Proceedings of the IBA IEA Conference on Economics and Public Policy (Ecofluence 2024)
Conference: Proceedings of the IBA IEA Conference on Economics and Public Policy (Ecofluence 2024)
Date: 5-7 December 2024
Location: Bangalore, India (Hybrid)
Website: https://iba.ac.in/ecofluence2024/ The genesis of Ecofluence is interesting. As the plan unfolded to have a conference on Economics and Public Policy, it was desired to have a component for attracting young and the aspirational. A method to do so was to create a competition and the competition be differentiation through a sportification of the same. With a relatively successful beginning in 2023, the event now scaled up into Ecofluence 2024- IBA IEA Conference on Economics and Public Policy and Economics Research Championship. The conference was held between Dec 5–7, 2024 in a hybrid mode. The collaboration with the Indian Economics Association was an important mile stone in the journey. The event saw presentation of more than 40 papers in the conference. Around 25 entries were seeded for the research championship. Therefore, over the three days, discussion and deliberations revolved over economics, public policy and associated topics. They further enriched by the presence of eminent personalities in the field whose interventions added a whole new dimension to the field. Economics is forceful and exciting. Contrary to popular perception, economics can be fascinating and revolve around numerous extents in our lives. Rather than the theo retical slant, it is the daily applications that make economics something curious. It offers multitude of fields of study. Hence the conference too presents variety in terms of discus sions. For long, there have been multiple schools of thoughts in economics each with their conflicting perspectives. There were discussions on the contrasting approaches between orthodox economics as one might term it as against the numerous heterodox models that have emerged. Current topics like sustainability, discrimination, urbanization have been increasingly getting importance in economics. To underline the same, there sessions organized around the same. In the field of public policy, there has been an emphasis on evidence based approaches. The session on the same discussed the cost benefit analysis of these approaches. Another session linked the role of econometrics in public policy. A discussion in economics would be incomplete without locating it in the national and provincial context. Therefore, a session was in place for locating Karnataka and Indian economy. Furthermore, the discussion aligned itself towards an inclusive understanding of growth. Public Policy is not immune from external interventions. Hence one brought into discussion the foreign policy dimension as well. On the technical session front, there were discussions on the economics of the marginalized. The sessions also touched upon international economics, government role, the role of dignity in labour, constitutional economics, financial economics, production analysis, rural economics, agricultural sector, digital domain, linkages to business among many other topics. There were discussions on the theoretical dimensions as well as the applied dimensions. On the broader front, the sessions were stimulating and created a building block for further development in theory. Yet that is one aspect of the conference. The second aspect is the proceedings of the papers presented in the event. The current endeavour is for the same. The process was rigorous. The papers were subject to double blind review and post incorporation of the suggestions of the reviewers, the papers were selected to be published in the proceedings. In the pursuit of publication, there are naturally trade-offs. The conference was on economics and public policy. There is a question what gets encompassed as part of the same. Naturally, there must exist linkages in the papers towards the theme and hence that had to be given importance along with the methodology, analysis and discussions of the results besides the clarity in objectives, the depth of literature review among others. As popular perception goes, economics is the mother of all disciplines. Economics has encroached wittingly or otherwise across domain of social sciences. Management is no exception. Hence papers were broad in scope to cover the linkages of economics across social science disciplines, management and business in particular. While there is a school that would view economics through a narrow prism of theory and the subsequent linkages to policy, economics presents a wider front. As scholars like Schelling, Becker, Frank, Levitt among others demonstrate, economics analysis becomes an integral part of human life. Often economics finds applications subconsciously yet it is worthwhile even in retrospect the analysis of the phenomenon. One can take an instance of Q-commerce. It is disrupting. While popular