Affiliation:
1. Universidade Federal do Pará, Brazil
Abstract
Abstract: This paper investigates the existence of lock-in of low technology and high environmental impact on Brazilian Amazon logging industry. The research employed evolutionary economics as a theoretical basis, especially the concept of technological trajectories. The duality of decisions involving logging - conventional logging (CL) versus reduced-impact logging (RIL) - was studied. An agent-based simulation model - in which decision-making under bounded rationality is based on a genetic algorithm - was implemented in Java programming language. Results demonstrate the existence of lock-in, producers aversion to risks, greater operational efficiency of sustainable logging, and benefits derived from a policy of environmental bonuses, both in economic and ecological terms.
Subject
General Economics, Econometrics and Finance
Reference40 articles.
1. Royalty reform and illegal reporting of harvest volumes under alternative penalty schemes.;AMACHER G. S.;Environmental and Resource Economics,2007
2. Policies for reduced deforestation and their impact on agricultural production;ANGELSEN A.;Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America,2010
3. DETERring Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon: Environmental Monitoring and Law enforcement;ASSUNÇÃO J.,2013
4. Competing Technologies, Increasing Returns, and lock-in by Historical Events;ARTHUR W. B.;The Economic Journal,1989
5. Designing Economic Agents that Act like Human Agents: A Behavioral Approach to Bounded Rationality;ARTHUR W. B.;American Economic Review,1991