Katarina Elofsson

• Professor
• Professor (Full) at Aarhus University

Livestock productivity and profitability are threatened by livestock diseases. In this study, we examine farmers' revealed preferences for testing and treating gastrointestinal parasites in sheep in Sweden, taking into account the sequential structure of these decisions. We control for preventive measures, as well as the potential impact of wildlif...

The benefits and costs of wildlife are contingent on the spatial overlap of animal populations with economic and recreational human activities. By using a production function approach with dynamic spatial panel data models, we analyze the effects of human hunting and carnivore predation pressure on the value of ungulate game harvests. The results s...

The aim of this study is to compare policy schemes for ecological compensation applied at national and regional levels, using exploited inland wetlands as an example. We study whether uncertainty, due to natural variability and measurement difficulties, motivates compensation that is carried out in the same region as that of the exploited site, or...

In this study, we investigate how households' choice of energy source is influenced by the status of the local forest resource. We assume that households choose between clean fuels (e.g., kerosene, LPG, solar, and electricity), dirty biobased fuels (e.g., firewood, animal dung, crop residues, and charcoal), and mixed fuels. We integrate socioeconom...

During the last years the application of biochar to arable land has been suggested as a method to improve soil fertility and plant growth, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and sequester carbon for centuries. The rapid increase in the interest in biochar means that empirical documentation and mechanistic understanding need to be assessed continuously...

The purpose of this paper is to examine and compare the contributions to environmental innovation of the public sector and private sector, respectively, and to compare their determinants. We analyze the development over time of triadic patents, classified as environmental technological innovations, for six major patenting countries from 1990 to 201...

In the choice between alternative environmental policy instruments, economists tend to favor policies capable of attaining cost-efficiency, but other considerations may be more important to stakeholders. We perform a choice experiment modeled on Swedish water and marine policy to estimate preferences for different policy instruments among citizens...

Mechanization in agriculture has greatly improved the efficiency of field operations, but also resulted in heavier agricultural vehicles, which has led to increased risks of soil compaction. Hence, farmers benefit from machinery with higher capacity but may suffer from decreased yields caused by compaction. Compaction may result in further environm...

Agri-environmental investment support that compensates landowners for the costs of wetland creation and restoration is considered an effective policy for increasing biodiversity and reducing nonpoint emissions in agricultural landscapes. This study assesses the extent to which such an agri-environmental scheme is propagated across landowners and ex...

Policies for investment in biofuel production facilities and feedstock may be necessary in order to meet climate and renewable energy targets. These policies entail a trade-off between high transportation costs of biomass and economies of scale of production facilities. We develop a spatial optimisation model and investigate the cost-effective loca...

The purpose of this study is to empirically investigate the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) relationship between water quality and income within the European Union, considering spatial interdependences across countries. To this end, we apply a spatial econometrics framework using panel data, at the national level, for twenty EU countries across s...

In this paper, we investigate the potential gains in cost-effectiveness from changing the spatial scale at which nutrient reduction targets are set for the Baltic Sea, with particular focus on nutrient loadings from agriculture. The costs of achieving loading reductions are compared across five levels of spatial scale, namely the entire Baltic Sea;...

Large carnivores provide ecosystem and cultural benefits but also impose costs on hunters due to the competition for game. The aim of this paper was to identify the marginal impact of lynx ( Lynx lynx ) and wolf ( Canis lupus ) on the harvest of roe deer ( Capreolus capreolus ) in Sweden and the value of this impact. We applied a production functio...

Notwithstanding their crucial role in ecosystem functionality, large carnivores generally entail economic costs to hunters due to competition for the same prey. This cost could potentially vary depending on carnivore density and the game hunting values at stake. We estimate a hedonic price model applying the unconditional quantile regression method...

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects on innovation of environmental regulations aimed at reducing eutrophication. We focus on innovations in nitrogen and phosphorus management technology in the wastewater treatment sector and the agricultural sector. Patent data from Sweden over a 50-year period is used as a measure of innovation. We...

