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This section briefly describes the significant political initiatives and acts of legislation in the environmental field adopted in the period from May 2021 until February 2022.

Crucial to understanding environmental policy on the front-lines is investigating how environmental policy is implemented. This chapter turns to the regulatory environment and begins by discussing the nature of command and control regulations and how they endeavor to implement environmental policy. In particular, we draw connections from earlier chapters as we discuss the governing and economic contexts that shape the implementation of environmental policy. In this chapter, we highlight the role of environmental inspectors, particularly those inspectors at the state level. These inspectors are the governmental officials who are responsible for the implementation of environmental regulation every day. We look at who these individuals are, what their experiences are like, and their challenges. This discussion helps illustrate the individuals who are responsible from protecting the environment on a daily basis.

Diane Wilson, a fourth-generation shrimper, had a life-changing experience in 1989 after she read a newspaper story about her native Calhoun County, Texas. The article reported on a study that Calhoun was one of the most polluted areas in the country due to the illegal practices of Formosa Plastics, a major multinational corporation.1 With this information, Wilson decided to act in order to protect her community; she founded the Calhoun County Resource Watch (CCRW) to stop Formosa from discharging toxins into the Gulf of Mexico.

Strict environmental regulations may change the behavioral decisions of firms. Based on the exogenous impact of the Chinese Central Government’s inclusion of environmental performance in the assessment targets of municipal officials in 2007, this study uses the difference-in-difference method to explore the impact of environmental regulations on employee income. We find that (1) environmental regulations will significantly reduce the average wage level of employees in polluting industries and have no significant impact on nonpolluting industries. (2) This effect is more pronounced in eastern China, where environmental regulations are more stringent, and in areas where political promotion incentives are stronger. (3) Mechanistic analysis finds that environmental regulations will affect employee income by increasing costs and constraining financing. (4) More importantly, we find that the decline in the average wage level of firms is mainly due to the decline in the average wage level of ordinary employees, and the average wage level of management has not decreased significantly, which means that environmental regulations have expanded social income inequality. Our findings contribute to a comprehensive understanding of the effectiveness of the implementation of environmental regulatory policies and economic cost issues.

In the context of green finance, whether listed companies in heavily polluting industries can convert the external pressure of environmental information disclosure into internal motivation is critical to achieving environmental governance goals. This paper selects 946 listed companies of 16 heavily polluting industries in the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock markets as samples to explore whether environmental information disclosure can help companies increase bank credit support and reduce debt financing costs to transform their external pressures into internal motivation. The empirical results show that there is a significant positive correlation between environmental information disclosure and bank credit decisions. From the perspective of financing scale, heavily polluting companies have the inherent motivation to disclose environmental information actively and proactively to obtain more credit support. There is no significant relationship between the corporate debt financing cost and environmental information disclosure. This paper puts forward some critical policy suggestions for government decision makers, heavily polluting enterprises and financial institutions.

The Great Lakes contain most of the United States’ surface freshwater and provide deep personal and economic connections for the residents of the region. These connections create an opportunity for bipartisanship in environmental policies with the potential to permeate energy policies. To explore that possibility, this paper examines how party affiliation affects support for water policy and energy policy in the Great Lakes region of the United States. Data from the Great Lakes Region Public Opinion Survey asked 696 Republicans, Independents, and Democrats from the Great Lakes region to respond to a range of environmental policy prompts. Responses to the policy prompts are grouped into four components: Water Quality, Water Diversions, Traditional Fuels, and Renewables. The results find that there is bipartisan support for the Water Quality and Water Diversions components. Energy policies do not receive the same bipartisan support, with Democrats and Independents having more support for the Renewables component while Republicans have more support for the Traditional Fuels component. However, when the fuel source is tied to its pollutants of the Great Lakes, then reactions to that fuel source receive a bipartisan response. The results of this research suggest that embedding water policy in energy policy may allow those policies to receive more bipartisan support. Combining water policy and energy policy can depolarize some of the politics surrounding environmental policy broadly.

