In terms of natural resources and sustainability, how can the UK reduce its dependence on natural resources from other countries, which in turn impacts their sustainability

ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONS

• Your final slide must provide the reference list. The content slide must have at least five reference sources (use footnotes/footer for citations and final reference page for full references)

PRESENTATION TASK: Long-run economic growth, innovation, and sustainability

“The key to long-run economic growth is rising labour productivity, or just productivity, which is output per worker. Increases in productivity arise from increases in physical capital per worker and human capital per worker as well as technological progress… The world economy contains examples of success and failure in the effort to achieve long-run economic growth.”

“Economic growth, other things equal, tends to increase the adverse impact of human activity on the environment, including an increase in pollution, the loss of wildlife habitats, the extinction of species, and reduced biodiversity… To achieve long-run economic growth with environmental protection, governments will need to use regulations and environmental standards, and institute policies that create market incentives to encourage individuals and firms to make the transition to clean energy sources. Governments—both rich and poor—will need to continue to cooperate with one another. Getting political consensus around the necessary policies will be key.”

Krugman & Wells, 2020 (Chapter 15)

This assessment is focused on the dynamics between long-run economic growth, innovation, and increasing concerns about the global sustainability of economic growth and human activity. The required economics concepts are covered in the Essentials of Economics textbook (Krugman & Wells, 2020) in chapters 15 and 16 (required reading). This corresponds to the subjects of module lectures 15-16. Useful world data sources can be found on the websites of the United Nations, the OECD, and the World Bank, as well as other academic journal reference sources such as those on the ARUL digital library or other digital academic library.

Students are invited to present a 5-minute analysis of sustainability, innovation, and long-run economic growth. To do this, students need to use economic theories and concepts learned in MOD3327 lectures and in the required textbook readings in Essentials of Economics (Krugman and Wells, 2020), as well as current events and international data on sustainability and economic growth. Students must identify, analyse and present their findings on ONE of the following topics:

1. What are the current top threats to the UK’s long-run economic growth in terms of sustainability and climate change? How are UK businesses responding to environmental sustainability concerns in 2021?
2. Compare the UK’s economic sustainability response to a chosen case study country that seems to have some sustainability and innovation advantages over the UK (excluding the EU member states, North America, Australia, and New Zealand due to economic and political ties). What could the UK learn from your chosen international case study country and how could UK businesses support this sustainability innovation?
3. Comparing the UK CO2 emissions per capita with a chosen case study country that has a similar or larger population but has less of a negative environmental impact (excluding the EU member states, North America, Australia, and New Zealand due to economic and political ties). Why does the UK have high CO2 emissions? How could the UK learn from your chosen case study country to reduce our CO2 emissions per capita?
4. In terms of energy in the UK, what are the top sustainability concerns about UK energy usage by households, businesses, and industries? How can businesses help support innovation to reduce the negative impact of energy consumption in the UK?
5. In terms of natural resources and sustainability, how can the UK reduce its dependence on natural resources from other countries, which in turn impacts their sustainability? How can UK businesses help the UK reduce its need for foreign natural resources?

2. Students will independently research and design a 3-slide PowerPoint presentation to present their topic, which they will present live at their scheduled assessment day and time. The PowerPoint presentation must be submitted on the VLE before students’ scheduled assessment time.

a) One cover slide with a presentation topic title, student name and ID, module number, cohort number, lecturer name, presentation day and time.

b) One topic slide about their chosen long-run growth, innovation, and sustainability presentation topic from one of the above list of five topic choices, including footnote citations of academic, government, world data sources, or news sources used for any facts provided. The topic slide should make at least five clear points with one different reference source for each of the five point. Maximum 200 words on the content slide, no quotations, must be student’s original text. Be mindful of text size, format, and choice of colours for best legibility. This slide is NOT meant to be read out loud by the student. The student is expected to use it as a guide for their spoken presentation, using their knowledge and memory to present with the slide as a reminder.

c) One references slide with Harvard style references for all footnote citations from the topic slide. Students are expected to use at least five sources, including the module textbook by Krugman & Wells (2020)

3. Students must present their slides for five minutes maximum during their scheduled 30 minute time slot during the live practical assessments, scheduled for Week 12 during normal class hours. Exact schedule time and day of presentations for each student will be confirmed to students by email during the trimester. Attendance on time for your scheduled assessment is mandatory. Late arrivals to your presentation may lead to failure (not possible to enter the assessment during another student’s presentation) and require you to resit the assessment and the module in future trimester.

Assignment Instructions:

1. Students must ensure they have attended lectures 1-16, reviewed lecture slides and/or videos 1-16, and read Krugman & Wells chapters 1-16 to successfully pass this assessment.
2. Students need to do independent research on their chosen topic on international data websites such as the United Nations, the OECD, the World Bank and UK data sources from UK government websites ending in “gov.uk”.mStudents should use academic reference sources available on the ARUL digital library and other academic digital libraries. Students should use major UK news sources in print or online such as BBC News, The Guardian, The Independent, etc.
3. Use of low quality/non-academic sources, irrelevant, false, off-topic, out of date sources (prior to 2020), or non-UK sources will result in loss of marks up to 20% and possible reporting to the Academic Offense team if plagiarism, collusion, or contract cheating is suspected, which can lead to failing the assessment and failing the module.
4. Students must submit their slides to the VLE submission link in the Assessments folder in advance of their presentation time to avoid technical delays during presentations and loss of 20% presentation references and formatting marks resulting from not submitting one’s presentation ahead of time. Presentation document must be correctly titled following these instructions and in this order to identify students and their presentations: lecturer initials, cohort number, presentation day and time, first and surname, (ex: “MC Group 01 28 Mar 230PM RashidaGrodzski”). Failure to correctly identify your presentation according to these specific guidelines could lead to it being considered as not submitted. It is students’ responsibility to label their presentations correctly. Compare the UK’s economic sustainability response to a chosen case study country that seems to have some sustainability and innovation advantages over the UK
5. Students MUST NOT read from a script when presenting. Reading from a script will incur a 10% penalty to overall marks (e.g. a mark of 60 would be reduced to 50), although a pass mark will not be reduced to a fail.
6. Students may not work together to write their presentations in collaboration; this is the definition of academic “collusion”, which is academic misconduct that can lead to failing an assessment and failing the module. All student presentations will be recorded and compared for content similarities in wording (written and spoken). Suspected cases collusion, contract cheating, and plagiarism will be reported to the Academic Offense team for investigation.