Being closely correlated with income and economic growth, trade openness impacts the environmental quality through different means. The study analyzes the robustness of the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis in OIC countries by examining the extent to which trade openness influence environmental quality through different environmental indicators for the period 1991 to 2018. A new methodology dynamic common correlated effects (DCCE) is applied to resolve the issue of cross-sectional dependence (CSD). We have used greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) along with ecological footprint as indicators of environmental quality. Results of DCCE estimation identify a negative association of trade openness with CO2, N2O, and CH4, while the positive relationship with the ecological footprint in overall OIC countries and higher income OIC countries. On the other hand, trade openness has a positive association with all environmental indicators in lower income OIC countries. Our findings confirm that inverted-U-shaped EKC exists in all groups of OIC countries when CO2, CH4, and ecological footprint are used as environmental indicators. However, a U-shaped EKC exists in overall OIC countries and lower income OIC countries when N2O is used. Eventually, it is recommended that if OIC countries continue trade openness policies and energy sector reforms and maintain sustainable use of biocapacity; then, they will be able to combat environmental issues with the increase in income.
The study aims to address the dynamic common correlated effects of trade openness, FDI, and institutional performance on environmental quality in OIC countries. Mostly, pollutants like CO2 and SO2 emissions are considered as the environmental indicators. However, for this study, we have selected ecological footprint as the indicator of environmental quality. The new econometric approach Dynamic Common Correlated Effects (DCCE) by Chudik and Pesaran (2015) has been used to measure the cross-sectional dependence among cross-sectional units. Results confirm that previous techniques for long panel data, like MG and PMG, give ambiguous outcomes in the presence of cross-sectional dependence. According to DCCE estimation, trade openness, FDI, and urbanization have a positive and significant relationship with ecological footprint while a significant and negative association is found between institutional performance and ecological footprint. The OIC countries must encourage green technology, clean production, and improved institutions for sustainable development and better environmental quality.
Empirical studies pertaining to the effects of fiscal policy instruments on environmental quality have provided mixed evidence. We consider the asymmetric effects of fiscal policy instruments on environmental quality for the top ten Asian carbon emitters over the period 1981-2018. We go beyond the literature and claim that the effects could be asymmetric. More specifically, we found that a positive shock in government expenditure will worsen environmental quality in Malaysia, UAE, Thailand, Indonesia, Turkey, Iran, India, and China, and improve it in Japan. On the other hand, we found that cutting government expenditure will improve environmental quality in these economies and will worsen only in Japan. Moreover, a higher government income tax revenue uniquely increases the government's spending that increases the carbon emissions in Malaysia, UAE, Thailand, Indonesia, Turkey, Iran, India, and China, and decrease in Japan. The negative shock of government revenue has adverse results on carbon emissions in these economies. However, short-run asymmetric effects translate to long-run effects in most Asian economies.
The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 10 focuses on combating the climate change and its effects. The inclusion of this agenda in the Sustainable Development Goals by the United Nations has shown that worsened environmental degradation is currently a major threat facing humankind. The World Commission on Environment and Development 2015 has highlighted that income inequality is one of the major causes for environmental deterioration. Hence, reducing environmental degradation requires a look at the problem of unequal income distribution. Moreover, educational attainment plays a vital role in providing relevant knowledge and skills to people in handling environmental problems. Thus, the objective of the study is to investigate the relationship between income inequality, educational attainment, and CO2 emissions by employing a panel data analysis for a group of 64 countries from 1990 to 2016.The study uses mainly dynamic common correlated effects (DCCE) estimator to take into account the issue of cross-section dependence which has been ignored by most of the previous studies. By tackling the problem of cross-section dependence, unbiased and reliable results could be produced in estimations. Our results portray that an inverted U-shaped environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) is found to be valid. Additionally, income inequality has a negative impact on environmental degradation. Likewise, educational attainment and CO2 emissions are revealed to be negatively correlated. The findings of the study could provide a better understanding on the root causes of environmental degradation, and further suggest remedial actions to overcome the problem.
