Journal of Environmental Assessment Policy and Management

In September 2013, China began to implement a series of policies in tackling severe air pollution. This paper aims to explore the diversity and effectiveness of its air pollution control policies at the city level. A city-level pollution control policy indicator is constructed for 35 Chinese cities during the last two air pollution control action periods from 2014 to 2017 and 2018 to 2020. Additionally, this paper employs the panel vector autoregression model (PVAR) to estimate the impact of air pollution control policies on air pollution reduction. The empirical results show that, in terms of the two main air quality indicators, PM_2.5 and PM₁₀, China’s air pollution control policies have helped improve the air quality over the last several years. The study concludes that air quality improvement should depend on coordinated strategies for controlling various pollutants that involve the collaboration of government and industries.

The nexus between trade openness and carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions remains unsettled in the existing literature. Using a balanced panel dataset for 76 countries from 1990 to 2019, this study empirically investigates the non-linear relationship between trade openness and CO₂ emissions. Given the potential cross-sectional interdependence in the panel, we employ the system-generalised method of moments. We also conduct a mediating effect analysis to explore potential mediation effect in the trade openness-CO₂ nexus. Finally, the regional heterogeneity is discussed. The empirical results revealed an inverted U-shaped relationship between trade openness and CO₂ emissions, indicating that CO₂ emissions increase initially with an expansion of trade openness, then decline after trade openness crossing the turning point. Furthermore, three mediation effects (i.e. scale effect, technique effect and composition effect) exist in the nexus between trade openness and CO₂ emissions. Additionally, the impact of trade openness is heterogeneous across different regions. The main research results show that technique spillover is an important way to achieve a win-win situation in emission reduction and trade openness.

Regarding the significant share of the automotive industry in both producing economic value added and employment, this sector is dominated in the industrial development approach. On the other side, different societies have focussed on the emissions, energy consumption and also waste production of road transportation as important risk threatening environmental health. So, the supply side is highly expected to deal with the expectations of stakeholders relating to sustainability concerns and related risks. To evaluate the implementation of environmental policies in the direction of sustainability and respond to the sustainability and environmental concerns of stakeholders, similar organisations need a uniform framework for performance appraisal. The present study aimed to identify, select and validate the environmental key performance indicators for sustainability assessment of the automotive industry to create a framework for selecting the indicators and using them as a uniform method for better comparison of the performance of car companies in the field of environmental sustainability.

In this research, key environmental performance indicators are studied in accordance with sustainability evaluation in the vehicle industry and final indicators introduced using SMARTL criteria. The results showed that 41 indicators included in five categories of waste and waste water, soil contaminators and solid waste, carbon production and energy consumption and management are introduced according to ISO14031 model. Evaluating and monitoring these indicators, defined based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals 2030, can both reflect the quantitative improvement in the environmental performance. Additionally, using SMARTL key environmental performance indicators, the organization is able to comprehensively manage the environmental performance in accordance with environmental and sustainable development goals and policy. Using a uniform method for evaluating and monitoring the environmental performance allows us to compare the environmental performance of similar companies in line with sustainable development policies and creates a competition that allows the organisation to always increase its performance in a positive way.

This study estimates willingness to pay (WTP) for different sustainable ecosystem management measures in the Jaffna lagoon. For this study, 118 fishermen were randomly selected along the lagoon. Choice modelling approach was employed and a conditional logit model was developed. This study found that fishermen from village communities are willing to pay more for increasing the number of mangroves and improving tourist facilities. The availability of land for planting mangroves and improving tourist facilities and increasing income from other sources positively influence the fisherman’s WTP for sustainable ecosystem management. Establishing fishing harbour facilities, properly planned multi-storey housing units in town areas would increase fishermen’s support for planting mangroves and developing tourist spots. Increasing income from other sources and fishermen’s awareness on the impact of inappropriate fishing gears and enforcing mechanism would increase fishermen’s support to ban the inappropriate fishing gears. Based on this study, government authority could make appropriate policy for urban and village coastal lagoon ecosystem management.

Understanding stakeholders’ perceptions and preferences regarding different soil conservation practices (SCPs) are essential for addressing short-term ecosystem service (ES) values from a particular field. Demand for multiple ESs of SCPs has received limited attention. This study aimed to examine stakeholders’ perceptions on multiple ESs of SCPs in Tiwa watershed, Northwest highlands of Ethiopia. Results of the multi-criteria analysis method indicated that the combination of vegetation stabilised terracing, compost and crop residue under the legume-cereal crop rotation (LCCR) system was the most preferred conservation method for enhanced provisional, regulating and social ESs. Soil bunds stabilised with Sesbania sesban shrubs were the second preferred by providing more ESs. Subsequently, the inclusion of crop residue into the soil under the LCCR system, followed by compost use was perceived to regulate soil fertility and increase crop yields, and reduce the cost of chemical fertiliser in the short term. Hence, it is recommended that a combination of terraces stabilised with Sesbania sesban, and compost under the LCCR system can be the best alternative approach for multiple ESs in the highland of Ethiopia.