On the basis of the "Pilot System of the Ecological Damage Compensation" launched in 2015 and a research sample of listed companies in China's heavy pollution industry from 2014 to 2017, this paper uses a difference-in-differences model to empirically evaluate the impact of the damage compensation system on corporate environmental investment, as well as the moderating effect of market degree and firm ownership. The result shows that the implementation of the damage compensation system significantly promotes corporate environmental investment and that the market degree exerts a moderating effect. The effect of supervision remains the same because of firm ownership. This research uses a pilot policy to form a natural experimental group to accurately identify the impact of environmental supervision on corporate environmental investment. The aforementioned conclusions recognize the need for the construction of the ecological damage compensation system, provide a reference for the national government to formulate specific effective environmental policies, stimulate the environmental governance motivation of regional governments, and encourage enterprises to assume environmental responsibilities and thereby achieve green sustainable development.

Dive fishing with cyanide is known as a risky fishing practice, as it pushes or lures divers to the limits of what their bodies can take. Its association with physical danger is linked to a culture of machismo and a coming-of-age process in which young men prove their bravery and become part of a shared manhood. What often remains implicit in the understanding of risk-seeking activities is the notion of body and masculinity that such practices entail and produce. Understanding risk and how it relates to masculinity in native terms requires conceptual tools to think beyond the self-contained body that navigates an external environment. Based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in Indonesia, this article explores cyanide dive fishing in the context of risky practice in relation to the body as contingent, permeable and leaky. Drawing from situated narratives and post-human phenomenology, the article makes room for masculinities beyond the self-contained man by describing dive fishing as a transformative process of becoming fluid to a submerged world of currents and spirits. By showing how this process brings bodies to or beyond their threshold of endurance, the article sheds light on the situated vulnerabilities of dive fishers in an environment of exploitation.

Food system is a powerful concept for understanding and responding to nutrition and sustainability challenges. Food systems integrate social, economic, environmental and health aspects of food production through to consumption. Aquatic foods are an essential part of food systems providing an accessible source of nutrition for millions of people. Yet, it is unclear to what degree research across diverse disciplines concerning aquatic foods has engaged food systems, and the value this concept has added. We conducted a systematic review of fisheries, aquaculture and aquatic food literature (2017–2019) to determine the following: the characteristics of this research; the food systems components and interrelations with which research engaged; and the insights generated on nutrition, justice, sustainability and climate change. Sixty five of the 88 reviewed articles focussed on production and supply chains, with 23 considering human nutrition. Only 13% of studies examined low- and middle-income countries that are most vulnerable to undernutrition. One third of articles looked beyond finfish to other aquatic foods, which illuminated values of local knowledge systems and diverse foods for nutrition. When aggregated, reviewed articles examined the full range of food system drivers—biophysical and environmental (34%), demographic (24%) and socio-cultural (27%)—but rarely examined interactions between drivers. Future research that examines a diversity of species in diets, system-wide flows of nutrients, trade-offs amongst objectives, and the nutritional needs of vulnerable social groups would be nudging closer to the ambitions of the food systems concept, which is necessary to address the global challenges of equity, nutrition and sustainability.

Elaborate transparency systems are now at the core of the 2015 Paris Agreement, with the assumption that this will enhance accountability, trust, and greater climate policy ambition. Much attention is now being devoted to increasing the capacity of developing countries to comply with climate transparency requirements. Contrary to viewing capacity building merely as a neutral ‘means of implementation’, our point of departure here is that capacity building has the potential to shape the nature and direction of climate transparency to be generated by countries. Key unasked questions are: What kind of transparency is facilitated through capacity-building efforts, and to further what climate policy ends? The potential steering effects of capacity building for transparency remain, in our view, largely unexamined. In addressing this research gap, we undertake a synthesis review of diverse perspectives on the ‘what, how and who’ of capacity building for transparency, as identifiable in (i) academic and grey literature; (ii) policy perspectives advanced by developed and developing countries; and (iii) emerging practices in two prominent capacity building for transparency initiatives. We draw on this three-part review to shed light on the scope and extent of climate transparency (to be) generated by developing countries in practice, with implications for the transformative potential of transparency in global climate governance. Key policy insightsTransparency about climate actions is central to the 2015 Paris Agreement.Efforts are underway to build capacities of developing countries to comply with transparency requirements.Rather than merely a neutral ‘means of implementation’, capacity building has the potential to influence the scope and extent of transparency generated by countries.To date, the focus has remained on building capacities to report on GHG emissions and mitigation, notwithstanding diverse additional priorities.There is a need for empirical analysis of capacity building’s steering effects in domestic contexts. Transparency about climate actions is central to the 2015 Paris Agreement. Efforts are underway to build capacities of developing countries to comply with transparency requirements. Rather than merely a neutral ‘means of implementation’, capacity building has the potential to influence the scope and extent of transparency generated by countries. To date, the focus has remained on building capacities to report on GHG emissions and mitigation, notwithstanding diverse additional priorities. There is a need for empirical analysis of capacity building’s steering effects in domestic contexts.

