Emerging market patterns in the recycled paper trade

The international recovered paper trade serves two important functions: increasing raw material availability in the paper and board industry and providing economic incentives to recycle. The purpose of this paper is to shed further light on emerging patterns in this trade by empirically analysing the changes in the bilateral trade flows of recycled paper between 1992 and 2008. According to our estimations, two important changes occurred in the 1990s and 2000s. First, the growing importance of developing economies in global recycled paper trade plays a significant role in import demand as a determinant of trade flows. Second, the changes in global trade patterns necessitate investigating the transportation cost measures used in applied research.     

SMART-SREC: A stochastic model of the New Jersey solar renewable energy certificate market

Markets for solar renewable energy certificates (SRECs) are gaining in prominence in many states, stimulating growth of the US solar industry. However, SREC market prices have been extremely volatile, causing high risk to participants and potentially less investment in solar power generation. Such concerns necessitate the development of realistic, flexible and tractable models of SREC prices that capture the behavior of participants given the rules that govern the market. We propose an original stochastic model called SMART-SREC to fill this role, building on established ideas from the carbon pricing literature, and including a feedback mechanism for generation response to prices. We calibrate the model to the New Jersey market and backtest it, analyzing parameter sensitivity and demonstrating its ability to reproduce historical dynamics. Finally, we run simulations to investigate the role and impact of regulatory parameters, thus providing insight into the crucial role played by market design.     

基于可疑筛查技术研究有机磷阻燃剂V6转化规律

运用Orbitrap高分辨质谱仪,评估了人体肝微粒体(HLM)代谢V6的转化规律.除5种已被报道过的O-脱烷基、氧化性去磷酸化和氧化脱氯产物外,首次发现了6种新型产物.基于其MS/MS质谱图,该6种代谢产物被鉴定为醛基和羧基产物.其中,5种代谢物生成量随孵育时间呈线性增加趋势,具有累积性.此外,推导的代谢途径表明,脱烷基化和羟基化代谢物进一步转化为次级代谢物,即醛和羧基代谢物.     

壬基酚的环境生物地球化学研究进展及对新污染物管理的建议

近年来,我国大气环境、水环境和土壤环境质量得到一定的改善,“碧水蓝天”已经成为常态.但随着持久性有机污染物、内分泌干扰物、抗生素和微塑料等新污染物在环境中不断被检出,新污染物正逐步受到广泛的关注,壬基酚作为一种典型的内分泌干扰物也备受研究人员的关注.系统地概括了我国水体中壬基酚的环境行为和暴露水平,并基于风险商法和联合概率曲线法对壬基酚可能造成的生态风险进行了评估.结果表明,壬基酚对水生生物的毒性效应主要包括急性毒性、生长发育毒性、雌激素效应和繁殖毒性;壬基酚在我国主要流域水体中普遍存在,其浓度平均值在60～1 000 ng·L^-1,浓度最高值可达4 628 ng·L^-1;基于风险商法和联合概率曲线法的风险评估结果表明,壬基酚对我国主要流域里的水生生物均存在一定的风险.最后,总结了目前比较常用的壬基酚处理处置和风险管控技术,比较了国际上内分泌干扰物的监管方法,针对我国在新污染物环境管理中存在的问题,提出了针对性政策建议,研究结果可以为我国新污染物管理和管控提供参考.     

河口-近海环境新污染物的环境过程、效应与风险

在全球变化和人类活动双重影响下,大量陆源污染物特别是备受各国政府和民众关注的微塑料、新型持久性有机污染物以及药物和个人护理品等新污染物进入水体环境并迁移扩散,对近海生态环境安全和人体健康产生了巨大影响.综述国内外微塑料、全/多氟化合物、抗生素和内分泌干扰物等新污染物在河口-近海环境中的污染来源、时空分布和迁移传输等环境过程及其影响因素,分析探讨近海水生生态系统中新污染物产生的不良生态效应和风险,提出未来研究重点应关注河口-近海环境中多种新污染物的相互作用和新污染物产生的联合生态毒理效应及造成的生态和健康风险等,为陆海统筹下的海洋污染防治和海洋经济的健康发展提供科学依据.     

Theory and Model of Agricultural Insurance Subsidy

The issue of agricultural insurance subsidy is discussed in this paper aiming to make it provided more rationally and scientifically. It is started with the connection between agricultural insurance and financial subsidy. It is really necessary and crucial to implement the financial insurance due to the bad operational performance, especially in the developing countries. But the subsidy should be provided more rationally because financial subsidy has lots of negative effects. A model in competitive insurance markets developed by Ahsan et al （1982） and a farmers＇ decision model are developed to solve the optimal subsidized rate. Finally, the equation is got to calculate it. But a quantitative subsidized rate is not made here because the calculation should be under some restricted conditions, which are always absent in the developing countries. So the government should provide some subsidy for the ex ante research and preparation to get the scientific probability and premium rate.     

