| 1. |
- Lööf, Hans, 1956-, et al.
(author)
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Technical Change and Total Factor Productivity Growth for Swedish Manufacturing and Service Industries
- 2009
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This paper presents alternative specifications of the production functions of a large panel of Swedish firms for the period 1992-2000. The period can be characterized as a transition when long-run productivity growth in the Swedish economy improved from being among the weakest to one of the strongest within the OECD. In order to present a detailed exploration of this dramatic change, the time trend and general index models are applied to estimate total factor productivity (TFP) growth, rate of technical change and returns to scale. The models are extended to allow for firm-specific as well as time-varying technical change. The parametric TFP measures are also compared with the non-parametric Solow residual, and several hypotheses are tested to explain the growth patterns in the Swedish economy. It is found that the improved growth rate, initially starting in large exporting manufacturing firms, after a deep economic crisis at the beginning of the 1990s, spilled over to the rest of the economy, both manufacturing and services.
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| 2. |
- Lööf, Hans, 1956-, et al.
(author)
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The Icelandic Economy : a victim of the financial crisis or simply inefficient?
- 2009
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Iceland, one of the smallest European economies, was hit severely by the 2008-financial crisis. This paper uses a firm-level Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data set to consider the economy in the period preceding the collapse of its financial system. We examine the linkage between the crisis and innovativeness from the perspective of technical efficiency by means of the Data Envelopment Analysis of 204 randomly selected firms. The results suggest that a substantial fraction of the Icelandic firms can be classified as non-efficient in their production process. The production scale of many manufacturing firms is too small to be considered technically efficient, while services firms typically use excessive resources in their production process. A remarkably weak performance in transforming R&D and labor efforts into successful innovations is observed. Based on the empirical results, suitable policy implications are suggested to remedy the inoptimal production structure and help economic recovery.
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| 3. |
- Lööf, Hans, 1956-, et al.
(author)
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Total Factor Productivity of Korean Manufacturing Industries : Comparison of Competing Models with Firm-Level Data
- 2009
-
Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This paper presents the parametric estimation of the rates of technical change and total factor productivity (TFP) growth of 7,462 Korean manufacturing firms for the period 1987 to 2007. Two alternative formulations of technical change measured by the time trend and the general index approaches are estimated with panel data models assuming flexible functional forms. Several extensions of each approach are also considered and their benefits and limitations are discussed. In addition to making estimates of the TFP growth and its decomposition, the paper compares the parametric TFP growth measure with the non-parametric Solow residual serving as a benchmark. Several hypotheses related to technology level, firm sizes, industrial sectors, skill biased technological change and macroeconomic and industrial policies are tested to explain the growth patterns and heterogeneity in technical change, input biases and TFP growth rates. Using second regression analysis, the paper explores the determinants of TFP growth and their policy implications.
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| 4. |
- Su, Biwei, et al.
(author)
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Analysis of the Determinants of Income and Income Gap between Urban and Rural China
- 2013
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In: China Economic Policy Review. - 1793-9690. ; 2:1, s. 1-29
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This paper studies on the determinants of income and urban-rural income gap to shed light on the problem of urban-rural income inequality in China. OLS, conditional quantile regression and Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition methods are used to analyze four waves of the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) household data. Results show that education and occupation are essential determinants of households’ income level. These two factors exert heterogeneous effects at different percentiles of the income distribution. In urban areas, education is more valued for high incomeearners, while for rural areas, specialized or tertiary education are more beneficial for the poorer households. Among all occupational types, farm activities show much lower returns than other types; and this is more evident for individuals at the left tail of the income distribution. We also find that for the sampled provinces, urban-rural income gap increases from the year of 2000 to 2004 but the gap decreases from 2004 to 2009. The income gap can be largely explained by the individuals’ attributes, especially by level of education and type of occupation.
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| 5. |
- Abolhosseini, Shahrouz, et al.
(author)
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A Review of Renewable Energy Supply and Energy Efficiency Technologies
- 2014
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Electricity consumption will comprise an increasing share of global energy demand during the next two decades. In recent years, the increasing prices of fossil fuels and concerns about the environmental consequences of greenhouse gas emissions have renewed the interest in the development of alternative energy resources. In particular, the Fukushima Daiichi accident was a turning point in the call for alternative energy sources. Renewable energy is now considered a more desirable source of fuel than nuclear power due to the absence of risk and disasters. Considering that the major component of greenhouse gases is carbon dioxide, there is a global concern about reducing carbon emissions. In this regard, different policies could be applied to reducing carbon emissions, such as enhancing renewable energy deployment and encouraging technological innovations. Two main solutions may be implemented to reduce CO2 emissions and overcome the problem of climate change: replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy sources as much as possible and enhancing energy efficiency. In this paper, we discuss alternative technologies for enhancing renewable energy deployment and energy use efficiency.
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| 6. |
- Abolhosseini, Shahrouz, et al.