This study critically examines the dynamic interplay between green finance and environmental sustainability using a systematic review and bibliometric analysis. The analysis is centered on 507 scholarly articles published between 2013 and 2023 in the Scopus database and leverages Microsoft Excel, Harzing Publish or Perish, and VOSviewer to identify publication trends, key contributors, research impact, and emergent themes in this rapidly evolving field. The findings reveal that research on green finance and environmental sustainability has increased exponentially over the past decade, with China and institutions in Asia emerging as prominent contributors compared to other regions. This study also identified the Environmental Science and Pollution Research journal as the most active source title, demonstrating its commitment to publishing current findings on the topic. Through keyword analysis, several research avenues have been proposed to guide future research on enhancing the strategic role of green finance in promoting environmental sustainability. These avenues include broadening the geographical scope of research, exploring the synergies between green finance and emerging fintech innovations, developing robust metrics to quantify the socioeconomic impacts of green finance, establishing a risk and resilience framework to protect green finance against uncertainties, and creating a Green Finance Performance Index to evaluate the dual returns of environmental and financial performance.
The natural gas (NG) forms the sizeable portion of the primary energy consumption in Pakistan. However, its depleting domestic reserves and increasing demand is challenging to balance the supply-demand in the country. This paper investigates the relationship between NG consumption and driving factors using LMDI-STIRPAT PLSR framework. It is learned that fossil energy structure and per capita gross domestic product (GDP) are most influencing factors on NG consumption, followed by non-clean energy structure, energy intensity, and population. The factors were further modelled to forecast the future values of NG consumption for various scenarios. It is found that NG consumption would be 42.107 MTOE under the high development scenario which would be twice the baseline scenario. It is projected that indigenous NG production will fall from 4 to 2 billion cubic feet/day and demand will increase by 1.5 billion cubic feet/day. Therefore, an optimized strategy is required for a long-term solution to cater this increasing supply-demand.
Greenhouse gasses have adverse effects on global warming and air pollution and need to be optimized by minimizing the contributing factors. This work analyzes the effects of economic growth and energy resources (renewable and nonrenewable) on the emissions of greenhouse gasses (GHG). A 2000-2016 panel data from 25 developing Asian countries is analyzed through a robust Random Effect (RE) approach and Hausman Taylor Regression (HTR). Findings show a positive correlation between economic growth and energy consumption, while a 1% increase in renewable energy consumption results in a 0.193% decrease in carbon emissions. Economic growth and renewable energy are positively correlated in both the short and long term, which implies a valid feedback hypothesis. The findings indicate the significant contribution of nonrenewable energy resources to greenhouse gas emissions and the positive impact of renewable resources on greenhouse gas emissions' control. Furthermore, this study highlights the potential of developing Asian economies to preserve the environment through more robust regional environmental policies and renewable energy resources. In light of this study's findings, policymakers in Asian developing economies should develop policies on Renewable Energy infrastructure (RE) to improve GDP and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The present study empirically confabulates the authenticity of the "resource curse hypothesis" in selected emerging nations. Furthermore, we also assessed the interconnections of three essential economic indicators with financial development, i.e., human development, political stability, and gross domestic product. To effectuate these objectives, we used annual data for the time frame 1990 to 2020 and advanced panel estimation techniques for getting the empirical outcomes. The study's empirical outcomes illustrate the existence of the "resource curse hypothesis" in sample nations. In addition, human development index and gross domestic product play an essential part in the furtherance of financial development in the long-run. The human development index is upsurging the financial development. Furthermore, political stability is also exerting a favorable influence on financial development. A similar interconnection is observed in the short-time period; nonetheless, the amplitude of the short-run impacts is smaller if we have a look at the long-run impacts. The empirical analysis offers a few pertinent policy insights for policymakers to improve the situation in the selected sample. Note: Financial development positively interconnected with human development, GDP and political stability while negatively associated with natural resources, respectively.
Sustainable consumption is crucial in reducing the growing pressure of environmental crises. This study proposes the Technique of Order Preference by Similarity to the Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) approach to evaluate sustainable consumption toward green growth. The proposed approach assesses criteria weights in Interval Valued Neutrosophic Sets (IVNSs) using the Method of Maximizing Deviation. The proposed method evaluates sustainable consumption for ten selected developed and developing countries, including Canada, France, Japan, China, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. The evaluation process encompasses four main criteria with eight sub-criteria, namely environment (population density, CO2), energy (total natural resource rents, renewable electricity), economics (value added of agriculture, forestry, and fishing, GDP per capita), and health (fertility rate, mortality rate). The countries are ranked based on the relative closeness coefficient. The results reveal that two economic sub-criteria are pivotal in the sustainable consumption rankings. Canada emerges as the country with the highest degree of green growth, attributed to its extensive land area and potential for renewable energy. Based on the findings, this study proposes some policy implications for Vietnam, including balancing fertility and mortality rates and regulating economic growth and resource exploitation.
