The authors analyze the determinants of fatalities in 2,194 large flood events in 108 countries between 1985 and 2008. Given that socioeconomic factors can affect mortality right in the aftermath of a flood, but also indirectly by influencing flood frequency and magnitude, they distinguish...

Romania was one of the first transition countries in Europe to introduce auctions for allocating standing timber (stumpage) in public forests. In comparison with the former system in the country-administrative allocation at set prices-timber auctions offer several potential advantages: greater...

Discrepancies in bilateral trade statistics for forest products have recently attracted attention as potential indicators of illegal trade practices. For example, if exporters understate quantities to evade export taxes or quotas, then one might expect reported exports to be less than reported...

"Ecosystem services" has become a catch-phrase for the complex connections between the natural environment and human well-being. This paper considers the impact of changes in the supply of ecosystem services, and programs to increase their supply, on near-term growth of gross domestic product....

The Amazon rainforest, the world's largest tropical rainforest and an important constituent of the global biosphere, continues degrading by rapid deforestation, which is expected to continue despite policies to prevent it. Current international funding to protect the Amazon rainforest focuses on...

Economic theory predicts that the current change in national wealth, broadly defined to include natural and human capital as well as produced capital ("genuine savings"), determines whether the present value of future changes in consumption is positive or negative. Theoretical research has...

Economic theory predicts that the current change in national wealth, broadly defined to include natural and human capital as well as produced capital ("genuine savings"), determines whether the present value of future changes in consumption is positive or negative. Theoretical research has...

Existing wealth estimates show that in most countries intangible capital is the largest share of total wealth. Intangible capital is calculated as the difference between total wealth and tangible (produced and natural) capital. This paper uses new estimates of total wealth, natural capital, and...

How rich would resource-abundant countries be if they had actually followed the Hartwick Rule (invest resource rents in other assets) over the past 30 years? The authors use time series data on investments and rents on exhaustible resource extraction for 70 countries to answer this question. The...

The World Bank has been publishing estimates of adjusted net or "genuine" saving since 1999. This measure of saving treats depletion of natural resources as a type of economic depreciation. Hamilton uses recent theoretical results relating growth in saving to growth in future consumption to...