method generally is better suited than the others for energy planning problems a good alternative might be to apply more than one method either in combination to make use of the strengths of both methods or in parallel to get a broader decision basis for the decision maker until now studies of mcda in energy planning have most often considered energy networks with only one energy carrier more advanced energy systems with multiple energy carriers have been neglected even though this field ought to be suitable for use of mcda due to its high complexity many decision makers and many conflicting criteria

between economic loss and social identity the multi dimensional cost of avoiding deforestation in eastern madagascar this paper exhibits the multiple dimensions of the cost of stopping the main driver of deforestation in madagascar slash and burn agriculture tavy as well as being a major component of the economic livelihoods of most local households living at the edge of forests tavy has been described by anthropologists as an important cultural practice in this paper we show that stopping tavy does not only entail an economic cost for local households the loss of the cultural dimension of tavy would come at an additional cultural cost for some our results suggest that a viable cessation of deforestation in madagascar would require going beyond simple compensation of the opportunity costs of avoiding deforestation

assessing long term energy security the case of electricity in the united kingdom there is a growing body of research into the potential security risks and trade offs which may emerge over the long term development of energy systems as part of this body of research this paper aims to develop and demonstrate a set of indicators for assessing the security of long term national electricity scenarios this paper extends the empirical work of existing frameworks by including reliability and cost parameters alongside a range of other important aspects of energy security such as diversity trade and acceptability and by using both qualitative and quantitative indicators without aggregation in order to identify trade offs this paper uses the indicators to assess the energy security implications of three plausible long term scenarios for the uk electricity system the results indicate that a major risk may be experienced by a lack of flexible responsive supply capacity in low carbon electricity pathways reducing overall energy demand is found to be the most beneficial policy for improving energy security in terms of generating benefits in multiple dimensions the paper finds that energy security is often conceptualised as the avoidance of causes of insecurity such as insecure fuel imports but that an equally important aspect of security lies in maximising responses to insecurity for example by increasing the flexibility and responsiveness of both supply and demand

trees as savings and security for the rural poor abstract professionals have rarely seen trees as savings banks for poor people but while trees and their products have become more valuable and easier to market many poor people have become more vulnerable as contingencies cost more and traditional supports weaken consequently trees have increasing importance and potential as savings and security for the poor and for use to meet contingencies for savings and security trees compare quite well with jewelry large stock small stock land and bank deposits disadvantages of trees can include insecure or unclear rights restrictions on cutting and selling when needed and problems with marketing but common advantages include cheap and easy establishment rapid appreciation in value divisibility to meet needs closely and regeneration after cutting more empirical studies are needed on the use and potential of trees as poor people s savings banks the policy implications of present evidence and analysis include tree reform improved marketing and prices and above all investing poor people with secure and full ownership of trees with rights to harvest cut and sell similar to the withdrawal rights of depositors in savings banks

what matters and why ecosystem services and their bundled qualities much ecosystem service es research is structured around four often implicit assumptions about es benefits and stakeholders conceptions of these 1 es assessors can identify and characterize priority es across stakeholders without local participation 2 stakeholders derive one kind of benefit from each es in a one to one production function manner 3 most ess are amenable to market or non market economic valuation and 4 stakeholders primarily conceive of the importance of nature in terms of ecosystems production of benefits we empirically evaluated these assumptions with a map based interview protocol to characterize what can be managed es and related activities what matters benefits and why values based on interviews with residents of coastal communities in british columbia 87 of responses to cultural es interview prompts conveyed bundles of linked services benefits and values many es related values e g transformative and identity matter in ways that are not adequately expressed using market or non market valuation respondents used diverse metaphors about why the ocean is important not only the es production metaphor which assumes that values are a function of ecosystem processes our research demonstrates the utility of our interview protocol for providing a fuller representation of ecosystem related values and benefits potentially informing environmental decision making processes

external costs of energy do the answers match the questions looking back at 10 years of externe abstract while the claim for getting prices right is quite popular in conceptual policy papers the implementation of appropriate internalisation strategies is still hampered by a lack of reliable external cost data great expectations were set into the externe project a major research programme launched by the european commission at the beginning of the 1990s to provide a scientific basis for the quantification of energy related externalities and to give guidance supporting the design of internalisation measures after more than a decade of research the externe label became a well recognised standard source for external cost data looking back into the externe history the paper pursues how emerging new scientific insights and changing background assumptions affected external cost estimates and related recommendations to policy over time based on externe results the usefulness and inherent limitations of external cost estimates for impact categories like climate change or nuclear waste disposal is discussed the paper also gives examples on how external costs in spite of remaining uncertainties are successfully used to support environmental policy

