Search results

Climate risk greatly increases the risk exposure of global investments. Both the climate risks of home countries and host countries may affect international investment behaviors. The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of climate risk and climate risk distance on foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows and outflows. Targeted proposals are provided to promote international economic and trade cooperation and the authors provide suggestions for the FDI strategies of multinational enterprises.

The authors define “climate risk distance” as the difference in climate risks between two countries. This paper uses both a theoretical model and a generalized least squares test to investigate the impact of climate risk distance on FDI from the perspectives of FDI inflows and outflows. In addition, the authors subdivide the samples according to the sign of climate risk distance and rank the FDI share from home country to host country into four groups according to the host country’s climate risk index. Finally, the authors undertake empirical tests with outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) data to support the empirical results.

Investors from countries with low climate risks have the upper hand due to their competitive advantages, like their skills, trademarks and patent rights, which they can transfer abroad to offset the disadvantage of being non-native. This is generally defined as ownership advantage. The impact of climate risk distance on FDI depends on the sign of climate risk distance. Specifically, host countries with higher climate risks compared with the climate risk levels of home countries may experience insignificant reductions in FDI inflows. For investors from home countries with higher climate risks, they are less likely to invest in host countries with lower climate risks. The results for samples from emerging market economies are shown to be more significant.

This study advances the O (ownership advantage) part of the ownership, location and internationalization (OLI) paradigm by incorporating the climate risk distance between the home country and the host country into the influencing factors of FDI. Both the O part and the L (location advantage, the advantage that host countries offers to make internationalization worthwhile to undertake FDI) part of the OLI paradigm concerning climate risks are validated with FDI and OFDI data.

The purpose of this paper was to develop an integrated framework for assessing the flood risk and climate adaptation capacity of an urban area and its critical infrastructures to help address flood risk management issues and identify climate adaptation strategies.

Using the January 2011 flood in the core suburbs of Brisbane City, Queensland, Australia, various spatial analytical tools (i.e. digital elevation modeling and urban morphological characterization with 3D analysis, spatial analysis with fuzzy logic, proximity analysis, line statistics, quadrat analysis, collect events analysis, spatial autocorrelation techniques with global Moran’s I and local Moran’s I, inverse distance weight method, and hot spot analysis) were implemented to transform and standardize hazard, vulnerability, and exposure indicating variables. The issue on the sufficiency of indicating variables was addressed using the topological cluster analysis of a two-dimension self-organizing neural network (SONN) structured with 100 neurons and trained by 200 epochs. Furthermore, the suitability of flood risk modeling was addressed by aggregating the indicating variables with weighted overlay and modified fuzzy gamma overlay operations using the Bayesian joint conditional probability weights. Variable weights were assigned to address the limitations of normative (equal weights) and deductive (expert judgment) approaches. Applying geographic information system (GIS) and appropriate equations, the flood risk and climate adaptation capacity indices of the study area were calculated and corresponding maps were generated.

The analyses showed that on the average, 36 (approximately 813 ha) and 14 per cent (approximately 316 ha) of the study area were exposed to very high flood risk and low adaptation capacity, respectively. In total, 93 per cent of the study area revealed negative adaptation capacity metrics (i.e. minimum of −23 to <0), which implies that the socio-economic resources in the area are not enough to increase climate resilience of the urban community (i.e. Brisbane City) and its critical infrastructures.

While the framework in this study was obtained through a robust approach, the following are the research limitations and recommended for further examination: analyzing and incorporating the impacts of economic growth; population growth; technological advancement; climate and environmental disturbances; and climate change; and applying the framework in assessing the risks to natural environments such as in agricultural areas, forest protection and production areas, biodiversity conservation areas, natural heritage sites, watersheds or river basins, parks and recreation areas, coastal regions, etc.

This study provides a tool for high level analyses and identifies adaptation strategies to enable urban communities and critical infrastructure industries to better prepare and mitigate future flood events. The disaster risk reduction measures and climate adaptation strategies to increase urban community and critical infrastructure resilience were identified in this study. These include mitigation on areas of low flood risk or very high climate adaptation capacity; mitigation to preparedness on areas of moderate flood risk and high climate adaptation capacity; mitigation to response on areas of high flood risk and moderate climate adaptation capacity; and mitigation to recovery on areas of very high flood risk and low climate adaptation capacity. The implications of integrating disaster risk reduction and climate adaptation strategies were further examined.