Occupational cancers, including mesothelioma and lung cancer are linked to the use of asbestos. Annually, at least 100,000 global deaths are attributed to asbestos exposure putting a heavy burden on national budgets. Expenses incurred on treatment of asbestos related diseases (ARDs) reduce households and national resource savings, while ARDs culminate in terminal burdens. The objective of this study is to measure the economic burden of ARDs and to assess the economic impact of asbestos consumption. The health and economic burden of asbestos was estimated in macro-global consumption-production model using production function frontier-based and generalized least squared approach for asbestos products and cost tabulation. Production, in metric tons (Mt) was adopted as a dependent variable among explanatory variables, including consumption. Information on treatment cost of asbestos related diseases (mesothelioma, asbestosis and lung cancer) was obtained from costing information and published literatures. Annual total economic burden of asbestos is at USD 11.92 billion. Out of this cost, USD 4.34 billion per annum is the economic burden of managing three common ARDs. The cost of compensation for patients suffering ARDs is USD 4.28 billion. From the remaining USD 3.3 billion, USD 2.93 billion is the value of asbestos consumed in 2003 and USD372.15 million is the loss of earning due to hospital visits and admissions. For every USD 1 spent on consumption of asbestos, global economy has to absorb almost USD 4 due to health consequences of ARDs. Banning of asbestos production and usage in production of goods has far-reaching impacts on household welfare, health and economic development. The insights revealed are expected to inform decision makers the need to ban all forms of asbestos, especially in developing countries where usage is increasing.
This study utilized panel data from 132 countries spanning from 1996 to 2019 to examine the effect of government efficiency on carbon emission intensity. Using a fixed effect model, the study found that stronger government efficiency is associated with a significant decrease in carbon emission intensity. Robustness tests were performed, the results of which consistently supported the main findings. Additionally, the study investigated the mechanisms underlying the linkage between government efficiency and carbon emission intensity, revealing that improved government efficiency can inhibit carbon emission intensity by fostering environmental innovation and promoting renewable energy consumption. Finally, the study examined the moderating effects of national income level, economic freedom, democracy, and ruling party ideology on the nexus of government efficiency and carbon emission intensity, and found empirical evidence supporting these moderating effects. These results provide new insights for governments seeking to reduce carbon emission intensity.
The government of any country can play a great role in promoting economic and environmental policy reforms in both normal and crisis periods, but during the crisis period, the role of the government should take the economy into a recovery position. The stock market is the backbone of the financial system that needs the government's attention, especially in the period of financial stress and environmental protection is the responsibility of every economy to live in a healthy environment. Combining this motive, this study analyzed the role of the government towards the stock market and carbon emission by using different approaches, including the wavelet approach, OLS regression, and the Granger causality test. The wavelet approach is useful for analyzing the role of the government at different time intervals by using the time horizon from 1993 to 2021. World governance's six indicators in terms of voice and accountability, control of corruption, rules of law, regulatory quality, political stability, and government effectiveness are used as the proxy for the role of the government. Our findings show that all WGI indicators have a positive relationship with the stock market of Malaysia except voice and accountability while concerning voice and accountability, the role of the government of Malaysia is negative on the stock market. Similarly, our findings also show that the effective government governance mechanism through WGI indicators has a significant positive impact on CO2 emission due to industrialization. Furthermore, findings of the Granger causality test reveal that all the WGI indicators cause to stock market of Malaysia, and political stability has bi-directional causality indicating stock market index is also a factor that caused the political stability within Malaysia. In the Granger causality results of the CO2 and WGI indicators, there is unidirectional causality found between rules of law and regulatory quality with CO2 emission. This study advocated strong implementations for the investors for investment decisions in effective governance countries and implications for the government to remove their weakness by making effective governance related to the economy and as well as the environments within the country.
