Assessing a country's drink driving situation: an overview of the method used in 6 low- and middle-income countries

The International Center for Alcohol Policies (ICAP) has developed an international program to reduce drink driving as part of its strategy for Global Actions on Harmful Drinking. The program focuses on capacity building, training, and the implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of regional and local pilot projects in 6 participating low- and middle-income countries. The first step in developing an effective program that addresses specific problems in a region or country is to assess the current drink driving situation. In order to meet this key requirement, ICAP developed a situation assessment approach based largely on the recommendations of Chapter 2 of the good practice manual on drinking and driving produced by the Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP) under the auspices of the United Nations (UN) Road Safety Collaboration. The aim of the assessment was to provide the foundation for preparing a prioritized and effective suite of projects using the good practice recommended by the GRSP/UN manual. Its output is intended to assist with determining program objectives, design, and evaluation so that the benefits from the investments in drink driving programs can be maximized and data led, focusing on the priorities identified by the assessment. The situation assessment approach was produced as a set of guidelines containing a detailed and structured list of questions. The questions are organized into 6 main groups or elements and they enable a comprehensive and systematic collection of existing information about the extent and nature of the drink driving problem, the strengths and weaknesses of the current prevention practices, and the capacity for improvements. Situation assessments using these guidelines have been completed in the 6 focus countries and the resulting information is now being used for capacity building and developing appropriate and relevant pilot projects, taking into consideration the country's culture with respect to transportation, enforcement, health care, and alcohol consumption.     

Consumer willingness to pay for plastic bags levy and willingness to accept eco-friendly alternatives in Botswana

Plastic bags, though commonly used for packaging of goods, are highly durable and non-biodegradable. Plastic bag litter serves as a negative environmental externality detrimental to animal health and natural beauty of the environment. In an effort to curtail the excessive use of plastic bags in Botswana, the government introduced a plastic levy targeted at consumers at retail points. This study uses primary data collected from 367 respondents randomly selected from six geospatially and purposively selected shopping malls to determine the consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for continued plastic bag usage and their willingness to accept (WTA) to shift to eco-friendly alternatives. The results of the study revealed that open dumping and burning of plastic litter are more common in Maun than in Gaborone. It also showed that there is a significant relationship between the level of education and WTP. Further, there is a significant variation in income and education in respect to environmental awareness. The government should improve its efforts of sensitizing the public about the improper disposal of plastic bags.     

Noisy and definitely not normal: responding to wicked issues in the environment,energy and health

Attempts by researchers and policy-makers to address the ‘wicked’ issues which pervade environmental policy usually revolve around attempting – or recommending – both more participatory and transparent, and more systematic and evidence-based, policy-making. Post-normal science (PNS), with its ‘extended peer community’, has emerged as one approach, whilst others focus on procedural reforms of the policy process, particularly on enhancing democratic decision-making. This paper applies a novel analytical framework to a primarily documentary analysis of three cases we argue are wicked—Canadian regulatory review of health products and food, European union (EU) environmental thematic strategies, and United Kingdom (UK) energy and climate change policy. It explores how various responses to wicked issues are implemented, through the ‘lenses’ of PNS and, more generally, ‘democratic and effective decision-making’. It finds such responses are often limited by practical and fundamental barriers relating to handling of uncertainty, issue framing, participation, power, politics, and attitude to evidence. We draw conclusions about future research on PNS, particularly the need to more clearly relate theory to different strands of literature on the evidence–policy-making relationship, and to continue empirical testing.