Through a survey with European companies and expert interviews we study how REACH authorisation affects the phase-out of hazardous chemicals focusing on trichloroethylene, a well-studied solvent used in metal parts cleaning. We find that most of the firms have substituted trichloroethylene by perchloroethylene, which has similar chemical characteristics. This allows them to continue to use the same machines and routines at low costs.

Chemical substitution can mitigate risks from chemical substances for individuals and the environment. This study investigates the preferences of companies regarding the adoption of safer alternatives to hazardous flame retardants in electronic appliances in Sweden.

We use three rounds of a rich panel data set to investigate the determinants of household cooking fuel choice and energy transition in urban Ethiopia. We observe that the expected energy transition did not occur following economic growth in Ethiopia during the decade 2000–2009. Regression results from a random effects multinomial logit model, which controls for unobserved household heterogeneity, show that households' economic status, price of alternative energy sources, and education are important determinants of fuel choice in urban Ethiopia.

AbstractThis article contributes to a growing body of empirical literature relating credit constraints and incomplete insurance to investment decisions. We use panel data from rural Ethiopia to investigate whether participation in a safety net program enhances fertilizer adoption. Using a difference‐in‐differences estimator and inverse propensity score weighting, we find that participation in Ethiopia's food‐for‐work (FFW) program increased fertilizer adoption in the short run, but not in the long run.

This paper contributes to the growing literature on energy poverty in developing countries. We use a dynamic probit estimator on three rounds of panel data from urban Ethiopia to estimate a model of the probability of being energy poor and to investigate the persistence of energy poverty.

AbstractHow does income uncertainty affect individual well‐being? Combining individual‐level panel data from rural Ethiopia with high‐resolution meteorological data, we estimate that mean‐preserving increases in rainfall variability are associated with reductions in objective consumption and subjective well‐being. Mediation analysis suggests that the estimated reduction in consumption does not fully explain the total effect on individual well‐being. Increased rainfall variability also has a large direct effect on individual well‐being.

AbstractBiodiversity decline in the tropics requires the implementation of comprehensive landscape management where agricultural systems are necessarily an integral element of biodiversity conservation. This study evaluates the potential for taxonomic biodiversity conservation within an intensive livestock-agricultural-forest mosaic landscape in Catacamas, Honduras. Tree sampling was performed in 448 plots set up within different forest and agricultural land uses: secondary forests, agroforestry coffee plantations, agriculture, pastures, live fences and riparian forest.

We use monthly municipality data for the period 2000-2015 in Guatemala and monthly district data for the period 1992-2019 in Costa Rica. We define relevant catchment areas using water flows to the population centers of the administrative units. Then, we calculate the precipitation inside and outside Pas within the relevant catchment areas, and test how the frequency of floods and landslides is affected by whether rain falls inside or outside PAs. We use a two-way fixed-effects panel data model. For Guatemala, we find no robust statistically significant effects on these types of disasters.