Consuming Asia - Systems and Structures of Consumption in Modern and Contemporary Asia

The Nordic Institute of Asian Studies (NIAS), the Network for Asian Studies (Asianettverket), the University of Bergen, and the Chr.  Michelsen Institute (CMI) co-hosted the 2023 Nordic NIAS Council (NNC) / ASIANET Conference: "Consuming Asia - Systems and Structures of Consumption in Modern and Contemporary Asia". Two Asia Centre's fellows, Anastasia Sinitsyna and Agnieszka Nitza-Makowska, participated with their presentations. 

Anastasia Sinitsyna's presentation "The Impact of Entrepreneurship on Environmental Changes across Asian Economies" focused on exploring the impact of innovation-driven entrepreneurship on environmental sustainability in Asian countries. Her findings suggest that entrepreneurship has a negative short-term impact on the environment, making sustainable development difficult to achieve. These results align with the Socio-technical system theory, which posits that economic goals should be reevaluated to include environmental health as a key indicator in measuring progress and performance, rather than relying solely on measures such as GDP. 

Agnieszka Nitza-Makowska's presentation was titled "Pakistan's Energy Consumption and Environmental Sustainability under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor". The paper looked at Pakistan's Energy Consumption and Environmental Sustainability under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. It provides answers to following questions: what are the implications of such an increase for Pakistan's environmental sustainability, especially given that most of the CPEC energy infrastructure relies on coal? Does Pakistan's establishment even consider such implications?