The business case for SDGs: an analysis of inclusive business models in emerging economies

In September 2015, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were endorsed by the United Nations and adopted by all 193 Member States. The SDGs integrate the 5P’s: People, Planet, Prosperity, Peace, and Partnership and clearly stress the need for all stakeholders to collaborate to create a sustainable world. Most importantly, the SDGs appeal to the central and diverse role that the business sector can play to deliver on the SDGs. This paper provides an analysis of inclusive business (IB) models as market-based solutions to contribute to the achievement of the SDGs and benefit those at the Base of the Pyramid (BoP). We investigate the IB models and their social impact in 20 organizations from emerging economies across five different sectors. The findings should help increase the uptake and scale of quality IB models and practices among the private sector, development communities, and governments to promote inclusive economic growth and social impact.     

Cost pass-through to higher ethanol blends at the pump: Evidence from Minnesota gas station data

We examine the pass-through of wholesale prices to retail prices in the market for E85, which contains 51%–83% ethanol, and in the much larger market for E10, which contains 10% ethanol. We use a panel dataset consisting of monthly observations from 2007 to March 2015 on wholesale and retail prices for 274 Minnesota gas stations that sell both E10 and E85. Consistent with prior research, the cumulative pass-through coefficient for E10 is 1.00 after one month. In contrast, the E85 market is sparse, and although pass-through increased over time, we estimate it to be only 0.53 statewide from 2012 to 2015. Pass-through is higher at stations with more local E85 competitors. In the Twin Cities, which has a high density of E85 stations, pass-through is nearly complete, but outside the Twin Cities slightly less than half the wholesale discount of E85, relative to E10, is passed on to the consumer.     

Rank-related partner choice in the fission–fusion society of the spotted hyena (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Crocuta crocuta</Emphasis>)

When social partners vary in their relative value, individuals should theoretically initiate partnerships with conspecifics of the highest value. Here, we tested this prediction in a wild population of spotted hyenas (Crocuta crocuta). Crocuta live in complex, fission–fusion societies structured by dominance hierarchies in which individuals vary greatly in their value as social companions. Because patterns of association among Crocuta reflect social preferences, we calculated association indices (AIs) to examine how social rank influences intrasexual partner choice among unrelated adults of both sexes. The highest-ranking individuals were generally most gregarious in both sexes. Females associated most often with dominant and adjacent-ranking females. Females joined subgroups based on the presence of particular conspecifics such that subordinates joined focal females at higher rates than did dominants. Dominants benefit from associations with subordinates by enjoying priority of access to resources obtained and defended by multiple group members, but the benefits of these associations to subordinates are unknown. To investigate this, we tested three hypotheses suggesting how subordinates might benefit from rank-related partner choice among unrelated females. We found that subordinates who initiated group formation benefited by gaining social and feeding tolerance from dominants. However, rates at which dominants provided coalitionary support to subordinates did not vary with AIs. Overall, our data resemble those documenting patterns of association among cercopithecine primates. We consider our results in light of optimal reproductive skew theory, Seyfarth’s rank attractiveness model, and biological market theory. Our data are more consistent with the predictions of Seyfarth’s model and of biological market theory than with those of skew theory.     

Globalization of the Amazon Soy and Beef Industries: Opportunities for Conservation

Abstract:  Amazon beef and soybean industries, the primary drivers of Amazon deforestation, are increasingly responsive to economic signals emanating from around the world, such as those associated with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE, "mad cow disease") outbreaks and China's economic growth. The expanding role of these economic "teleconnections" (coupled phenomena that take place in distant places on the planet) led to a 3-year period (2002–2004) of historically high deforestation rates. But it also increases the potential for large-scale conservation in the region as markets and finance institutions demand better environmental and social performance of beef and soy producers. Cattle ranchers and soy farmers who have generally opposed ambitious government regulations that require forest reserves on private property are realizing that good land stewardship—including compliance with legislation—may increase their access to expanding domestic and international markets and to credit and lower the risk of "losing" their land to agrarian reform. The realization of this potential depends on the successful negotiation of social and environmental performance criteria and an associated system of certification that are acceptable to both the industries and civil society. The foot-and-mouth eradication system, in which geographic zones win permission to export beef, may provide an important model for the design of a low-cost, peer-enforced, socioenvironmental certification system that becomes the mechanism by which beef and soy industries gain access to markets outside the Amazon.