tendency might be to look towards management disciplines, it is a key integral to economics in the sense of changing industry and market structures. Human responses differ in degree to these changes and therefore naturally a wider canvas gets built up on the same. Another instance would be emergence of sustainability as a key discipline and has found its way into application in economics. One cannot ignore the role of finance and more evidently the emergence of new phenomena of green finance in economics aspects. Taxation, corporate governance, financial markets all find themselves a spot for the economists to study and build further the linkages. Issues like agriculture and rural development have long been staple of economics. Let’s move further into digital marketing. Its existence arises the firms have to make their presence felt across domains.While there existed traditional domains, the digital has opened up new spaces. The need to make the presence felt itself is an outcome of the firm’s despite to make itself different from the rest and thus try to seek a price premium. Hence economics unwittingly encroaches into the same. Similarly, the need to study impulsive or panic buying forces the researcher to locate the theories in economics apart from the other disciplines. Topics like corporate governance, corporate social responsibility have become integral part of economics text books too. Finance originally was considered part of economics till it broke away. Hence when one attempts a location of economics theory, these topics cannot be kept away. Economics also goes beyond into understanding human aspects something like the role of transgender or even an economic analysis of social intelligence with implications for public policy. Public policy itself is determinant of multiple factors. Invariably it’s reactive. It also follows what is generally considered a precautionary principle. Any new industry must demonstrate no harm to the people before being permitted. Yet in the days of artificial intelligence and deep learning industry shelf life has taken new shape. Industry emerge and collapse pretty fast. Thereby the need to study how these play out in varying sectors especially areas like agriculture. At the same time human freedom and creativity and expression too are undergoing metamorphosis. What was Preface vii usually considered taboo or social heretics are now are being considered acceptable. These issues too merit a discussion and given their intricate underpinnings in human and societal behaviour and choices, they too form part of economics understanding with implications for public policy. Conferences are composed into sessions and hence the current endeavour too is divided into sessions ranging from theoretical economics to sustainability and livelihoods to agriculture and rural development to human aspect of economics to finance and governance to marketing and other functional areas of management and their linkages to economics and public policy. In organizing this conference and subsequent publication of proceedings, it is natural to express gratitude to all those who made the same possible. One of the editors (Prashant Kulkarni) thank the other editor (Dr. Subhash Sharma) for coming on board and all the suggestions and encouragement in execution of the same. Dr. Manish Jain as the Chief Patron was the central pillar in conceptualization and execution of the idea. The Indian Economics Association lent a strong support, Dr. Ravindra Brahme, the General Secretary of the Organization and Dr. Anil Thakur, its Chief Convenor both deserve our strong gratitude for having trusted and supported us. Dr. Tapan Shandilya, Dr. Sudhakar Panda, Dr. AK Mittal and Dr. Naseer Khan also lent us their support and encouragement. Dr. R.S. Deshpande as the Chair of the Advisory Committee was always available and without his encouragement, suggestions and leads, it would have been inconceivable to have organized this event on a scale we have achieved. The Advisory Committee members Dr. Amalendu Jyotishi, Dr. S.R. Keshava, Dr. Kala Seetharam Sreedhar, Dr. Pushkarni Panchamkhi, Dr. Sridevi Gummadi, Dr. Basavaraj Nagoor, Dr. Subhendu Dey all were accommodating and gave in constructive suggestions though we troubled them quite a bit. An expression of acknowledgement to Dr. R. K Mishra for his advice on different facets of the event. We must also place on record the acknowledgments to Dr. Neeraj Hatekar, Dr. N. R. Bhanumurthy, Dr. Ashok Dalwai, Dr. S. S. Somra, Dr. Anurag Asawa, Dr. Padmini Rao, Dr. B. S. Venkatesh, Dr. Puja Guha, Dr. Malini Tantri, Dr. Shar nappa Saidapur, Dr. R. R. Biradar, Dr. Jayaram Bhat, Dr. Madhumathi M, Dr. Kasturi Bhattacharya, Dr. Vijaya Priya Shanmugam, Dr. Anand Dasgupta, Dr. Nikhil Jha, Dr. Neelakantha N.T. for their constructive contributions at different points of the conference. It must be placed on record our thanks to Dr. K. S. Rajshekhar, Dr. Siva