Problem definition: We investigate the effectiveness of different extended producer responsibility (EPR) implementation models for pharmaceuticals. In particular, we study two viable and prevalent models: (1) source reduction (SR), where a form of fee on sale is imposed on producers, and (2) end-of-pipe control (EC), where producers are made responsible for the collection of unused pharmaceuticals. Academic/practical relevance: The existing literature on EPR implementation models has focused primarily on nonconsumable products (e.g., electronics), whereas there is limited research on the effectiveness of different EPR implementation models for pharmaceuticals used in practice. We aim to fill this gap in this study. Methodology: We develop a game-theoretic model to characterize the equilibrium strategies of different stakeholders under both the SR and EC models and compare the resulting producer profit, environmental/social impact, and total welfare. Results: In contrast to the nonconsumable contexts where the SR model is shown to maximize total welfare, the EC model leads to a higher total welfare for certain categories of pharmaceuticals because of its effectiveness in eliminating overprescription. Moreover, we characterize conditions under which stakeholder (e.g., producer, environmental/social advocacy groups) preferences toward EPR implementation model choices are (mis-)aligned. We further show that limiting the social planner’s budget surplus under SR can eliminate the preference misalignment but leads to a loss of total welfare. Managerial implications: (1) Policymakers should be cautious about directly applying preferred EPR models from other product categories to the pharmaceutical setting. (2) The EC model maximizes the objectives of all stakeholders for a salient category of pharmaceuticals with high health benefits, high collection costs, and high environmental/social costs. (3) Policymakers should give thought to differentiating EPR implementation models across pharmaceutical categories. (4) It is important to carefully quantify the health impact of the pharmaceuticals and the operational cost parameters to inform policymaking.

This study investigates the relationship among technology innovation, emission trading schemes, and carbon productivity based on data from firms participating in the Korean Emission Trading Scheme. First, the total factor carbon productivity based on stochastic frontier analysis is estimated by industry and it is confirmed that changes in carbon productivity vary by industry. Based on the estimated carbon productivity, panel data analysis is conducted to determine the effects of innovation and environmental policy on carbon productivity. The results show that R&D investment and environmental policy play an important role in promoting carbon productivity. In this study, the factors affecting carbon productivity are also analyzed by industry. Comparative analysis across industries confirms that factors affecting environmental performance vary by industry. Innovation does not significantly affect carbon productivity in assembling industries, but in the process industry, R&D investment plays an important role in increasing environmental performance.

This research develops a difference-in-differences (DID) model to explore the relationship between environmental policy (The Measures for the Administration of Permits for the Discharge of Key Water Pollutants in the Huaihe and Taihu River Basins, MAPD) and the performance of firms involved in the paper and paper products industry (MPP) in China. Cost and innovation are introduced as mediators to explore the mediating effects. A firm-level dataset from 1998 to 2007 is adopted for empirical study. The findings support the positive role of the MAPD, and the average treatment effect is 0.016.The heterogeneity analysis shows that the MAPD exerts a positive impact on non-state-owned and small-scale enterprises, with coefficients of 0.018 and 0.021, respectively. Moreover, MAPD increases enterprise costs harming firm performance. On the other hand, it can promote firm performance by improving innovation ability.

This paper analyses the effectiveness of regional governments’ environmental taxes and policies in reducing industrial waste. We propose a spatial and dynamic model for the Spanish regions during the period 1999–2017. The results suggest that there are spatial and dynamic components in the generation of industrial waste; and that the specific environmental tax policy applied to industrial waste is not very effective, although the induced effect of these taxes and other environmental policies reduces the waste generation. Our model also suggests a relative decoupling between growth and waste, although many regions are still far from the waste Kuznets curve (WKC) turning point.

