Ecological network analysis for economic systems: growth and development and implications for sustainable development

How greedy is too greedy? A network toy model for evaluating the sustainability of biased evolutionary dynamics

Modern humanity has changed the biosphere at a global scale, threatening its own sustainability. It is claimed that through technology humans maximize the extraction of energy from the natural system towards their own benefit, with rates of appropriation that surpass the time-scales for systemic adaptation. This time-decoupled coevolutionary dynamic is at the core of human societal unsustainability. Here, we developed in silico experiments of an open energy-based flowing network toy model of natural systems and study the effects that greedy evolutionary strategies, resembling human societal demands, have upon the performance and scarcity tolerance of the system. We aim to determine the flexibility that those biased evolutionary dynamics have for matching or surpassing natural evolution outcomes. We studied four different indexes of system's growth and development (total system throughflow (TST), average mutual information, ascendency and entropy difference) and compare their scarcity tolerance and performance outcomes with respect to four different greedy scenarios. The results showed that greedy strategies rarely surpassed the tolerance and performance achieved by natural systemic evolution. The nature of the greedy scenarios developed were closely related to increases in TST and therefore, we emphasized this comparison. Here, the maximum percentage of greedy networks capable of surpassing natural dynamics was around one-third (approx. [Formula: see text]). However, results suggest the existence of a space parameter where local increases of energy flow can outperform the outcomes of natural systemic evolution, but no evident network property seems to characterize those greedy networks. A mild inverse relationship was found between the number of links that greedy nodes have towards the output and their capacity to outpass the control evolution. As many of the human societal effect upon biospheric processes have dissipative byproducts, knowing that such dynamics might diminish the systems tolerance and performance suggest care in their (ab)use. This article is part of the theme issue 'Evolution and sustainability: gathering the strands for an Anthropocene synthesis'.

Economic freedom, inclusive growth, and financial development: A heterogeneous panel analysis of developing countries

The effective and efficient management of financial systems and resources fosters a socioeconomic climate conducive to technological and innovative advancement, thereby fostering long-term economic growth. The study used panel data from 72 countries classified as less financially developed between 2009 and 2017 to examine the role of economic freedom and inclusive growth in financial development. For the long-run estimations, we utilised the linear dynamic panel GMM-IV estimator, panel corrected standard errors (PCSE) linear regression method, and contemporaneous correlation estimator, a generalised least squares method. Our analyses indicate that economic liberty, inclusive growth, and capital stock significantly contribute to financial development in a positive manner. Moreover, inclusive growth contributes positively to overall financial development by enhancing economic freedom. Regardless of exogenous and endogenous shocks, we found that the tax burden and investment freedom are negative drivers of financial development as measured by the overall financial development index. In contrast, protection of property rights, government spending, monetary freedom, and financial freedom are positive and significant drivers of economic growth.

Evolution Characters and Influencing Factors of Regional Eco-Efficiency in a Developing Country: Evidence from Mongolia

The sandstorm in 2021 in East Asia demonstrated the ecological issues that culminated for decades in Mongolia. Mongolia is facing challenges to realize green and sustainable development. This article aims to increase the understanding of eco-efficiency and its influencing factors in Mongolia and to provide a reference for similar developing countries and regions to achieve green and sustainable development. This article used the Slacks-Based Measure of Efficiency (SBM) model with advantages of dimension freedom and unit variable to estimate the economic efficiency and eco-efficiency of 22 provinces in Mongolia from 2007 to 2016; energy consumption and undesirable environmental outputs were taken as ecological/environmental indicators in the input and output system of regional eco-efficiency in Mongolia, combining traditional indicators of economic efficiency to build Mongolia's eco-efficiency input-output framework. This article applied hot spot analysis and gravity center analysis to reveal the temporal and spatial evolution characters of eco-efficiency in Mongolia. Finally, the article applied panel Tobit regression to analyze the influencing factors of eco-efficiency. We were found that Mongolia's eco-efficiency slightly improved from 0.7379 in 2007 to 0.7673 in 2016, lower than the economic efficiency. The high eco-efficiency provinces appeared in the capital Ulaanbaatar and its surrounding areas, showing an obvious spatial spillover effect. The low eco-efficiency provinces were mainly in the undeveloped western region. The relationship between per capita GDP and eco-efficiency was U-shaped and consistent with environmental Kuznets theory. Accelerating economic growth, optimizing population distribution, and improving energy structure and green technology can improve Mongolia's eco-efficiency.

