درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Environment quality and its determinants are one of the main challenges of the present and future of humanity and sustainable development is interpreted in the direction of preserving and improving the environment. In recent years, many studies have been conducted on the factors affecting environmental quality. One of the main topics that have been less considered in the related studies is the impact of governance on the quality of the environment. In this study, the impact of good governance components, including economic freedom, trade freedom, and political freedom, on the Environmental Performance Index (EPI) and its sub-indices including environmental health, ecosystem vitality, and climate change is investigated. The data required for statistical analysis are related to Middle East and North Africa region countries and Turkiye (MENAT) during 2000-2021. The panel data method was used to estimate the model and examine the relationship between the variables. The findings show that there is a positive and significant relationship between economic freedom and political freedom with the environmental performance index (EPI), and there is no significant relationship between trade freedom and EPI. </span>In addition, the study found that economic freedom had a detrimental effect on ecosystem vitality and climate change, leading to negative impacts in these areas. However, it had a positive impact on environmental health, indicating that it contributed positively to this aspect. On the other hand, political freedom was observed to have a positive effect on the vitality of the ecosystem and climate change. However, it did not have a significant impact on the overall health of the environment, suggesting that its influence was more prominent in specific areas related to ecosystem vitality and climate change. <span style="layout-grid-mode: line;" data-mce-fragment="1">The result of this research showed that economic freedom has led to more investment in the oil and gas sector of MENA countries, and therefore wastewater and gas emissions have had a negative impact on the vitality of the environment and climate change, but with the increase in production and sales of oil and Gas, per capita income of countries has increased, and environmental health has improved. Also, considering that political freedom among the MENA region has a lot of diversity, the results showed that the countries with more political freedom, through greater awareness of the society and more accountability of the governments and the establishment of environmental protection laws, had a positive impact on the environment. Of course, the environmental health index is more influenced by the economic situation and per capita production of countries and political freedom has little effect on it.

Burundi, like other countries, invests in agricultural research and development. The adoption of the most productive varieties is one of the ways of increasing agricultural yields. Rice, because of its high productivity, is among the cereals which occupy an important place in the food security strategy in Burundi. This study aims to identify the effect of the adoption of this variety on the productivity of rice farmers. Using random sampling technique was used to select the respondents to fill the questionnaires, data were collected from 524 rice farmers spread across the five villages, namely Buringa, Murira, Nyeshanga, Ninga and Bwiza of the Gihanga commune in Bubanza, Burundi. The analysis of the determinants and the quasi-experimental method based on propensity score matching was used in the estimation of the results of the effect of adoption of the rutete variety on the productivity of rice farmers and estimate the results. The study found that the average rice yields for adopted and non-adopted farmers were respectively 9754 and 9912 kg/ha. Also, if non-adopting farmers decide to adopt the variety, their counterfactual rice yield would be 7931 kg/ha for adopters and for non-adopters reached 7927 kg/ha. The average effect of the treatment on the rice yield of the adopters was 1823 kg/ha and significant (p<0.01). The decision to adopt for non-adopting rice farmers could increase the average yield by 1984 kg/ha. The results imply the positive role of the adoption of the rutete rice variety on the performance of rice farmers in Gihanga. It is recommended that the government and research institutions involved in the agricultural sustainable development support rice farmers by increasing agricultural research innovation with the aim of increasing the yield of crops.