Territorial Efficiency Research Articles

Territorial Impact Assessment for Coal Sites in Transition

This article describes a part of the POTENTIALS project promoted by the Research Fund for Coal and Steel (RFCS) of the EU, which, in general, has aimed to develop business models for the reuse of former industrial and mining sites in different European regions. The goal of this project focused on the creation of so-called eco-industrial parks to enable sustainable energy production and reduce waste and pollution on coal sites in transition. A key aspect was the development of a suitable territorial impact assessment (TIA), a new and complex policy tool for the assessment of the territorial impacts of EU policies and projects on territorial cohesion. Therefore, the special TEQUILA (Territorial Efficiency, Quality and Identity Layer Assessment) approach is used to describe the TIA for this case and emphasizes its application in assessing ex ante the impacts of the transition from a coal site to an eco-industrial park. It underlines the need for a differentiated understanding of the regional characteristics and potential impacts of transition policies or projects. Furthermore, the process and results of applying the TEQUILA methodology, a multicriteria analysis, in the context of regionalized impact models has shown how important it is to select well-defined, expert-based criteria, but at the same time, to establish a system that is flexible and adaptable to the needs of political decision makers and stakeholders considering the normative weights of the criteria. This has been illustrated by some examples.

Territorial efficiency of Russian regions

Territorial efficiency of Russian regions

Territorial efficiency of social spending in Spain

PurposeRegional disparities in social risk levels threaten social cohesion in Spain, which cannot be justified by the territorial differences in social spending per capita. These divergences may encourage and spread nationalist positions and populist discourses. The objective of this paper is to examine the efficiency of social policies (health, education and social protection) aimed at reducing the risk of exclusion across Spanish autonomous communities.Design/methodology/approachThe authors use data envelopment analysis (DEA) to compare each autonomous community. The analysis will determine whether the autonomies' resources (inputs or social spending in this case) are appropriately translated into goods and/or services (outputs or social cohesion), and which regions are more efficient in doing so.FindingsThis work contributes to sustaining DEA analysis in the study of social policy efficiency, as it reveals the regions that have better adjustments between social investment and social results from a global perspective, as well as from the different intervention areas. The authors also provide a ranking of regions based on their relative efficiency, estimating a possible margin of improvement in the results.Originality/valueIt is unusual to include the disaggregated analysis of social spending in efficiency studies using DEA at regional level. Therefore, this is an innovative analysis compared to most extended models that are mainly concerned with health or education expenditure, which are also considered in this study.

Analysis of the Territorial Efficiency of European Funds as an Instrument to Reduce Labor Gender Differences

Gender equality has been one of the goals of the European Union since 1957. Article 157 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union authorizes the European Parliament and the Council to adopt all those measures that guarantee the application of the principle of equality opportunities and equal treatment for men and women in employment and occupation matters. The main goal of this article was to determine whether the use of European Funds by Eurozone countries has made it possible to reduce labor differences in gender matters. To this end, the efficiency levels of the Funds are analyzed in two different periods, 2007 to 2013 and 2014 to 2020. Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), a methodology frequently used by researchers in efficiency analyses, was applied. Among the main conclusions obtained are that the efficiency levels from the period 2014 to 2020 have been higher than that obtained in the previous period, but there are significant and persistent differences over time in the levels of gender efficiency between the different countries of the Eurozone.

Методичні підходи до оцінки бюджетної ефективності територій

Annotation. Introduction. According to the principles of the program-target method of budgeting, the diagnosis of budget efficiency of territories is the key goal of assessing the implementation of regional policy and improving the efficiency of budget funds, which, in turn, will not only determine the effectiveness of this process Therefore, assessing the level of budget efficiency of territories is a mandatory element of financial management at the local level. The purpose of the article is to study the methodological approaches of scientists to assess the budget efficiency of territories and on their basis the formation of the author’s directions of assessment of the object of study. Results. It is investigated that in recent years there have been positive trends in the socio-economic development of the state as a whole and its regions in particular, but still the development of individual regions remains asymmetric due to the inability of territories to accumulate the necessary financial resources to local budgets. places, which, in turn, does not contribute to providing appropriate conditions for the structural development of the regions. The existing methodological approaches are systematized, their advantages and disadvantages are analyzed and it is found that they are based on traditional methodological principles and provide for the analysis of absolute, relative indicators, integrated indices and rankings, etc.; do not have a single vision for a set of indicators; mainly focus on assessing the structure of the budget and the individual components of its revenue and expenditure parts. The necessity of improvement of a technique of diagnostics of budgetary efficiency of territories which will provide the analysis in the following directions is substantiated: the state of the budget; financial capacity of the budget; intergovernmental relations; financial independence; budget load; budgeting efficiency; budget management. Conclusions. The system of the formed directions will allow to estimate a level of budgetary efficiency of territories of Ukraine in the conditions of decentralization and to develop long-term budgetary strategy on places. Keywords: territory; methodical approaches; diagnostics; budget efficiency.

