No description available.

This thesis examines how the secondary effects of environmental regulations are assessed before the regulations are proclaimed. Negative secondary effects of a policy (such as regulation) may outweigh direct benefits; it is important that secondary effects are clearly assessed. The case study is the control of organochlorines in the Canadian pulp and paper industry via federal regulation of dioxins and furans and British Columbia's regulation of Adsorbable Organic Halogen (AOX). The thesis is founded upon the premise that sustainability must be an integral consideration. A systems approach is used to evaluate assessments and to generate recommendations. The evaluation is divided into two parts: the process of assessing the regulation and the contents of the assessments. Background information is provided on organochlorines, pulp and paper making, the pulp and paper industry and the relevant regulatory processes. A chronology of the regulation is established. Assessments are reviewed from five classes of stakeholders: industry, labour, environmentalists, the federal government and the British Columbia government. The study found that secondary impacts of the regulation were less important than the primary action, which was managing the risk posed by organochlorines in effluent. For the secondary assessments, stakeholders felt problems with the process were greater than shortcomings in content. In particular, governments' lack of response to submissions caused a lack of confidence in the system, which was well-founded in British Columbia's highly political process. The federal Regulatory Impact Analysis Statements gave a valuable but limited summary of impact assessments and the rationale behind the regulations. To improve the process of creating environmental regulation I recommend that the federal government assemble a reference document for assessments, that all levels of government institute class assessments for general cases, and that all stakeholders use a consistent, multiobjective framework. The proposed framework is presented.

The purpose of this dissertation is to provide a better economic basis for the discussion on how much natural capital the current generation should be allowed to deplete. Chapter I uses overlapping-generations models to show the effects of different assumptions about which generation owns the stock of a natural resource on the distribution of intergenerational welfare. An increase in the share of the resource stock that is owned by the first generation, reduces welfare of later generations. If the first generation owns the full resource stock, intermediate generations have to be sufficiently wealthy to buy the resource from the first generation and sell it to later generations. This channelling effect can lead to a situation of resource abundance followed by rapidly increasing resource prices and scarcity. Chapter II show that the incompleteness of intergenerational insurance markets constitutes a market failure that leads to inefficient intergenerational investment decisions. Risks that increase from generation to generation would be under-insured by the current generation. Examples of excessive reduction of biodiversity, excessive natural resource depletion, and inefficiently low protection against global warming are provided. Chapter III analyzes the decision theoretical foundation of environmental choices under uncertainty. Since ambiguity and ignorance are important aspects of many environmental problems, subjective expected utility theory (SEU) has significant limitations as a normative decision making model. The use of SEU leads to a systematic bias against the conservation of natural capital. An alternative decision model is suggested based on the Dempster-Shafer belief-function theory and Choquet expected utility. The synthesis in chapter IV suggests that the costs of natural capital depletion are systematically underestimated in conventional analysis. To remedy the biases against future generations and the complete valuation of natural capital, a sustainability constraint on the economic activities of the current generation is proposed. This constraint requires compensation for natural capital depletion through functional substitutes. From this sustainability constraint, an operational sustainable supply rule is derived for determining shadow prices of natural capital depletion.

The issue of tensions between market access and environmental protection is relatively new focus in the domain of international trade. This article suggests solutions to this conflict within the WTO framework so that while pursuing the goals of free trade and promoting development of economy the objective of 'sustainable development' can be achieved at the same time. This article includes an introduction, the main body (three chapters) and conclusion. j The Introduction starts by describing the development of the regimes of market access and environmental protection; it goes on to analyze the causes of the tension between the two and finally emphasizes the importance of resolving this tension within the World Trade Organization (WTO) framework. Chapter One elaborates on the existing principles, regulations and exception in the WTO framework and states that these regulations cannot live up to expectations of the developed countries and environmentalists. The conclusion is that it is impractical for the developing countries to avoid this issue. Chapter Two starts with an inquiry into the crux of tensions between free trade and environmental protection. It goes on to enlist different proposals by academic scholars and compare these principles' application in European Community Treaty (EC) and North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), hoping to resolve the tensions between market access and environmental protection. Chapter Three summarizes academic proposals and experiences of EC and NAFTA and discusses possible practical resolutions within WTO including both short-term measures and long-term ones. This chapter concludes by suggesting possible courses of action for China that could allow it to sustain the 'green challenge.' The Conclusion discusses the objectivity and unavoidability of the tensions between the free trade and the environment protection and reinforces the importance of resolving the problem within the WTO framework as well as the necessity of amending related regulations and harmonizing environmental standards of the WTO members.

This dissertation consists of three chapters discussing the effects of changing trade barriers for Canadian firms and a final chapter investigating hazardous waste trade, one of the important environmental issues in international business. The first three chapters use simple theoretical structures and firm level data to examine the evolution of Canadian manufacturing following the tariff changes imposed by the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement. Chapter one considers the influence of falling tariffs on firm survival, chapter two investigates how trade liberalization effects firm growth in terms of size and productivity, and the third chapter considers the implication o f falling trade barriers for firm financial structure. The fourth chapter diverges from the first three to explore the determinants of international shipments in hazardous waste using a gravity model with factor endowment conditions and waste trade data from 89 countries.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.