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Even though following the laws of nature to construct harmonious nature–human interactions has long been one of the most influential philosophies in Chinese history, nature-based solutions (NBS), an innovative concept referring to the sustainable utilization of nature in solving various social and environmental challenges facing contemporary societies, can hardly be found in research papers and practices in Chinese context until very recently. Yet, some NBS features, and also NBS thinking, have already been successfully embedded within many environmental management decisions and practices, which are commonly characterized by (1) prioritization of nature preservation/restoration to economic activities and (2) functionalization of nature as a countermeasure to environmental and/or social issues. This chapter will present a comprehensive overview of the Beijing Afforestation Scheme, an exemplar case of NBS in the Chinese context. Starting from a description of Beijing and this massive afforestation project, it delineates major characteristics of this NBS, signified by (1) a shift from outcome-driven to integrated ecological resilience, (2) a change from recreating tree rows to restoring natural boreal forest, and (3) an evolution from top-down to adaptive and inclusive governance. Lastly, lessons learnt and future challenges are discussed.

In this chapter, we will review the history, deregulation, policy reforms, and airline consolidations and mergers of the Chinese airline industry. The measurement of airline competition in China’s domestic market will also be discussed. Although air deregulation is still ongoing, the Chinese airline industry has become a market-driven business subject to some mild regulations. Then, we will review the impressive development of the high-speed rail (HSR) network in China and its effects on the domestic civil aviation market. In general, previous studies have found that the introduction of HSR services has a significant negative impact on airfare and air travel demand in China. The rapidly expanding network of HSR has important policy implications for Chinese airlines.

The U.S. 2009 Tobacco Control Act opened the door for new antismoking policies by giving the Food and Drug Administration broad regulatory authority over the tobacco industry. We develop a behavioral welfare economics approach to conduct cost-benefit analysis of FDA tobacco regulations. We use a simple two-period model to develop expressions for the impact of tobacco control policies on social welfare. Our model includes: nudge and paternalistic regulations; an excise tax on cigarettes; internalities created by period 1 versus period 2 consumption; and externalities from cigarette consumption. Our analytical expressions show that in the presence of uncorrected internalities and externalities, a nudge or a tax to reduce cigarette consumption improves social welfare. In sharp contrast, a paternalistic regulation might either improve or worsen social welfare. Another important result is that the social welfare gains from new policies do not only depend on the size of the internalities and externalities, but also depend on the extent to which current policies already correct the problems. We link our analytical expressions to the graphical approach used in most previous studies and discuss the information needed to complete cost-benefit analysis of tobacco regulations. We use our model as a framework to reexamine the evidence base for strong conclusions about the size of the internalities, which is the key information needed.

We compare environmental impacts associated with incoming foreign direct investment versus domestic capital in China. We use aggregate data on Chinese provinces’ economic and pollution indicators to explore the effects of the financial origin of fixed capital. Our simultaneous models consider three prime channels through which these effects work: economic scale, sectoral composition, and pollution intensity. Results show that emissions associated with foreign financed capital are lower than with domestically financed capital for some but not all of the considered types of pollution.

The huge flow of foreign direct investment (FDI) in recent decades has prompted concern among policy-makers and researchers regarding its impact on the environment, as well as its contribution to China’s economic growth. In this study, by combining FDI and trade pollution theory, we establish a model to evaluate the impact of FDI on pollution, which facilitates testing the “pollution haven” hypothesis. Our results indicate that FDI is concentrated in pollution-intense industries. Moreover, it is necessary to undertake further research on FDI pollution with new data after environmental regulation.

This chapter contributes to the overall tourist satisfaction to local economies using sustainable practices. The aim therefore is to analyse to what extent the characteristics of a product and service can bridge the gap between locals and visitors. This chapter is based on secondary data. We find evidence for six themes which are considered to be the most theoretical issue affecting the studies on street food in tourism considered in the analysis.

Results show that street food tourism, as a new paradigm, can be a viable option while thinking the process of sustainable tourism development in emerging destinations. Our findings have clear implications for the fast growing literature on overtourism and related perverse impacts (conceptual contribution) giving also additional options to Destination Marketing Organisations' (DMOs) managers in terms of strategy to combat tourismphobia analysed in the study. Proposals for future research will also be outlined.

Generation Z makes up 20% of China’s population, and accounts for the highest share of household spend at 13% (vs. 3% for the United Kingdom and 4% for the United States). To advance marketers’ understanding about this group of consumers and capitalise on China’s booming market, this chapter uses rich statistics and information to show that China’s Generation Z has distinct behaviour patterns, which can be attributed to the unique background in which they grew up: (1) rigidity of social stratification, (2) abundance of materialism, (3) digital era, (4) limited (vs. extended) family, and (5) heavy schoolwork. Growing up in such a background, Generation Z’s lifestyle and consumption-related attitudes and behaviour are distinct from their predecessors. The chapter presents specific actions that marketers can take when targeting this distinct group of consumers in China, along with useful guidelines to HR managers for hiring them.

Accompany with the development of economy, the environment becomes deteriorating, especially in developing countries. Many studies found that foreign direct investment (FDI) with the effect of technology spillover would be one of the best ways to solve the environmental problem. By using the model of trade theory distinguishing between environmental and productive technology and separately analyzing the technology spillover effect of these two technologies on reducing environmental pollution in host countries, we find that the pollution problem could be worse if more intensive pollution industrial structure is induced by the environmental technology development. Naturally, this did not mean restraining the development of technology, but rather emphasizing the importance of the regulation and the industrial structure.