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Vol. 43 No. 78 (2024)
Special Issue: the Contemporary Global Economy

Economic policy

Environmental Sustainability in South America

https://doi.org/10.19053/uptc.01203053.v43.n78.2024.17728

Published 2024-08-01

  • Paola Hermosa Del Vasto
    • ,
  • Rui Cunha Marques
    • ,
  • Juan Luis Peñaloza

Paola Hermosa Del Vasto
University of Granada

Rui Cunha Marques
Full Professor image/svg+xml

Juan Luis Peñaloza
Associate Professor image/svg+xml

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to determine the similarities in the context of environmental practices and sustainability of twelve South American countries and compares the environmental sustainability performance with six principal components. A multivariate analysis as a hierarchical method was carried out with 12 countries of South American with seventeen sustainable environmental indicators, secondary official data sources were consulted, namely the databases of ECLAC (Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean), applying eigenvector and eigenvalues from the correlation matrix and Ward's method with squared Euclidean distances.

The results suggest that the initial jumps in terms of distance are small. accordingly, the twelve countries analysed in study are grouped into five clusters. Deepening then in the perspective of characteristics of each cluster, CL1: Colombia, Venezuela, Suriname, Argentina and Bolivia; CL2: Guyana, Paraguay, Uruguay and Peru; CL3: Brazil; CL4: Ecuador; CL5: Chile. The research highlights significant differences among these South American countries, clustering those presenting similar patterns of behaviour and identifying the best performers. We argue that biodiversity must be protected and encouraged, and awareness raised of the importance of environmental sustainability and support the impact of climate change. Argentina, Uruguay and Chile face severe scarcity water issues and temperatures have risen in every country, but especially in Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Suriname, Venezuela.

 

Keywords

Environmental sustainability, South America, Multivariate analysis, Sustainable environmental indicators

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Author Biography

Paola Hermosa Del Vasto

PhD in Economic and Business Sciences from the Complutense University of Madrid. She is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Business Organization I at the University of Granada. She has taught Master's degrees nationwide. She has published in several national journals and has participated in International Conferences. Since 2020, she has been part of a national interuniversity research group, Research in Accounting and Economics for Sustainable Development in Emerging Economies (READEES) and since 2023 in the Advanced Research in Business Management group (SEJ478).

Rui Cunha Marques

Graduated, Post-graduated, MSc, PhD, and Postdoc (habilitation), he is a Full Professor of Systems Engineering in the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management at Lusófona University, Portugal. He is a researcher at the Research Centre for Asset Management and Systems Engineering (RCM2+), the Public Utility Research Center (PURC) at the University of Florida, and the Center of Local Government (CLG) at the University of New England, Australia, where he is a Visiting Professor. His expertise includes public service regulation, performance assessment, project management, and public-private partnerships. He has authored over 700 publications, including 14 books, and produced more than 500 technical reports. Currently, he consults for the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank and has collaborated with various international organizations and entities in over 50 countries across five continents.

 

 

Scopus ID: 15837022600

Google Scholar: Rui Cunha Marques

ResearchGate: Rui Cunha Marques

 

Juan Luis Peñaloza

Juan Luis Peñaloza is currently working as an Associate Professor in the Department of Statistics and Operations Research II (Decision Methods) at the Complutense University of Madrid. His current project is "Big Data, Demand and Supply of Justice, Judicial Services." His research disciplines include Experimental Economics, Environmental Economics, and Behavioural Economics. He possesses expertise and experience in Game Theory, Decision Theory, Economic Analysis, and Applied Econometrics. Peñaloza’s work focuses on understanding complex decision-making processes and their applications in various economic contexts, contributing to advancements in both theoretical and applied economics.

 

Orcid ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9109-7247

Google Scholar: Juan Luis Peñaloza

ResearchGate: Juan Luis Peñaloza

 

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