Large carnivores are keystone species but represent economic costs to hunters. In Sweden, carnivore territories generally overlap with hunting areas, and as a result, conflicts occur because of the competition for prey. The wolf, lynx, and brown bear are protected species by law but are hunted when authorities allocate license hunting quotas. The a...

Nutrient contents of mussels harvested within the Nutritrade project.

Rapporter om skador av vildsvin för lantbrukare har duggat tätt under de senaste åren. Det är inte första gången lantbrukare är bekymrade. Vildsvinen utrotades i Sverige redan under 1700-talet för att de förstörde mark och skördar, men återinfördes under 1970-talet då de hölls inhägnade för jakt. Några individer lyckades dock smita och reproducerad...

We use data from a survey of 2439 farmers in 5 countries around the Baltic Sea (Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Poland and Sweden) to investigate their preferences for adopting agricultural practices aimed at reducing nutrient leaching and greenhouse gas emissions. The measures considered are set-aside, catch crops and reduced fertilization. Contracts v...

This paper analyzes the main weaknesses and key avenues for improvement of nutrient policies in the Baltic Sea region. HELCOM’s Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP), accepted by the Baltic Sea countries in 2007, was based on an innovative ecological modeling of the Baltic Sea environment and addressed the impact of the combination of riverine loading and...

Policy efforts to improve Baltic Sea water quality will be expensive if the ambitious targets agreed are to be achieved. The aim of this study is to evaluate the ex‐post cost‐effectiveness of nitrogen load reductions to the Baltic Sea made between 1996 and 2010. We first calculate the counterfactual change in nitrogen load to the Baltic Sea and com...

The objective of this study is to examine the role of surface water quality for the decisions by Swedish municipalities to adopt environmental targets and action plans, as well as allocating these decisions to a responsible authority. To this end, we assess how environmental, socioeconomic, and political factors, as well as the availability of envi...

Carnivore conservation is considered essential because the species offer significant benefits to biodiversity. However, their predation on ungulates reduces ungulate populations with subsequent effects on hunters' harvests and welfare. In this paper, we use the hedonic price method to estimate the effects of large carnivores on hunting lease prices...

Landscapes composed of agricultural land mixed with forest are desirable since they provide a wide range of diversified ecosystem services, unlike specialized agricultural landscapes, but that creates a trade-off between these land uses since wildlife usually feed on crops and reduce yields. In Nordic countries, where human population density is lo...

Carnivore depredation gives rise to direct costs for killed and injured animals as well as indirect costs due to productivity losses and additional labor requirements. Our aim was to investigate indirect costs to sheep farmers in Sweden due to carnivore depredation and presence. We estimated these costs using survey data describing conditions in 20...

Adoption of new manure and fertiliser technology is considered an effective tool to reduce diffuse nutrient pollution from agriculture, and policy instruments to encourage technology uptake are therefore widespread. But policy makers need to understand farmers' reasons for adoption of such technologies to design policies that actually work. Using d...

Carbon sequestration is suggested as a low-cost option for climate change mitigation, the functioning of which can be threatened by pathogen infestation. This study calculates the effects of infectious pathogens on the cost of achieving the EU’s 2050 climate targets by combining the so-called production function method with the replacement cost met...

Pathogens affect forest productivity and thereby provision of associated ecosystem services including carbon sequestration, which has been recognized for its importance to achieve climate targets. This study calculates effects of infectious pathogens on the cost of achieving EU 2050 climate targets by combining the so-called production function met...

Pathogens affect forest productivity and thereby provision of associated ecosystem services, where timber is a well-known product, but also carbon sequestration, which has been recognized for its importance to achieve climate targets. This study calculates effects of infectious pathogens on the cost of achieving EU 2050 climate targets by combining...

This study makes an explorative overview on two main research topics in economics of wildlife management: determination of population sizes and policy design. The results point out a large and comprehensive research on each of these issues, in particular on the estimation of values and costs of wildlife, where this information is necessary for the...