The newly developed spatially explicit analytical technique, identified in this study as the Flood Risk-Adaptation Capacity Index-Adaptation Strategies (FRACIAS) Linkage/Integrated Model, allows the integration of flood risk and climate adaptation assessments which had been treated separately in the past. By applying the FRACIAS linkage/integrated model in the context of flood risk and climate adaptation capacity assessments, the authors established a framework for enhancing measures and adaptation strategies to increase urban community and critical infrastructure resilience to flood risk and climate-related events.

It is not surprising that the dominant cognitive frame through which most audiences view climate change is that of an environmental problem. However, this messaging strategy has proven susceptible to counter-attacks, defensing processing, and other cognitive biases. As such, many environmental advocates are switching gears. From Barack Obama to Pope Francis, the environment-as-public-health-concern narrative is increasingly found in climate change messages. This strategy involves making the abstract issue of climate change more concrete by tying it to negative health impacts, like asthma, heat-related illness, and the spread of disease. Understanding why and for whom this strategy is persuasive, particularly in a social media context where users often encounter persuasive climate change messages, can help advance theory and practice.

The purpose of this chapter is two-fold: 1.) Test the effects of climate message frame (damage to nature or damage to public health), message source (liberal or conservative organization), and the use of visual human exemplars (present or absent) in social media messages; and, 2.) Assess the predictive utility of different conceptual frameworks (personification, construal level theory, and moral foundations theory) as explanatory mechanisms for persuasive social media climate message effects. The results of a nation-wide experiment reveal that the use of visual exemplars matters when climate change is framed as an environmental problem, but otherwise message frame, source, and visual exemplar use have little impact on policy attitudes. Further analyses demonstrated that multiple conceptual mechanisms related to the aforementioned theories help explain social media effects on climate change attitudes.

Psychological safety climate has been commonly conceptualized as a facilitative team property. Despite the literature review and meta-analysis conducted recently, little is known about the potential dark side of psychological safety climate. The purpose of this paper is to develop a theoretical framework to advance our understanding of both the bright and dark sides of psychological safety.

Drawing on extant theories and previous literature, the authors propose a conceptual framework of the mechanisms and boundary conditions underlying the relationship between psychological safety climate and dysfunctional team behavior.

The authors propose that the relationship between psychological safety climate and dysfunctional behaviors in the team is directly contingent on psychological safety climate strength, and indirectly contingent on task interdependence, group faultlines, group conflict asymmetry and team power distance differentiation.

First, the authors attempt to expand psychological safety climate literature by considering its potential damaging outcomes. Second, they contribute to the theory of psychological safety climate by suggesting a theoretical model consisting of the boundary conditions wherein psychological safety climate could reduce team effectiveness. Finally, the authors incorporate climate strength into the psychological safety literature to probe the antecedents of psychological safety climate strength and when it matters to the subsequent negative outcomes.

This study aims to examine determinants of farmers’ use of climate-smart agricultural practices, specifically improved crop varieties, intercropping, improved livestock breeds and rainwater harvesting in Wadla district, northeast Ethiopia.

A cross-sectional household survey was used. A structured interview schedule for respondent households and checklists for key informants and focus group discussants were used. This study used both descriptive statistics and a multivariate probit econometric model to analyze the collected data. The model was used to compute factors influencing the use of climate-smart agricultural practices in the study area.

The results revealed that households adopted selected practices. The likelihood of farmers’ decisions to use improved crop varieties, intercropping, improved livestock breeds and rainwater harvesting was 85%, 52%, 69% and 59%, respectively. The joint probability of using these climate-smart agricultural practices was 23.7%. The model results confirmed that sex, level of education, livestock holding, access to credit, farm distance, market distance and training were significant factors that affected the use of climate-smart agricultural practices in the study area.

The present study used the most selected locally practiced interventions for climate-smart agriculture.

The overall objective of this study is envisaged to provide decision makers with actionable insights and access to multi-risk maps for the most in-danger stave churches (SCs) among the existing 28 churches at high spatial resolution to better understand, reduce and mitigate single- and multi-risk. In addition, the present contribution aims to provide decision makers with some information to face the exacerbation of the risk caused by the expected climate change.