To tackle the growing menace of environmental degradation, the idea of green entrepreneurship has gained popularity, which is the process of creating new goods and technologies to solve environmental problems. Like traditional entrepreneurs, green entrepreneurs also need financial backing from financial institutions. However, no empirical evidence was found regarding the relationship between formal credit and green entrepreneurship. This analysis is an effort to plug this vacuum into the literature by analyzing the impact of formal credit on green entrepreneurship in high, middle, and low-income economies from 2011 to 2021. The study has employed various econometric techniques such as fixed-effects, random-effects, 2SLS, and GMM. The results show that formal credit substantially develops green entrepreneurship in high, middle, low-income, and full samples. Besides formal credit, GDP, environmental pressure, trade openness, technological development, and human capital are crucial in green entrepreneurship development in all samples. Policymakers may collaborate with financial institutions to create and provide specialized financial products and services catering to green entrepreneurs.
：The aim of this paper is to examine the impact of local government competition and environmental regulation intensity on regional innovation performance and its regional heterogeneity. Based on the theoretical mechanism of the aforementioned variables, this study uses the Chinese provincial panel data from 2001 to 2016. We use the super-efficiency data envelopment analysis (SE-DEA) to evaluate regional innovation performance. To systematically examine the impact of local government competition and environmental regulation intensity on regional innovation performance, we build a panel date model using the feasible generalized least squares (FGLS) method. The results indicate that: the regional innovation performance can be significantly improved through technological spillover; local governments compete for foreign direct investment (FDI) to participate in regional innovative production. Moreover, improvements in environmental regulation intensity enhance regional innovation performance through the innovation compensation effect. Our results show that the local governments tend to choose lower environmental regulation intensity to compete for more FDI, which has an inhibitory effect on regional innovation performance. Furthermore, due to regional differences in factor endowments, economic reforms and economic development levels in Chinese provinces, there exists a significant regional consistency in the impact of local government competition and environmental regulation intensity on regional innovation performance. Therefore, institutional arrangements and incentive constraints must be adopted to enhance regional innovation performance as well as to guide and foster the mechanism of green innovation competition among local governments. At the same time, considering the regional heterogeneity of local government competition and environmental regulation intensity affecting regional innovation performance, policy makers should avoid the "one-size-fits-all" strategy of institutional arrangements.
Rural areas play traditionally important role for our economy as well maintaining social stability. Most of the development is entirely dependent on natural resources in the area which is specialized in a limited number of industries such as agriculture, livestock, forestry, fisheries and local tourism. People that live in rural areas have fewer choices in the social and economic terms. They are facing many problems such as low income, unemployment, low quality of social services like education and healthcare. In addition, remoteness from major urban centres is also one of the problems which is implying the need for well-developed transport infrastructure to support economic development. As stated in the Eleventh Malaysia Plan, the Malaysian Government is committed to ensuring equitable opportunities for all segments of society.
The ecological footprint has currently become a highly popular environmental performance indicator. It provides the basis for setting goals, identifying options for action, and tracking progress toward stated goals. Because the examination of the existence of convergence is important for the climate change protection of the earth, the convergence of ecological footprint and its subcomponents are a major concern for scholars and policymakers. To this end, this study aims to investigate the stochastic convergence of ecological footprint and its subcomponents. We employ the recently developed Hepsag (2021) unit root test that allows nonlinearity and smooth structural change simultaneously to study stochastic convergence in per-capita ecological footprint over the period 1961-2018 for the most polluting countries. The results provide mixed evidence of the presence of stochastic convergence in conventional unit root tests such as ADF, KPSS and Fourier KPSS. According to the Hepsag (2021) unit root test results for all countries, built-up land footprint converges except Australia, Malaysia, Poland, and Turkey. Carbon footprint converges for Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, South Africa, Thailand, Turkey, the UK, and the USA. Cropland footprint converges for Australia, Canada, China, France, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland, South Africa, the UK, and Vietnam. Fishing grounds footprint converges in Brazil, France, Germany, Indonesia, Italy, Mexico, South Africa, and Vietnam. Forest product footprint converges in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, India, Korea, Mexico, Poland, Turkey, and Vietnam. Grazing land footprint converges in Canada, France, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Poland, South Africa, Thailand, and Vietnam. And lastly, the total ecological footprint converges in Canada, France, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, South Africa, the UK, and the USA.
