Rutger HoekstraMetricsForTheFuture.com
Rutger Hoekstra
PhD. Environmental Economics Free Univ. Amsterdam
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39
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Introduction
Author of "Replacing GDP by 2030: Towards a common language for the well-being and sustainability community" (Cambridge University Press).
www.cambridge.org/9781108739870
Additional affiliations
September 2014 - October 2016
Publications
Publications (39)
The System of National Accounts (SNA) has adapted, and will adapt, as economic, social and environmental conditions change. The revision process of the SNA2008, which is now underway, will take place in the context of developments such as globalization, digitalization, climate change, biodiversity loss, inequality as well as the COVID19-pandemic. T...
The desire to include environmental information in national accounts has resulted in the construction of a system of environmental-economic accounting (SEEA). As the international statistical standard for environmental-economic accounting, the SEEA can provide valuable support for monitoring Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This study assesses...
Cambridge Core - Statistics for Social Sciences, Behavioral Sciences and Law - Replacing GDP by 2030 - by Rutger Hoekstra
Abstract Firm size is increasingly acknowledged as an important factor for (macro-)economic policy. It is known that the overall importance of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is different relative to large multinationals in terms of their impact on economic growth, exports and innovation. Yet empirical evidence to substantiate the role o...
Summary for policy makers from a report about the Dutch system for monitoring progress towards the circular economy in the Netherlands. The full report has the same title´, but is published as a policy study.
Summary to be found at: http://www.pbl.nl/sites/default/files/cms/publicaties/pbl-2018-circular-economy-what-we-want-to-know-and-can-measure-...
Global multiregional input-output databases (GMRIOs) became the standard tool for tracking environmental impacts through global supply chains. To date, several GMRIOs are available, but the numerical results differ. This paper considers how GMRIOs can be made more robust and authoritative. We show that GMRIOs need detail in environmentally relevant...
Full report (in Dutch) on the Dutch system to monitor the progress of the transition towards the circular economy in the Netherlands. Report to be found on http://www.pbl.nl/sites/default/files/cms/publicaties/pbl-2018-circulaire-economie-wat-we-willen-weten-en-kunnen-meten-2970.pdf
The effect of changes in trade patterns, particularly increasing international sourcing, on global CO2-emissions growth has yet to be clearly understood. In this paper, we estimate the emission cost of sourcing (ECS), which originates from replacing domestic products by imports from countries with more CO2-intensive technologies. Using a structural...
Although multiregional input–output (MRIO) databases use data from national statistical offices, the reconciliation of various data sources results in significantly altered country data. This makes it problematic to use MRIO-based footprints for national policy-making. This paper develops a potential solution using the Netherlands as case study. Th...
Economic indicators, such as GDP, do not measure all dimensions of society's progress. Hundreds of alternative measurement systems have been proposed to measure sustainable development. This paper argues for harmonization of these methods, and facilitates this discussion by providing a detailed comparison of country-level measures. The analysis inc...
Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to study reducing the variation of environmental footprint estimates based on multiregional input–output (MRIO) databases. Footprint estimates from various MRIO databases sometimes vary significantly. As a result, conclusions about the absolute levels or trends of a footprint may be inconsistent. The sources o...
As the internet grows National Statistical Institutes (NSI) are increasingly using data from the internet as a source for their statistics. This paper describes the first experiences of Statistics Netherlands in the automated collection of data from web pages. First, we explore the feasibility of this method of data collection for NSI's. We conclud...
Our knowledge of the relationship between the economy and the environment has increased significantly over recent decades. One of the areas in which this is most apparent is the area of environmental accounting, where environmental data is presented according to national accounting principles. These accounts provide consistent, complete and detaile...
Environmentally extended input-output analysis (EE-IO) is one of
the fastest growing fields in input-output analysis. This paper provides an
overview 360 EE-IO articles that have appeared in peer-reviewed journals
from 1969-2009. The paper shows that the field of EE-IO has experienced
rapid growth since the mid-1990s. Last year (2009) was the most...
This paper provides an overview of the plethora of approaches that are available to measure welfare and sustainable development. Many methods exist but there is no consensus on the ‘correct’ approach. Furthermore, we also show that the wide variety of sustainable development indictor (SDI) sets which have been adopted also show significant differen...
On September 14th 2009 the Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress presented its final report to President Sarkozy of France. The Commission was led by the Nobel laureates Stiglitz and Sen and the eminent French economist Fitoussi as well as many other renowned social scientists. The report is very much a reflectio...
Economic activities lead to pressures on environmental systems because of emissions of pollutants and extraction of natural resources. This paper will argue and illustrate that the environmental accounting framework (SEEA, 2003) is particularly useful to assess the interrelationships between economy and environment. The primary reason for this is t...
Structural decomposition analysis (SDA) is employed to examine physical flows other than energy and energy-related emissions. A unique set of hybrid-unit I/O tables, including both physical and monetary data, was constructed for this purpose. The decomposition results are used to perform forecasting and backcasting (target) analyses. The approach i...
A physical input–output table (PIOT) provides a framework in which all the physical flows associated with an economy can be recorded. This makes it a valuable tool for environmental–economic modeling and accounting. During the 1990's PIOTs were constructed for a number of countries. Subsequently, the PIOT and related physical supply and use tables...
