Country's Environmental Protection Research Articles

Constitutional and Judicial Interpretation of Environmental Laws in Nigeria, India and Canada

The judiciary, an important branch of government responsible for legal interpretation, dispute resolution, and justice administration, holds a crucial role in national environmental protection. Courts play a key role in safeguarding a nation's environment by interpreting constitutional provisions related to environmental protection and other legislative frameworks. The effectiveness of a country's environmental protection is contingent on the assertiveness, creativity, and innovation of its judiciary in interpreting laws, policies, and regulations designed for environmental preservation. The widely held belief is that the judiciary, more than any other institution, is best positioned to adjudicate, inform, guide, and lead in environmental protection. A proactive, inventive, and inspirational judiciary motivates the executive and legislative branches to implement pertinent environmental laws, policies, and regulations. This study utilizes a doctrinal research methodology to comprehensively review and compare the environmental protection frameworks in Nigeria, India, and Canada. The focus is on constitutional provisions related to environmental protection and judicial interpretations, particularly in the context of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) laws. While explicit constitutional provisions on environmental protection are absent in Canada, India, and Nigeria, the courts in India and Canada have demonstrated creative interpretation of their constitutions to safeguard the environment. Notably, in India, environmental protection falls under the non-adjudicable Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSP).

Research on Environmental Accounting Information Disclosure of Listed Companies in My Country's Manufacturing Industry

The rapid economic development is inseparable from the support of industrial production and technological progress. Although the material living standard of human beings has been improved, at the same time, the environment on which human beings lives has been destroyed, and physical health is also threatened. Environmental problems are the product of unreasonable use of resources and economic growth. In recent years, my country's environmental protection measures and laws and regulations have been increasingly improved, but the environmental situation is still not optimistic. Manufacturing enterprises are part of the pollution problem and should play an important role in the disclosure of environmental information. This paper analyzes the problems of environmental accounting information disclosure of listed companies in my country's manufacturing industry, and puts forward relevant suggestions and countermeasures accordingly.

Investment Treaties, Local Institutions and Policies in the Global Land Rush

Abstract Large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs) are large tracts of land purchased or leased in low- and middle-income countries by multinational firms. This study examines whether these firms respond to the presence of bilateral investment treaties (BITs), whether BITs reinforce or undermine institutions in this process, and whether these firms respond to recipient-country environmental regulations. It analyzes data on LSLAs, BITs, and environmental policies from 2002 to 2012 in a gravity framework controlling for country-pair and time fixed effects. It finds a BIT is associated with a 96 to 149 percent increase in land deals and a 1 point increase in a recipient country's environmental protection index is associated with around a 36 percent decrease in the total amount of land investors lease or purchase in a country. Interactions between BITs and institutional measures in recipient countries yield large relationships with the number of LSLA deals between countries, although these are statistically insignificant.

Toward Socialist Environmentalism? Scientists and Environmental Change in Modern Hungary

Abstract This article discusses state-socialist Hungary's approach towards environmental protection from theoretical, institutional and practical perspectives. It discusses the genesis of a holistic and complex scientific approach to the environment in the 1950s and 1960s and its impact on the formation of the country's environmental protection system (including environmental legal framework; environmental institutional system; and daily practices of environmental protection). Its aim is to find out why the teachings of the holistic and complex school of environmentalism were implemented only vaguely in Hungary; instead, beginning from the 1960s, the government turned away from Soviet science and gradually implemented Western methods of environmental protection (pollution levy fees; discharge permit system; subsidies for energy saving products; and end-of-pipe solutions). The article asserts that, although a large body of environmentally focused social sciences research suggests the opposite, state-socialist Hungary developed its own school of environmental thinking, partly based on Soviet environmentalism, in which humanity and nature are interconnected and interdependent. That scientific approach was developed by some of the leading environmental scientists of Hungary - Dénes Börzsöny, Ede Kertai, Imre Dégen, András Madas, István Oroszlány and József Mantuánó - who understood natural resources as the primary actor and determiner for the human condition and who focused on finding the equilibrium between society's needs and natural resources via attentive and complex planning.

