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Item Metadata only Recent progress on high-entropy materials for electrocatalytic water splitting applications(Springer Science and Business Media LLC, 2021) Huo, W.Y.; Wang, S.Q.; Zhu, W.H.; Zhang, Z.L.; Fang, F.; Xie, Z.H.; Jiang, J.Q.Advanced materials for electrocatalytic water splitting applications have been sought-after considering both environmental and economic requirements. However, the traditional materials design concept limits the exploration of high-performance catalysts. The born of a materials design concept based on multiple elements, high-entropy materials, provides a promising path to break the shackles of compositional design in materials science. A number of high-entropy materials were reported to show remarkable properties for electrocatalytic water splitting applications. High-entropy materials were widely confirmed to be one kind of the best electrocatalysts for water splitting applications. Due to the synergy of multiple metal components, they show excellent catalytic activity. Several nontraditional methods were developed and reported to prepare high-performance high-entropy materials. This review article presents the recent progress on high-entropy materials for electrocatalytic water splitting applications. Moreover, it presents the research interests and future prospects in this field.Item Metadata only Community attitudes towards marine parks in South Australia(Elsevier, 2022) Haensch, J.; Wheeler, S.A.; McWhinnie, S.F.Marine protected areas are a common conservation management tool to protect marine ecosystems around the world. It has been found that while technical considerations regarding location and size are important for assessing a marine protected area’s effectiveness, the attitudes that communities hold towards marine protected areas can be equally important. Using seven years of public surveys in South Australia from 2012 to 2019, this study explores what potential differences exist across space and time in community attitudes towards marine parks. Overall, probit regression modelling results indicate that opposition to marine parks in South Australia has fallen over time, and that opposition was highest in regional areas. In addition, familiarity with marine parks and associating parks in general with conservation protection influenced people’s positive attitudes towards marine parks. Sociodemographic characteristics of gender, age and education were also important.Item Metadata only Technology Heterogeneity and Poverty Traps: A Latent Class Approach to Technology Gap Drivers of Chronic Poverty(Informa UK Limited, 2023) Hill, D.; McWhinnie, S.F.; Kumar, S.; Gregg, D.The analysis of household wealth dynamic remains an important methodology in the identification of poverty traps. To overcome measurement issues in survey data, livelihoods-based approaches of the dynamics of poverty are typically examined using panel regressions of a livelihoods regression on household assets and other socio-economic factors over time. In this paper, we characterise the livelihoods regression as a ‘livelihoods technology’, and use a latent class-technology approach to account for heterogeneity in how households generate a livelihood. We use a detailed dataset from rural India covering 213 households across 2001–2014, and control for selection issues through a Heckman Selection model. Our results are the first in the wealth dynamics literature to show that substantial heterogeneity exists in the technologies with which households generate their livelihoods. Importantly, we show that accounting for heterogeneity in household livelihoods ‘technologies’ more readily identifies different equilibria in wealth levels and provides previously foregone information on who is poor and why they remain poor.Item Open Access Genetic distance, cultural differences, and the formation of regional trade agreements(Springer, 2021) Heid, B.; Lu, W.Genetic distance between countries’ populations has been shown to proxy crosscountry diferences in cultures and preferences. In an unbalanced panel of 133 countries from 1970 to 2012, the study fnds that higher genetic distance between two countries decreases their probability of having a trade agreement, even when controlling for geographic distance and other controls. The impact of cultural differences proxied by genetic distance is persistent over time and economically signifcant: While increasing the geographic distance between two countries by 1% decreases the probability of a regional trade agreement by 0.11% points, increasing their genetic distance by 1% decreases the probability by 0.06% points.Item Open Access The economics of investor protection: ISDS versus national treatment(Elsevier BV, 2019) Kohler, W.; Stähler, F.Item Open Access International agreements, economic sovereignty and exit(Elsevier BV, 2019) Richardson, M.; Stähler, F.Abstract not avaialbleItem Open Access Import tariffs and transport prices(Wiley Periodicals LLC, 2024) Staehler, F.; Boddin, D.This paper discusses how import tariffs interact with transport prices in episodes of trade liberalization. We develop a model of a transport industry that operates under imperfect competition and economies of scale. Double marginalization due to market power reduces the effects of trade liberalization, while a larger trade volume may support them due to economies of scale. We use a large data set of maritime transport data and combine it with tariff data to find that economies of scale beat market power: a decline in the tariff implies a decline in freight rates.Item Open Access A model of conflict and leadership: Is there a hawkish drift in politics?