Taking industrial waste gas control as an example, this study explores the impact of fiscal decentralization on the efficiency of local governments' environmental governance under the pressure of competition, and analyzes the role of competition among local governments and support for R&D activities. The results demonstrate that fiscal decentralization can significantly promote the efficiency of local governance on control of waste gas, and this positive effect is mainly realized through the support from local government for R&D activities. As for the influence of inter-governmental competitions, only the competition in terms of governance efficiency delivers a significant U-shaped impact, and competition in expenditure scale and economy area weakly inhibits the positive influence of decentralization, meaning that the evaluation system centered on economic growth and the imitation strategy of local expenditure will not lead to a great decline in the efficiency of the use of environmental governance. Overall, this study suggests that further fiscal decentralization, emphases on government support for R&D activities, and enhanced environmental assessment in official evaluation are all the important directions for boosting the efficiency of governance.

Global agriculture consumes substantial resources and produces significant pollution. By shifting its production to new locations, and inducing changes in technology and input use, trade has a substantial impact on environmental sustainability of the world's food systems, but due to suboptimal environmental policy, the exact nature of these impacts is in dispute. We review the literature on agricultural trade and environmental sustainability, highlighting the different approaches taken in ecology versus economics. While useful in identifying environmental costs, much of the ecological literature does not compare these costs to a trade-free counterfactual and can therefore be misleading. Further, by moving production to places with more resources and increasing production efficiency, trade can reduce the environmental impact of food production. On the other hand, trade can also limit the effectiveness of domestic environmental policy because production can be shifted to countries with less stringent regulations. However, recently, consumers are leveraging trade policy to induce exporters to improve environmental sustainability. While such policies are gaining traction in wealthy countries, evidence suggests that such measures will not reach their potential without buy-in from decision makers in the countries where the environmental damages are occurring.

In security and foreign policy discourse, environmental issues have been discussed increasingly as security threats that require immediate action. Yet, as the traditional security sector does not provide straightforward means to deal with climate change and other environmental issues, this has prompted concerns over undue securitisation and ill-placed extreme measures. We argue that an effective policy to address foreseeable environmental security threats can only be developed and maintained by ensuring that it remains resolutely within the domain of civil society. In this article, we consider the case of Finland, where the policy concept of comprehensive security has been presented as the official guideline for security and preparedness activities in different sectors. Comprehensive security aims to safeguard the vital functions of society through cooperation between authorities, business operators, organisations, and citizens. We analyse the opportunities and challenges of Finland’s comprehensive security policy in addressing environmental changes through a three-level framework of local, geopolitical and structural security impacts. Our empirical evidence is based on a set of expert interviews (n = 40) that represent a wide range of fields relevant to unconventional security issues. We find that the Finnish comprehensive security model provides an example of a wide and inclusive perspective to security which would allow for taking into account environmental security concerns. However, due to major challenges in the implementation of the model, it does not fully incorporate the long-term, cross-sectoral, and cascading aspects of environmental threats. This weakens Finland’s preparedness against climate change which currently poses some of the most urgent environmental security problems.

Governments around the world are seeking to achieve socially just transitions to environmentally sustainable modes of agricultural production. Policy makers have increasingly sought to engage an array of societal actors in the collaborative design and implementation of associated policies, which we refer to as Agri-Environmental Policy (AEP) initiatives. Yet, the existing literature includes little context specific exploration of the motivations of those who engage with such initiatives. This paper addresses this gap by exploring the motivations of a small group of actors who established and coordinated a collaborative group to apply to one AEP initiative in Ireland – the European Innovation Partnership for Agricultural Productivity and Sustainability (EIP-AGRI). This group included three farmers, an agri-environmental policy advocate, and a research scientist. Drawing on assemblage literature, we illustrate how each of these actors' motivations emerged 1) based on the specific relationships in which they operated and 2) based on their imagining of potential future scenarios, which they sought to actualise through EIP-AGRI. This paper thus provides a qualitative account of how motivations emerge as different actors creatively navigate complex sets of relationships. We illustrate the utility of an assemblage approach to explore such motivations in ways that account for specific contexts and the capacity of each actor to engage with possible futures. We conclude that the capacity of collaborative approaches to AEP to appeal to actors from different backgrounds relies heavily on such actors’ ability to envisage and anticipate new possibilities. This line of exploration helps us to better understand the extent to which collaborative AEP may align the multiple goals associated with transitioning to environmentally sustainable and socially just food production systems.

