77 research outputs found
Informal regulation of industrial pollution in developing countries : evidence from Indonesia
No full textThe authors test a model of supply-demand relations in an implicit market for environmental services when formal regulation is absent. They use plant-level data from Indonesia for 1989-90, before the advent of nationwide environmental regulation. Treating pollution as a derived demand for environmental services, their model relates emissions of biological oxygen demand to the price (expected cost) of pollution; to prices of other inputs (labor,energy, materials); and to enterprise characteristics that may affect pollution demand, including scale, vintage ownership, and efficiency. The price of pollution is determined by the intersection of plant-level demand and a local environmental supply function, enforced by community pressure or informal regulation. Environmental supply is affected by community income, education, the size of the exposed population, the local economic importance of the plant, and its visibility as a polluter. Their results are strongly consistent with the existence of an informal"pollution equilibrium."Pollution intensity declines with increase in plant size, efficiency, and local materials prices. Older plants and publicly owned facilities are more pollution intensive; multinational ownership has no independent effect. The results also suggest that the price of pollution is higher when plants are particularly visible and is far lower in poorer, less-educated communities. Thus the intensity of pollution is far higher in such communities. While it would be premature to generalize from these results, they suggest that the model of optimal pollution control in environmental economics is more relevant for developing countries than many have believed. Community-factory interactions seem to reflect environmental supply-demand considerations even when formal regulation does not exist. In addition, the apparent power of informal regulation implies that cost-effective formal systems should be designed to complement, not supplant, community control. In particular: 1) Local communities should not be forced to rely so heavily on visibility when judging environmental performance. Formal regulation should include publication of audited emissions reports from factories; 2) Environmental injustice may be real and important. Many poor, uneducated communities may need extra support from national regulators.; and 3) However, appropriate regulation should strike the right balance between equity and efficiency. Uniform national standards go too far because they eliminate all the natural and legitimate regional diversity that is also reflected in informal arrangements.Public Health Promotion,Environmental Economics&Policies,Water and Industry,Sanitation and Sewerage,Water Conservation,Environmental Economics&Policies,Water and Industry,TF030632-DANISH CTF - FY05 (DAC PART COUNTRIES GNP PER CAPITA BELOW USD 2,500/AL,Sanitation and Sewerage,Urban Services to the Poor
Business environment, clustering, and industry location : evidence from Indian cities
No full textHow do differences in the local business environment influence location of industry within countries? How do the benefits of a good business environment compare with those from good market access and agglomeration economies from industry clustering? The authors examine these questions by analyzing location decisions of individual firms. Using data from a recently completed survey of manufacturing firms in India, they find that both the local business environment and agglomeration economies significantly influence business location choices across cities. In particular, excessive regulation of labor and of other industrial activities reduces the probability of a business locating in a city. The authors'findings imply that in order to attract industrial activity, smaller or remoter cities need to offer even more attractive policy concessions or reforms to offset the effects of their relatively adverse (economic) geography. Their methodology pays special attention to the identification of agglomeration economies in the presence of unobserved sources of natural advantage.
Do incompatible network standards lead to domestic benefits? The case of color television
No full textReducing air pollution from urban passenger transport : a framework for policy analysis
No full textThis paper develops a simple framework to analyze various pollution control strategies that have been used or are proposed in the urban passenger transport sector. The context is the declining quality of air in urban areas, which is among the serious problems associated with the rapid motorization of societies the world over. The paper examines the point of impact of different policy levers and provides a categorization of different instruments that should assist policy makers when choosing between them. A distinguishing feature of this framework is its explicit recognition of behavioral incentives, in particular, the fact that offsetting changes in consumer behavior can often undermine the original intent of particular policies. The paper is organized as follows. Section II presents the basic framework we have used to examine transport emissions. Section III reviews pollutant characteristics and their impact. The resulting policy choices are discussed in more detail in section IV. Several urban transport projects supported by the World Bank are then reviewed in section VI, and section V concludes the report.Montreal Protocol,Environmental Economics&Policies,Air Quality&Clean Air,Roads&Highways,Public Health Promotion,Roads&Highways,Urban Transport,Transport and Environment,Environmental Economics&Policies,Airports and Air Services
Achievements, Opportunities, and Challenges in Bangladesh's Power Sector
No full textThe report surveys the challenges facing
Bangladesh's power sector today and makes
recommendations for consideration by national policy makers.
Its starting point is the Government's goal of
universal access to electricity by 2021, when Bangladesh
completes 50 years of independence. Bangladesh can justly be
proud of its progress in providing power to its people over
the past decade. Generation capacity has steadily grown from
5.5 GW in 2009 to more than 13 GW in 2017—an increase of 140
percent. Starting from levels of access to electricity below
50 percent, today access is around 80 percent, with a
globally recognized off-grid rural Solar Home System (SHS)
program contributing almost 14 percent of that total. Sector
performance is better than that of larger countries in the
South Asia Region on key dimensions—distribution and
transmission losses (together around 14 percent) and
collection efficiency (above 90 percent). Bangladesh was an
early mover in initiating private power generation in the
late 1990s. The independent power producer (IPP) contracts
awarded at that time through a transparent competitive
process brought it what remains even today some of the
lowest cost power in South Asia. Power imports from India
commenced in 2013 and are set to grow—they are a critical
element of the Government's strategy to supplement
domestic generation with other sources of supply. The
country has also demonstrated impressive mobilization and
institutional capacity in selected agencies, which it can
leverage in its quest to rapidly achieve middle-income status
More power to India. The challenge of electricity distribution
No full textMore power to India. The challenge of electricity distribution / Sheoli Pargal and Sudeshna Ghosh Banerjee. World Bank, 2014, 255 p. http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/WDSContentServer/WDSP/IB/2014/06/20/000456286_20140620091641/Rendered/PDF/889060PUB0978100Box385252B00PUBLIC0.pdf Presentation (© Esmap) : Two decades after the liberalization of India’s economy and a decade after the passage of the Electricity Act of 2003, what is the state of India’s power sector? This new ESMAP-su..
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