TOWARD AGRICULTURAL ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT: APPLYING LESSONS FROM CORPORATE ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT

Many business firms both in the U.S. and abroad are practicing corporate environmental management. They are committed to improving the efficiency of material use, energy use and water use; to recycle; to make safer products and processes and to reduce their overall impact on the environment. In pursuing corporate environmental management, some businesses have found that the presumed tradeoff between profits and environmental quality does not always apply. Instead, by innovating and redesigning their products, processes, corporate culture, and organizational strategy, these firms have been able to improve environmental performance and add to profits. These improved profits are sometimes referred to as "innovation offsets" because they result from technological changes to reduce pollution which also reduce production costs (and/or improve productivity) and thereby "offset" the costs of compliance. The necessary technological innovation is pursued when firms take a dynamic investment perspective rather than presume a static tradeoff between profits and environmental quality.Environmental Economics and Policy,

Can the Poor Participate in Payments for Environmental Services?: Lessons from the Silvopastoral Project in Nicaragua

This paper uses data from a Payments for Environmental Services (PES) project being implemented in Nicaragua to examine the extent to which poorer households that are eligible to participate are in fact able to do so, an issue over which there has been considerable concern. The study site provides a strong test of the ability of poorer households to participate as it requires participants to make substantial and complex land use changes. The results show that poorer households are in fact able to participate—indeed, by some measures they participated to a greater extent than better-off households. Moreover, their participation was not limited to the simpler, least expensive options. Extremely poor households had a somewhat greater difficulty in participating, but even in their case the difference is solely a relative one. Transaction costs may be greater obstacles to the participation of poorer households than household-specific constraints.Payments for Environmental Services; PES; poverty; participation

Poor Household Participation in Payments for Environmental Services: Lessons from the Silvopastoral Project in Quindío, Colombia

As the use of Payments for Environmental Services (PES) approaches in developing countries has grown, concern has arisen over the ability of poorer households to participate. This paper uses data from a PES project being implemented in Quindío, Colombia, to examine the extent to which poorer households that are eligible to participate are in fact able to do so. The project provides a strong test of the ability of poorer households to participate in a PES program as it requires participants to make substantial and complex land use changes. The results show that poorer households are in fact able to participate at levels that are broadly similar to those of better-off households. Moreover, their participation was not limited to the simpler, least expensive options. Transaction costs may be greater obstacles to the participation of poorer households than household-specific constraints.Payments for Environmental Services (PES); poverty; silvopastoral; Colombia

Can the Poor Participate in Payments for Environmental Services?: Lessons from the Silvopastoral Project in Nicaragua

This paper uses data from a Payments for Environmental Services (PES) project being implemented in Nicaragua to examine the extent to which poorer households that are eligible to participate are in fact able to do so, an issue over which there has been considerable concern. The study site provides a strong test of the ability of poorer households to participate as it requires participants to make substantial and complex land use changes. The results show that poorer households are in fact able to participate—indeed, by some measures they participated to a greater extent than better-off households. Moreover, their participation was not limited to the simpler, least expensive options. Extremely poor households had a somewhat greater difficulty in participating, but even in their case the difference is solely a relative one. Transaction costs may be greater obstacles to the participation of poorer households than household-specific constraints

Poor Household Participation in Payments for Environmental Services: Lessons from the Silvopastoral Project in Quindío, Colombia

As the use of Payments for Environmental Services (PES) approaches in developing countries has grown, concern has arisen over the ability of poorer households to participate. This paper uses data from a PES project being implemented in Quindío, Colombia, to examine the extent to which poorer households that are eligible to participate are in fact able to do so. The project provides a strong test of the ability of poorer households to participate in a PES program as it requires participants to make substantial and complex land use changes. The results show that poorer households are in fact able to participate at levels that are broadly similar to those of better-off households. Moreover, their participation was not limited to the simpler, least expensive options. Transaction costs may be greater obstacles to the participation of poorer households than household-specific constraints

TOWARD AGRICULTURAL ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT: APPLYING LESSONS FROM CORPORATE ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT

Many business firms both in the U.S. and abroad are practicing corporate environmental management. They are committed to improving the efficiency of material use, energy use and water use; to recycle; to make safer products and processes and to reduce their overall impact on the environment. In pursuing corporate environmental management, some businesses have found that the presumed tradeoff between profits and environmental quality does not always apply. Instead, by innovating and redesigning their products, processes, corporate culture, and organizational strategy, these firms have been able to improve environmental performance and add to profits. These improved profits are sometimes referred to as "innovation offsets" because they result from technological changes to reduce pollution which also reduce production costs (and/or improve productivity) and thereby "offset" the costs of compliance. The necessary technological innovation is pursued when firms take a dynamic investment perspective rather than presume a static tradeoff between profits and environmental quality

Economy-wide impact of water reallocation decision in a small open economy

This study examines the economy-wide effects of water reallocation decision. It takes off from the point that the existing surface water supply cannot be increased by tapping groundwater or building new dams which could take years to construct and operationalize. Thus, the available surface water supply must be reallocated to pursue certain policy objectives. This requires rigorous empirical analysis to ensure that such decision can improve or inflict the least negative impact on lhe economy. In line with the results of existing literature, this study has attempted to test the hypothesis that water reallocation can produce negative impacts not only on the sectors whose water supply is reduced but on the entire economy as well. In testing the hypothesis, the study focuses on one policy objective: accelerating induslrialization that requires a reallocation of water from the agricultural sector to the industrial sector. It uses a small CGE model for an open economy with water being explicitly included as one of the factors of production. The simulation results suggest that withdrawing some amount of water and transferring ii to the industrial sector to support a rapid industrialization of the economy can indeed produce a negative impact on the economy. This may well be a reflection of the structure of the Philippine economy in which key manufacluring sectors such as food processing and beverage sectors are heavily dependent on agricultural outputs as their primary inputs. The results, which appear consistent with existing literatures, send signals to policymakers to look at the economy-wide impacts of water reallocation policies. Future work on the issue of water reallocation decision can perhaps yield better insights when more disaggregated data become available to warrant the use of a larger CGE model with less constraints

Can the poor participate in payments for environmental services? Lessons from the Silvopastoral Project in Nicaragua

This paper uses data from a Payments for Environmental Services (PES) project being implemented in Nicaragua to examine the extent to which poorer households that are eligible to participate are in fact able to do so, an issue over which there has been considerable concern. The study site provides a strong test of the ability of poorer households to participate, as it requires participants to make substantial and complex land use changes. The results show that poorer households are in fact able to participate – indeed, by some measures they participated to a greater extent than better-off households. Moreover, their participation was not limited to the simpler, least expensive options. Extremely poor households had a somewhat greater difficulty in participating, but even in their case the difference is solely a relative one. Transaction costs may be greater obstacles to the participation of poorer households than household-specific constraints.