低炭素社会の構築に向けて Global Warming Policy and Local Environment Taxes : Focusing on the Development of Forest and Water Resource Environment Taxes in Japan

For effective measures against global warming given the current demand to shift to a lowcarbon society and for policy measures that will simultaneously achieve the twin policy goals of environmental conservation and economic development, we must implement a policy mix that uses economic means by combining economic means with other policy means including autonomous means and regulatory means. Economic means, which are premised on market mechanisms, use economic incentives including tax treatment and subsidies to induce behaviors in each actor, such as curbing of emissions, as a result of rational economic decisions, and it is anticipated that economic measures will provide effective economic support for global warming policy. In many European countries, there are already taxes on gasoline, coal, and natural gas, etc., and a carbon tax has been introduced in order to restrain emissions of CO_2 that result from consumption of the above fuels. In contrast, Japan has not yet introduced a carbon tax at the national level. In Japan, while debate continues on the usage of economic measures in the national environmental policy by introducing a carbon tax as a global warming policy or creating of an emission trading system, it is the local governments that are taking the lead in actual implementation of economic measures by introducing industrial waste taxes, forest and water source environment taxes, and so forth. At the local government level, prefectures are increasingly introducing independent forest and water source environment taxes for the purpose of forest development and water source environment conservation. This is occurring in a context where water issues are growing increasingly serious around the world and the world\u27s forests continue to decrease and deteriorate; it has been pointed out that these phenomena are closely linked with the global warming problem, and so attention is being paid to the role filled by forests, as absorbers of CO_2, in the resolution of the global warming problem as well as to the public benefits provided by forests. This paper discusses about the development of forest and water resource environment taxes at the local government level in Japan, especially case of Kanagawa Prefecture