Distributional impacts of taxing water pollution in the Olifants river basin of South Africa

We study the distributional impacts of a water pollution tax in the Olifants river basin using a regional environmental computable general equilibrium (CGE) model. The distributional impacts were evaluated considering both the household income and spending-side effects. We find that the water pollution tax is progressive on the income side as the poorest and vulnerable derive lower shares of their income from capital, which bears the biggest burden of the tax. However, the tax is regressive on the expenditure side due to the higher share of pollution-intensive goods in poor households’ expenditure. The net effect of the tax is, however, not pro-poor. Revenue recycling through a subsidy to pollution abatement sectors mitigates the adverse distributional impacts of the tax whereas uniform direct lump-sum transfers to households’ income reverse the adverse distributional impacts.