Visualizations in Economics

Submitted by Manuela Fonseca on

Visual artists and graphic designers have rarely communicated with economists. Yet much of applied economics involves comparisons of states of the world that ought to be imagined. Through a simple case study, we discuss methods used in economics to value individual preferences over the environment, and the use of visualizations in these exercises. We pinpoint that it is time for economists to start a constructive dialogue with artists in general and visual artists in particular.

Conservation

Negative leakage: The key role of forest management regimes

Submitted by Manuela Fonseca on

A model of two regions with a common wood market is introduced. Regions may be of two types, according to their forest management regime, namely managed forest plantations (M) and unmanaged open access forests (U). It is found that when regions are of the same type, unilateral climate policy in the forestry sector leads to (positive) carbon leakage. However, when regions are of different types, unilateral climate policy results in negative carbon leakage.

Forestry

Identifying Drivers and Spatial Patterns of Deforestation in the Rio Grande Basin, Colombia

Submitted by Manuela Fonseca on

Identifying the spatial patterns and drivers of deforestation is a critical task in geographic research. In addition to mapping deforestation, it’s important to determine the statistical effects of the spatial configuration of tropical landscapes on current deforestation trends. In order to model drivers of deforestation is important to take into account the spatial structure of data (i.e., whether observed deforestation is spatially clustered or not).

Conservation

Linking inequalities and ecosystem services in Latin America

Submitted by Manuela Fonseca on

Latin America exhibits one of the highest rates of biodiversity and ecosystem services (ES) loss worldwide along with a remarkable asymmetry in the access to ES benefits (ecosystem services inequality, ESI hereafter). The objective of this manuscript is to propose and validate a conceptual model to understand the links between ESI and ecosystem services supply. First, previous ES frameworks were expanded to acknowledge the role of the unequal access to ES on socio-ecological system dynamics.

Conservation

Naturally available wild pollination services have economic value for nature dependent smallholder crop farms in Tanzania

Submitted by Salvatory Macha on

Despite the importance of naturally available wild pollination ecosystem services in enhancing sub-Saharan African smallholder farms’ productivity, their values to actual farming systems remain unknown. We develop a nationally representative empirical assessment by integrating nationally representative plot level panel data with spatially and temporally matched land cover maps to identify the contribution of wild pollinators to crop revenue.

Agriculture, Climate Change

Livelihood mushroomed: Examining household level impacts of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) under new management regime in China's state forests

Submitted by Hang Yin on
EfD Authors:

Finding alternative livelihood possibility for state worker households is crucial for the successful implementation of Natural Forest Protection Program (NFPP) in China's key state forest regions. One local innovation to implement NFPP while allowing worker households alternative use of forestland is the “Contract Management Responsibility System (CMRS)”. Under CMRS, participating households have exclusive rights to harvest and grow non-timber forest products (NTFP) while fulfilling forest protection responsibility.

Forestry

Prospect Theory and Tenure Reform: Impacts on Forest Management

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on
EfD Authors:

We examine the role of risk and time preferences in how forest owners respond to forest certification. We test hypotheses from a two-period harvest model derived from prospect theory in the context of Fujian, China, where new forest certification started in 2003. Using survey and field experiment data, we find that certification resulted in reduced harvesting, and the effect was larger for households who are more risk averse and exhibited distorted probability weighting.

Forestry

Context Matters: Exploring the Cost-effectiveness of Fixed Payments and Procurement Auctions for PES

Submitted by Eugenia Leon on

Successfully implemented payment for ecosystem services (PES) programs can provide both conservation of nature and financial support to rural communities. In this paper, we explore how PES programs can be designed so as to maximize the amount of additional ecosystem services provided for a given budget. We also provide a brief summary of the use of auction mechanisms in real world PES programs.

Conservation, Policy Design

Functional forms and price elasticities in a discrete continuous choice model of the residential water demand

Submitted by NENRE Concepcion on

During recent decades, water demand estimation has gained considerable attention from scholars.  From an econometric perspective, the most used functional forms include log-log and linear specifications.  Despite the advances in this field and the relevance for policymaking, little attention has been paid to the functional forms used in these estimations, and most authors have not provided justifications for their selection of functional forms.  A discrete continuous choice model of the residential water demand is estimated using six functional forms (log-log, full-log, log q

Water