A Systematic Review of the Existing Literature for the Evaluation of Sustainable Urban Projects

From the 21st century to the present(2021), a worldwide awareness that cities’ development must be based on projects for socio-economic growth and environmental protection is increasing. World governmental agencies and the European Union have suggested action strategies for the construction of «prototype cities» whose value must be founded on the inclusion and/or preservation of anthropic-natural elements and their effects on territories. In order to minimize the theoretical–practical gap between planning and project design with a view to sustainable development and the evaluation of their performance from economic, social and environmental points of view, the present contribution aims to outline a framework useful for systematizing the main scientific contributions concerning sustainability and the evaluation of urban transformation projects. The objective is pursued by analyzing bibliographic references with specific regard to the use of logical-operative methodologies used to rationalize the processes of interventions’ evaluation and selection. The task of examining the available literature is carried out with an investigation protocol of four sequential steps. From the implementation of the last one, the evidence expressing the heterogeneity of the examples in the literature is described. Accordingly, the theoretical-methodological framework for the project evaluation from an urban sustainability perspective is illustrated.

Urban biocycles - Closing metabolic loops for resilient and regenerative ecosystem: A perspective

Cities are at crossroads, confronting challenges posed by increasing population growth, climate change and faltering livability. These problems are prompting urban areas to chart novel path towards adopting sustainable production/consumption strategies. The alluring concept of circular economy (CE) that focuses on reuse and recycling of materials in technical and biological cycles to reduce waste generation is a critical intervention. Present article aims on precisely highlighting the importance of biogenic materials which have an immense potential to be transformed into a source of value in an urban ecosystem. It also sets out to explore the scope of implementing 'urban biocycles' that strategically directs the flow of resources, their use, extracting value in the form of nutrients, energy and materials post consumption within an urban metabolic regime. The concepts discussed contribute to biocycle economy by outlining emerging requirements, identification of common strategies, policies and emerging areas of research in line with sustainable development goals.

Allometric Scaling of Mutual Information in Complex Networks: A Conceptual Framework and Empirical Approach

Complexity and information theory are two very valuable but distinct fields of research, yet sharing the same roots. Here, we develop a complexity framework inspired by the allometric scaling laws of living biological systems in order to evaluate the structural features of networks. This is done by aligning the fundamental building blocks of information theory (entropy and mutual information) with the core concepts in network science such as the preferential attachment and degree correlations. In doing so, we are able to articulate the meaning and significance of mutual information as a comparative analysis tool for network activity. When adapting and applying the framework to the specific context of the business ecosystem of Japanese firms, we are able to highlight the key structural differences and efficiency levels of the economic activities within each prefecture in Japan. Moreover, we propose a method to quantify the distance of an economic system to its efficient free market configuration by distinguishing and quantifying two particular types of mutual information, total and structural.

A quantitative engineering study of ecosystem robustness using thermodynamic power cycles as case studies

Human networks and engineered systems are traditionally designed to maximize efficiency. Ecosystems on the other hand, achieve long-term robustness and sustainability by maintaining a unique balance between pathway efficiency and redundancy, measured in terms of the number of flow pathways available for a given unit of flow at any node in the network. Translating this flow-based ecosystem robustness into an engineering context supports the creation of new robust and sustainable design guidelines for engineered systems. Thermodynamic cycles provide good examples of human systems where simple and clearly defined modifications can be made to increase efficiency. Twenty-three variations on the Brayton and Rankine cycles are used to understand the relationship between design decisions that maximize a system’s efficient use of energy (measured by thermodynamic first law efficiency) and ecological measures of robustness and structural efficiency. The results reveal that thermodynamic efficiency and ecological pathway efficiency do not always correlate and that while on average modifications to increase energy efficiency reduce the robustness of the system, the engineering understanding of ecological network design presented here can enable decisions that are able to increase both energy efficiency and robustness.

A network analysis of indirect carbon emission flows among different industries in China

Indirect carbon emissions account for a large ratio of the total carbon emissions in processes to make the final products, and this implies indirect carbon emission flow across industries. Understanding these flows is crucial for allocating a carbon allowance for each industry. By combining input-output analysis and complex network theory, this study establishes an indirect carbon emission flow network (ICEFN) for 41 industries from 2005 to 2014 to investigate the interrelationships among different industries. The results show that the ICEFN was consistent with a small-world nature based on an analysis of the average path lengths and the clustering coefficients. Moreover, key industries in the ICEFN were identified using complex network theory on the basis of degree centrality and betweenness centrality. Furthermore, the 41 industries of the ICEFN were divided into four industrial subgroups that are related closely to one another. Finally, possible policy implications were provided based on the knowledge of the structure of the ICEFN and its trend.

