Reading 9

Question 1

Viña and colleagues (2016) find that this reforestation program has been quite
successful, increasing

Answer 1

forest cover in China by 1.6 percent (or 157,315 square kilometers). For
scale, this corresponds to an area slightly larger than the state of Georgia

Question 2

2016). Initially, to support economic growth as well as changing
consumption patterns, China did what and what did this decision cause

Answer 2

utilized its own vast natural resources and land (Mol). 2011). However,
this decision created extensive environmental problems including increased forest loss,
biodiversity loss and endangerment of species, soil erosion, air pollution, and water scarcity (Karl,

Question 3

Thus, China’s conservation policy may be exacerbating

Answer 3

forest degradation in other regions” like exporting the problem- like we discussed in prev lecs

Question 4

Despite the apparent connection between domestic conservation efforts and resulting
displacement of environmental harms to other countries, we are not aware of

Answer 4

any cross-national
research that that actually tests this contention, which leaves a rather large gap in the empirical
literature.

Question 5

2019). In spite of the theoretical

developments and growing body of empirical research that are pertinent to the case of China, there
remains a scarcity of

Answer 5

of research on this particular question.

Question 6

On the one hand, using a multi-region input-output model for a sample
of 186 nations, scholars such as Feng and Hubacek (2014) found that China has been able to offset

Answer 6

a portion of its carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide emissions by importing natural resources and
agricultural products from low- and middle-income nations

Question 7

Environmental harms may be avoided because Chinese companies and banks
have been participating in

Answer 7

voluntary codes of conduct designed to lessen their environmental

impacts, and Chinese investments and other economic activities have been under scrutiny by non-
governmental organizations and social movements to improve their environmental performance

Question 8

Drawing on the theory of ecologically unequal exchange, we anticipate that China’s reliance
on exporting nations to reduce its own domestic environmental harms, does what

Answer 8

while also not producing

harms in those very same exporting nations, may amount to a sleight of hand.

Question 9

hand. Thus, as the starting

point for our study, we draw on the theory of

Answer 9

of ecologically unequal exchange and the existing but

contested empirical research on the topic.

Question 9

hand. Thus, as the starting

point for our study, we draw on the theory of

Answer 9

of ecologically unequal exchange and the existing but

contested empirical research on the topic.

Question 10

The theory of unequal ecological exchange is an extension of

Answer 10

of various political-economic
theories that suggest that high-income nations are advantageously situated within the global
economy and are more likely to secure favorable terms of trade

Question 11

Put differently, high-income nations

are able to shift

Answer 11

many of the negative environmental externalities associated with their natural
resource demands onto low- and middle-income nations

Question 12

1967). This is the result of several factors that drive down the price of natural resources including
…

Answer 12

competition among the number of nations exporting similar products, subsidies by governments
in high-income nations who also produce similar goods, and an abundant supply of cheap labor to
produce the goods in low- and middle-income nations (Hornborg

Question 13

For example, the World Bank’s investment loans often

finance … (Rich) High-income nations also finance similar projects via their …

Answer 13

1. infrastructure projects that are meant to facilitate bringing exports to market
2. export credit agencies

Question 14

At the same time, the International Monetary Fund’s structural adjustment lending requires

Answer 14

requires highly
indebted low- and middle-income nations to adopt certain macro-economic policy reforms meant
to boost natural resource exports, including economic incentives (e.g., tax holidays) and regulatory
concessions (e.g., environmental law exemptions) for foreign investors (Shandra, Rademacher,
and Coburn 2016).

Question 15

In such instances, multinational corporations are able to

Answer 15

extract economic incentives and
regulatory concessions from a host nation by relocating or threatening to relocate their facilities to
another low- or middle-income nation (Frey 2012).

Question 16

In such instances, multinational corporations are able to

Answer 16

extract economic incentives and
regulatory concessions from a host nation by relocating or threatening to relocate their facilities to
another low- or middle-income nation (Frey 2012).

Question 17

The authors then compare scores across nations at different income

levels to conclude that

Answer 17

high-income nations externalize various environmental problems onto low-
income nations via imports from these nations.

Question 18

The authors
go on to demonstrate that higher levels of exports sent from low- and middle-income nations to

high-income nations are related to worse

Answer 18

ecological footprint scores across low- and middle-
income nations. Rice (2007) also examined the ecological footprint of nations and demonstrates

that the impact of exports to high-income nations are especially detrimental in low-income nations.