evaluating policy interventions with general equilibrium externalities abstract we report on the results of analytical and numerical models that describe the effects of non separable externalities or public goods on public policies with important general equilibrium consequences in the numerical exercise we calibrate a general equilibrium model with non separable air quality benefits in order to measure the excess burden and total net benefits of transportation and energy taxes in the 1995 u s economy the change in the physical level and the economic value in air quality associated with a given policy is a function of the substitution patterns between air quality and market goods that we assume the size of the deadweight loss due to pre existing distortions such as a tax on labor income is substantially affected by these substitution patterns

poverty alleviation and tropical forests what scope for synergies abstract this paper explores the state of the art of the two way causal links between poverty alleviation and natural tropical forests microimpacts of rising poverty can increase or slow forest loss at the macrolevel poverty also has an ambiguous effect but it is probable that higher income stimulates forest loss by raising demand for agricultural land the second question is what potential forest led development has to alleviate a country s poverty in terms of producer benefits consumer benefits and economy wide employment natural forests widely serve as safety nets for the rural poor but it proves difficult to raise producer benefits significantly urban consumer benefits from forest an important target for pro poor agricultural innovation are limited and seldom favor the poor absorption of poor unskilled labor is low in forestry which tends to be capital intensive natural forests may thus lack comparative advantage for poverty alleviation there are few win win synergies between natural forests and national poverty reduction which may help to explain why the loss of tropical forests is ongoing this may have important implications for our understanding of sustainable forest development and for the design of both conservation and poverty alleviation strategies

reflex an adapted production simulation methodology for flexible capacity planning as intermittent energy resources become more significant in power production traditional capacity planning may be insufficient to ensure reliable system operation a system planner must ensure that flexibility solutions are available to respond to large and uncertain ramping events these solutions may be operational such as improved unit commitment and dispatch curtailment of renewables or demand response procurement based such as new fast ramping resources or batteries or involve market reform this paper outlines a new methodology for modeling the economic tradeoffs in implementing flexibility solutions for integrating renewables the proposed model includes both a stochastic treatment of system states to account for a wide range of operating conditions and an adapted production simulation methodology that weighs the cost of reliability and subhourly flexibility violations against the cost of the operational flexibility solutions available to mitigate them the model s functionality is demonstrated with a case study of california at a 50 rps in 2030 the model tests the value of 1088 mw of generic flexible units relative to the same capacity of must run resources finding an expected annual value of 347 pm 42 million yr potential applications of the model for resource planning and procurement are also discussed

safety nets gap filling and forests a global comparative perspective summary in the forest livelihoods literature forests are widely perceived to provide both common safety nets to shocks and resources for seasonal gap filling we use a large global comparative dataset to test these responses we find households rank forest extraction responses to shocks lower than most common alternatives for seasonal gap filling forest extraction also has limited importance the minority of households using forests for coping is asset poor and lives in villages specialized on forests in particular timber extraction overall forest resources may be less important as a buffer between agricultural harvests and in times of unforeseen hardship than has been found in many case studies 2014 published by elsevier ltd

credit constraints and the composition of housing sales farewell to first time buyers during the housing bust of 2008 2009 housing prices and transaction volumes fell across the united kingdom while the drop in prices was similar across housing types transaction volumes fell more for units at the lower end of the market i document this fact and provide panel and instrumental variable estimates showing its link with tightening credit conditions in england and wales during 2008 i then use an overlapping generations framework to relate the change in the composition of sales with the reduction in loan to value ratios by british banks and to derive additional predictions as down payment requirements increase young households with scarce financial resources are priced out by older owners who retain their previous houses as rental properties when trading up recent changes in aggregate housing tenure disaggregated changes in renting and sales in areas with different age compositions are consistent with these predictions the results presented here show how the composition of sales changes over the housing cycle and may inform ongoing policy discussions about reduced access to home ownership by the young

the rise of the sunbelt in the last 50 years population and incomes have increased steadily throughout much of the sunbelt this paper assesses the relative contributions of rising productivity rising demand for southern amenities and increases in housing supply to the growth of warm areas using data on income housing price and population growth before 1980 economic productivity increased significantly in warmer areas and drove the population growth in those places since 1980 productivity growth has been more modest but housing supply growth has been enormous we infer that new construction in warm regions represents a growth in supply rather than demand from the fact that prices are generally falling relative to the rest of the country the relatively slow pace of housing price growth in the sunbelt relative to the rest of the country and relative to income growth also implies that there has been no increase in the willingness to pay for sun related amenities as such it seems that the growth of the sunbelt has little to do with the sun

