Resource Stock Research Articles

Tourism Dynamics and Sustainability: A Comparative Analysis between Mediterranean Islands—Evidence for Post-COVID-19 Strategies

Tourism may not sustainably support territories with limited natural resource stock such as islands. The volume of visitor arrivals and the industry investments can increase the pressure even beyond sustainable levels. There is an evident and unresolved tension between these two great polarities, sustainability and economic growth driven by tourism. The aim for policymakers is to find an acceptable equilibrium between these two dimensions. This paper investigates tourism evolution between 2007 and 2019 in 15 Mediterranean islands, comparing tourism pressures through statistical indicators. The analysis will compare tourism demand and supply trends in these contexts. The performances will be evaluated to identify the islands’ positioning between sustainability needs and tourism development opportunities while considering post-COVID-19 challenges.

Interaction and mediation effects of economic growth and innovation performance on carbon emissions: Insights from 282 Chinese cities

China is under rapid urbanization and consequently facing increasing carbon emissions (CE). Economic growth (EG) and innovation performance (IP), as two critical indicators of urbanization, are considered the driving forces of CE. Although economy and innovation are entangled and can jointly affect CE in reality, the measured effects of economy and innovation on CE are often treated separately in traditional studies. We adopted a three-part research framework including the total, interaction and mediation effect tests to elucidate how EG and IP affected CE in China from 2005 to 2015 based on insights from 282 Chinese cities. The empirical results showed that both economy and innovation contributed to CE, although the contribution has reduced over the 11 years. In particular, the interaction effect between economy and innovation for North China, Northeast China, and Southwest China was −4.201, −8.442, and − 3.897, respectively, in 2015, meaning that these regions adversely affect CE. In addition, we found that the economy helps reduce CE via innovation. When considering the changes of economy and innovation, their mediation effect on CE changes varied in different regions, attributable to the level of economy and innovation as well as the stocks of energy resources. Therefore, future planning for low-carbon transition should regard the economy and innovation together. Based on this principle, we propose five detailed policies. Overall, this study is valuable not only for further understanding the triangle relationship among economy, innovation, and CE, but also for reaching low-carbon goals.

Entrepreneurial Bricolage Based on Big Data and Artificial Intelligence Decision-Making

After entering the new century, the rapid development of information technology has brought a huge impact to traditional social life, which has also triggered drastic changes in the production environment of enterprises. As long as we seize the opportunity of the development of the times, we will quickly accumulate huge wealth. Some new types of companies have surpassed traditional large companies with decades of history in a short period of time, which makes entrepreneurship very attractive. At the same time, the state has also given strong support to people’s entrepreneurship, encouraging capable people to start their own businesses in terms of policies and funds, which has stimulated a wave of entrepreneurship among the people. However, due to the short period of time for the construction of China’s market economy system, the vast majority of new ventures cannot obtain sufficient resource stock to grow and develop and can only turn to the external market to seek opportunities for development. Entrepreneurial bricolage has become a “keyword of the times” in recent years under this background. Previous studies have shown that entrepreneurial bricolage has a relatively positive effect in alleviating the plight of enterprise development resources, and many new ventures regard it as an important way to obtain development resources. The development of big data and artificial intelligence decision-making provides more possibilities for information sharing and personalized analysis and also gives new ventures more opportunities to choose development resources that suit their own characteristics. However, from the actual situation, it is obvious that Chinese enterprises have not achieved very obvious results in how to make full use of big data and artificial intelligence decision-making technology to improve their entrepreneurial and bricolage capabilities. Based on the technical support provided by big data and artificial intelligence decision-making, this research studies the entrepreneurial bricolage activities of China’s new ventures in this context, through the questionnaire survey and tracking analysis of 135 enterprises established in the two provinces from 2015 to 2020. After comparative analysis of a large amount of data, it is found that enterprises that combine big data and artificial intelligence technologies can obtain more high-quality resources and make more informed decisions in the process of starting a business. It can be concluded that the companies that have excellent application of big data and artificial intelligence decision-making technology have more opportunities to obtain ideal resources in entrepreneurial bricolage. The study conducted an in-depth analysis of the problems of China’s new ventures in entrepreneurial bricolage and put forward suggestions for improvement based on the specific conditions of this type of enterprise. It is hoped that it can help start-ups to realize the alleviation of resource constraints.