Jointly with the Global North, the rise of the Global South has come at a high cost to the environment. Driven by its high energy intensity and the use of fossil fuels, the South has contributed a significant portion of global emissions during the last 30 years, and is now contributing some 63% of today's total GHG emissions (including land-use change and forestry). Similar to the Global North, the Global South's emissions are heavily concentrated: India and China alone account for some 60% and the top 10 countries for some 78% of the group's emissions, while some 120 countries account for only 22%. Without highlighting such differences, it makes little sense to use the term 'Global South'. Its members are affected differently, and contribute differently to global climate change. They neither share a common view, nor do they pursue joint interests when it comes to international climate negotiations. Instead, they are organised into more than a dozen subgroups of the global climate regime. There is no single climate strategy for the Global South, and climate action will differ enormously from country to country. Furthermore, just and equitable transitions may be particularly challenging for some countries.

With increasing global pressure on transition to carbon neutrality, various technical and policy efforts such as emission trading scheme and carbon tax are being made to improve energy productivity. Yet, there are not many literatures that analyze determinants of firm-level energy productivity, which is an important issue as energy use in industry accounts for one fourth of global carbon emission. This study investigates factors affecting energy productivity such as technology innovation, environmental policy and energy price based on firm-level data from the Korean Emission Trading Scheme (KETS). The total factor energy productivity is estimated by industry based on stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) and panel data analysis is performed to identify determinants of firm-level energy productivity. The results show that energy productivity in Korea has been improved since 2016, and technical progress and environmental policy play an important role in promoting energy productivity. In addition, analysis identifying industry-specific characteristics is performed as their production process and energy consumptions structures vary. The result shows that innovation activity does not significantly affect energy productivity in process industries, but it does in the assembling and high technology industries. This paper implies that policy design reflecting industry-specific characteristics is important to improve energy efficiency more effectively.

One of the most critical problems of today is the environmental policies with the focus on economy. Despite the many efforts of global organizations, environmental pollution is the subject of human beings. For this, the most polluting countries attract the attention of researchers. Many studies produce economy-centered environmental policies for the USA. However, the asymmetric effect of natural resources on environmental pollution has been neglected in the literature. In this paper, the effects of economic growth, renewable energy, biocapacity, and natural resources on the ecological footprint are addressed within the framework of the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis over the period 1980-2017. Empirical findings confirm that economic growth and biocapacity increase environmental degradation, while renewable energy consumption helps reduce environmental damage. More specifically, when the results are analyzed in terms of natural resources, positive shocks in natural resources contribute to reducing environmental damage, while negative shocks in it negatively affect the environmental quality. The paper presents important policy implications for economy-centered environmental issues.

As the digital economy develops rapidly and the network information technology advances, new development models represented by the network economy have emerged, which have a crucial impact on green economic growth. However, the relevant previous studies lacked the role of analyzing the direct and indirect effects of internet development on green economic growth at the prefecture-level city level. For this purpose, this paper aims to examine the intrinsic mechanism of the impact of internet development on green economic growth and provide empirical support for cities and regions in China to increase internet construction. Furthermore, the mixed model (EBM), which includes both radial and non-radial distance functions, is applied to calculate the green economic growth index. Fixed effect model and mediation effect model are also employed to test influence mechanisms of the internet development on green economic growth using panel data of 269 prefecture-level cities in China from 2004 to 2019. The statistical results reveal that internet development has contributed significantly to green economic growth. When the internet development level increases by 1 unit, the green economic growth level increases by an average of 5.0372 units. However, regional heterogeneity is evident between internet development and green economic growth, that is, the promoting effect of internet development on green economic growth is gradually enhanced from the eastern region to the western region. We also find that internet development guides industrial structure upgrading improves environmental quality and accelerates enterprise innovation, which indirectly contributes to green economic growth. And internet development mainly achieves green economic growth through enterprise innovation. Based on the above findings, we concluded that policymakers should not only strengthen the guiding role of social actors to promote the stable development of the internet industry, but also foster the construction of the three models of "internet+industry integration," "internet+environmental governance," and "internet+enterprise innovation" to promote green economic growth.

