This report reviews the current status of second generation biofuels. First generation biofuels continue to be substantially subsidized, and this has contributed to the increasing use of such fuel. However, recent studies claim that the future of biofuels lies in second generation biofuels, in particular biochemical ethanol made from cellulose.
The ability to provide public goods is essential for economic and social development, yet there is very limited empirical evidence regarding contributions to a real local public good in developing countries. This paper analyzes a field experiment where 200 households in rural Vietnam could make real contributions to an archetypical public good, a bridge.
Press release from University of Gothenburg, School of Business, Economics and Law, Environmental Economics unit, 24 May 2011 People living in coastal areas in Africa can rarely utilise their entire…
This paper uses data from household- and plot-level surveys conducted in the highlands of the Tigray and Amhara regions of Ethiopia to examine the contribution of sustainable land-management practices to net values of agricultural production in areas with low- and high-agricultural potential.
Agricultural Investment and Productivity provides a deep and systematic look at the opportunities for and constraints to investments in sustainable agriculture in East Africa, offering important insights into what works and how to analyze agricultural investments in one of the poorest regions of the world.
Press release from Environmental Economics Unit, School of Business, Economics and Law, University of Gothenburg, 2011-05-13 Most people would probably agree that quality of life means more than just…
Thomas Sterner makes the latest addition to RFF policy commentary series with a piece on whether fuel taxes are indeed regressive. Raising fuel taxes could significantly reduce emissions of greenhouse…
Unique survey data from a contingent valuation study conducted in three different countries (China, Sweden, and the United States) were used to investigate the ordinary citizen’s willingness to pay (WTP) for reducing CO2 emissions. We found that a large majority of the respondents in all three countries believe that the mean global temperature has increased over the last 100 years and that humans are responsible for the increase.
This paper uses a choice experiment to study citizens' preferences for effort-sharing rules for reducing carbon dioxide emissions. For a given global cost and level of emission reduction, we study the willingness to pay for various rules that imply different distributions of the cost between EU, the US, China and Africa.
The paper reviews the current use of instruments for environmental fiscal reform (EFR) in selected East and Southern African countries and analyzes the effects on income distribution from fuel taxes. Theoretical arguments for introducing taxes on environmental and fiscal grounds as well as potential trade-offs between environmental and fiscal objectives are discussed.