Green economic growth from a developmental perspective

This paper discusses the relationship between industrial development and environmental protection. The paper argues that human beings cannot solve the problems linked to the environment and the natural resources in a stagnant manner, nor can human beings achieve sustainable development in the extensive economic growth model of ignoring resource constraints and the environment. The difficulties of China's environmental protection lie in the balance of the relationship between the reform of regulation governing resources and the environmental and the international competitiveness of China's industrial sector, in particular, the balance of the relationship between environmental protection and economic growth. China's industrialization practices show that the country's industrial sector itself has the potential to help promote the improvement of the utilization efficiency of resources and the environment. At the same time, however, it can consume significant resources, causing certain environmental degradation. Industrial processes can have negative environmental impacts, but industrial development can play a positive role in environmental protection and improvement from a global and long-term perspective. It is impossible for China to solve the problems linked to resources and the environment without the development of industrial entities. On the contrary, the pressure on the resources and the environment can only be relieved with more advanced and powerful industries. In China, public opinion on environmental protection has been formed and will become stronger. Therefore, we have reason to be optimistic for the country's environmental protection and improvement.

Democratizing Bureaucracy: The Political Economy of Environmental Impact Assessment and Air Pollution Prevention Fees in Taiwan

In recent years, as many newly democratized countries have entered the phase of democratic consolidation, scholars' attention has gradually moved from studying the functional and socioeconomic prerequisites of democracy to studying the social and economic consequences of democratization.1 Research, for example, has examined democratization's impact on world peace,2 economic growth,3 and social equality.4 An equally important issue is the impact of democratization on environmental governance.5 A limited number of empirical studies documents the impact of democratization on environmental governance. In a cross-national survey Congleton showed that leaders in democratic regimes were more likely to adopt environmentally friendly policies than their counterparts in authoritarian ones.6 Silva compared environmental policies in Chile before and after its democratic transition and concluded that democratization helped improve the country's environmental protection.7 Similarly, Cole showed how environmental protection in Poland has improved since it began the transition to market democracy.8 If these few empirical studies are indicative of the general trend, the third wave of democratization is indeed most welcoming to those who care about global environmental protection. Yet one needs to put this good news in perspective, since much of the comparison was made between the new democracies and their authoritarian past. As documented in many previous studies, authoritarian regimes suffer from many institutional weaknesses, such as regulatory conflicts of interest and lack of public scrutiny of policy processes that make environmental protection difficult.9 It is not surprising that movement away from authoritarianism potentially has a positive impact on environmental protection. Nevertheless, the extent to which this potential can be fully realized remains an open question. Much depends not just on competitive elections and political rights, but also on institutional factors that affect the ways environmental problems are tackled. By definition, democratization is a series of partial institutional adjustments of the political system.'0 Institutional reform intended to create a governing system responsive to environmental interests may not necessarily evolve as expected. Several major obstacles may hinder the representation of environmental interests in newly democratized countries. First, democratic transitions, by definition, involve

Sweden Seeking New Technology to Combat Oil Spills

ABSTRACT Due to the special circumstances of the Baltic Sea—brackish water, low temperatures, ice, and widespread archipelagos—special oil spill response and cleanup methods and equipment have proven to be necessary. The Swedish Government therefore commissioned the Swedish National Board of Technical Development to establish a research and development program involving the six authorities that are responsible for the country's environmental protection. The first step in this program was a common document, Policy Guidelines for Swedish Maritime Oil Spill Protection in the 1990s, with high-priority strategies according to which all subsequent development has been carried out. The program has produced methods and systems ranging from those for handling oil spills at sea and from leaking wrecks, to protection against and deflection of oil from sensitive areas, and cleanup operations in the beach zone.

Strive to Improve Our Country's Environmental Protection Work

The problem of the environment is a major problem confronting all countries of the world today. It poses a challenge to China as well as to other countries and is closely linked with many other problems. In my work and my contact with foreign friends, I have acquired much information concerning environmental protection. This information tells us clearly that environmental protection is a major problem of strategic importance in our country's socialist modernization endeavor. Whether or not this problem can be solved satisfactorily has a direct bearing on our future and on whether we can smoothly achieve the magnificent goal of building a strong modern socialist country with Chinese characteristics. Therefore, environmental problems must be given ample attention and dealt with in real earnest.