This study aims to investigate the relationship between renewable energy and ecological footprint during the period of 1994-2018 from selected developing countries in Europe (Czechia, Croatia, Poland, Romania, Romania, and Turkey). In this context, the ecological footprint (EF), which has recently been the most widely used environmental indicator in the literature and is known as the most comprehensive because it includes many environmental factors, has been determined as the dependent variable. As independent variables, renewable energy consumption (REC), energy-related tax revenue (ETR), and energy productivity (EP) are included in the model. GDP and development of environment-related technologies (DET), which affect the ecological footprint in the model, are determined as control variables. As a result of the panel data analysis, according to the Durbin-Hausman cointegration test result, a long-term relationship between the variables was determined. According to the CCE estimator analysis, it can be said that there is a positive relationship between ETR and GDP variables and EF. For the AMG estimator analysis, it can be said that there is a positive relationship between GDP and EP variables and EF. Finally, according to the results of the Konya Causality test, a unidirectional causality relationship is detected from environmental technologies to the ecological footprint in Turkey, and a unidirectional causality relationship from the ecological footprint to GDP in Czechia, Romania, and Turkey. Furthermore, no causality relationship is detected between other variables. Based on the results, several policy implications are suggested.
Extensive theoretical and empirical evidence supports the crucial role of savings in driving a nation's economic growth and development. However, previous studies have not considered their potential environmental implications. This study aims to explore the influence of savings and remittances on the Developing-8 countries (D-8) from 1989 to 2019, using the panel autoregressive distributed (ARDL) model. The findings reveal that national savings and remittances, in the long run, help mitigate environmental degradation in the D-8 countries but energy use and population growth stimulate carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. In contrast, economic growth does not significantly affect these countries' environmental quality in the long run. However, none of the explanatory variables have any significant relationship with CO2 emissions in the short run. Therefore, policymakers in the D-8 countries are strongly encouraged to prioritize the enhancement of national savings across the three economic agents to maximize the positive effects of savings on environmental quality. Government savings can be increased by reducing deficits and borrowings, while corporate savings can be encouraged by implementing investment tax credits and promoting research and development. Additionally, governments can embark on public enlightenment campaigns on financial education and provide incentives to encourage household savings.
Addressing global environmental concerns requires the widespread adoption of renewable energy sources. More research is needed to examine the relationships between renewable energy (RE) and globalization, economic growth, and environmental quality in Indonesia. Therefore, we examined how renewable energy usage in Indonesia has changed due to the dynamic effects of globalization, financial development, and environmental quality. Time-series data were analyzed using an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model to test for cointegration and long-run/short-run dynamics between 1990 and 2020. In addition to ARDL bounds testing, we used the Johansen and Engle-Granger cointegration methods for confirmation. Globalization, financial progress, human capital, greenhouse gas emissions, and economic expansion have favorable long- and short-term effects on renewable energy sources. Globalization has enabled Indonesia to expand trade, FDI, and financial investment. It has also increased energy-efficient technology use due to environmental policies. The computed results are robust enough to substitute estimators, such as dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS), fully modified least squares (FMOLS), and canonical cointegrating regression (CCR). We recommend the implementation of policies that support financial and environmental development by utilizing renewable resources and increasing investments in renewable energy ventures.
Recent empirical research has found that there is an inverted U-shaped or Kuznets relationship between income and motor vehicle crash (MVC) deaths, such that MVC deaths increase as national income increases and decrease after reaching a critical level. Corruption has been identified as one of the underlying factors that could affect this relationship, primarily by undermining institutional development and effective enforcement schemes. The total effect of corruption can be decomposed into two components, a direct and an indirect effect. The direct effect measures the immediate impact of corruption on MVC deaths by undermining effective enforcement and regulations, while the indirect effect captures the impact of corruption on hindering increases in per capita income and the consequent impact of reduced income on MVC deaths. By influencing economic growth, corruption can lead to an increase or decrease in MVC deaths depending on the income level. Using data from 60 countries between 1982 and 2003, these effects are estimated using linear panel and fixed effects negative binomial models. The estimation results suggest that corruption has different direct effects for less developed and highly developed countries. It has a negative (decreasing) effect on MVC deaths for less developed countries and a positive (increasing) effect on MVC deaths for highly developed countries. For highly developed countries, the total effect is positive at lower per capita income levels, but decreases with per capita income and becomes negative at per capita income levels of about US$ 38,248. For less developed countries, the total effect is negative within the sample range and decreases with increased per capita income. In summary, the results of this study suggest that reduction of corruption is likely a necessary condition to effectively tackle road safety problems.