Material and data collection started with the consultation of the available literature related to: (1) SCs' conservation status, (2) available methodologies suitable in multi-hazard approach and (3) vulnerability leading indicators to consider when dealing with the impact of natural hazards specifically on immovable cultural heritage.

The paper contributes to a better understanding of place-based vulnerability with local mapping dimension also considering future threats posed by climate change. The results highlight the danger at which the SCs of Røldal, in case of floods, and of Ringebu, Torpo and Øye, in case of landslide, may face and stress the urgency of increasing awareness and preparedness on these potential hazards.

The contribution for the first time aims to homogeneously collect and report all together existing spread information on architectural features, conservation status and geographical attributes for the whole group of SCs by accompanying this information with as much as possible complete 2D sections collection from existing drawings and novel 3D drawn sketches created for this contribution. Then the paper contributes to a better understanding of place-based vulnerability with local mapping dimension also considering future threats posed by climate change. Then it highlights the danger of floods and landslides at which the 28 SCs are subjected. Finally it reports how these risks will change under the ongoing impact of climate change.

The purpose of this paper is threefold: first, to understand how Filipino children perceive climate change; second, to determine how children themselves adapt to its impacts; and third, to identify the level of support available at the household, community, and city levels as children adjust to their changing environment.

A qualitative study was conducted in three peri-urban communities in Malolos, Philippines, looking at the perception and adaptation mechanisms of children in the face of climate change, using Lazarus and Folkman’s typology for children’s coping strategies in stressful situations. The support that children receive at the household, community, and city levels was also examined.

Climate change has impacted the daily lives of children, aggravating in particular the “everyday” and “invisible” risks of those who belong to poor households. In general, emotion-focused coping that hinges on denial or distancing did not seem to be prominent among children; many of them were rather pre-disposed to problem-focused coping as they try to cope with the impacts of climate change in their immediate environment. Unfortunately, however, interventions to mitigate the impacts of climate change on children at the household, community, and city levels were found to be lacking.

The selected communities do not represent the wide spectrum of localities in the Philippines. At best, findings from the small sample size provide only a snapshot of the conditions of children living in peri-urban areas.

The study points to the need for child-sensitive climate change adaptation at the household, community, and city levels to support the coping mechanisms of children.

The study adopts a multi-level approach at understanding the impacts of climate change on Filipino children and the interventions that they and other social institutions have undertaken in response thereto. Findings add empirical evidence to growing literature on the subject, especially in the context of the Philippines where academic studies on the matter remain scant.

The purpose of this paper to develop an empirical methodology for managing spatial basis risk in weather index insurance by studying the fundamental causes for differences in weather risk between distributed locations.

The paper systematically compares insurance payouts at nearby locations based on differences in geographical characteristics. The geographic characteristics include distance between stations and differences in altitude, latitude, and longitude.

Geographic differences are poor predictors of payouts. The strongest predictor of payout at a given location is payout at nearby location. However, altitude has a persistent effect on heat risk and distance between stations increases payout discrepancies for precipitation risk.

Given that payouts in a given area are highly correlated, it may be possible to insure multiple weather stations in a single contract as a “risk portfolio” for any one location.

Spatial basis risk is a fundamental problem of index insurance and yet is still largely unexplored in the literature.

This paper aims to assess the willingness of individuals living in coastal communities affected by climate change to financially support mitigation policies towards the preservation of marine ecosystems and fish resources and to identify the key drivers of their behaviour.

A survey was carried out involving 994 people living in three main Italian coastal communities. To investigate the main factors affecting Italian coastal communities’ willingness to pay (WTP) to support climate change mitigation measures to protect the marine ecosystem and fishery resources, a Tobit regression model was implemented.

The results show that these communities are likely to pay to safeguard fish resources and the marine ecosystem, owing to their social and economic importance for these communities. In particular, this study’s findings highlight that the individuals’ attitudes towards climate change, social pressures and their perception of the phenomenon play a significant role on their intention to support mitigation policies. Moreover, the findings demonstrate that the communities most threatened by the negative effects of climate change are more willing to contribute financially to protect fish resources and the marine ecosystem.

A limitation is related to the adopted methodology. In particular individuals’ intention to adopt pro-environmental behaviours does not always translate into real WTP through additional taxes.

The value of the research stems from its unique collective cross-communal comparison of attitudes and intentions, its parallel identification of behavioural drivers at the individual level and its prescriptive conclusions of both scholarly and practical worth.