Evaluation of China's forest carbon sink service value.

A study on the value accounting of forest carbon sink services can promote the rapid development of the carbon sink market and help better understand the impact of forest carbon sinks on climate change and economic development. However, few studies have evaluated the value of China's current forest carbon sink services. Based on research on carbon peak and carbon neutrality, according to the characteristics of China's forest ecosystems and forest resource inventory data, the stock volume method was used to measure the amount and value of forest carbon sinks in China in 2009-2013 and 2014-2018. The results showed that: (1) the physical amount of forest carbon aggregates in China increased from 2009 to 2013 and from 2014 to 2018. The carbon storage of natural and plantation forests both showed an upward trend. Among them, the growth rate of the carbon storage of plantation forests was higher than that of natural forests. (2) The state, adjoint, and coupling equations of forest carbon sinks were employed to ascertain the best price for China's forest carbon sinks in 2020. The results showed that the price of China's forest carbon sinks was slightly higher than the internationally accepted carbon sink price, reflecting that the changes in the value of China's forest carbon sinks and international carbon sinks were roughly the same. (3) We obtained an appropriate accounting model for China's forest carbon sinks. (4) The value of China's forest carbon sinks increased from 2009 to 2013 and from 2014 to 2018. Although the price of carbon sinks has declined, the overall forest resource stock has increased, especially in plantation forests. The increase in the value of carbon sinks was as high as 24.7%, resulting in an overall increase in the value of forest carbon sinks, which was also in line with the physical amount of forest carbon sinks. The measurement conclusions were consistent. Several key points to note based on these findings are as follows: (1) China's current forest carbon sink transactions are all project-level certified emission reduction transactions, and diversified non-market means should be constructed to comprehensively promote carbon sink transactions. (2) China's current carbon sink transactions are mainly clean development mechanism projects, with few transactions between enterprises, and the carbon trading market situation is not optimistic. (3) The key to effective forest carbon sequestration trading is the accurate accounting of forest carbon storage and carbon sequestration value. Thus, it is of great significance to establish a forest carbon sequestration measurement method that is economical, simple, and accurate. (4) The physical amount and value of carbon sequestration of China's forest resources are rising, and the contribution rate is increasing year by year. However, there is still a gap in per capita forest area and storage compared with those in other countries worldwide. Thus, China must be vigilant in times of peace and further strengthen the protection and construction of forest resources.

Productivity and Management of Renewable Resources: Why More Efficient Fishing Fleets Should Fish Less

This article analyses the effect of productivity improvements on optimal fisheries management. It is shown that when harvest costs are independent of resource stock and the stock is below its steady state level, then for any given stock it is optimal to reduce harvest levels in response to a productivity increase unless optimal harvest rate is already zero. If harvest costs are stock dependent this result is modified; for stock dependent harvest costs there exists an interval of stock sizes below the steady state where it is optimal to reduce the harvest rate for any given stock size whereas if the harvest rate is close to an economically optimal steady state it is optimal to increase the harvest rate.