Question 19

loss. Noble (2017) demonstrates that higher levels of
chocolate export flows from low- and middle-income to high-income nations also correspond with
increased forest loss in the exporting nations. The findings from this wide-ranging body of
empirical research consistently show that

Answer 19

exports to high-income nations are associated with

environmental harms.

Question 20

While this body of research yields fairly conclusive results, less is known
about the role that rapidly industrializing

Answer 20

middle-income nations like China play in the process of
ecologically unequal exchange, despite recent calls for social scientists to better understand the
issue (Frame

Question 21

what is unclear about chinas trade practices and what do we seek to do

Answer 21

It is unclear whether
their trade practices displace harms onto poorer nations or if China has been successful inestablishing more balanced and less ecological destructive trade relations. As such, we seek apply
the theory of ecologically unequal exchange to China and contribute to the nascent and contested
research that exists on the topic.

Question 22

China’s new focus was well timed, as it was positioned to

Answer 22

ake advantage of investments

opportunities abroad that opened up as a result of the International Monetary Fund requiring low-
and middle-income nations to privatize many government functions as part of structural

adjustment lending during the 1990s

Question 23

The Chinese government also

provided what to its overseas companies and give examples
by the central government (Smaller, Wei, and Yalan 2012). China also tends to limit 2

Answer 23

1. inancial incentives and regulatory concessions to its companies (Bräutigam and
   Xiaoyang 2009). The financial incentives include tax holidays, regulatory concessions, and the
   elimination of administrative requirements that companies receive permission to invest overseas
2. monitoring,
   enforcement, and prosecution of exports known to have been logged or harvested illegally

Question 24

2016). Because of the limited financial ties to the Chinese
government and banks, Kittilaksanawong and Dai (2016) argue that …1 Second,
large Chinese companies are now directly acquiring forest concessions and setting up pulp and
saw mills to process logs for export to China as paper and wood (Li and Yan 2016). These
investments allow China to 2

Answer 24

1. small and medium sized
   enterprises are less likely to comply with voluntary guidelines related to conservation.
   2play a larger role in the management of a low- or middle-income
   nation’s forests (Li and Yan 2016).

Question 25

The factors discussed above are the ways that China has been able to

Answer 25

reduce domestic
environmental problems by developing and relying more on increased forestry exports from other
low- and middle-income nations. This would lead us to expect that exporting nations would absorb
the environmental harms displaced onto them. However, the limited research applying ecologically
unequal exchange to China has yielded contradictory results.

Question 26

Second, China has attempted to respond to criticism related to

Answer 26

he environmental performance

of its investments abroad and be more proactive about warding off such criticisms

Question 27

Third, China has been more willing to work with the World Bank and United Nations to
integrate their regulations on

Answer 27

governance and transparency into its investments (Mol 2011). In this
regard, China’s Export-Import Bank signed an agreement to ensure that its investments in forestry
in Sub-Saharan Africa meet the World Bank’s and International Finance Corporation’s
environmental standards (Mol 2011). At the same time, the China-Africa Development Fund has
committed to meet the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development guidelines that
include environmental standards (Mol 2011).

Question 28

The author finds

that in the 1990s, rosewood imports in China were correlated with

Answer 28

increased forest loss in Vietnam,
Myanmar, and Cambodia during the 1990s. As rosewood supplies dwindled among these nations
at the turn of the century and prices rose, imports from Sub-Saharan Africa began to increase, as
did forest loss in the region (Tranor 2015).

Question 29

A similar study by Yin (2018) found that China’s

demand for wood from the Solomon Islands increased forest loss. In this instance, China facilitated

Answer 29

exports by supporting “industrialization” such as financing the building of roads that are primarily
used to gain access to forests in remote regions, which in turn increased forest loss (Yin 2018).

Question 30

The World Wildlife Fund (2018) estimates that Asia Pulp and Paper’s
and Asia Pacific Resources International Holdings Limited’s mills do not have access to enough

Answer 30

forest concessions to keep running at capacity.

Question 31

Thus, forest loss is anticipated to increase with

suppliers clearing natural forests illegally to meet demand. Despite the regulatory framework in

Answer 31

place, we argue that the pressure of consumptive demand fulfilled in the structure of unequal
exchange will be the determinative factor for forests.

