Nidhaleddine Ben Cheikh

Economic theory and recent empirical evidence show that nonlinear progressive water pricing policies are the most useful tool to reduce water demand in water stressed countries. The originality of our paper is to implement Pedroni (1999) panel cointegration tests, using databases on a breakdown of two consumption blocks (a lower and an upper block) from the Tunisian water regulator over 27 years. The results reveal that increasing block tariffs have been successful in managing scarce water in Tunisia. The authors observe that, in the long-run, proportion of subscribers in the upper water consumption block decreases when price increases, while in the lower block, which is composed essentially of low-income households characterized by inelastic water demand, proportion of subscribers is less elastic to price changes and still unchanged. This paper calls for the implementation of nonlinear progressive pricing to reduce demand by large consumers in order to promote efficiency in use and to promote the access of poor consumers to the resource in order to promote equity.

The main originality of this paper is to empirically investigate the long-run relationship between carbone dioxide (CO2) emissions, energy use and real GDP per capita in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) during the last three decades. Using panel cointegration tests (Westerlund, (2007) and DOLS estimation method, we validate the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis in the long run for the MENA region countries. Therefore, we conclude that oil producer countries have adopted several policy decisions in favor of CO2 emissions reduction. The estimated turning point of the EKC confirms our intuitions that only oil producer countries achieve CO2 emissions reduction goal.

This paper examines whether a causal relationship exists between waste tonnage and employment when the waste collection is entrusted to a private operator in France (i.e. waste management policy by delegation of service). The empirical investigation is based on weekly data for four waste streams for the period from January 2015 to June 2017. Using nonstationary time series techniques including cointegration, VECM (Vector Error Correction Model) and long-run causality test of Toda and Yamamoto (1995) within a bivariate framework, the results demonstrate potential causal negative relationship between waste tonnage and employment. For three waste streams (i.e. household waste, outdoor garbage waste and miscellaneous waste), the results suggest that waste management practices that aim at entrusting the collection and treatment to a private operator (i.e. waste management by delegation of service) are not economically beneficial to society, because this policy does not favor environmental jobs creation. The paper calls for the adoption of other waste management practices to preserve employment in the waste collection sector.