Subramanian, Dr. M R Suresh, Dr. Shikha Ojha, Prof.Niveditha K, Prof. Sharada T. V, Dr. Akanksha Agrawal, Dr. Kamlesh Acharya, Dr. Balakoteshwari, Dr. Hema D, Dr. Sowmya C. S., Prof. V. Suresh Chandra, Dr. Ravi Shankar R, Dr. Aravamudhan N, Dr. Muralidhar Deshpande, Dr Bikash Debta, Dr. BB Tiwari, Dr.Angan Sengupta, Ms. Anindita Kundu, Ms. Siddarthi N, Mr. Jayadev M, Mr. Dinesh Subramanian, Mr. Anjan Banerjee for their significant help at different points in the event. At various point in the run up to the event, during the event and the post event work, we had the fortune of having secured the support of our colleagues, Prof. Narendra Babu, Dr. Nagendra Hegde and Prof. Gowrish B M for which we shall remain grateful. It would also be opportune to thank our colleagues, Dr. Ramana Acharyulu, Dr. B K Bhattacharya, Dr. Krishna Kumari, Dr. R Murganandan and Dr. Krishnan Hariharan for their support at different times. It would be also appropriate to thank our colleagues Ms. Bhavya Kalra, Dr. Sharmila Natraj, Mr. Dhanush and Mr. Suresh YVS for their administrative support at various points. Our colleagues in administration, maintenance, systems, security, infrastructure and mess departments too deserve our heartfelt thanks for their tireless efforts in making the event a success. The student volunteers play a critical role in these activities and thus they need a strong round of applause without whom we could not have achieved what we wanted to do. We would like to name on record, Ms. Kashish, Ms. Supriya, Mr. Mohibul, Mr. Shubham, Ms. Srishti, Mr. Jagjeet, Mr. Bharath, Ms. Anushree, Ms Bhavani, Ms Likhitha, Ms. Saloni, Ms. Anisha, Ms. Rupa, Ms. Gahana, Ms. Jyotirmayi, Mr. Aryan, Mr. Niteesh, Mr. Tarun, Mr. Krishna, Ms. Sneha, Ms. Bhuvana among many others. The students of Batch 2325 and Batch 2426 of Indus Business Academy deserve applause and gratitude. We would like to place on record our gratitude to Atlantis Press- an imprint of Springer Nature for agreeing to publish the proceedings. We would like to thank all the team members for Springer Nature and Atlantis for their invaluable contribution in getting the proceedings ready. The event is not an individual initiative but a collective one. Hence gratitude to all the families of all those who were part of the event and thus making it successful and subsequent publication of the proceedings. To all the readers, you are important. Your feedback is important. It will help in significant way to enhance and further the narrative set by the publication of the proceedings.
Date: 5-7 December 2024
Location: Bangalore, India (Hybrid)
Website: https://iba.ac.in/ecofluence2024/ The genesis of Ecofluence is interesting. As the plan unfolded to have a conference on Economics and Public Policy, it was desired to have a component for attracting young and the aspirational. A method to do so was to create a competition and the competition be differentiation through a sportification of the same. With a relatively successful beginning in 2023, the event now scaled up into Ecofluence 2024- IBA IEA Conference on Economics and Public Policy and Economics Research Championship. The conference was held between Dec 5–7, 2024 in a hybrid mode. The collaboration with the Indian Economics Association was an important mile stone in the journey. The event saw presentation of more than 40 papers in the conference. Around 25 entries were seeded for the research championship. Therefore, over the three days, discussion and deliberations revolved over economics, public policy and associated topics. They further enriched by the presence of eminent personalities in the field whose interventions added a whole new dimension to the field. Economics is forceful and exciting. Contrary to popular perception, economics can be fascinating and revolve around numerous extents in our lives. Rather than the theo retical slant, it is the daily applications that make economics something curious. It offers multitude of fields of study. Hence the conference too presents variety in terms of discus sions. For long, there have been multiple schools of thoughts in economics each with their conflicting perspectives. There were discussions on the contrasting approaches between orthodox economics as one might term it as against the numerous heterodox models that have emerged. Current topics like sustainability, discrimination, urbanization have been increasingly getting importance in economics. To underline the same, there sessions organized around the same. In the field of public policy, there has been an emphasis on evidence based approaches. The session on the same discussed the cost benefit analysis of these approaches. Another session linked the role of econometrics in public policy. A discussion in economics would be incomplete without locating it in the national and provincial context. Therefore, a session was in place for locating Karnataka and Indian