Conference Agenda
Overview and details of the sessions of this conference. Please select a date or location to show only sessions at that day or location. Please select a single session for detailed view (with abstracts and downloads if available).
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Daily Overview |
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Thematic Session: Economics of Biodiversity (Streaming) Location: B008 Session Chair: Yuanning Liang, Peking University | |
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Environmental Impacts of China's Overseas Development Projects 1: National University of Singapore, Singapore; 2: Columbia University While the economic and social benefits of foreign aid and development finance receipt are well-established, relatively little is known about the environmental impacts in recipient countries. China has undertaken overseas investment projects on a massive scale across more than 140 countries. This paper quantifies their impacts on key ecological outcomes: deforestation, land use, air pollution, and biodiversity. Using 6,303 geocoded Chinese finance projects from 2000-2023 combined with satellite and biodiversity data, we find that project implementation leads to an immediate and persistent decline in surrounding vegetation by 0.3%, equivalent to an average annual loss of 4,755 km2 of vegetated land worldwide. Air quality also deteriorates, with aerosol optical depth rising 0.9%. Biodiversity losses are concentrated among higher trophic groups: bird species richness declines by 1.6% and mammalian richness by 0.1%. Translating vegetation loss into reduced carbon sink capacity implies annual emissions of 52-174 million tons of CO2e, corresponding to annual global welfare losses of $2.6-$33.1 billion. | |