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Behavioral spillovers from food-waste collection in Swedish municipalities

Ek, Claes LU and Miliute-Plepiene, Jurate LU (2018) In Journal of Environmental Economics and Management 89. p.168-186
Abstract

We estimate behavioral spillovers from environmental policy within the context of a natural experiment on food waste in Sweden. Exploiting the staggered implementation of food-waste collection across Swedish municipalities, we use a difference-in-difference design to measure the causal effect of introducing such collection on another pro-environmental behavior, namely the sorting of packaging waste. Results suggest a positive spillover effect on packaging waste which corresponds to 5–10% of the population average and rises gradually over time, possibly due to slow implementation of food-waste collection in many municipalities. These estimates are unconfounded with a number of shifts in the waste-related incentives facing households,... (More)

We estimate behavioral spillovers from environmental policy within the context of a natural experiment on food waste in Sweden. Exploiting the staggered implementation of food-waste collection across Swedish municipalities, we use a difference-in-difference design to measure the causal effect of introducing such collection on another pro-environmental behavior, namely the sorting of packaging waste. Results suggest a positive spillover effect on packaging waste which corresponds to 5–10% of the population average and rises gradually over time, possibly due to slow implementation of food-waste collection in many municipalities. These estimates are unconfounded with a number of shifts in the waste-related incentives facing households, e.g. introduction of curbside collection of packaging waste from single-family homes. Although we are unable to directly account for all such factors, indirect robustness tests provide no compelling evidence that estimated spillovers are spurious.

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author
and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Behavioral spillovers, Environmental behavior, Food waste, Packaging waste, Recycling
in
Journal of Environmental Economics and Management
volume
89
pages
19 pages
publisher
Elsevier
external identifiers
  • scopus:85046110322
ISSN
0095-0696
DOI
10.1016/j.jeem.2018.01.004
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
afd793fa-7c2e-4582-9f41-689bd0b38073
date added to LUP
2018-05-07 14:52:15
date last changed
2022-04-17 20:27:47
@article{afd793fa-7c2e-4582-9f41-689bd0b38073,
  abstract     = {{<p>We estimate behavioral spillovers from environmental policy within the context of a natural experiment on food waste in Sweden. Exploiting the staggered implementation of food-waste collection across Swedish municipalities, we use a difference-in-difference design to measure the causal effect of introducing such collection on another pro-environmental behavior, namely the sorting of packaging waste. Results suggest a positive spillover effect on packaging waste which corresponds to 5–10% of the population average and rises gradually over time, possibly due to slow implementation of food-waste collection in many municipalities. These estimates are unconfounded with a number of shifts in the waste-related incentives facing households, e.g. introduction of curbside collection of packaging waste from single-family homes. Although we are unable to directly account for all such factors, indirect robustness tests provide no compelling evidence that estimated spillovers are spurious.</p>}},
  author       = {{Ek, Claes and Miliute-Plepiene, Jurate}},
  issn         = {{0095-0696}},
  keywords     = {{Behavioral spillovers; Environmental behavior; Food waste; Packaging waste; Recycling}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{05}},
  pages        = {{168--186}},
  publisher    = {{Elsevier}},
  series       = {{Journal of Environmental Economics and Management}},
  title        = {{Behavioral spillovers from food-waste collection in Swedish municipalities}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jeem.2018.01.004}},
  doi          = {{10.1016/j.jeem.2018.01.004}},
  volume       = {{89}},
  year         = {{2018}},
}