Territorial efficiency: Analysis of the role of public work safety controls

This study analyzes the efficiency of Spanish provinces in a model that incorporates occupational health and safety (OHS) policy controls and work accidents into the analysis. Building on productivity models rooted in non-parametric frontier methods, namely Data Envelopment Analysis, the proposed approach allows the development of a production function that accurately models the joint production of desirable (GDP) and undesirable (work accidents) outputs. The efficiency analysis of the 50 Spanish provinces during 2003–2012 reveals that territories that drastically cut resources dedicated to OHS controls—in our case, safety inspections and economic sanctions for safety violations—show higher inefficiency levels. Nevertheless, the changes in OHS policies introduced by Spanish provinces after the change in the state of the economy in 2008 had a heterogeneous impact on their efficiency level. Effective OHS policy is not necessarily linked to merely implementing more OHS policy controls, but rather to the capacity of territories to efficiently allocate their available OHS resources and monitor business activity. Policy implications and future research avenues are discussed.

УПРАВЛЕНИЕ НАЛОГОВЫМ КОНТРОЛЕМ: ВЗГЛЯД С ПОЗИЦИИ НАЛОГОВОГО МАРКЕТИНГА

The purpose of the article is to consider the possibility of using marketing tools in tax control. The authors proved the incompleteness of the applied tax control methodology. A model of tax marketing of tax control management is proposed to increase the competitiveness of territories. The article is practical in nature and offers recommendations on the use of the developed model, which can be used in tax control to improve the efficiency of territories and attract more taxpayers.

Indicators to evaluate agricultural nitrogen efficiency of the 27 member states of the European Union

Nitrogen (N) use in European agriculture is not efficient, with less than one third of available N recovered in intended outputs. Over two thirds of N is lost to the environment, where it has negative ecological, social and economic consequences. Improving N efficiency in crop and animal production is a priority to reduce its detrimental effects while maintaining food production. The territory scale is particularly suitable for evaluation of N efficiency because it is used for environmental impact assessment and public policies. However, N Use Efficiency (NUE), the efficiency indicator available at this scale, has several limitations: (i) inputs and outputs can vary depending on the boundaries and definitions used, (ii) input production and transport are not always included, and (iii) changes in soil N stock are rarely considered. Three indicators were recently developed at the farming system scale to overcome NUE limitations. System N efficiency (SyNE) expresses N in intended outputs as a function of all major N inputs and losses. Relative N efficiency (RNE) expresses N efficiency relatively to its potential given the nature of productions. System N balance (SyNB) expresses N losses from cradle to the gate of the farm. All three indicators include N losses due to the production and transport of inputs and soil N stock variations. The current study tested these indicators at the national scale to provide a better understanding of N management in 27 European countries. The study demonstrates the feasibility and utility of calculating these indicators at the national scale. The mean NUE of European countries is 0.35, while their mean SyNE is 0.23, highlighting the importance of considering soil N loss in efficiency indicators. Average SyNB is 113kgNha−1 AA, but varies from 31 to 432kgNha−1 AA, showing the large margin of progress of some countries regarding N losses. Mean RNE is 0.43, which means that European countries could maintain their production with much less N inputs. The systems approach enables relevant comparisons among countries with different production methods and intensities. Combining SyNE and SyNB provides complementary information about the agricultural use of N resources and the resulting environmental pressure. RNE assesses the progress margin of each country based on its production and enriches the efficiency analysis by considering the nature of agricultural products. These indicators are promising tools to study, compare and improve the N efficiency of territories or countries.

Conducting creativity in the periphery of Sweden: A bottom-up path towards territorial cohesion

ABSTRACTSocio-economic cohesion has been a foundational overarching objective of the European Union. The European Union's recent enlargement, not to mention the worldwide economic downturn, persisting asymmetries of globalization and deindustrialization have deepened existing cleavages and accentuated persisting effects of unbalanced development. The mainstreaming of the sustainability concept and the ascendance of creativity and innovation as regional development tools have caused municipalities and regions to explore ‘soft’ strategies aimed at fostering culture and creativity in order to revive their image and their economies. A shift in the thinking about cohesion policy after the publication of the Fifth Cohesion Report in November 2010 has signalled the need for European municipalities and regions to focus on bottom-up strategies so as to compliment top-down redistributional arrangements as paths towards regional development. This article focuses on the concept of territorial cohesion as spatial justice and its implications for the sparsely populated Swedish northern periphery. The aim of this study was to investigate the value of cultural industries (CIs) as a regional policy tool in the periphery in the context of justice, sustainability and the three dimensions of territorial cohesion: territorial identity, territorial efficiency and territorial quality. Findings suggest that viewing CIs as tools towards regional development in the periphery follows the tenets of (spatial) justice, sustainability and the dimensions of territorial cohesion.

Environmental influences on mate location in male chequered skipper butterflies, Carterocephalus palaemon (Lepidoptera: Hesperiidae)

Abstract. The behaviour of male chequered skipper butterflies was studied to determine the factors affecting mate location. Males were territorial within small areas where they aggregated. They used favoured perches, intercepted most passing objects and distinguished between heterospecifics and conspecifics. They increased their territorial efficiency by making many, short flights from perches instead of few, long flights. The areas selected do not represent any resource to females or larvae and it is suggested that they are chosen primarily on the basis of their favourable temperature relations. These have beneficial effects on flight activity and perch height which in turn improve male vision and mating chances.