Question 32

Having reviewed the ways that China may be facilitating ecologically unequal exchange in
low- and middle-income nations, and despite the initial contradictory evidence regarding whether
this is occurring, from this discussion we turn to empirically addressing this important lacuna in
the cross-national literature:

Answer 32

Are higher levels of forestry exports from low- and middle-income
nations to China related to increased forest loss in the exporting nations?

Question 33

We analyze the data using

Answer 33

ordinary least squares regression (OLS) in Stata 14.2

Question 34

Before the use of OLS (the stat thing they are using), we must ensure that

Answer 34

we are not violating any regression assumptions.
First, we calculate mean and highest variance inflation factor (VIF) scores for each model, which
we report in Table 2. There does not appear to be any potential problems with multicollinearity
because the mean and highest VIF scores do not exceed the conservative threshold value of 2.5
(Tabachnick and Fidel 2013).

Question 35

1977). Thus, if the chi-square test coefficient is statistically significant, then we reject the null
hypothesis and conclude that

Answer 35

the specified transformation does a worse job at approximating
normality than the variable in its original form.

Question 36

We removed these nations from the analysis and report results based on their exclusion. We
also examined Cook’s distance statistics to detect influential cases. The results indicate

Answer 36

no

potential problems with influential cases among the remaining nations included in the sample.

Question 37

The sample includes what countries

Answer 37

75 low- and middle-income nations as classified by the World Bank

Question 38

Our dependent variable is forest loss. Until recently, cross-national research on forest loss
was largely based upon data made available in

Answer 38

the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture
Organization’s Global Forest Resources Assessment. However, the reliability of the data has been called into question because they are gathered
utilizing data collection methods that vary from nation to nation (Grainger 2008).

Question 39

We calculate forest loss in the following way.

Answer 39

First, we set the minimum tree cover canopy
density level upon which to base the estimates. Second, we obtain the amount of nation’s land area in hectares with the
corresponding minimum tree cover canopy density. Third, we obtain the number of hectares of forests cleared from 2001 to 2014 in the
preceding area. Fourth, we divide the total amount of hectares cleared by the total forest size to
compute the rate of forest loss over this time period (Rudel, 2017). We take the natural log of the
forest loss rate because it is skewed.

Question 40

As noted above, we use the theory of ecologically unequal exchange to inform this study.

Answer 40

Our
main independent variable is a nation’s forestry exports to China. From this, we then draw upon
Shandra (2007) to guide our choice of other independent variable to include in the models. See
Shandra (2007) for a discussion of how each independent variable is related to a given theory of
forest loss (World Bank 2016). Descriptive statistics and bivariate correlations for all variables in
our analysis are provided in the appendix (Table A1).

Question 41

Forestry Exports to China. This variable measures a nation’s forestry exports sent to China
as

Answer 41

a percentage of a nation’s total forestry exports.

Question 42

Forestry Exports to China. This variable measures a nation’s forestry exports sent to China
as

Answer 42

a percentage of a nation’s total forestry exports.

Question 43

It is also necessary to control for a country’s total forestry exports in
order to determine whether it is the flow of exports to a given nation or overall exports that may
be contributing to forest loss (Shandra, Leckband, and London 2009). Thus, we include

Answer 43

total
forestry exports as a percentage of total exports of goods and services. The forestry export data
come from the Food and Agriculture Organization (2017).

Question 44

We expect higher levels of forestry

exports to correspond with

Answer 44

more forest loss.

Question 45

We expect that nations with a larger forestry sector should have higher levels of

Answer 45

forest loss

as extraction of these natural resources are central to their economies.

Question 46

Forest Proximity to Infrastructure. This variable is

Answer 46

the percentage of a country’s total forests

that are located within 10 kilometers of infrastructure including roads, highways, rivers, and ports.

Question 47

Rudel (1989) argues that geometric growth

in population outstrips arithmetic growth in the means of

Answer 47

subsistence, leading a growing

population to clear forests to grow crops.

Question 48

We use Vanhanen’s (2014) measure of democracy, which is calculated by

Answer 48

taking

the average of his political competition index with his political participation index.

Question 49

In the judicial sector, corruption involves judges and their agents receiving
undocumented extra payments or bribes from an individual or company to speed up, delay, or
obtain a favorable decision (Sommer 2017). We hypothesize that

Answer 49

higher levels of corruption
should be related to increased forest loss. This is because corruption across sectors diverts
government funds away from investment in conservation (Koyuncu and Yilmaz 2009). It also
allows illegal logging and other violations of a country’s forestry laws to go unenforced with little
fear of punishment (Sommer 2017).