Integrating landscape system and meta-ecosystem frameworks to advance the understanding of ecosystem function in heterogeneous landscapes: An analysis on the carbon fluxes in the Northern Highlands Lake District (NHLD) of Wisconsin and Michigan

The successful integration of ecosystem ecology with landscape ecology would be conducive to understanding how landscapes function. There have been several attempts at this, with two main approaches: (1) an ecosystem-based approach, such as the meta-ecosystem framework and (2) a landscape-based approach, such as the landscape system framework. These two frameworks are currently disconnected. To integrate these two frameworks, we introduce a protocol, and then demonstrate application of the protocol using a case study. The protocol includes four steps: 1) delineating landscape systems; 2) classifying landscape systems; 3) adjusting landscape systems to meta-ecosystems and 4) integrating landscape system and meta-ecosystem frameworks through meta-ecosystems. The case study is the analyzing of the carbon fluxes in the Northern Highlands Lake District (NHLD) of Wisconsin and Michigan using this protocol. The application of this protocol revealed that one could follow this protocol to construct a meta-ecosystem and analyze it using the integrative framework of landscape system and meta-ecosystem frameworks. That is, one could (1) appropriately describe and analyze the spatial heterogeneity of the meta-ecosystem; (2) understand the emergent properties arising from spatial coupling of local ecosystems in the meta-ecosystem. In conclusion, this protocol is a useful approach for integrating the meta-ecosystem framework and the landscape system framework, which advances the describing and analyzing of the spatial heterogeneity and ecosystem function of interconnected ecosystems.

Network structure impacts global commodity trade growth and resilience

Global commodity trade networks are critical to our collective sustainable development. Their increasing interconnectedness pose two practical questions: (i) Do the current network configurations support their further growth? (ii) How resilient are these networks to economic shocks? We analyze the data of global commodity trade flows from 1996 to 2012 to evaluate the relationship between structural properties of the global commodity trade networks and (a) their dynamic growth, as well as (b) the resilience of their growth with respect to the 2009 global economic shock. Specifically, we explore the role of network efficiency and redundancy using the information theory-based network flow analysis. We find that, while network efficiency is positively correlated with growth, highly efficient systems appear to be less resilient, losing more and gaining less growth following an economic shock. While all examined networks are rather redundant, we find that network redundancy does not hinder their growth. Moreover, systems exhibiting higher levels of redundancy lose less and gain more growth following an economic shock. We suggest that a strategy to support making global trade networks more efficient via, e.g., preferential trade agreements and higher specialization, can promote their further growth; while a strategy to increase the global trade networks' redundancy via e.g., more abundant free-trade agreements, can improve their resilience to global economic shocks.

Evaluating the evolution of the Heihe River basin using the ecological network analysis: Efficiency, resilience, and implications for water resource management policy

One of the most critical challenges in the anthropocentric age is the sustainable management of the planet's increasingly strained water resources. In this avenue, there is a need to advance holistic approaches and objective tools which allow policy makers to better evaluate system-level properties and trade-offs of water resources. This research contributes to the expanding literature in this area by examining the changes to system-level network configurations of the middle reaches of the Heihe River basin from 2000 to 2009. Specifically, through the ecological network analysis (ENA) approach, this research examines changes to the system-level properties of efficiency, redundancy, and evaluates the trade-offs to the resiliency of ecosystem water services of the middle reaches of the Heihe River basin. Our results indicate that while the efficiency of the middle reaches has increased from 2000 to 2009 by 6% and 78% more water is released to the lower reaches, the redundancy of the system has also decreased by 6%. The lower level of redundancy, particularly due to the changes in the groundwater body levels, has critical long-term consequences for the resilience of the water ecosystem services of the middle reaches. In consideration of these holistic trade-offs, two hypothetical alternative scenarios, based on water recycling and saving strategies, are developed to improve the long-term health and resilience of the water system.