housing booms and city centers popular discussions often treat the great housing boom of the 1996 2006 period as if it were a national phenomenon with similar impacts across locales but across metropolitan areas price growth was dramatically higher in warmer less educated cities with less initial density and higher initial housing values within metropolitan areas price growth was faster in neighborhoods closer to the city center the centralization of price growth during the boom was particularly dramatic in those metropolitan areas where income is higher away from the city center we consider a number of different explanations for this connection and find that the connection between centralized price growth and decentralized income seems to be most explained by the faster price growth in central cities that use relatively more public transit

equity reexamined a study of community based rainwater harvesting in rajasthan india summary equity is central to community based development efforts but community perspectives on equity are seldom examined in the development literature this study investigates how equity in a rainwater harvesting program is understood and practiced in two rajasthani communities drawing on bourdieu s concept of symbolic capital we find that the symbolic capital accrued from contributing to the project is as central to community understandings of equity as the distribution of benefits from the project we find that a continuing sense of community despite heterogeneity is itself a form of symbolic capital community based valuations of equity thus enable a more catholic approach to costs and benefits that broadens our knowledge both of equity and of development

power system expansion planning under uncertainty a methodology is described for expansion planning of power systems under uncertainty in factors such as demand growth fuel cost delay in project completion and financial constraints the approach draws upon three classes of techniques decomposition and stochastic optimization provide the basic framework and allow an implicit representation of alternative investment strategies decision analysis is used to represent the dynamic aspects of decision making as uncertainties are resolved over time and hedging objectives from tradeoff analysis help select flexible and resilient expansion strategies case studies within the brazilian system are presented and discussed

decentralization and participation the governance of common pool resources in nepal s terai summary decentralization has emerged as an important instrument of environmental and development policy in the last two decades presumed benefits of environmental policy decentralization depend in significant measure on broad participation in the programs that governments create to decentralize decision making related to resource management this paper uses data from protected areas in nepal s terai to examine who participates in environmental decentralization programs on the basis of our statistical analysis we highlight the fact that the likelihood of participation in community level user groups is greater for those who are economically and socially better off we also find that individuals who have greater access to and who visit government offices related to decentralization policies more often are also more likely to participate in user groups created by state officials finally we find a negative correlation between education and levels of participation our study and analysis support the argument that for decentralization policies to be successful on equity issues it is important to build institutional mechanisms that encourage poorer and more marginal households to access government officials improve access to educational opportunities and create incentives to promote more interactions between less powerful rural residents and government officials 2005 elsevier ltd all rights reserved

power generation expansion planning model towards low carbon economy and its application in china climate change poses a huge threat to human welfare hence developing a low carbon economy has become a prevailing and inevitable trend decarbonization of power generation especially converting the current power mix into a low carbon structure will be a critical option for co2 emission mitigation in this paper an integrated power generation expansion pge planning model towards low carbon economy is proposed which properly integrates and formulates the impacts of various low carbon factors on pge models in order to adapt to the characteristics of pge models based on low carbon scenario a compromised modeling approach is presented which reasonably decreases complexities of the model while properly keeping the significant elements and maintaining moderate precision degree in order to illustrate the proposed model and approach a numerical case is studied based on the background of china s power sector making decisions on the optimal pge plans and revealing the prospects and potentials for co2 emission reduction

valuing environmental factors in cost benefit analysis using data envelopment analysis abstract environmental cost benefit analysis ecba is used for the social evaluation of investment projects and policies that involve significant environmental impacts economic valuation of environmental impacts forms one of the critical steps of ecba we develop a new method for this purpose which does not require price estimation for environmental impacts using stated or revealed preference methods our approach is based on data envelopment analysis dea which is modified to ecba by using absolute shadow prices instead of relative prices we also discuss how the method can be used for sensitive analysis in ecba we illustrate the method by means of a hypothetical numerical example

generation expansion planning optimisation with renewable energy integration a review generation expansion planning consists of finding the optimal long term plan for the construction of new generation capacity subject to various economic and technical constraints it usually involves solving a large scale non linear discrete and dynamic optimisation problem in a highly constrained and uncertain environment traditional approaches to capacity planning have focused on achieving a least cost plan during the last two decades however new paradigms for expansion planning have emerged that are driven by environmental and political factors this has resulted in the formulation of multi criteria approaches that enable power system planners to simultaneously consider multiple and conflicting objectives in the decision making process more recently the increasing integration of intermittent renewable energy sources in the grid to sustain power system decarbonisation and energy security has introduced new challenges such a transition spawns new dynamics pertaining to the variability and uncertainty of these generation resources in determining the best mix in addition to ensuring adequacy of generation capacity it is essential to consider the operational characteristics of the generation sources in the planning process in this paper we first review the evolution of generation expansion planning techniques in the face of more stringent environmental policies and growing uncertainty more importantly we highlight the emerging challenges presented by the intermittent nature of some renewable energy sources in particular we discuss the power supply adequacy and operational flexibility issues introduced by variable renewable sources as well as the attempts made to address them finally we identify important future research directions