ОСНОВИ МАСШТАБНОЇ ЦІННОСТІ ІНФОРМАЦІЙНО-ТЕХНОЛОГІЧНИХ ПІДПРИЄМСТВ НА ЗАСАДАХ КЛАСТЕРИЗАЦІЇ

The study for the first time highlighted the scale value at certain stages of development through clustering. It is noted that among the various types of scales that relate directly to the economic dimensions, the public sector of the economy (PSE) is the most extensive, because it is through its evaluation that the efficiency of the state's economic resources is correctly established. In particular, the scale of PSE can be assessed from two positions: 1) through indicators of stocks and flows; 2) through absolute and relative values. It is specified that the volume of state ownership is a stock of resources owned by the state; the amount of government revenues and expenditures is the flow of funds that are mobilized and spent by the state for the period under study. It is proposed and substantiated that the scale of performance is intertwined with the needs, which basically form a scale value. Scale value (SV) is a measure of the possibility of meeting a need, based on generally accepted value priorities (benchmarks) or important for a given individual potential or realized requests (expectations). Moreover, the SV can act at different hierarchical levels: from an individual to the state or their aggregates. SV is a value in active development, when it draws into its own environment the demands of additional consumers, educating and exacerbating in them the manifestation of its root cause. For the first time, the place of state-creative patriotism of nation (a quantitative feature of which are taxes) was singled out in SV, because the citizen's motive for his SV clearly shows the desire not just to pay taxes, but to create a civilized state. In fact, the manifestation of a positive change in the taxpayer's SV also affects the price parameters of tax administration, as they are reduced, providing increased efficiency in the use of budget resources. The choice of the number of clusters in the system of information technology (IT) enterprises for the evaluation of SV in them was made on the basis of comparing the results obtained by the method of the elbow and the assessment of the silhouette, providing management capabilities. It is noted that the clustering error and the number of iterations of the value approach in the system of analysis of IT enterprises depends on the initial choice of centroids, based on this launch of k-means several times with different initial candidates for centroids. An algorithm for selecting strategic directions for the development of the IT sphere, based on SV and the clustering process, is proposed.

Menadžment održivog razvoja sagledavan kroz prizmu imperativa očuvanja prirodnog kapitala

After explaining the content coverage and elementary explanation of the basic dimensions of the paradigm of sustainable development, the concept of sustainability is considered in the light of preserving the total amount of capital in the production process, assuming no technological change and population growth. The research task set in this way brought to the fore the extremely complex question of the substitutability of produced and natural capital (stocks of natural resources and carrying capacity of the environment). The answer to it is directly related to the concept of weak and strong sustainability. The concept of poor sustainability allows substitutability between produced and natural capital, provided that the total amount of available capital does not decrease. On the contrary, the concept of strong sustainability implies a special observation of produced and natural capital. It practically eliminates the possibility of replacing one form of capital with another in the production process and from the point of view of the development economy is the only acceptable option in the long run. If unlimited substitution between natural and produced capital is allowed, then natural resources will eventually be depleted due to the creation of produced capital.

РОССИЙСКИЕ РЕГИОНАЛЬНЫЕ ПРАКТИКИ ПРЕДПРИНИМАТЕЛЬСКИХ СТРАТЕГИЙ В УСЛОВИЯХ ПАНДЕМИИ COVID-19

The article is based on a sociological study conducted by a semi-structured survey of entrepreneurs in the Omsk region and was aimed at finding answers to the following questions: how did the crisis caused by the COVID19 pandemic affect the organizational and management strategies of the latter; what decisions were regional business forced to make in working with personnel in the new economic realities; how were the policy of promotion and marketing communication of goods and/or services adjusted in conditions of restrictions; what is the attitude of entrepreneurs to the measures taken by state aid for business in the most affected industries; how is the situation with the stock of financial resources? When collecting data and summarizing them, it was possible to identify that the most common entrepreneurial strategy in the region is the practice of preserving business, its pre-coronavirus microeconomic indicators, which, in particular, is expressed in the priority tasks of preserving the existing management and production processes, business personnel, restrained financing of marketing communications and rejection of risky investments. The second strategy is the proactive practice of entrepreneurs, which is characterized by the search for new markets for products and the search for resources; willingness to invest in new industries and spheres for current business; focus on increasing investments in promotion and marketing tools, digitalization of management processes. The second group of entrepreneurs, unlike the first, is more inclined to believe that the measures developed by the state at the federal and regional levels are not sufficient to solve business problems that have arisen during the period of restrictions. The study showed that, despite tangible economic difficulties, regional entrepreneurs in extremely rare cases consider the complete closure of an existing business as a solution to their problems (the third identified management strategy). The latter strategy is an exception to the rule and is generally typical for entrepreneurs with little business experience. The results were presented to the Omsk City Council Committee on Economic Development.