Designing Industrial Networks Using Ecological Food Web Metrics

Biologically Inspired Design (biomimicry) and Industrial Ecology both look to natural systems to enhance the sustainability and performance of engineered products, systems and industries. Bioinspired design (BID) traditionally has focused on a unit operation and single product level. In contrast, this paper describes how principles of network organization derived from analysis of ecosystem properties can be applied to industrial system networks. Specifically, this paper examines the applicability of particular food web matrix properties as design rules for economically and biologically sustainable industrial networks, using an optimization model developed for a carpet recycling network. Carpet recycling network designs based on traditional cost and emissions based optimization are compared to designs obtained using optimizations based solely on ecological food web metrics. The analysis suggests that networks optimized using food web metrics also were superior from a traditional cost and emissions perspective; correlations between optimization using ecological metrics and traditional optimization ranged generally from 0.70 to 0.96, with flow-based metrics being superior to structural parameters. Four structural food parameters provided correlations nearly the same as that obtained using all structural parameters, but individual structural parameters provided much less satisfactory correlations. The analysis indicates that bioinspired design principles from ecosystems can lead to both environmentally and economically sustainable industrial resource networks, and represent guidelines for designing sustainable industry networks.

Tracking Inter-Regional Carbon Flows: A Hybrid Network Model

The mitigation of anthropogenic carbon emissions has moved beyond the local scale because they diffuse across boundaries, and the consumption that triggers emissions has become regional and global. A precondition of effective mitigation is to explicitly assess inter-regional transfer of emissions. This study presents a hybrid network model to track inter-regional carbon flows by combining network analysis and input-output analysis. The direct, embodied, and controlled emissions associated with regions are quantified for assessing various types of carbon flow. The network-oriented metrics called "controlled emissions" is proposed to cover the amount of carbon emissions that can be mitigated within a region by adjusting its consumption. The case study of the Jing-Jin-Ji Area suggests that CO2 emissions embodied in products are only partially controlled by a region from a network perspective. Controlled carbon accounted for about 70% of the total embodied carbon flows, while household consumption only controlled about 25% of Beijing's emissions, much lower than its proportion of total embodied carbon. In addition to quantifying emissions, the model can pinpoint the dominant processes and sectors of emissions transfer across regions. This technique is promising for searching efficient pathways of coordinated emissions control across various regions connected by trade.

Spatial variation in the ecological relationships among the components of Beijing's carbon metabolic system

In this paper, we construct a spatially explicit model of carbon metabolism for the flows of carbon among the components of an urban area. We used the model to identify spatial heterogeneity in the ecological relationships within a carbon metabolic network. We combined land-use and cover type maps for Beijing from 1990 to 2010 with empirical coefficients and socioeconomic data to quantify the flows. We used utility analysis to determine the ecological relationships between the components of the system and analyzed their changes during urban development. We used ArcGIS to analyze their spatial variation. We found that the positive utilities in Beijing decreased over time and that negative relationships mostly outweighed positive relationships after 2000. The main ecological relationships were distributed throughout the entire urban area before 2000; subsequently, exploitation, control, and mutualism relationships became concentrated in the southeast, leaving competition relationships to dominate the northwest. Mutualism relationships were most common for natural components, but were not stable because they were easily disturbed by urban expansion. Transportation and industrial land and urban land were the most important contributors to exploitation and control relationships and may be important indicators of spatial adjustment. Increasing competition relationships unbalanced the carbon metabolism, and limitations on the area of land available for development and on the water resources led to increasingly serious competition. The results provide an objective basis for planning adjustments to Beijing's land-use patterns to improve its carbon metabolism and reduce carbon emission.

Ecological network analysis for a virtual water network

The notions of virtual water flows provide important indicators to manifest the water consumption and allocation between different sectors via product transactions. However, the configuration of virtual water network (VWN) still needs further investigation to identify the water interdependency among different sectors as well as the network efficiency and stability in a socio-economic system. Ecological network analysis is chosen as a useful tool to examine the structure and function of VWN and the interactions among its sectors. A balance analysis of efficiency and redundancy is also conducted to describe the robustness (RVWN) of VWN. Then, network control analysis and network utility analysis are performed to investigate the dominant sectors and pathways for virtual water circulation and the mutual relationships between pairwise sectors. A case study of the Heihe River Basin in China shows that the balance between efficiency and redundancy is situated on the left side of the robustness curve with less efficiency and higher redundancy. The forestation, herding and fishing sectors and industrial sectors are found to be the main controllers. The network tends to be more mutualistic and synergic, though some competitive relationships that weaken the virtual water circulation still exist.