economy. Furthermore, the discussion aligned itself towards an inclusive understanding of growth. Public Policy is not immune from external interventions. Hence one brought into discussion the foreign policy dimension as well. On the technical session front, there were discussions on the economics of the marginalized. The sessions also touched upon international economics, government role, the role of dignity in labour, constitutional economics, financial economics, production analysis, rural economics, agricultural sector, digital domain, linkages to business among many other topics. There were discussions on the theoretical dimensions as well as the applied dimensions. On the broader front, the sessions were stimulating and created a building block for further development in theory. Yet that is one aspect of the conference. The second aspect is the proceedings of the papers presented in the event. The current endeavour is for the same. The process was rigorous. The papers were subject to double blind review and post incorporation of the suggestions of the reviewers, the papers were selected to be published in the proceedings. In the pursuit of publication, there are naturally trade-offs. The conference was on economics and public policy. There is a question what gets encompassed as part of the same. Naturally, there must exist linkages in the papers towards the theme and hence that had to be given importance along with the methodology, analysis and discussions of the results besides the clarity in objectives, the depth of literature review among others. As popular perception goes, economics is the mother of all disciplines. Economics has encroached wittingly or otherwise across domain of social sciences. Management is no exception. Hence papers were broad in scope to cover the linkages of economics across social science disciplines, management and business in particular. While there is a school that would view economics through a narrow prism of theory and the subsequent linkages to policy, economics presents a wider front. As scholars like Schelling, Becker, Frank, Levitt among others demonstrate, economics analysis becomes an integral part of human life. Often economics finds applications subconsciously yet it is worthwhile even in retrospect the analysis of the phenomenon. One can take an instance of Q-commerce. It is disrupting. While popular tendency might be to look towards management disciplines, it is a key integral to economics in the sense of changing industry and market structures. Human responses differ in degree to these changes and therefore naturally a wider canvas gets built up on the same. Another instance would be emergence of sustainability as a key discipline and has found its way into application in economics. One cannot ignore the role of finance and more evidently the emergence of new phenomena of green finance in economics aspects. Taxation, corporate governance, financial markets all find themselves a spot for the economists to study and build further the linkages. Issues like agriculture and rural development have long been staple of economics. Let’s move further into digital marketing. Its existence arises the firms have to make their presence felt across domains.While there existed traditional domains, the digital has opened up new spaces. The need to make the presence felt itself is an outcome of the firm’s despite to make itself different from the rest and thus try to seek a price premium. Hence economics unwittingly encroaches into the same. Similarly, the need to study impulsive or panic buying forces the researcher to locate the theories in economics apart from the other disciplines. Topics like corporate governance, corporate social responsibility have become integral part of economics text books too. Finance originally was considered part of economics till it broke away. Hence when one attempts a location of economics theory, these topics cannot be kept away. Economics also goes beyond into understanding human aspects something like the role of transgender or even an economic analysis of social intelligence with implications for public policy. Public policy itself is determinant of multiple factors. Invariably it’s reactive. It also follows what is generally considered a precautionary principle. Any new industry must demonstrate no harm to the people before being permitted. Yet in the days of artificial intelligence and deep learning industry shelf life has taken new shape. Industry emerge and collapse pretty fast. Thereby the need to study how these play out in varying sectors especially areas like agriculture. At the same time human freedom and creativity and expression too are undergoing metamorphosis. What was Preface vii usually considered taboo or social heretics are now are being considered acceptable. These issues too merit a discussion and given their intricate underpinnings in human and societal behaviour and choices, they