(Public Library of Science (PLoS), 2022) Bandyopadhyay, S.; Chattopadhyay, A.K.; Oak, M.; Liu, Q.We analyze conflict between a citizenry and an insurgent group over a fixed resource such as land. The citizenry has an elected leader who proposes a division such that, the lower the land ceded to the insurgents, the higher the cost of conflict. Leaders differ in ability and ideology such that the higher the leader’s ability, the lower the cost of conflict, and the more hawkish the leader, the higher his utility from retaining land. We show that the conflict arises from the political process with re-election motives causing leaders to choose to cede too little land to signal their ability. We also show that when the rents of office are high, the political equilibrium and the second best diverge; in particular, the policy under the political equilibrium is more hawkish compared to the second best. When both ideology and ability are unknown, we provide a plausible condition under which the probability of re-election increases in the leader’s hawkishness, thereby providing an explanation for why hawkish politicians may have a natural advantage under the electoral process.Item Metadata only The spatial distribution and determinants of irrigators’ price choices for water entitlement trading(TAYLOR & FRANCIS AS, 2022) Haensch, J.Although many studies have examined irrigators’ water trading behaviour, little is known about how irrigators value their water, especially for their water entitlements (permanent water rights). This article’s aim is to assess the determinants of irrigators’ values for their water (i.e. price choices for selling and buying of water entitlements). Specifically, we focus on spatial determinants and how irrigators’ price choices vary spatially. We used stated preferences data from an irrigator survey in the southern Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) in Australia at the end of the Millennium drought (2011). It was found that (spatial) influences affect the price choices of the selling and buying decision differently depending e.g. on irrigators’ location in the southern MDB, i.e. with regards to rural areas, lower resource areas and the regional socio-economic index. Furthermore, irrigators’ valued their water differently if they owned it compared to if they were going to own it, which may relate to the ‘endowment effect’.Item Open Access Household food waste disposal behaviour is driven by perceived personal benefits, recycling habits and ability to compost(Elsevier BV, 2022) Nguyen, T.T.T.; Malek, L.; Umberger, W.J.; O'Connor, P.J.Households are responsible for a large proportion of total food waste and are an important focal point for addressing food waste disposal issues. Determinants of household food waste minimisation behaviour have been previously explored; however, little is known about the determinants of household food waste disposal behaviour. Several food waste disposal options are available to households, depending on context, with some disposal practices being more sustainable than others. This study applies the food waste hierarchy to household food waste disposal behaviour and identifies three sustainable food waste disposal behaviours (sorting food waste into the green organics bin, reusing food waste for animal feed, and home composting); and three unsustainable behaviours (disposing of food waste in the general waste bin, the recycling bin, and/or the sink). Using data from a survey of 1027 respondents, a fractional multinomial logit model is used to analyse the associations between explanatory variables and sustainable versus unsustainable household food waste disposal behaviour. Having a kitchen caddy is associated with increased sustainable food waste disposal behaviour (higher proportion of food waste diverted to the green bin and composted). Key factors that drive households’ use of kerbside green organics bins are perceived personal costs and benefits, and recycling habits. Importantly, environmental self-identity is positively associated with home composting practices. Factors associated with a higher proportion of food waste disposed of in the general waste bin (unsustainable behaviour) include stronger perceived inconvenience of using the green bin, living in a unit, and having a higher household income. Findings from this study can provide insight into interventions to promote more sustainable household food waste disposal practices.Item Metadata only Grain price spikes and beggar-thy-neighbor policy responses: A global economywide analysis(World Scientific, 2020) Jensen, H.G.; Anderson, K.; Anderson, K.When prices spike in international grain markets, national governments often reduce the extent to which that spike affects their domestic food markets. Those actions exacerbate the price spike and international welfare transfer associated with that terms of trade change. Several recent