(author)
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The Effect of Renewable Energy Development on Carbon Emission Reduction: An Empirical Analysis for the EU-15 Countries
- 2014
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The increased concerns about climate change have made renewable energy sources an important topic of research. Several scholars have applied different methodologies to examine the relationships between energy consumption and economic growth of individual and groups of countries and to analyze the environmental effects of energy policies. Previous studies have analyzed carbon emission savings, using renewable energy usage as an individual source or in combination with traditional sources of energy (e.g., hybrid plants) in connection with lifecycle analysis methods. It is shown that after a certain period, economic growth leads to the promotion of environmental quality. However, econometric modelling critiques have opposed the results of these studies. One reason is that the effectiveness of governance-related parameters has previously been neglected. In this research, we analyze the impact of renewable energy development on carbon emission reduction. We estimate a model to evaluate the effectiveness of renewable energy development, technological innovation, and market regulations in carbon emission reduction. The empirical results are based on a panel data estimation using the EU-15 countries data observed from 1995 to 2010. The elasticities of CO2 emissions are estimated, in order to evaluate the effectiveness of each parameter. The findings show that the effects of a negative climate change could be mitigated by governance-related parameters instead of economic development.
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| 7. |
- Abolhosseini, Shahrouz, et al.
(author)
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The Main Support Mechanisms to Finance Renewable Energy Development
- 2014
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Considering that the major part of greenhouse gases is carbon dioxide, there is a global concern aimed at reducing carbon emissions. Additionally, major consumer countries are looking for alternative sources of energy to avoid the impact of higher fossil fuel prices and political instability in the major energy supplying countries. In this regard, different policies could be applied to reduce carbon emissions, such as enhancing renewable energy deployment and encouraging technological innovation and creation of green jobs. There are three main support mechanisms employed by governments to finance renewable energy development programs: feed-in-tariffs, tax incentives, and tradable green certificates. Considering that many of the promising technologies to deploy renewable energy require investment in small-scale energy production systems, these mechanisms could be used to enhance renewable energy development at the desired scale. Employing a carbon emission tax or emission trading mechanism could be considered ideal policies to mitigate emissions at the lowest cost. The comparison of feed-in-tariffs and renewable portfolio standard policies showed that the former is good when a policy to develop renewable energy sources with a low level of risk for investors is considered. However, the latter is an appropriate policy when a marketview policy is applied by the government.
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| 8. |
- Al-Athwari, Baseem, et al.
(author)
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A Conceptual Model and Methodology for Evaluating E-Infrastructure Deployment and Its Application to OECD and MENA Countries
- 2013
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- As information and communication technologies have spread throughout the world, countries have realized the importance of investing more and more in building ICT-relevant infrastructure. However, for fostering further information and communication technology (ICT) development, countries are in need of an analysis tool for measuring their advancement in ICT-relevant infrastructure. Motivated by a variety of attempts to generate measures of ICT development, this study aims to develop an index that quantifies the level of ICT-relevant (e-infrastructure) deployment. In particular, this study introduces two e-infrastructure indices that are composed of six components, namely electricity, telecommunication, Internet, processing power, broadcasting, and human capital. Each component is generated from one or more indicators. This composition provides the possibility of tracking each of them separately and to identify strengths and weaknesses of each country with respect to the ICT-relevant area of the component. It will also help pointing out the source of failure in developing the ICT-related infrastructure and to develop policies for enhancing ICT-related infrastructure accordingly. For the index computation, the study uses a parametric and a non-parametric computation method rather than the traditional approaches which are frequently used in literature. In addition to this, this study also aims at analyzing the indices ranking differences among OECD countries and Middle East & North Africa (MENA) countries, using data for the time period between 2000 and 2007. The ranking of the countries shows that MENA and OECD countries differ significantly in their e-infrastructure development. However, a small group of MENA countries are ranked higher than a few OECD countries. Those countries belong to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).
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| 9. |
- Al-Hammadany, Firas H., et al.
(author)
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Determinants of Internet Use in Iraq
- 2009
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The Internet is considered to be today's most advanced technology and a key to progress of communication and exchange of information, goods, services and technologies. Since its introduction during the late 1960s, the Internet has led to the creation of opportunities and conditions of development both for the developed and developing nations around the globe. Not all nations though welcome this particular tool of world connection. Iraq is facing huge challenges in increasing Internet penetration and usage and changing the traditional way of communication. However, this is a difficult task as there are many factors that define this transition process. This issue and more shall be better presented in this study. Through the use of a suitable approach, this study aims to explain the determinants of Internet use in Iraq. The results indicate that while the people of Iraq are eager to adopt this technology in order to reach out to the world, a number of factors like lack of adequate resources, insufficient incentives and encouragement from the government and some social inhibitions are not allowing this technology to become a public domain.
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| 10. |
- Bhandari, Amit Kumar, et al.
(author)
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Willingness to Pay for Biodiversity Conservation
- 2009
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Nature based tourism is the fastest growing tourism in many parts of the world. The attitude towards conservation of nature is measured by individuals' willingness to pay. This study has made an attempt to investigate the determinants of tourists' willingness to pay (WTP) for biodiversity conservation. The determinants include a combination of socio-economic and site-specific characteristics of tourists. The study was conducted in Sikkim, which is India's prime nature based tourism destination. Results show that willingness to pay is determined by the level of education and income of tourists. Among site-specific characteristics length of stay and number of spots are the significant determinants of willingness to pay. This empirical research is a valuable input to identify market segment among tourists, which might help to generate more revenue for biodiversity conservation in Sikkim.
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