Environmental pollution and scarcity of resources continue to increase and intensify into serious conflicts. Environmental economics is at the forefront of the response to local, national and global environmental problems. As such, it has become an essential part of the thinking and actions of civil society, national and regional governments, international agencies as well as the private sector.

The module identifies and discusses the most important contemporary issues in environmental and resource economics, such as climate change and sustainable development. In doing so, the module introduces selected issues and methods in environmental and resource economics including theory, empirical evidence and policy.

The module covers the following major topics in Environmental Eonomics:

  • Economic growth and the environment

  • Climate Change Economics

  • Market Failures and the need for environmental policy

  • Pollution as a market failure

  • Economics of pollution control: Instruments (an overview)

  • Valuing the environment via stated and revealed preferences

  • Exploiting and managing natural resources – Non-renewables

  • Renewable Resources - Fisheries.