analyses have assessed the extent to which those policies contributed to the 2006–08 international price rises but only by focusing on one commodity or by using a back-of-the envelope (BOTE) method. The present more comprehensive analysis uses a global, economy-wide model that is able to take account of the interactions between markets for farm products that are closely related in production and/or consumption and able to estimate the impacts of those insulating policies on grain prices and on the grain trade and economic welfare of the world’s various countries. Our results support the conclusion from earlier studies that there is a need for stronger WTO disciplines on export restrictions.Item Metadata only Grain price spikes and beggar-thy-neighbor policy responses: A global economywide analysis(Oxford University Press (OUP), 2017) Jensen, H.; Anderson, K.When prices spike in international grain markets, national governments often reduce the extent to which that spike affects their domestic food markets. Those actions exacerbate the price spike and international welfare transfer associated with that terms of trade change. Several recent analyses have assessed the extent to which those policies contributed to the 2006–08 international price rises but only by focusing on one commodity or by using a back-of-the envelope (BOTE) method. The present more comprehensive analysis uses a global, economy-wide model that is able to take account of the interactions between markets for farm products that are closely related in production and/or consumption and able to estimate the impacts of those insulating policies on grain prices and on the grain trade and economic welfare of the world’s various countries. Our results support the conclusion from earlier studies that there is a need for stronger WTO disciplines on export restrictions.Item Metadata only Urban Household Coping Strategies during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Viet Nam(Asian Development Bank Institute, 2023) Dang, T.; Kyoko, T.; Shreyas, B.; Shogo, K.; KE Seetha, R.Item Open Access The impact of gender and age on bullying role, self-harm and suicide: Evidence from a cohort study of Australian children(Public Library of Science (PLoS), 2023) Ahmad, K.; Beatson, A.; Campbell, M.; Hashmi, R.; Keating, B.W.; Mulcahy, R.; Riedel, A.; Wang, S.; Shepherd, S.There has been limited longitudinal investigation to date into the association between bullying, self-harm, and suicidality in Australia and the impact of specific demographic differences on this relationship. This is despite the continued rise in the incidence of bullying, self-harm, and suicide. As such, the current study draws on data from the Longitudinal Survey of Australian children (LSAC) to examine the association between bullying, self-harm, and suicidality and explore the impact of demographic differences across three bullying related behaviors (being bullied, bullying others and being both bullied and bullying others). The evidence indicates that bully-victims exhibit the highest risk of self-harm and suicidality in Australia. When considering demographic differences, it was identified that females and adolescents aged 16-17-years-of-age had the highest risk of self-harm and suicidality. Further, a direct curvilinear relationship between age and the categories of self-harm was identified with an inflection point around 16-17 years. The study supports the need for further investigation into the association between bullying, self-harm, and suicidality longitudinally with a particular focus on other moderators.Item Metadata only Global and Local Spatial Spill-Overs: What Matters Most for the Diffusion of Organic Agriculture in Australia?(Elsevier BV, 2023) Mannaf, M.; Wheeler, S.A.; Zuo, A.Australia has the largest area of certified organic agricultural land in the world, yet to date there has been no studies conducted on its diffusion. This study used local area census data from 2010/11 and 2015/16 across Australia with a SLX Tobit model to investigate what drove a three-fold increase in organic land area during this time-period. Overall, stronger evidence was found for local spatial spill-overs than global spill-overs, which is perhaps reflective of the difference between Australian and European agriculture. The results also found that community area attributes (e.g., larger farms with low stocking rates, higher irrigation, higher grazing and horticultural land, increased labour supply); environmental factors (located in drought affected areas, increased vegetation, good quality soil and high altitude); and socio-economic characteristics (rural areas characterised by low human population density, higher community income and proximity to urban centres) significantly increased the intensity of the diffusion process.Item Open Access On bootstrapping tests of equal forecast accuracy for nested models(Wiley, 2023) Doko Tchatoka, F.; Haque, Q.The asymptotic distributions of the recursive out-of-sample forecast accuracy test statistics depend on stochastic integrals of Brownian motion when the models under comparison are nested. This often complicates their implementation in practice because the computation of their asymptotic critical values is burdensome. Hansen and Timmermann (2015, Econometrica) propose a