Growth In North Research Articles

Towards economic value-added growth without carbon emission embodied growth in North-North trade-An empirical analysis of US-German trade.

Nationally determined contributions were at the core of the Paris Agreement for the global response to climate change. However, with the geographical separation of production and consumption caused by international trade, traditional trade statistics can no longer accurately reflect the flows of economic value and carbon emissions between countries, which will affect the participation and implementation of global climate policies. Based on a multi-regional input-output model, we measured the embodied carbon flows of bilateral trade between developed countries represented by Germany and the US, discussed the decoupling relationship between embodied carbon and export-led growth, and finally used structural decomposition analysis (SDA) to show how the driving factors affect embodied carbon flow in German-US trade. We found that from 2000 to 2014, embodied carbon in German-US trade showed an overall downward trend. While Germany maintained a trade surplus with the US, it also maintained an embodied carbon surplus. In addition, embodied carbon and value added in Germany's exports to the US were mostly strongly decoupled, while in US exports to Germany were mostly weakly decoupled, and the two-way decoupling had been weakened in the later stage. The results of SDA showed that changes in carbon intensity clearly inhibited bilateral carbon flows, while trade scale effects promoted it. This study provided an opportunity to use trade to achieve carbon reduction and increased the possibility of providing a convenient and feasible market mechanism for emission reduction through international partnerships.

THE RELATION BETWEEN CLIMATE CHANGE AND ECONOMIC GROWTH: THE IN-VESTIGATION THE REGIONAL DIFFERENCES WITH RCM MODEL IN EU-28 COUNTRIES

This study investigates the effect of climate change on economic growth. In the study, it has been used over the period from 1996 to 2014 for EU-28 countries. We applied endogeneity, cross-sectional dependence and slope homogeneity tests. Then, we used panel unit-root and panel cointegration tests. Estimated random coefficient panel regression results show that increasing carbon emission contributes to economic growth in North and East Europe regions countries, relatively cold side. In South-West Europe countries, coefficient of CO2 is insignificant. Increasing carbon emission positively effect on economic growth through especially agricultural and tourism sector outputs in North and East Europe regions.

How bank regulations impact efficiency and performance?

PurposeThis study aims to examine the impact of regulation and other micro- and macro-economic factors on banks’ productivity growth. It investigates the impact of different regulatory reforms on banks’ performance of total factor productivity (TFP) and its component efficiencies, along with their association with bank-specific variables of profitability and equity, and with macro-level variables of economy and freedom. That is, through analysing the influence of regulatory and supervisory policies related to Basel accords pillars of capital and market discipline through private monitoring; restrictions on bank activities; and economic and financial freedoms on TFP growth and year-end performance in banking.Design/methodology/approachThe authors examine TFP for commercial banks in response to regulatory reforms on an international scale. To estimate the TFP, the authors use a non-parametric frontier technique by calculating the Malmquist output-oriented index, following Delis et al. (2011) and Worthington (1999). The components of the Malmquist index are ratios of distance functions making its estimation a straightforward technique using activity analysis or data envelopment analysis methods. This allows controlling for efficiency changes depending on the reallocation of production frontiers signalling the technical change and the technical efficiency at once.FindingsResults show that high capital requirements enhance productivity growth in North and Latin American banks, but not in European African or Asian banks. Supervisory powers drive bank productivity growth in all regions except Europe and Central Asia. Restrictions on real estate, insurance and securities activities impede productivity change in all income level groups but not in high-income economies. The results also show that market volatility and Z-score drive technological change and scale efficiency growth, but negatively impact pure technical efficiency.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the literature by examining the relationship between the implementation of regulatory standards and the performance of the banking sector following a structural model of the banking firm and the concept of optimisation. An additional contribution of this study is that it examines economies with different levels of income based on the gross national income per capita. The study summarises bank-specific data used to synthesise the banks’ productivity (inputs and outputs) and country-specific economic and regulatory compliance data over 19 years (1999-2017). The extent of this data set coverage makes it most recent and most conclusive of variables to provide a significant contribution to the literature on bank regulation and efficiency effect.

Contemporary issues in north\u2013south health research partnerships: perspectives of health research stakeholders in Zambia

BackgroundThe late 1990s and early 2000s have seen a growth in north–south health research partnerships resulting from scientific developments such as those in genetic studies and development of statistical techniques and technological requirements for the analysis of large datasets. Despite these efforts, there is inadequate information representing the voice of African researchers as stakeholders experiencing partnership arrangements, particularly in Zambia. Furthermore, very little attention has been paid to capturing the practice of guidelines within partnerships. In this paper, we present achievements and highlight challenges faced by southern partners in north–south health research partnerships.MethodsA qualitative inquiry was employed using in-depth interviews developed using the Bergen Model of Collaborative Functioning with 20 key informants in Lusaka district in Zambia purposively sampled from a wide range of health research partnerships.ResultsPartnerships produce benefits for southern partners, including evidence generation to influence policy, improved service delivery, infrastructure development and designing interventions to improve the healthcare of populations in greatest need. Most importantly, through partnerships, there is availability of financial resources to accomplish partnership goals. For success to be achieved, there must be effective communication and leadership, values and accountability that go into the process of partnership functioning. Trust interacts with different elements that create partnerships where there is co-ownership of study rewards. Challenging aspects of the interaction are largely due to funding mechanisms where 90% of the funding for health research is from northern partners. This funding mechanism results in power imbalances that lead to publication challenges, dictation of research agenda and ownership of samples and data leading to a general lack of motivation to collaborate.ConclusionMistrust has implications on joint working such that partners find it difficult to work together and produce results greater than their individual efforts. Property rights and resource sharing must be resolved early in the partnership and each partner’s contributions recognised. These findings highlight areas that partnerships need to focus on to make the most of guidelines on research partnership with developing countries.

