The deforestation problem in oil-importing developing countries: A capital theory approach to a renewable resource

Miscellaneous · Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 1991

OSTI ID:7180293

Rodriguez, A E

This study attempts an analysis of the effects of a crude-oil price shock on the tropical rain-forest biomass of oil-importing developing countries. It establishes the logical plausibility of this relationship between price shocks and deforestation by developing a stylized capital-theoretic intertemporal model with a trade constraint. This formulation allows one to determine the correct price path at each moment in time, an efficiency consideration. A second theoretical model purports to show that justification for the building of high dams as a response to energy shocks was based on myopic expectations of crude oil supplier behavior. Once rational supplier response to natural capital stocks is taken into consideration, a different result emerges suggesting a much larger optical biomass stock. Noting that deforestation is an externality with global repercussions and appealing to the logic of the Folk Theorem of game theory, the last chapter proposes an international collaborative effort whereby concerned nations would supply crude oil to oil-importing developing countries that have witnessed the deterioration of their forest biomass as a direct or indirect consequence of oil price shocks.

• Research Organization: Texas Univ., Austin, TX (United States)
• OSTI ID: 7180293
• Resource Relation: Other Information: Thesis (Ph.D.)
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

02 PETROLEUM
09 BIOMASS FUELS
DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
DEFORESTATION
OIL-IMPORTING COUNTRIES
PETROLEUM
PRICES
BIOMASS
ECONOMIC IMPACT
FORESTS
RESOURCE DEPLETION
ENERGY SOURCES
FOSSIL FUELS
FUELS
RENEWABLE ENERGY SOURCES
020700* - Petroleum- Economics
Industrial
& Business Aspects
095000 - Biomass Fuels- Environmental Aspects- (1990-)