scholarly journals Does the Environmental Supervision System Improve Air Quality in China? An Empirical Study Using the Difference-in-Differences Model

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Cao Zhiying ◽  
Wang Liangjian ◽  
Wu Jiahao
PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. e0246257
Author(s):  
Guangqin Li ◽  
Lingyu Li ◽  
Xing Li ◽  
Yu Chen

Drawing on fine particulate matter (PM2.5) from satellite raster data and matching with the county-level socio-economic data from 2008 to 2015 in China, this paper investigates the impacts of the establishment of National Key Ecological Functional Zones (NKEFZ) on environmental quality by employing the difference-in-differences method, which was stablished in June 2011. The results indicate that the establishment of the NKEFZ significantly decreased the concentration values of PM2.5, a drop of about 20% during the study period, after the paper controls for other factors affecting air quality. The robustness tests using the maximum and medium concentration values of PM2.5 show similar results. Through further analysis, the paper finds that the establishment of NKEFZ can improve the ecological utilization efficiency of land.


Author(s):  
Guoguo Zhang ◽  
Jingci Zhu ◽  
Weijie Luo ◽  
Honghong Zhang

Abstract This paper explores the short-run impact of work resumption, extensively launched on February 10, 2020 in China, on air quality after the subsiding of COVID-19. Utilizing the data of 1012 air-quality monitoring sites in 233 cities derived from the Real-time Release Air Quality Platform and the difference-in-differences method, we find that alternative measures of air quality index in non-Hubei provinces increase significantly, compared with those in Hubei province which was temporarily not allowed work resumption due to the severity of epidemic. Specifically, our results reveal a rise in AQI of 11.28 per cent, in PM2.5 of 12.47 per cent, in PM10 of 10.49 per cent, and in NO2 of 23.64 per cent, relative to the baseline mean. Moreover, the deterioration of air quality is found to be caused by intracity rather than intercity migration.


2019 ◽  
pp. 109-123
Author(s):  
I. E. Limonov ◽  
M. V. Nesena

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the impact of public investment programs on the socio-economic development of territories. As a case, the federal target programs for the development of regions and investment programs of the financial development institution — Vnesheconombank, designed to solve the problems of regional development are considered. The impact of the public interventions were evaluated by the “difference in differences” method using Bayesian modeling. The results of the evaluation suggest the positive impact of federal target programs on the total factor productivity of regions and on innovation; and that regional investment programs of Vnesheconombank are improving the export activity. All of the investments considered are likely to have contributed to the reduction of unemployment, but their implementation has been accompanied by an increase in social inequality.


Author(s):  
Tshokey Tshokey ◽  
Pranitha Somaratne ◽  
Suneth Agampodi

Air contamination in the operating room (OR) is an important contributor for surgical site infections. Air quality should be assessed during microbiological commissioning of new ORs and as required thereafter. Despite many modern methods of sampling air, developing countries mostly depended on conventional methods. This was studied in two ORs of the National Hospital of Sri Lanka (NHSL) with different ventilation system; a conventional ventilation (CV) and a laminar air flow (LAF). Both ORs were sampled simultaneously by two different methods, the settle plate and sampler when empty and during use for a defined time period. Laboratory work was done in the Medical Research Institute. The two methods of sampling showed moderate but highly significant correlation. The OR with CV was significantly more contaminated than LAF when empty as well as during use by both methods. Overall, the difference in contamination was more significant when sampled by the sampler. Differences in contamination in empty and in-use ORs were significant in both ORs, but significance is less in LAF rooms. The consistent and significant correlation between settle plate and sampler showed that the settle plate is an acceptable method. The LAF theatre showed less contamination while empty and during use as expected. Air contamination differences were more significant when sampled with sampler indicating that it is a more sensitive method. Both CV and LAF ORs of the NHSL did not meet the contamination standards for empty theatres but met the standards for in-use indicating that the theatre etiquette was acceptable.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 804
Author(s):  
Jean Dubé ◽  
Maha AbdelHalim ◽  
Nicolas Devaux

Many applications have relied on the hedonic pricing model (HPM) to measure the willingness-to-pay (WTP) for urban externalities and natural disasters. The classic HPM regresses housing price on a complete list of attributes/characteristics that include spatial or environmental amenities (or disamenities), such as floods, to retrieve the gradients of the market (marginal) WTP for such externalities. The aim of this paper is to propose an innovative methodological framework that extends the causal relations based on a spatial matching difference-in-differences (SM-DID) estimator, and which attempts to calculate the difference between sale price for similar goods within “treated” and “control” groups. To demonstrate the potential of the proposed spatial matching method, the researchers present an empirical investigation based on the case of a flood event recorded in the city of Laval (Québec, Canada) in 1998, using information on transactions occurring between 1995 and 2001. The research results show that the impact of flooding brings a negative premium on the housing price of about 20,000$ Canadian (CAN).


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (15) ◽  
pp. 2981
Author(s):  
Jeanné le Roux ◽  
Sundar Christopher ◽  
Manil Maskey

Planet, a commercial company, has achieved a key milestone by launching a large fleet of small satellites (smallsats) that provide high spatial resolution imagery of the entire Earth’s surface on a daily basis with its PlanetScope sensors. Given the potential utility of these data, this study explores the use for fine particulate matter (PM2.5) air quality applications. However, before these data can be utilized for air quality applications, key features of the data, including geolocation accuracy, calibration quality, and consistency in spectral signatures, need to be addressed. In this study, selected Dove-Classic PlanetScope data is screened for geolocation consistency. The spectral response of the Dove-Classic PlanetScope data is then compared to Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data over different land cover types, and under varying PM2.5 and mid visible aerosol optical depth (AOD) conditions. The data selected for this study was found to fall within Planet’s reported geolocation accuracy of 10 m (between 3–4 pixels). In a comparison of top of atmosphere (TOA) reflectance over a sample of different land cover types, the difference in reflectance between PlanetScope and MODIS ranged from near-zero (0.0014) to 0.117, with a mean difference in reflectance of 0.046 ± 0.031 across all bands. The reflectance values from PlanetScope were higher than MODIS 78% of the time, although no significant relationship was found between surface PM2.5 or AOD and TOA reflectance for the cases that were studied. The results indicate that commercial satellite data have the potential to address Earth-environmental issues.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 4941
Author(s):  
Jin Zhao ◽  
Ghulam Rasool Madni ◽  
Muhammad Awais Anwar ◽  
Syeda Masooma Zahra

It is widely accepted that the economic and social system may be more efficient by reforming institutions. Institutional reforms are attempts to change the rules affecting human interactions and these reforms are fundamental for development and economic prosperity. The reforms can be divided into two categories; political and economic institutional reforms. It is need of the hour to determine the category of reform that is more suitable for developing countries. Moreover, a vast literature describes the impact of institutional reforms but little focused on exploring their impacts on macroeconomic activities. So, this study is an effort to determine the impact of institutional reforms on macroeconomic variables by considering the panel data of 122 developing countries covering the time span from 1996 to 2019. The study applied treatment analysis using the difference-in-differences technique to gauge the effects of reforms. Besides, it will be interesting to know the causes triggering the institutional reforms in developing countries. The findings of the study reveal that economic reforms are more important as compared with political reforms to grow the economies. The countries focusing on political reforms are not able to overcome the economic crisis. Moreover, both types of reforms do not cause each other in these countries.


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