Greening the Budget regards the fundamental cause of environmental degradation as government and market failure and proposes the use of budgets as an instrument of environmental policy to rectify this problem. The book focuses on the elements of the public budget which currently affect the environment and explores the scope for greening both revenue and expenditure through specific measures. The authors begin by considering the effects of removing environmentally damaging subsidies and the potential for correcting market failure by way of appropriate pricing. They go on to examine the introduction of new taxes following the 'polluter pays' principle and, in contrast, the allocation of incentives for those who take the environmentally preferred course of action. They also explore the environmental and budgetary implications of European Union financial transfers by looking at a case study of the agricultural sector. The book concludes by addressing public purchasing and administration. This book will be of particular interest and value to scholars of environmental economics, researchers involved in environmental policy, and environmental consultants, practitioners and policymakers.

Do environmental regulations harm international competitiveness? In answer to this question, this book focuses on the impact of regulatory policies on competitiveness and employment at the firm level. It investigates the trade-off between environmental regulations and competitiveness across countries and regions throughout Europe, using the food processing industry as a case study.The authors compare and contrast the experiences of similar firms across Europe to examine the different costs firms face in applying environmental regulations and the different levels of competitiveness they achieve as a result. The investigation includes a detailed and thorough comparison of the European food processing industries using 67 company case studies. The results show that firms can achieve national or international levels of competitiveness even when they face a relatively unfavourable level of regulatory costs. These important findings will almost certainly have general application to small and medium sized firms in other industries. This book will be welcomed by policymakers, practitioners, researchers and academics interested in industrial economics, environmental management and environmental economics.

The aim of this book is to link demand and supply of environmental information in the field of Life Cycle Management. The book is based on the results of the CHAINET concerted action financed by EU-DGXII for the work period 1998-2000, and is intended to build bridges between the different scientific communities in the field of Life Cycle Management. A structured approach is followed, meaning that both demand and supply of environmental information are characterised, after which the two are linked.
Chapter 2 deals with the demand side; a number of characteristics are identified including the object of analysis, different question types, consecutive decision steps, and the cultural context of the decision at hand. Chapter 3 gives an overview of the supply side, distinguishing between concepts, analytical tools, procedural tools, technical elements, and data. The focus of the book is on analytical tools. In Chapter 4 and in a 34-page annex, eleven analytical tools are systematically described, including LCA, MIPS, ERA, MFA, SFA, CERA, IOA, analytical tools for ecodesign, LCC, TCA, and CBA.
In Chapter 5, demand and supply are linked, starting from the question types and indicating which types of tools are particularly suited for which type of question. For instance, it is shown that LCA is particularly useful for operational questions, but less so for more strategic questions. Other aspects concern the distinction between a broad overview and a detailed analysis, and, interestingly, the cultural context of the decision. It appears that without agreement on the criteria to be used, quantitative analytical tools such as LCA, ERA, or CBA may not be very helpful as support for decision-making. Rather more robust quantitative, or even qualitative, tools may then be used instead.
Chapter 6 makes a number of concluding remarks. A plea is made for the combined use of tools, rather than the development of a super tool. Another important topic concerns the customisation of tools, which is seen as quite useful if combined with a periodic validation against a more detailed analysis.
In the text of the preceding chapters, 26 text boxes are included as practical illustrations of the principles described in the text. In the following chapters, three cases are presented, dealing with electronic goods, the car, and clothes washing. These cases show how, in practice, different tools are used in combination, as a support for a given decision situation.
The book is particularly suited for courses in higher education, both for universities and polytechnics, and for use by consultancy firms, by larger companies, and industrial branch organisations.

This study focuses in detail on the environmental compliance/competitiveness relationship with respect to the regulation of packaging waste. An important and innovative feature of the study is its emphasis on backward and forward linkages. An entire supply chain is considered: packaging manufacturers and suppliers, food processors and the food retail sector, to study the competitive effects of environmental standards on manufacturing companies and the vertical links and supply responses. A variety of regulatory regimes is represented by including within the study companies from Germany, Italy, the Republic of Ireland and the United Kingdom. While it is of note that the relatively strong regulation in Germany has indeed had effects on company behaviour, there is no evidence that environmental regulations hindered companies from achieving competitive performance.Analyses consider: the response of individual firms to different levels of regulation; the cost of compliance; impact on employment; the influence of the supply chain on environmental and competitive performance; the importance of firm size and ownership; and the impact of regulation on competitiveness, and firm competitiveness on the efficiency of adjustment to regulation.

The aim of this book is to link demand and supply of environmental information in the field of Life Cycle Management. The book is based on the results of the CHAINET concerted action financed by EU-DGXII for the work period 1998-2000, and is intended to build bridges between the different scientific communities in the field of Life Cycle Management. A structured approach is followed, meaning that both demand and supply of environmental information are characterised, after which the two are linked.
Chapter 2 deals with the demand side; a number of characteristics are identified including the object of analysis, different question types, consecutive decision steps, and the cultural context of the decision at hand. Chapter 3 gives an overview of the supply side, distinguishing between concepts, analytical tools, procedural tools, technical elements, and data. The focus of the book is on analytical tools. In Chapter 4 and in a 34-page annex, eleven analytical tools are systematically described, including LCA, MIPS, ERA, MFA, SFA, CERA, IOA, analytical tools for ecodesign, LCC, TCA, and CBA.
In Chapter 5, demand and supply are linked, starting from the question types and indicating which types of tools are particularly suited for which type of question. For instance, it is shown that LCA is particularly useful for operational questions, but less so for more strategic questions. Other aspects concern the distinction between a broad overview and a detailed analysis, and, interestingly, the cultural context of the decision. It appears that without agreement on the criteria to be used, quantitative analytical tools such as LCA, ERA, or CBA may not be very helpful as support for decision-making. Rather more robust quantitative, or even qualitative, tools may then be used instead.
Chapter 6 makes a number of concluding remarks. A plea is made for the combined use of tools, rather than the development of a super tool. Another important topic concerns the customisation of tools, which is seen as quite useful if combined with a periodic validation against a more detailed analysis.
In the text of the preceding chapters, 26 text boxes are included as practical illustrations of the principles described in the text. In the following chapters, three cases are presented, dealing with electronic goods, the car, and clothes washing. These cases show how, in practice, different tools are used in combination, as a support for a given decision situation.
The book is particularly suited for courses in higher education, both for universities and polytechnics, and for use by consultancy firms, by larger companies, and industrial branch organisations.

This study examines in three case studies whether German plants suffer from a negative impact on competitiveness caused by stringent environmental legislation. A micro level analysis showed that abatement initiatives had in general been implemented without economic damage and did not touch on the core business. Moreover, German sample plants ranked environmental pressure as relatively unimportant compared with other competitive pressures. Finally, the low absolute levels of compliance costs, at least in two of the case studies, explained why environmental regulation cannot have a great influence on competitiveness in the chosen sectors. High productivity levels were not among the essential factors explaining our findings. It implies for our case studies that also plants with lower productivity can withstand high compliance costs.