Carbon pricing and industrial policy in South Africa

Brent Cloete and Genna Robb

Climate Policy, 2010, vol. 10, issue 5, 494-510

Abstract: Economic instruments to mitigate climate change alter the relative cost structures of sectors within economies and between economies. This will lead to structural changes within economies benefiting less carbon-intensive goods and services. One area of government policy that is particularly important in this context is industrial policy, which aims to facilitate structural changes in economies towards higher-productivity activities. To ensure that industrial policy places South Africa on a low-carbon growth path, it needs to start favouring less carbon-intensive industries. Industrial policy must align with the use of economic instruments to mitigate climate change in South Africa in order to ensure the implementation of appropriate industrial strategies for a carbon-constrained world. This interplay between carbon pricing and industrial policies in South Africa is investigated by considering, on the positive side, the opportunities created by climate change and, on the negative side, the potential impact of carbon pricing on industrial competitiveness. Climate change considerations can be successfully incorporated into industrial policy in order to move South Africa towards a sustainable low-carbon growth path. Several suggestions for modifying policy are made. This will ensure that the economic costs of carbon pricing are minimized while potential long-term competitiveness advantages are maximized.

Date: 2010
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.3763/cpol.2010.0104 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:tcpoxx:v:10:y:2010:i:5:p:494-510

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/tcpo20

DOI: 10.3763/cpol.2010.0104

Access Statistics for this article

Climate Policy is currently edited by Professor Michael Grubb

More articles in Climate Policy from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().