Livestock depredation by large carnivores entails economic damage to farmers in many parts of the world. The aim of this paper is to analyse and compare the costs of livestock depredation by carnivores in Sweden across different carnivore species and counties. To this end, we estimate the government's compensation cost function using Swedish data o...

The purpose of this paper is to investigate cost-effective climate policy instruments for bioenergy and timber, adapted to the impacts on interdependent forest carbon pools, and applied in the EU climate policy to 2050. We develop a discrete time dynamic model including forest carbon pools in biomass, soil, and products, as well as fossil fuel cons...

The aim of this paper is to analyze the optimal management of two ecologically interdependent, competing species, roe deer (Capreolus capreolus) and fallow deer (Dama dama). To this end, we develop a numerical stage-structured model, accounting for species-specific life history characteristics, gender, and stage-specific hunting values. Two contras...

Despite the recognition of the eutrophication problem, Baltic-wide environmental targets for nutrient pollution reductions have not been met. Possible factors include inefficiency of environmental policy, and a lack of coordination between environmental policy and policies in other fields like agriculture and energy. The former requires improvement...

Game species generate considerable benefits to society in terms of hunting values, tourism, and maintenance of ecosystem balance. This paper seeks to estimate hunting values for multiple hunted species by disentangling the role of wildlife harvesting opportunities from other factors that affect hunting lease prices. We examine the determinants of h...

Nitrogen and phosphorus loads are considered a major reason for the eutrophication of the Baltic Sea. Until now, most of the abatement has been made at point sources while the implementation of policies for nonpoint sources has not led to equally large reductions in emissions. The purpose of this study is to investigate the determinants of how nutr...

Heavy loads of the nutrients nitrogen and phosphorus cause severe damage in many waters in the world. Nutrient trading markets where capped firms can buy and sell nutrient load credits have been established in several countries in order to achieve certain nutrient reduction targets at minimum costs for society. The availability of multifunctional n...

Forest management affects the quantity of CO2 emissions in the atmosphere through carbon sequestration in standing biomass, carbon storage in forest products and production of bioenergy. The main question studied in this paper is whether forest carbon sequestration is worth increasing at the expense of bioenergy and forest products to achieve the E...

It has been suggested that carbon labelling of food, on voluntary or non-voluntary basis, could reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. However, there is limited empirical evidence on the influence of such labels on consumer purchases. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether voluntary carbon labelling affects the demand for milk. A rando...

Invasive species often cause economic damage due to their impact on economically valuable resident species. We study optimal regulation in terms of simultaneous control and adaptation when the purpose is to manage an invasive species which competes for scarce resources with a resident species. The optimal policy includes both subsidies for control...

The Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP) requires tools to simulate effects and costs of various nutrient abatement strategies. Hierarchically connected databases and models of the entire catchment have been created to allow decision makers to view scenarios via the decision support system NEST. Increased intensity in agriculture in transient countries wo...

Large emissions of greenhouse gases are expected to cause major environmental problems in the future. European policy makers have therefore declared that they aim to implement cost-efficient and fair policies to reduce carbon emissions. The purpose of this paper is to assess whether the cost of the EU policies for 2020 can be reduced through the in...

Within the European Union, it is agreed that watershed-based management of water quality problems is more efficient than centralised arrangements. In this study, a mechanism for allocating international funds to watershed authorities for nitrogen abatement in the presence of moral hazard is investigated. The results show that when there is a risk o...

The general objective of this study is to identify measures that promote biodiversity in the plain districts of southern Sweden in a cost-effective manner. To achieve this goal we rank different conservation measures according to cost-effectiveness. We also account for uncertainty about the impact of measures on biodiversity. The effect of a measur...

This paper carries out numerical calculations on the potential of carbon sinks in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and national commitments under conditions of stochastic carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and carbon sequestration by forests. Chance constraint programming is used to analyze the role of stochastic carbon sinks for natio...