Assessing impacts to biodiversity and ecosystems: understanding and exploiting synergies between Life Cycle Assessment and Natural Capital Accounting

All economic activity depends on natural capital, i.e., the stock of both renewable and non-renewable resources (including biodiversity) providing a flow of ecosystem services (ES) to society. However, as also highlighted in the European Green Deal and follow-up policy initiatives of the European Commission, unsustainable practices of production and consumption of human beings have put nature in crisis, which has negative effects on different aspects of human wellbeing as retro-feedback. The need for action is urgent, and this calls for the availability of appropriate methods and tools that can be used to assess and guide the mitigation and reversion of the impacts of human activities on biodiversity and ES. In this context, we describe a conceptual framework that aims to show how Life Cycle Assessments (LCA) and Natural Capital Accounting (NCA) can be integrated and used for a more comprehensive understanding of the biodiversity and ES quality footprint, i.e., pressures and impacts, associated with product value chains, organizations and territories. First, an in-depth and separate description of LCA and NCA is provided, including ongoing progress, complexities, and challenges of each field. Second, integration options are presented that could be followed and further developed to link LCA and NCA, thus helping to overcome the shortages of the two fields and providing a more holistic and interdisciplinary approach to address the current environmental crisis.

Drosophila Genetic Resources for Elucidating piRNA Pathway.

Emerging evidence indicates that PIWI proteins, in collaboration with PIWI-interacting RNAs (piRNAs), play a critical role in gonadal development and retrotransposon silencing in metazoans. Numerous studies have characterized the mechanism of retrotransposon silencing and identified dozens of factors involved in the piRNA pathways. Drosophila is an attractive model organism for piRNA studies due to its great availability of genetic tools and the low cost of maintenance. Here, I introduce Drosophila genetic resources and techniques valuable for studying piRNA pathway genes via their impact on retrotransposon silencing.

On the profitability of cross-ownership in Cournot nonrenewable resource oligopolies: Stock size matters

We examine the profitability of cross-ownership in a nonrenewable resource oligopolistic industry where firms compete as Cournot rivals. Assuming a subset of the oligopolists own a share in each other’s profits, we show that a symmetric cross-ownership can be profitable for any number of participating firms, provided that the initial resource stock owned by each firm is small enough. This is in sharp contrast with the static case where for any levels of non-controlling minority shareholdings, a symmetric cross-ownership is never (always) profitable if the relative number of participating firms is below (above) some lower (upper) threshold. When the relative number of participating firms is in between the two thresholds, profitability of cross-ownership depends on the level of shareholdings. We also highlight that cross-ownership can be preferable to a horizontal merger in terms of Cournot competition. Not only is it more profitable to do so, more importantly, it constitutes a shrewd strategy to avoid the possible legal challenges. Finally, we show that cross-ownership may turn out to be relatively less detrimental to society in a nonrenewable resource industry than other industries where resource constraints are absent. Thus, a specific analysis is needed when dealing with industries where resource constraints play an important role.

Water diversion and pollution interactively shape freshwater food webs through bottom-up mechanisms.

Water diversion and pollution are two pervasive stressors in river ecosystems that often co-occur. Individual effects of both stressors on basal resources available to stream communities have been described, with diversion reducing detritus standing stocks and pollution increasing biomass of primary producers. However, interactive effects of both stressors on the structure and trophic basis of food webs remain unknown. We hypothesized that the interaction between both stressors increases the contribution of the green pathway in stream food webs. Given the key role of the high-quality, but less abundant, primary producers, we also hypothesized an increase in food web complexity with larger trophic diversity in the presence of water diversion and pollution. To test these hypotheses, we selected four rivers in a range of pollution subject to similar water diversion schemes, and we compared food webs upstream and downstream of the diversion. We characterized food webs by means of stable isotope analysis. Both stressors directly changed the availability of basal resources, with water diversion affecting the brown food web by decreasing detritus stocks, and pollution enhancing the green food web by promoting biofilm production. The propagation of the effects at the base of the food web to higher trophic levels differed between stressors. Water diversion had little effect on the structure of food webs, but pollution increased food chain length and trophic diversity, and reduced trophic redundancy. The effects at higher trophic levels were exacerbated when combining both stressors, as the relative contribution of biofilm to the stock of basal resources increased even further. Overall, we conclude that moderate pollution increases food web complexity and that the interaction with water abstraction seems to amplify this effect. Our study shows the importance of assessing the interaction between stressors to create predictive tools for a proper management of ecosystems.