The pollution haven hypothesis states that there is a shift of high polluting industries to countries with lower environmental standards. This paper examines the hypothesis for the Netherlands by relating developments in emissions of CO 2 , CH 4 , N 2 O, NO x , SO 2 and NH 3 in Dutch industries to changes in trade patterns. The study concerns the p...
During 2002-03 Statistics Netherlands (CBS) conducted the pilot project 'Tourism Satellite Accounts for the Netherlands'. This article describes the main results of this project. A Tourism Satellite Account (TSA) provides a systematic and consistent description of the economic effects of tourism based on an internationally recommended method in acc...
To analyze and understand historical changes in economic, environmental, employment or other socio-economic indicators, it is useful to assess the driving forces or determinants that underlie these changes. Two techniques for decomposing indicator changes at the sector level are structural decomposition analysis (SDA) and index decomposition analys...
Increased spatial dependency of economic activities, as well as spatial differentiation of production and consumption, has implication for environmental policy. One of the issues that has gained importance is the responsibility for the emissions from products that cross national boundaries during its life cycle. This paper discusses the different e...
Many environmental problems can be attributedto the extraction and emissions of physicalsubstances. Increasing our understanding of theeconomic and technological driving forcesbehind these physical flows can contribute tosolving the environmental problems related tothem. The input-output framework is a usefulsetting in which to integrate detailedin...
Technology and trade are widely considered to be significant driving forces of economic growth and have been subject to numerous studies. The input-output framework is a useful tool in this respect, because it coherently integrates information on the production technologies of the sectors and on the import and export relations. Input-output tables...
Research in the field of industrial metabolism traditionally has been focused on measuring and describing physical flows of economic systems. The metabolism of economic systems, however, changes over time, and measuring material flows is insufficient to understand this process. Understanding the relation between economic activities and material flo...
Structural decomposition analysis (SDA) and index number analysis (INA) are methods that decompose (economic) relationships into determinant sources. The effects of technological, demand and structural changes on physical flows can therefore be analyzed. A large number of environmental problems are related to material flows generated by economy. Th...
This paper uses a structural decomposition to analyze the effects of technological change and trade on the sectoral outputs in the Netherlands. A novel RAS decomposition is implemented, so that the technological change may be split up into its components: average substitution, average intermediate input intensity and cell-specific effects. An ordin...
Apart from the traditional sources used by National Statistical Institutes, like sample surveys and administrative sources, nowadays more and more electronic sources of information are available that potentially can be used for the production of statistics. At Statistics Netherlands we studied four 'new' secondary data sources for this purpose: i)...
Thesis (Ph.D.)--Free University, Amsterdam, 2003. Includes bibliographical references (p. 197-209) and index.
Questions
Questions (13)
I have heard a lot about New-Zealand's well-being budget. Basically the narrative in the press is: New Zealand dethrones GDP and replaces it by well-being. I am very supportive but at the same time I have seen these type of initiatives come and go (Australia, France, Britain). What seems to be new is that it has prominent role in the budget process. Does anyone know the best resource to understand exactly how that works?
I think many people agree that we need better ways to measure society's progress. However, over the last couple of decades many indicators have been suggested without really overcoming the dominance of GDP. What can be done?
In my book "Replacing GDP by 2030" (Cambridge University Press) I propose a strategy to replace GDP by 2030. www.cambridge.org/9781108739870
I am really curious to other solutions about how we might arrive at a post-GDP world.
Has anyone ever calculated what the total cost of the IPCC (are? Is there any literature on the amount of time that scientists have spent on the IPCC reports and the costs of transport and organisational costs?
In the Inclusive wealth report 2012 and 2014 (lead author Partha Dasgupta) it was said that it was a biennial publication. But I can't find an edition after 2014. Am I overlooking something?
Are there aggregate measures for resilience? i.e. indexes that measure the overall resilience in one number.
Any literature suggestion would be highly appreciated (either in the ecological field or elsewhere).
Quite often in environmental-economic literature (e.g. The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity) welfare theory is used to calculate the supply of "ecosystem services" in "natural capital accounting" (NCA)?
I am interested in literature which views ecosystems in different ways, especially from a "network" perspective. For example, a food web or food chain seem to me to have network structures. Do you have any suggestions about the most important references in this field?
Does any one have an authoritative estimate/reference of the number of species on Earth? Perhaps clustered into ecosystems (terrestrial, marine etc)?
The current wave of globalization started in 1990 (the "second unbundling" according to Richard Baldwin). Companies started to use their western knowledge combined with lower wage rates. This led to the phenomenon which we now call global value chains and the "fragmentation" of production processes.
In that period, the number of multinationals must have grown, but I can't seem to find any statistics on the number of MNEs or their importance for the economy. Does anyone know of any data in this field?
The System of Environmental and Economic Accounts (SEEA) only measures the environmental assets within territorial boundaries. By this definition that means that all assets outside of territorial jurisdiction is not considered to be natural capital. I am trying to find out how great this omission really is. How many species actually exist outside of territorial boundaries?