twenty thousand sterling under the sea estimating the value of protecting deep sea biodiversity the deep sea includes over 90 of the world s oceans and is thought to be one of the most diverse ecosystems in the world it supplies society with valuable ecosystem services including the provision of food the regeneration of nutrients and the sequestration of carbon technological advancements in the second half of the 20th century made large scale exploitation of mineral hydrocarbon and fish resources possible these economic activities combined with climate change impacts constitute a considerable threat to deep sea biodiversity many governments including that of the uk have therefore decided to implement additional protected areas in their waters of national jurisdiction to support the decision process and to improve our understanding for the acceptance of marine conservation plans across the general public a choice experiment survey asked scottish households for their willingness to pay for additional marine protected areas in the scottish deep sea this study is one of the first to use valuation methodologies to investigate public preferences for the protection of deep sea ecosystems the experiment focused on the elicitation of economic values for two aspects of marine biodiversity i the existence value for deep sea species and ii the option value of deep sea organisms as a source for future medicinal products

does participation in common pool resource management help the poor a social cost benefit analysis of joint forest management in jharkhand india abstract joint forest management jfm has succeeded in halting forest degradation in india but its poverty reduction objective has not fully been evaluated previously this paper compares jfm forests and government managed forests to assess their respective net social benefits to different groups of local villagers it shows that the jfm regime reflects the social preference of the rural nonpoor and that the poor are net losers over a 40 year time horizon future plans for jfm need to include suitable compensatory mechanisms to reduce the poverty of the poorest within a village

value of recreational fishing in the brazilian pantanal a travel cost analysis using count data models abstract recreational fishing value of the brazilian pantanal is measured using travel cost method tcm we compare non linear poisson and negative binomial count data models to estimate recreational fishing trip demands the count data and truncated models are used primarily to account for non negative integer and truncation properties of recreational fishing trips as suggested by the recreation valuation literature the results reveal that non linear and truncated count data models perform relatively well in our study the economic values of recreational fishing in terms of consumer surplus cs are derived using non linear and truncated models we estimate the cs values from 540 54 to 869 57 per trip resulting in the total social welfare estimate range from 35 to 56 million the study demonstrates a relatively high value of recreational fishing in the pantanal in comparison to similar studies conducted in other parts of the world the findings of this study would be important for resource management decisions in the pantanal and could serve as a reference in valuing similar resources in other ecosystems around the world

estimates of the genuine progress indicator gpi for vermont chittenden county and burlington from 1950 to 2000 the genuine progress indicator gpi a version of the index of sustainable economic welfare isew is a significantly more comprehensive approach to assessing economic progress than conventional measures like gross domestic product gdp gpi adjusts for income distribution effects the value of household and volunteer work costs of mobility and pollution and the depletion of social and natural capital isew or gpi have been estimated for several countries around the world and a few canadian provinces but we report here on the first multi scale application at the city county and state levels in vermont usa we show that it is feasible to apply the gpi approach at these smaller scales and to compare across scales and with the national average data limitations and problems still exist but potential solutions to these problems also exist all three vermont scales had significantly higher gpi per capita since 1980 than the national average indicating the major differences that can exist within countries the gpi per capita for all vermont scales was similar to the national average in the 1950 1980 period but more than twice the national average by 2000 the main factors explaining this difference had to do with vermont s much better environmental performance than the national average in the post 1980 period d 2004 elsevier b v all rights reserved

the inclusion of spinning reserves in investmetn and simulation models for electricity generation abstract the demand for electricity varies substantially from hour to hour from day to day and from season to season because electricity is a highly perishable commodity which can be stored only at great expense and because the penalty for failing to meet demand is severe the fluctuations of demand over time are crucial in determining an optimal investment strategy for generating equipment traditionally demand is represented by a load duration curve which neglects the time of day when peaks and troughs occur by incorporating a load distribution curve into the model in a computationally tractable manner this paper demonstrates that the results of the traditional models may be sensitive to changes in the assumptions implied by the load duration curve