The thinking behind the creation of alternative scenarios is presented in chapter 12. This Working Paper presents systematically the results at the country group level. The assumptions for each of the alternative scenarios are set out below.
Assumptions underlying the alternative scenarios
| GDP | Prices | Costs | Construction | Recovery rate | |
| BASE LOW | Low | Constant | Constant | Base | Base |
| BASE HIGH | High | Constant | Constant | Base | Base |
| High prices and high costs | Low | + 1% p.a. | + 1% p.a. | Base | Base |
| High prices, constant costs | Low | + 1% p.a. | Constant | Base | Base |
| High prices and low costs | Low | + 1% p.a. | - 1% p.a. | Base | Base |
| Constant prices, high costs | Low | Constant | - 1% p.a. | Base | Base |
| Constant prices, low costs | Low | Constant | - 1% p.a. | Base | Base |
| Low prices, constant costs | Low | - 1% p.a. | Constant | Base | Base |
| Low prices and low costs | Low | - 1% p.a. | - 1% p.a. | Base | Base |
| Low construction | Low | Constant | Constant | Low | Base |
| High waste paper recovery | Low | Constant | Constant | Base | High |
| Low waste paper recovery | Low | Constant | Constant | Base | Low |
| Minimum imports 1 | Low | + 2% p.a. | Constant | Base | Base |
| Minimum imports 2 | Low | + 1% p.a. | Constant | Base | Base |
The “Low” and “High” scenarios for GDP are presented and discussed in section 3.3. These scenarios apply only to the 18 west European countries explicitly modelled (see ECE/TIM/DP/4). Elsewhere (transition economies and very small countries) the forecasts are not based on explicit GDP scenarios and therefore show no variation between Base Low and Base High scenarios.
The scenarios for costs and prices are self explanatory. Their significance is discussed in sections 12.2 and 12.3.
The base scenario for construction is presented in section 3.4. The “Low” variant is growth in residential investment one percentage point lower than in the base scenario (see section 12.4).
The base scenario for waste paper recovery is presented and discussed in section 7.3. The “higher” and “lower” variants are estimated at a country level, but for Europe as a whole, while the base scenario expects a recovery rate in 2020 of 48.6%, the Lower Recovery scenario expects 44.0% and the Higher Recovery 53.6%.