Various approaches to the implementation of the concept of extended producer responsibility in the European Union are considered, and the features of the introduction and use of the closed-cycle economy in European countries are determined. Some examples of the impact of waste legislation on the production cycle of a product in the European Union are considered, as well as the main obstacles that manufacturers had to face when trying to introduce the extended producer responsibility concept in its current form into production. The key problems of using and implementing the concept under consideration in the economy are highlighted. The interrelation of ESG factors as guidelines for strategic development with the need for the development of mechanisms of extended producer responsibility is shown. The prospects for the development of extended producer responsibility in Russian production are also outlined.

Decentralized environmental governance has become increasingly common across much of Latin America and in developing countries more generally, yet the impacts of decentralization on wildlife conservation remain unclear. Decentralized environmental governance is thought to improve efficiency, local compliance, and democratic potential of natural resource management. However, wildlife conservation, especially that of large mammals, poses unique challenges in the context of decentralized governance: wildlife conservation is often expensive, requires large expanses of contiguous habitat, and often offers few economic benefits. We analyzed Colombia's decentralized environmental governance and its performance in conserving a contentious and border-crossing wildlife species, the Andean bear (Tremarctos ornatus). We considered both decentralized institutions and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). This analysis is informed by 67 semi-structured interviews with conservation practitioners in Colombia. We found inconsistent program implementation across the country and little information exchange among institutions. These issues quite likely contribute to exacerbated human-bear conflict and thus more Andean bear deaths suggesting that the successful coordination of large-scale wildlife conservation may yet require the leadership of strong central institutions. A few international NGOs were working to improve Andean bear conservation in Colombia, but we saw little involvement at the national level of Colombian NGOs-some of whom felt they were being unfairly outcompeted by international elites. We recommend a greater engagement with Colombian NGOs (by both donors and international NGOs) as a means through which to ensure the integrity of Andean bear conservation into the future.

Environmental policy advocates are increasingly proposing ‘bundled’ clean energy policies to combat climate change while also creating jobs and transforming the economy. While such strategies may b...

The loss of international competitiveness of domestic industries remains a key obstacle to the implementation of effective carbon prices in a world without harmonized climate policies. We a...

This paper evaluates the impact of China’s Low-carbon Pilot Cities (LCPC) program on urban innovation over the period of 2004–2016. Surprisingly, this program has lowered urban nongreen innovation without affecting urban green innovation. An average decline of 0.31 (ranging from 0.27 to 0.34) in urban nongreen innovation contributes most to the average decline of 0.29 (ranging from 0.25 to 0.32) in total urban innovation during this period. This finding is at odds with the Porter hypothesis that environmental policy may trigger innovation, especially green innovation. Rather, the LCPC program appears to have a crowding-out effect on urban nongreen innovation. A possible mechanism that generates such an outcome is the program’s negative influence on industrial firms without green innovation. Evidence of the reduction in the number of industrial firms without green innovation, the increase in the number of zombie firms and the reduction in foreign newborn firms all support this argument.

Voluntary approaches to environmental policy can contribute to stemming environmental degradation in developing countries with weak institutions. We evaluate the role of a lack of awareness of a law in explaining the voluntary adoption of environmental certification by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the food and beverage industry in Vietnam. We find that firms, where owners or managers were unaware of the law were 38 percentage points less likely to receive environmental certification. Moreover, this effect is larger for firms that exported, had internet access or paid bribes, and it is weaker for household enterprises. Our results suggest that increasing legal awareness can weaken informational constraints for SMEs, where weak institutions and a lack of information often hamper the uptake of environmental policy initiatives.

At present, the state of the economy of the agricultural sector in many countries of the world, including in the countries of the European Union (EU), inherent in developed industry, has led to the transition to a new environmentally oriented agricultural policy. An important role is assigned to state support of agricultural producers, through subsidies, preferential credit policy, and in some countries, the complete abolition of taxation of entrepreneurial activity in rural areas, which confirms the relevance and national economic significance of the article. In domestic agroeconomic science and practice, there is no scientific concept of state participation in the process of bringing the agricultural sector out of the crisis. Research objectives – consider the development policy of the agricultural sector of the EU countries; study the level of state support for agricultural producers. The purpose of the work is to consider the degree of development of the agricultural policy of the EU countries in the context of ensuring food security. The methods and methodology of the research were general scientific, particular methods of cognition, including the historical and logical, the method of observation and comparison. Shows the main approaches to state regulation of the development of the agro-industrial sector at the level of the European Union as a whole and in the context of member countries; characteristic features and principles that determine the success and integrity of a unified agricultural policy; factors contributing to the productivity of agricultural land; agro-ecological requirements restricting the import of genetically modified products; the main tasks in the development of a new policy of the agrarian sector of the economy; priority directions of regulation of measures to support agricultural producers, integrated development of rural areas, increasing the competitiveness of the EU agricultural sector. The practical significance of the work lies in the fact that this study will allow the state bodies of Belarus to better understand how it is necessary to form an agricultural policy in the context of ensuring food security.

