Using household-plot level panel data from the Nile Basin of Ethiopia, this article applies a random effects ordered probit endogenous switching regression model to empirically investigate the impact of weather events and other conditioning factors on farmers’ choice of tillage intensity and the effect of changing tillage frequencies on differences in farm returns. Results indicate that, while low frequency tillage is more likely in drier areas, plot-level shocks (such as pests and diseases) are key variables in the choice of high-frequency tillage.

An appropriate design of climate mitigation policies such as carbon taxes may face a lot of challenges in reality, e.g., the strategic behavior of fossil fuel producers, and huge uncertainty surrounding the climate system. This paper investigated the effect of possible climate tipping events on optimal carbon taxation and energy pricing, taking into account the strategic behavior of energy consumers/producers and the uncertainty of tipping points through a stochastic dynamic game.

Outdated capacity and substantial potential for energy conservation are the two main features of energy-intensive sectors in developing countries. Such countries also seek to implement market-based options to further control domestic carbon emissions as well as to promote the withdrawal of outdated capacity and upgrade production level. This paper presents a quantitative assessment of the emission trading scheme (ETS) for China's iron and steel industry. The diverse array of normal and outdated capacities was modeled in a two-country, three-good partial equilibrium model.

To move China's climate policy forward, improved analyses of climate impacts on economic sectors using rigorous methodology and high quality data are called for. We develop an empirical framework, using fine-scale meteorological data, to estimate the link between corn and soy bean yields and weather in China.

The adoption of good practices for the economic valuation of environmental services (ES) has strong implications in the evaluation and design of a Payment for Environmental Services program.

Stated preference approaches, such as contingent valuation, focus mainly on the estimation of the mean or median willingness to pay (WTP) for an environmental good. Nevertheless, these two welfare measures may not be appropriate when there are social and political concerns associated with implementing a payment for environmental services (PES) scheme. In this paper the authors used a Bayesian estimation approach to estimate a quantile binary regression and the WTP distribution in the context of a contingent valuation PES application.

In semi-arid highlands of northern Ethiopia, episodes of droughts of varying severity and duration occur. The occurrence of these droughts is associated mainly with the seasonal rainfall variability. This study attempts to investigate the temporal and spatial variability of climate parameters, particularly rainfall and temperature for the period 1954-2008. Standardized rainfall anomaly was used to examine the temporal characteristics of climate variability and determine the prevalence of droughts.

Climate change and variability severely affect rural livelihoods and agricultural productivity, yet they are causes of stress vulnerable rural households have to cope with. This paper investigated farming communities’ vulnerability to climate change and climate variability across 34 agricultural-based districts in Tigray, northern Ethiopia. It considered 24 biophysical and socio-economic indicators to reflect the three components of climate change vulnerability: exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity.

We investigate the effects of climate variables on food and nutrition security and the probability of a household being food and nutrition insecure. Panel data methods from three waves of the Tegemeo Institute Household survey data (2004, 2007, and 2010) are used. Climate change is measured by long-term averages of temperature and rainfall, all measured at the peak precipitation month and extreme values of the Standardised Precipitation-Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI).

This paper constructs a theoretic model to study the behaviors of China local governments in environmental policy-making process. In our model, local governments make environmental policies under promotion incentives, while polluting firms produce according to such policies. The model predicts a Ushaped relationship between the GDP ratio of local secondary industry and the strictness of local environmental policies, which we use the 2003-2011 "China City Statistical Yearbook" panel data to test.