Assessment of the Sustainable Utilization Level of Water Resources in the Wuhan Metropolitan Area Based on a Three-Dimensional Water Ecological Footprint Model

The shortage and overexploitation of water resources restrict the sustainable development of metropolitan areas. To evaluate the sustainable utilization level of water resources, we identified the occupancy of natural capital stock and the consumption of natural capital flow by water resources consumption and analyzed the factors influencing water resources consumption in metropolitan area development. We took the Wuhan Metropolitan Area in China from 2010 to 2019 as the research object and introduced footprint depth and size, the water ecological footprint (WEF) model was expanded into the three-dimensional WEF model. Based on this model, an evaluation system for the sustainable utilization level of water resources was constructed with five indices—water ecological deficit, water ecological surplus, water ecological pressure, WEF depth, and WEF size. Finally, the driving factors of WEF change were analyzed using the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index. The evaluation of the sustainable utilization level of water resources showed that the Wuhan Metropolitan Area as a whole experienced water ecological surplus from 2010 to 2019, but there were different degrees of water ecological deficit in its inner urban areas, and the most serious cumulative deficit was 5.02 ha/cap in Ezhou. In 2011 and 2019, the sustainable utilization level of water resources in the metropolitan area reached a relatively unsustainable state. Xianning was the urban area with the most sustainable utilization level of water resources. During the study period, the metropolitan area did not occupy the natural capital stock of water resources, and the natural capital flow of water resources in the inner urban areas could meet the demand of the current consumption of the region in 2010 and 2016. The analysis of the driving factors of WEF change showed that economic development effect and population pressure effect had a positive driving effect on WEF change, while WEF intensity effect and water resources carrying capacity effect had the opposite effect. Finally, according to the research results, it can be seen that improving the efficiency of water resources utilization, protecting the natural capital stock of water resources, realizing differentiated regional development through the market economy and developing water policy can be helpful to improve the level of sustainable water resources utilization.

Interventions and Cognitive Spillovers

Abstract This article investigates how incentives and behavioural policy interventions affect individuals’ allocation of scarce cognitive resources. Based on experimental evidence, we demonstrate that incentives systematically influence individuals’ allocation of cognitive resources, and their propensity to actively engage with a decision or to stay passive. Policies that steer individuals’ attention to a specific decision lead to more active decision-making and better choices in the targeted choice domain, but induce negative cognitive spillovers on the quality of choices in other domains. In our setting, these two countervailing effects offset each other, such that the overall payoff consequences of the interventions are essentially zero. We further document that cognitive spillovers are especially pronounced for complex choices and for subgroups of the population with a smaller stock of cognitive resources. We discuss implications for the design and evaluation of behavioural policy interventions.

Modeling of systems with a closed loop of material resources circulation

The work is devoted to the problem of artificial realization of the unique property of living systems to self-recovery due to the existence in them of mechanisms of accumulation and closed circulation of material resources. The problem of developing a mathematical model that reproduces the processes of functioning of such systems is being solved. A functional diagram of these processes is built, in which the stages of active use of resources, their recovery and subsequent accumulation as a reserve are highlighted. The formal description of the system is made in the class of stochastic models with continuous time – in the form of a Markov process with a discrete set of states. Analytical expressions for the final probabilities of each of its states were found on the basis of the hypothesis of the Poisson character of event streams in the system. As an assessment of the system’s ability to self-recovery, the probability of its functioning with the maximum amount of resources capable of being processed by the system was calculated. Using a numerical example, a quantitative study of the dependence of this estimate on the main variable parameters of the closed-loop system was carried out: the number of recovery channels, the intensity of these channels, and the amount of resources accumulated in the reserve. The presence of an accumulated stock of resources in the system allows ensuring high indicators of its efficiency with a significant decrease in the requirements for the total intensity of resource recovery.

On the Estimation of the Initial Stock in the Problem of Resource Extraction

We consider a differential game of non-renewable resource extraction, in which the players do not know the precise value of the resource stock and, thus, have to make an estimate. We define the value of information about the initial stock and give recommendations for the choice of the estimate depending on the parameters of the problem. Further, we consider the situation where the players only know the bounds for the stock of the resource and solve the problem of computing the optimal estimate, such that it minimizes the players’ losses in the worst-case scenario. The analysis allows us to give a simple rule for the choice of the optimal estimate of the resource stock.