Environmental impact assessment (EIA) is a process that examines the potential impacts of development projects on society and the environment. The concept of EIA originated in 1969 by the US National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), followed by other developed and developing countries all over the globe. This paper reviews the legal status of EIA and its implementation, effectiveness, and deficiencies in Pakistan. EIA received legal status in Pakistan when the Environmental Protection Ordinance (PEPO) was drafted in 1983. This ordinance was then converted into the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act (PEPA) in 1997. Currently, EIA is conducted for many development projects in Pakistan, including infrastructure and industry projects. Environmental protection acts containing sections related to EIA and Initial Environmental Examinations (IEE; a small preliminary study for an EIA project) have been established by all Pakistani provinces, which conduct its systematic facilitation in the country. The effectiveness of the EIA/IEE process in Pakistan can be enhanced by ensuring stakeholder participation, guaranteeing transparency, providing resources to environmental agencies, and post-monitoring of EIA/IEE processes. Integr Environ Assess Manag 2022;18:314-318. © 2021 SETAC.

Promoting new energy vehicles (NEVs) is considered to be one of the most effective ways to solve the increasingly serious problems of energy security and environmental pollution. Under the background of a gradual decline in the use of subsidy policy, the dual-credit policy (DCP), as a market-incentive environmental regulation, has been introduced to the process of policy development. This is of great significance in promoting NEVs and upgrading of the automobile industry. Based on data for 56 listed companies related to NEVs from 2012 to 2019, this study investigated the impact of the DCP on total factor productivity (TFP) under the framework of the propensity score matching difference-in-differences (PSM-DID) and further analyzed the mechanisms by how the DCP impacted on TFP. In addition, the heterogenous impacts of different firms were investigated. The results reveal three key findings. (1) After using instrumental variable to overcome endogenous problems and carrying out a series of robustness tests, the DCP can significantly improve firms’ TFP, and this effect is increasing annually. (2) The results of the mechanism analysis show that technological innovation, reputation enhancements, and the reduction of manager motivation have promotional effects on firms’ TFP. Besides, environmental tax can reduce the contribution of research and development (R&D) innovation to TFP. (3) In terms of regional and market structural levels, the promotional effect of the DCP on firms’ TFP in the eastern region is greater than that in the midwestern region. Furthermore, it has no significant effect on competitive firms, but plays a significant role in the improvement of oligopolistic firms’ TFP. This study supported the Porter Hypothesis that flexible market-incentive environmental regulation is likely to trigger positive productivity effects, and provided an empirical basis and latest information for promoting the accuracy and effectiveness of the DCP implementation.

Subject. The article discusses the role of the budgetary system in the EU countries in financing the environmental policy of States. We analyze the volume and structure of environmental taxes and national budgetary spending on environmental protection, and their equilibrium. Objectives. We trace modern trends in the environmental portion of the EU countries’ budgets and substantiate thresholds of budgetary revenue and expenditures with respect to the environment in the Russian Federation. Methods. The study is based on general, economic-statistical methods and methods of economic analysis of trend series. Results. Having analyzed ecotaxes and budgetary spending on environmental protection in 2010–2019, we traced the stabilizing tendency of the budgetary contribution to finance of the environmental policy in 27 EU countries in terms of income and expenditures for environmental protection, the differentiation of the above indicators across the EU countries. In the EU countries, local authorities are obviously in charge of financing environmental protection costs, maintaining the surplus of the environmental portion of national budgets. We measured the mean value of environmental taxes and national budget spending in environmental protection in 27 EU countries. Conclusions and Relevance. As the EU actively promotes sustainable development values, respective budgetary systems continue to make more or less the same contribution throughout 2010–2019, according to aggregate data of 27 EU countries. However, the contribution significantly differs as per data of certain EU countries. Assessing the adequacy and balance of the environmental portion of the Russian consolidated budget, mean values of the EU data can be used to substantiate thresholds of the indicators.