Wald approximation of the commonly used recursive F-statistic and provide a simple characterization of the exact density of its asymptotic distribution. However, this characterization holds only when the larger model has one extra predictor or the forecast errors are homoscedastic. No such closed-form characterization is readily available when the nesting involves more than one predictor and heteroscedasticity or serial correlation is present. We first show through Monte Carlo experiments that both the recursive F-test and its Wald approximation have poor finite-sample properties, especially when the forecast horizon is greater than one and forecast errors exhibit serial correlation. We then propose a hybrid bootstrap method consisting of a moving block bootstrap and a residual-based bootstrap for both statistics and establish its validity. Simulations show that the hybrid bootstrap has good finite-sample performance, even in multi-step ahead forecasts with more than one predictor, and with heteroscedastic or autocorrelated forecast errors. The bootstrap method is illustrated on forecasting core inflation and GDP growth.Item Metadata only Cost Benefit Analysis of Legislation to Mandate the Supply of Opal Fuel in Regions of Australia: Final Report(South Australian Centre for Economic Studies, 2010) Hancock, J.; Stephens, E.; Kosturjak, A.; Whetton, S.; Pietsch, A.; Williams, J.; Hewitt, A.; The Australian Government Department of Health and AgeingItem Open Access Relaxing the symmetry assumption in participation games: A specification test for cluster heterogeneity(Springer (part of Springer Nature), 2023) Kirman, A.; Laisney, F.; Pezanis-Christou, P.; Duffy, J.We propose a novel approach to check whether individual behaviour in binary-choice participation games is consistent with the restrictions imposed by symmetric models. This approach allows in particular an assessment of how much cluster-heterogeneity a symmetric model can tolerate to remain consistent with its behavioural restrictions. We assess our approach with data from market-entry experiments which we analyse through the lens of ‘Exploration versus Exploration’ (EvE, which is equivalent to Logit-QRE) or of Impulse Balance Equilibrium (IBE). We find that when the symmetry assumption is imposed, both models are typically rejected when assuming pooled data and IBE yields more data-consistent estimates than EvE, i.e., IBE’s estimates of session and pooled data are more consistent than those of EvE. When relaxing symmetry, EvE (IBE) is rejected for 17% (42%) of the time. Although both models support cluster-heterogeneity, IBE is much less likely to yield over-parametrised specifications and insignificant estimates so it outperforms EvE in accommodating a model-consistent cluster-heterogeneity. The use of regularisation procedures in the estimations partially addresses EvE’s shortcomings but leaves our overall conclusions unchanged.Item Open Access The welfare enhancing effects of agricultural innovation platforms and soil monitoring tools on farming household outcomes in southeastern Africa(Informa UK Limited, 2023) Abebe, F.; Wheeler, S.A.; Zuo, A.; Bjornlund, H.Utilizing survey information obtained from five irrigation schemes in southeastern Africa, we investigated the influence of agricultural innovation platforms (AIPs) and monitoring tools on a range of farm and household outcome indicators. Doubly robust estimation was used to measure the effects of these interventions, with a variety of other methods used for robustness checks. Involvement in AIP activities and using monitoring tools was found to be statistically associated with increased on-farm income together with an increased capacity to fund child education. Participation in AIPs also had a significant positive influence on off-farm income and reduced food shortages. Moreover, spillover effects were accounted for in the estimations and statistically significant positive effects were found regarding on-farm income for non-participants. These findings suggest that interventions with strong agricultural innovation system approaches in irrigation schemes in Africa could provide significant societal benefits.Item Open Access International environmental agreements and imperfect enforcement: Evidence from CITES(Elsevier BV, 2023) Heid, B.; Márquez-Ramos, L.International environmental agreements address global environmental problems such as the decline in biodiversity. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) regulates international trade in wildlife to prevent its decline. Discussions about CITES’ effectiveness abound, but evidence is lacking. We combine the largest available panel database on wildlife populations with the history of countries’ membership and species’ protection under CITES. We find that after more than 20 years of a species’ inclusion into CITES, wildlife populations increase by about 66% in countries with thorough enforcement, irrespective of whether trade in the species is only restricted or completely banned under CITES. Our results suggest re-focusing discussions away from whether CITES should partially restrict trade or impose a complete trade ban, and towards better enforcement. More generally, we find that enforcement is crucial for effective international environmental agreements.