Since more than 30 years, the Swedish government as well as other governments in the drainage basin strives toward a reduction in nutrient loads to Baltic Sea coastal waters in order to combat eutrophication of the sea. In spite of this, the cost-effectiveness of actual environmental policy for meeting Baltic Sea nutrient targets has not been evalu...

Different nutrient abatement activities jointly determine water quality. Policies are determined by governments at central and local level, implying that decisions can be affected by strategic considerations. In this article, decentralization of wetland policies is analyzed with regard to the environmental and economic consequences. A two-stage gam...

In this paper, a numerical model is developed where the role of species life history and age structure for the optimal management of a harvested resident species which is exposed to an invasive species. It is shown that reproduction and mortality characteristics of both species as well as age structure of the invader at the time of invasion are imp...

Within the EU, it is agreed that watershed-based management of water quality problems is likely to be more economically efficient compared to existing institutional arrangements. Watershed authorities, assigned under the European Water Framework Directive, do however lack financial resources for policy implementation. EU funding for agri-environmen...

The governments around the Baltic Sea have agreed on a new set of targets for nutrient load reductions. The major motive for this is new and better knowledge about the link between nutrient loads and water transparency in different parts of the sea. The Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP) defines target for transparency in different marine basins, the lo...

In the water management literature both the normal and log-normal distribution are commonly used to model stochastic water pollution. The normality assumption is usually motivated by the central limit theorem, while the log-normality assumption is often motivated by the need to avoid the possibility of negative pollution loads. We utilize the trunc...

The environmental targets of the recently agreed Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP) targets are likely associated with a considerable cost, which motivates a search for low-cost policies. The following review shows there is a substantial literature on cost-efficient nutrient reduction strategies, including suggestions regarding low-cost abatement, but a...

Unilateral abatement is sometimes advocated in order to set a good example that will make other countries follow. The aim of this paper is to investigate whether existence of correlated cost uncertainty provides an incentive for a country to undertake unilateral abatement. The theoretical model is driven by two main mechanisms; first, a learning ef...

Excess nutrient loads to coastal waters lead to increased production of algae, which when decaying cause oxygen depletion in bottom sediments, which in turn leads to major changes in marine ecosystems. A cost-minimization model was investigated in which nitrogen and phosphorus were assumed to interact with respect to algae production. It was invest...

This paper presents a theoretical and methodological review of the literature relevant for the management of eutrophicated coastal ecosystems. First, we define a coastal ecosystem and argue that coastal ecosystem pollution is characterised by multiple, interacting, heterogeneous emissions at different, interdependent locations. We pay special atten...

Overenrichment of nutrients is a major environmental problem in the Baltic Sea region. Large loads of nitrogen and phosphorus cause eutrophication in both the coastal regions and the open sea. The purpose of this paper is to calculate cost-effective solutions to nutrient load reductions to the Baltic Sea, while taking into account the stochastic re...

The Baltic Sea is a mutual resource of nine countries, with different economic and political systems. It is well known that the state of the natural resource base has been degraded in many areas within the Baltic region, and this has negatively affected the Baltic Sea. Inherent properties of the Baltic Sea, including a relatively small mean depth a...

Due to eutrophication caused by heavy loads of nitrogen and phosphorus, the biological conditions of the Baltic Sea have been disturbed: large sea bottom areas without any biological life, low stocks of cods, and toxic blue green algaes. It is recognized that the nitrogen and phosphorus loads to the Baltic Sea must be reduced by 50% in order to res...

Abatement and mitigation of nutrient loads to the Baltic Sea are two central aims of HELCOM's Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP) as well as being required by the Water Framework Directive and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. As part of the Baltic Nest Institute and the RECOCA project (a BONUS + project), integrated cost-minimisation models have...

Large overloads of nutrients are one of many stresses on coastal and marine ecosystems and there is a need for policies that reduce nutrient emissions. This thesis contributes to the knowledge about policy design for marine pollutants. All applications are made to nutrient emissions to the Baltic Sea, but the concepts and issues are likely to be re...