A model of endogenous growth that elucidates the complexity of South–North convergence

This North–South model of Schumpeterian endogenous growth combines a market, productivity and knowledge effect. Depending upon the interaction of these effects, various convergent and divergent South–North growth paths occur: for example, full or partial convergence of the Southern technology level to the Northern one, conditional convergence or divergence depending upon the Southern initial technology level and absorptive capacity, higher or lower as well as decreasing or increasing growth rates during the phase of catching up, and equal or higher growth rates of the South compared to the North after catching up. This set of growth paths can better explain the diversity of the empirical observations for economies at different income and technology levels than those generated by existing models. In this new model, convergence based on North–South trade and associated flows of patents (innovations) is guaranteed if the knowledge effect dominates the productivity effect. A larger Southern market expands the area of convergence and can prevent divergence. Not only a larger Southern market, but also a higher Southern steady state growth rate benefit the North so that convergence is desirable for both, the South and the North.

Viticulture and landscape, values for the society in Mendoza, Argentina

The landscape is a perception of the agroecosystem valued as aesthetic, cultural, recreational and touristic, for conservation, among others. It is considered an environmental service and cultural heritage according to the International UN Conference 1972 (Paris, France). The agroecosystem of Mendoza's Northern Oasis creates a landscape with the presence of vineyards framed by the Andes, which is a scenic resource characterized as an environmental cultural service. The disordered process of urban growth in North of Mendoza, threatens the provision of the mentioned service. In this paper, a qualitative and a quantitative assessment aim to characterize the perceptions of urban residents on the vineyards landscape. Two methodologies were applied: expert opinion through focus groups and survey data collection. By working with focus groups, positive impacts of this kind of landscape were recognized. In the 638 surveys made in the urban area of Mendoza, a six landscape images valuation was requested (with a score of 1 to 10, where 10 is the maximum). The highest average scores were for the view of Aconcagua, secondly the agricultural landscape with vineyards and mountains and thirdly another view of vineyards in the North Oasis.

Examining Perceptions of Rapid Population Growth in North and South Gondar Zones, Northwest Ethiopia

Ethiopia is one of the most populous countries in Africa and ranks second only to Nigeria. Rapid population growth has hampered the country's development, making the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger difficult. This study which had two components--quantitative and qualitative--was aimed at exploring the perceptions of women and other social groups on the prevailing population pressures. The quantitative study involved 3,512 women aged 15-49 years. The qualitative study consisted of five focus-group discussions and six key-informant interviews. Over 90% of women (n = 3,512) who participated in the quantitative study and nearly all the focus-group discussants and interviewees (n = 39) felt that something should be done to keep the population from growing too fast. Most (over 90%) participants approved of the Government passing a law regarding the maximum number of children that a couple should have. It is, therefore, timely for the responsible bodies to exert maximum effort and commitment in responding to the emerging attitudes of the people by making the population problem a priority.

Endogenous Imitation and Technology Absorption in a Model of North–South Trade

This paper considers the transfer of technology from the North to the South that occurs through trade in high-technology goods and explicitly models the ‘reverse-engineering’ process that allows the South to assimilate new technologies. A key finding of this study is that the South's rate of growth is dictated by the size of the country's human capital, which determines its absorptive capacity and its ability to assimilate knowledge from the North. We find that while a Southern country that is poor in human capital can only imitate, Southern countries that possess sufficiently large human capital endowments, beyond a certain threshold, signal the onset of innovation. We also find that the North enjoys a higher rate of innovation and growth with trade than without. North's gains are the highest when it trades with a human-capital ‘poor’ South, because imitation increases South's demand for Northern intermediates. But trade with the Southern countries that are human capital rich (and therefore involved in innovation), dampens their demand for Northern imports, adversely affecting North's growth. The model predicts growth convergence between the North and a South that is well passed the threshold for innovation.

"The First Economic Revolution" As Fiction

In an earlier issue of this journal Douglass C. North and Robert Paul Thomas proposed to explain agricultural revolution as both cause and effect of a revolution in rights. 1 In their view population pressure led to a gradual shift to cultivation which must, they argue, have occurred simultaneously with a change in rights, which then provided incentive for shift to cultivation and for human progress which followed. In this comment I shall argue that North's and Thomas's story is tautological; that it is marred by rather curious economic theory; and that assumptions which they make about prehistoric man are not supported by anthropological and archaeological reports, including some of sources which they themselves cite. The story North and Thomas tell is a simple one: once upon a time there was an abundance of animals and thus constant returns to hunting. Population grew. As population grew, groups hived off to form new bands, but eventually those groups inside the population frontier would feel pressed to regulate population. However, they would fail because, in pre-agricultural world, there was common property by which North and Thomas apparently mean no rights at all (free access by all).2 In absence of any territory of its own, each group would lose out to other groups whose population continued to grow. Thus population would continue to grow at such a rate that eventually, because of diminishing returns to hunting and gathering, agriculture would replace hunting simultaneously with assertion of exclusive rights over area being farmed.3 Two assumptions are necessary for this story: (i) that population grew sufficiently rapidly before agricultural revolution to cause shift to agriculture, and (2) that there were no rights for pre-agricultural peoples. The basis for these assumptions is not empirical there is a dearth of evidence for either. Rather it is tautological reasoning: rapid population growth occurred because there were no rights to make population control feasible and there were no rights until population reached some critical level. The importance of population growth in North and Thomas story is