Browsing by Author "Bluffstone, Randy"

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    Corporate environmental management in transition economies: The case of Central and Eastern Europe
    (2009-12-04T12:55:13Z) Garcia, Jorge; Bluffstone, Randy; Sterner, Thomas
    We use firm-level data to study the adoption of Environmental Management Practices (EMPs) in the most polluting industrial sectors in Bulgaria, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia during the 1990 – 1998 period when these countries were in a transition away from a centrally planned economy. Despite the stickiness of a long established managerial regime and the declines in industrial output during this period, around 42% of the firms in our sample adopted Environmental Plans (EPs) and/or established Environmental Departments (EDs). The analysis reveals that enforcement and public disclosure of the environmental performance of firms are the most important forces behind the implementation of both of these EMPs. Also, but to a lesser extent, export oriented firms and larger firms are prone to adoption. Finally, we use a methodology that clarifies some of the links between different EMPs not addressed in earlier studies. Notably, once a firm has decided to adopt (or not adopt) an ED, additional increases in enforcement do not to lead to EP implementation.
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    Economics of Soil Conservation Adoption in High-Rainfall Areas of the Ethiopian Highlands
    (2009-11-30T10:37:09Z) Kassie, Menale; Holden, Stein; Köhlin, Gunnar; Bluffstone, Randy
    This study measures the impact of fanya juu bunds (an important soil and water conservation technology and the most popular type of contour bund in east Africa) on the value of crop production in a high-rainfall area in the Ethiopian highlands using cross-sectional multiple plot observations. We applied switching regression, stochastic dominance analysis (SDA), and decomposition and propensity score matching methods to ensure robustness. The switching regression, SDA, and decomposition analyses relied on matched observations, which was important because regression and SDA often do not ensure that comparable plots with conservation technology (conserved) and plots without (unconserved) actually exist in the distribution of covariates. All models told a consistent story that the value of crop production for plots with bunds was lower than for plots without bunds. In addition, the yield decomposition results showed that, although there was little difference in endowments between conserved and unconserved plots, the returns to endowments were substantially higher for unconserved plots. Based on these findings, it was hard to avoid the conclusion that these technologies might reduce soil erosion and associated off-site effects, but they did so at the expense of poor farmers in the Ethiopian highlands. We concluded that unless productivity was increased—for example by increasing fodder grass production on bunds—fanya juu bunds reduced on-farm production and therefore could not be characterized as a “win-win” measure to reduce soil erosion.