Pascale Scapecchi

The firm, environmental management and environmental measures: Lessons from a survey of European manufacturing firms

This paper reports on the results of a survey of environmental management and technical measures amongst almost 2000 European firms. Logit analysis is undertaken to determine the effects of firm characteristics, commercial conditions, perceived environmental impacts, expected benefits and stakeholder pressures on the probability of having an environmental management system in place. Subsequently, determinants of the likelihood of undertaking environmental actions in five environmental areas are estimated. There is a positive effect of environmental management on the likelihood of undertaking technical measures to reduce environmental impacts in some (but not all) areas, as well as a positive role for integrated environmental management strategies.

How to correctly assess mortality benefits in public policies

Abstract This paper concerns the difficulty of taking long-term effects on health into account in an economic valuation. Indeed, public decision makers should incorporate the cessation lag between implementation of an abatement policy and achievement of all of the expected mortality-related benefits for any projects involving health impacts. This paper shows how this time lag problem can be handled by proposing two approaches—either in terms of deaths avoided or of life years saved—within a dynamic perspective. The main findings are that long-term health benefits calculated by standard methods and widely applied to adverse health effects should be corrected downwards when incorporated into an economic analysis. The magnitude of correction depends on the discount rate, on technical choices dealing with epidemiology and on the method chosen to assess mortality benefits.

Determinants of Corporate Environmental Measures: Public Policy, Community Pressure and Self-Enforcement

Drawing upon data collected from over 4,000 manufacturing facilities across the OECD this paper examines the factors which determine the likelihood of having undertaken significant measures with respect to air pollution, wastewater effluent, and solid waste. The roles played by the public policy framework, informal stakeholder pressures, and internal management practices are examined. While the role of public policy (perceived stringency and inspection frequency) is significant, an important role is also played by self-enforcement mechanisms through environmental management. Stakeholder pressures are not significant, except in the case of employees.