Profits, prices and productivity in a common pool fishery

AbstractProfitability change for any firm depends on both price and productivity change. Because most firms have little influence on prices in either output or input markets, oftentimes productivity change is thought to be the most relevant determinant of profitability change. When firms produce a product by harvesting or extracting government‐regulated natural resource stocks, it is important for regulators to understand how their decisions influence firm profitability and its underlying drivers. In this study, we use a recently developed index number decomposition method to identify the drivers of profitability, price, and productivity change for vessels operating in the U.S. northeast scallop fishery. Our main finding is that increases in profitability over the period 1996 to 2015 were primarily due to increases in prices for scallops, combined with favorable biomass change. Fishing vessels were able to get higher prices for their harvest because of an innovative spatial harvest strategy, which resulted in catches of large, premium‐priced scallops. Remarkably, this system resulted in both an increase in vessels harvesting scallops and large increases in profitability.

Closed‐form solutions of an economic growth model of tourism

The economic growth model for tourism aims at optimizing the quality of life of the residents. The model is studied under the limitations of crowding conditions, environmental, and economic resources. The current value Hamiltonian function is effectively used to determine the necessary first conditions for the optimal values of consumption and number of tourists in the destination. When the necessary conditions are sufficient for optimality, the Arrow sufficient theorem provides the special case. The partial Hamiltonian approach is applied to construct the first integrals of the economic growth model for two cases. These first integrals were utilized to compute the closed‐form solution of the model under consideration. As it is well‐known, different Ramsey‐type models are solved with restrictions on the parameters. The system dynamics were studied mainly by describing the trajectories of the variables and the equilibrium, which is not enough to understand the evolution of any economy. This study is to examine the existence of closed‐form solutions for the growth model of tourism. We apply this newly developed technique to analyze the dynamics of the total income for different initial stock ratios. The effects of natural amenities on the control and state variables were also part of this study. It is also shown that crowding aversion saves the stock of natural resources and services. We offer that for the long‐term growth of the tourism, the optimal number of the tourist at the destination plays an important role.

Product quality differentiation in a renewable resource oligopoly

The typical assumption in the literature on oligopoly exploitation of natural resources is that all units of extracted resource have the same commercial value. We depart from this assumption by allowing a constant share θ of the available resource stock to be associated with higher commercial value, thus introducing product quality differentiation. We interpret θ as a measure of resource quality and study the impact of an increase in θ on resource exploitation and social welfare. The main finding of our analysis is that an increase in resource quality can be welfare-reducing.

Water ecological footprint size, depth and its spatial pattern correlation in the “Four-city Area in Middle China”

Three-dimensional ecological footprint method is used to distinguish the capital flows and capital stocks of water resources, and measure water ecological footprint size (WEFsize) and water ecological footprint depth (WEFdepth) of 38 regional cities “Four-city Area in Middle China” from 2010 to 2019, and analyze its spatial correlation. The research results are as follows: Firstly, WEFsize per capita of 38 regional cities in the “Four-city Area in Middle China” from 2010 to 2019 had obvious differences, and with large inter-annual fluctuations. The high value area of water resource capital flows occupancy rate (ORFLOW) was distributed in the 13 regional cities, its average capital flows occupancy rate was more than 80%. The low value area of ORFLOW was distributed in the 18 regional cities. Secondly, the annual average value of WEFdepth in the 23 cities of the “Four-city Area in Middle China” was all greater than 1. The high value area of use ratio of stocks to flows (URSTOCKFLOW) for water resource was distributed in the 8 regional cities, its average value was as high as 6.97. The low value area of water resource URSTOCKFLOW was distributed in the 15 regional cities, its average value was as low as 0.02. Thirdly, the relationship between WEFsize and WEFdepth has significant regional differences on an intercity scale. The utilization level of capital stocks and capital flows presents complementary situation on the whole. Fourthly, during the study period, WEFsize and WEFdepth across regional cities in the “Four-city Area in Middle China” had a positive spatial autocorrelation. WEFsize had H-H cluster mainly in CS of 2010 and 2019, CS, PX and XY of 2014, CS and LD of 2016. WEFdepth was in H-H cluster in BB of 2010, BB and XT of 2014, BB and HN of 2016 and 2019. These findings not only provided a new research method for water ecological footprint analysis by measuring the size and depth of water ecological footprint in “Four-city Area in Middle China”, but also provided a theoretical basis for sustainable utilization of water resources in other urban agglomerations.