The Role of International Co-operations 

     Common access resources are resources which are non-excludable and non-rival in nature. They are therefore have the incentive to be used or degraded rapidly by rational private individuals in order to gain maximum short-term utility and benefit, but are ignorant to the fact that they can cause negative long term externalities to the society. For example a herd of cows using a common pasture for gazing, each owner has the incentive to place their cow that area. As the number of cows increase there is a long term destruction of the land due to over gazing. All users will eventually suffer this loss causing a negative externality. This behaviour can also be known as the free-rider problem where the benefit is gained without a cost to pay, thus causing sustainability issues.

The possible solution to these problems are:

1. Extension of property rights — this will encourage protection and management of the resources 

2 .Carbon Trading— the carbon levels won’t rise

3. Tradable Permits— avoid the adversarial relationship between tax and policies

     These solutions are usually taken care of by the government bodies uniting and forming international co-operations. These international co-operations are neutral bodies that can help protect these common access resources from being exploited. An example of one such International body is the EPA or the Environmental protection agency. Their main priority is controlling the air quality. They are doing this by Improving public information and awareness, evaluating and demonstrating technology options, setting up air quality management capacities that monitor, model and forecast the air quality and extensive research. Other examples are the Paris Summit, the Montreal Protocol, WTO, etc.

The video link attached below is the video made by the EPA to raise awareness in Sydney about air pollution.

video link: https://vimeo.com/127797118

Bibliography

Maley, Sean, and Jason Welker. Economics: Developed Specifically for the IB Diploma. Oxford: Pearson Education, 2011. Print.

"IB1 Economics Presentation - Common Access Resources." Prezi.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Jan. 2016.