too form part of economics understanding with implications for public policy. Conferences are composed into sessions and hence the current endeavour too is divided into sessions ranging from theoretical economics to sustainability and livelihoods to agriculture and rural development to human aspect of economics to finance and governance to marketing and other functional areas of management and their linkages to economics and public policy. In organizing this conference and subsequent publication of proceedings, it is natural to express gratitude to all those who made the same possible. One of the editors (Prashant Kulkarni) thank the other editor (Dr. Subhash Sharma) for coming on board and all the suggestions and encouragement in execution of the same. Dr. Manish Jain as the Chief Patron was the central pillar in conceptualization and execution of the idea. The Indian Economics Association lent a strong support, Dr. Ravindra Brahme, the General Secretary of the Organization and Dr. Anil Thakur, its Chief Convenor both deserve our strong gratitude for having trusted and supported us. Dr. Tapan Shandilya, Dr. Sudhakar Panda, Dr. AK Mittal and Dr. Naseer Khan also lent us their support and encouragement. Dr. R.S. Deshpande as the Chair of the Advisory Committee was always available and without his encouragement, suggestions and leads, it would have been inconceivable to have organized this event on a scale we have achieved. The Advisory Committee members Dr. Amalendu Jyotishi, Dr. S.R. Keshava, Dr. Kala Seetharam Sreedhar, Dr. Pushkarni Panchamkhi, Dr. Sridevi Gummadi, Dr. Basavaraj Nagoor, Dr. Subhendu Dey all were accommodating and gave in constructive suggestions though we troubled them quite a bit. An expression of acknowledgement to Dr. R. K Mishra for his advice on different facets of the event. We must also place on record the acknowledgments to Dr. Neeraj Hatekar, Dr. N. R. Bhanumurthy, Dr. Ashok Dalwai, Dr. S. S. Somra, Dr. Anurag Asawa, Dr. Padmini Rao, Dr. B. S. Venkatesh, Dr. Puja Guha, Dr. Malini Tantri, Dr. Shar nappa Saidapur, Dr. R. R. Biradar, Dr. Jayaram Bhat, Dr. Madhumathi M, Dr. Kasturi Bhattacharya, Dr. Vijaya Priya Shanmugam, Dr. Anand Dasgupta, Dr. Nikhil Jha, Dr. Neelakantha N.T. for their constructive contributions at different points of the conference. It must be placed on record our thanks to Dr. K. S. Rajshekhar, Dr. Siva Subramanian, Dr. M R Suresh, Dr. Shikha Ojha, Prof.Niveditha K, Prof. Sharada T. V, Dr. Akanksha Agrawal, Dr. Kamlesh Acharya, Dr. Balakoteshwari, Dr. Hema D, Dr. Sowmya C. S., Prof. V. Suresh Chandra, Dr. Ravi Shankar R, Dr. Aravamudhan N, Dr. Muralidhar Deshpande, Dr Bikash Debta, Dr. BB Tiwari, Dr.Angan Sengupta, Ms. Anindita Kundu, Ms. Siddarthi N, Mr. Jayadev M, Mr. Dinesh Subramanian, Mr. Anjan Banerjee for their significant help at different points in the event. At various point in the run up to the event, during the event and the post event work, we had the fortune of having secured the support of our colleagues, Prof. Narendra Babu, Dr. Nagendra Hegde and Prof. Gowrish B M for which we shall remain grateful. It would also be opportune to thank our colleagues, Dr. Ramana Acharyulu, Dr. B K Bhattacharya, Dr. Krishna Kumari, Dr. R Murganandan and Dr. Krishnan Hariharan for their support at different times. It would be also appropriate to thank our colleagues Ms. Bhavya Kalra, Dr. Sharmila Natraj, Mr. Dhanush and Mr. Suresh YVS for their administrative support at various points. Our colleagues in administration, maintenance, systems, security, infrastructure and mess departments too deserve our heartfelt thanks for their tireless efforts in making the event a success. The student volunteers play a critical role in these activities and thus they need a strong round of applause without whom we could not have achieved what we wanted to do. We would like to name on record, Ms. Kashish, Ms. Supriya, Mr. Mohibul, Mr. Shubham, Ms. Srishti, Mr. Jagjeet, Mr. Bharath, Ms. Anushree, Ms Bhavani, Ms Likhitha, Ms. Saloni, Ms. Anisha, Ms. Rupa, Ms. Gahana, Ms. Jyotirmayi, Mr. Aryan, Mr. Niteesh, Mr. Tarun, Mr. Krishna, Ms. Sneha, Ms. Bhuvana among many others. The students of Batch 2325 and Batch 2426 of Indus Business Academy deserve applause and gratitude. We would like to place on record our gratitude to Atlantis Press- an imprint of Springer Nature for agreeing to publish the proceedings. We would like to thank all the team members for Springer Nature and Atlantis for their invaluable contribution in getting the proceedings ready. The event is not an individual initiative but a collective one. Hence gratitude to all the families of all those who were part of the event and thus making it successful and subsequent publication of the proceedings. To all the readers, you are important. Your feedback is important. It will help in significant way to enhance and further the narrative set by the publication of the proceedings.