IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/erg/wpaper/635.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Geography of Trade and the Environment: The Case of CO2 Emissions

Author

Listed:
  • Sami Bensassi
  • Laura Márquez-Ramos
  • Inmaculada Martínez-Zarzoso
  • Habib Zitouna

    (University of Carthage, Tunisia)

Abstract

According to recent theoretical developments, there are three key channels through which trade affects the environment. The first is via its effect on the scale of economic activity, the second is via a composition effect and the third is via a technical effect. This paper argues that, in addition to these traditional factors, the geography of international trade flows does matter. Since, transport activity is also a source of pollution, trading with close countries does not have the same implications as trading with distant ones. However, this geographical distance effect can be offset by a transport sector effect i.e. the use of different modes, techniques and scale of transport. Indeed, when distances increase, it is expected that transport companies use less energy-intensive modes of transport. These two opposite effects are tested for carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in a set of 149 countries as well as for different economic groups over the period 1986 to 2003. The main findings show a U-shaped relation between distance and CO2 emissions: the distance (transport sector) effect dominates long (short) distance travel. This paper underlines the possible high costs in terms of CO2 emissions of globalized trade as opposed to regionalized trade flows.

Suggested Citation

  • Sami Bensassi & Laura Márquez-Ramos & Inmaculada Martínez-Zarzoso & Habib Zitouna, 2011. "The Geography of Trade and the Environment: The Case of CO2 Emissions," Working Papers 635, Economic Research Forum, revised 10 Jan 2011.
    • Handle: RePEc:erg:wpaper:635
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://erf.org.eg/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/635.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://bit.ly/2n3fc3B
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Managi, Shunsuke & Hibiki, Akira & Tsurumi, Tetsuya, 2009. "Does trade openness improve environmental quality?," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 58(3), pages 346-363, November.
    2. Werner Antweiler & Brian R. Copeland & M. Scott Taylor, 2001. "Is Free Trade Good for the Environment?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(4), pages 877-908, September.
    3. Brian R. Copeland & M. Scott Taylor, 1994. "North-South Trade and the Environment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 109(3), pages 755-787.
    4. World Bank, 2011. "World Development Indicators 2011," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 2315.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Baghdadi, Leila & Martinez-Zarzoso, Inmaculada & Zitouna, Habib, 2013. "Are RTA agreements with environmental provisions reducing emissions?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(2), pages 378-390.
    2. Yongbum Kwon & Hyeji Lee & Heekwan Lee, 2018. "Implication of the cluster analysis using greenhouse gas emissions of Asian countries to climate change mitigation," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 23(8), pages 1225-1249, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yang, Yuting, 2022. "Electricity interconnection with intermittent renewables," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    2. Cui, Jingbo & Lapan, Harvey E. & Moschini, GianCarlo, 2012. "Are exporters more environmentally friendly than non-exporters? Theory and evidence," ISU General Staff Papers 201210040700001076, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    3. Ling-Yun He & Liang Wang, 2019. "Import Liberalization of Intermediates and Environment: Empirical Evidence from Chinese Manufacturing," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-15, May.
    4. Ajayi, Patricia & Ogunrinola, Adedeji, 2020. "Growth, Trade Openness and Environmental Degradation in Nigeria," MPRA Paper 100713, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Edy Yusuf Agung Gunanto & Tri Wahyu & Jaka Aminata & Banatul Hayati, 2021. "Convergence CO2 Emission in ASEAN Countries: Augmented Green Solow Model Approach," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 11(5), pages 572-578.
    6. Natalia Zugravu-Soilita, 2019. "Trade in Environmental Goods and Air Pollution: A Mediation Analysis to Estimate Total, Direct and Indirect Effects," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 74(3), pages 1125-1162, November.
    7. Moinul Islam & Keiichiro Kanemoto & Shunsuke Managi, 2016. "Impact of Trade Openness and Sector Trade on Embodied Greenhouse Gases Emissions and Air Pollutants," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 20(3), pages 494-505, June.
    8. Yang, Yuting, 2020. "Electricity Interconnection with Intermittent Renewables," TSE Working Papers 20-1075, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    9. Fumei He & Ke-Chiun Chang & Min Li & Xueping Li & Fangjhy Li, 2020. "Bootstrap ARDL Test on the Relationship among Trade, FDI, and CO 2 Emissions: Based on the Experience of BRICS Countries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-23, February.
    10. Helen Tammela Naughton, 2010. "Globalization and Emissions in Europe," European Journal of Comparative Economics, Cattaneo University (LIUC), vol. 7(2), pages 503-519, December.
    11. Ren, Shenggang & Yuan, Baolong & Ma, Xie & Chen, Xiaohong, 2014. "The impact of international trade on China׳s industrial carbon emissions since its entry into WTO," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 624-634.
    12. Dhimitri Qirjo & Razvan Pascalau, 2019. "The Role of TTIP on the Environment," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 85(4), pages 1262-1285, April.
    13. Udo Kreickemeier & Philipp M. Richter, 2014. "Trade and the Environment: The Role of Firm Heterogeneity," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(2), pages 209-225, May.
    14. Ling-Yun He & Geng Huang, 2020. "Tariff Reduction and Environment: Evidence from CAFTA and Chinese Manufacturing Firms," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-25, March.
    15. Michael Schymura & Andreas Löschel, 2012. "Trade and the Environment: An Application of the WIOD Database," EcoMod2012 3948, EcoMod.
    16. Brian Chi-ang Lin & Siqi Zheng & Maximilian Auffhammer & Weizeng Sun & Jianfeng Wu & Siqi Zheng, 2016. "The Decomposition And Dynamics Of Industrial Carbon Dioxide Emissions For 287 Chinese Cities In 1998–2009," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(3), pages 460-481, July.
    17. Fernández-Amador, Octavio & Francois, Joseph F. & Oberdabernig, Doris A. & Tomberger, Patrick, 2017. "Carbon Dioxide Emissions and Economic Growth: An Assessment Based on Production and Consumption Emission Inventories," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 269-279.
    18. Ben Jebli, Mehdi & Ben Youssef, Slim, 2015. "The environmental Kuznets curve, economic growth, renewable and non-renewable energy, and trade in Tunisia," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 173-185.
    19. William Bekoe & Talatu Jalloh, 2023. "Assessing the Economic Implications of Free Trade on Environmental Quality: Empirical Evidence from Africa," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 84(1), pages 19-36, January.
    20. Hideo Konishi & Minoru Nakada & Akihisa Shibata, 2018. "Free Trade Agreements with Environmental Standards," Boston College Working Papers in Economics 972, Boston College Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:erg:wpaper:635. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sherine Ghoneim (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/erfaceg.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.