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This article examines the association between institutional quality, natural resources and multidimensional well-being in Saudi Arabia from 1990 to 2021, filling a notable gap in the existing literature on the linkage between human well-being and natural resources in a country with significant global energy influence. By integrating Sen's capabilities approach and constructing comprehensive indices of human well-being, including quality of life (QL) and standard of living (SL), this study specifically investigates the direct effects of natural resources wealth on these two indices and emphasizes the role of institutional quality as a transmission channel. The results show that natural resources, particularly total natural resource rents and oil rents, have positive direct effects on QL and SL, suggesting that effective resource management can enhance human well-being and economic prosperity. Furthermore, institutional quality plays a key role in shaping this relationship, with factors such as institutional quality index, government stability, and law and order having net positive effects on QL and SL. The study also identifies critical thresholds for controlling corruption, beyond which the positive effects of natural resource rents on QL and SL become more pronounced. These results highlight the importance of accountable and strong institutions to ensure equitable distribution of benefits from natural resources for human well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main goal of this investigation is to apply a comparative analysis to look at the influence of green energy and environmental innovation on four environmental indicators. This investigation is based on Saudi Arabia's economy with data spanning from 1990 to 2018. In this study, several econometric approaches were applied, including the unit root test, the cointegration test of Johansen (1988), and the DOLS (Dynamic OLS) estimation methodology. The empirical outcomes demonstrate that (i) the Environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) assumption in Saudi Arabia is not validated; (ii) the unconditional effects of the indicator of economic growth contribute to environmental degradation in all estimated models; (iii) the indicators of green energy use and environmental innovation contribute to environmental improvement but the magnitude of their effects is extremely slight; and (iiii) the net effect of both joint impacts (i.e., the interaction between green energy usage and economic growth as well as between environmental innovation and economic growth) for each estimated model yields a positive sign which implies that the green energy industry is in its immature stage in Saudi Arabia and innovations in green technology require a high status of scientific research to have a major contribution to environmental improvement. In light of obtained results, policy implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent literature on the health impacts of CO2 emissions suggests a variety of factors that may establish a more robust link. However, no previous study has explored the role of research and development (R&D) in explaining the nexus between CO2 emissions and health outcomes. Using data for Saudi Arabia over the period 2000–2018, this paper investigates the ability of R&D (expenditures and environmentally related R&D) to reduce the incidence of emissions on population health outcomes, particularly infant mortality and life expectancy. We find (i) negative impacts of CO2 emissions on health outcomes; (ii) R&D expenditures have a weak positive impact on health outcomes; (iii) additionally to their direct effects on health outcomes, R&D expenditures remarkably enhanced health outcomes through reducing per capita CO2 emissions; (iv) R&D expenditures interact with CO2 from electricity and heat production and from electricity and heat production to negatively influence health outcomes. Similarly, environmentally related R&D, measured by patents environmental-related technologies, interacts with per capita CO2 emissions to negatively influence health outcomes. To address these negative impacts, we calculated the corresponding R&D thresholds. Policymakers in Saudi Arabia are therefore called to give more and more incentives for R&D to reduce emissions and then improve population health outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Middle East and North African (MENA) economies experienced substantial economic fluctuations due to variations in carbon emissions and energy use. For this purpose, the present study examines the factors influencing carbon emissions in MENA economies, particularly economic growth and energy use. To this end, this study disaggregates economic growth into three sectors (agriculture, industry, and services) and energy use into renewable and non-renewable, and examines their environmental impacts by including the roles of urbanization and trade openness in the environment Kuznets curve (EKC) framework. This study uses panel data from 16 MENA countries over the period 1990–2018 to estimate the short-run and long-run coefficients and the Granger causality between the variables. The empirical results using the Mean Augmented Group (AMG) and the Common Correlated Effects Mean Group (CCE-MG) revealed that (i) the signs of GDP per capita and its squared scores validate the EKC hypothesis only at the aggregate level; (ii) the coefficients of sectoral GDP show that the industry and services sectors have the highest contributions to carbon emissions in the MENA region; (iii) non-renewable energy increases emissions, whereas renewable energy lessens them. The outcomes of the Granger causality confirm (i) a bidirectional relationship between emissions and per capita GDP as well as sectoral GDP, between CO2 emissions and renewable energy, and between per capita GDP and renewable and non-renewable energy however; (ii) a unidirectional causal impact running from non-renewable energy to CO2 emissions is found in the short term. The study calls for effective policies to focus on curbing emissions in secondary and tertiary economic sectors by growing the part of renewable energy in the total energy mix. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a new three-step approach to build an Optimal Production Plan for insurance companies. Two techniques are used compared to the existing studies: Lagrangian function and Directional Output Distance Function. As a first step, we estimated the production frontier parameters under which the insurance industry works. The second step consists of applying the Lagrangian function to specify the Optimal Production Plan for each insurance company. These optimal levels are used, in a third step, to construct efficiency scores for the profit and these production factors. We applied this approach on a 250 European Non-Life Insurance Companies (ENLIC) sample in 2008-2014. Our findings show that ENLIC should change their production plans to attain a higher level of Profit Efficiency. Otherwise, owners of ENLIC will contemplate re-investing in some other profitable industries, which preserve the minimum required ROE. Managerial implications and policy are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While global warming and climate change associated with increasing carbon dioxide are widely seen to be one of the most serious worldwide dangers to population health, little is known regarding "how" country alters the linkage between increasing CO2 emissions and population health outcomes. Current literature on the health effects of CO2 emissions recommends various factors that may establish a more robust link, including health expenditure and research and development. Therefore, the purpose of this inquiry is to examine the effectiveness of health expenditure and R&D in improving health outcomes through reducing CO2 emissions. Using data for Saudi Arabia over the period 2000–2018, the dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS) technique shows that (i) health and R&D expenditures decrease infant mortality and increase life expectancy; (ii) health and R&D expenditures reduce CO2 emissions in all the estimated models; (iii) health and R&D expenditures can improve health outcomes through reducing CO2 emissions; and (iv) health and R&D expenditures have both direct and indirect effect on health outcomes. Policy implications and limitations are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to examine the impacts of renewable and non-renewable energy on carbon dioxide emissions for 14 Middle East and North Africa economies using fully modified least-squares and vector error correction model techniques. Different sectoral outputs (agricultural, industry, and services) are considered in the analysis to find the influence of each sector on carbon emissions and to validate the environmental Kuznets curve model at both aggregate and disaggregate levels. The fully modified least-squares estimates show that renewable energy enhances environmental quality, whereas non-renewable energy deteriorates it. We also find that the industry sector has the highest contribution to environmental degradation. The results of the vector error correction model technique show a two-way linkage between CO2 emissions and renewable energy and between CO2 emissions and non-renewable energy in both short and long runs. At the sectoral level, we also find a two-way linkage between agricultural value added and CO2 emissions, a unidirectional relationship running from emissions to industry value added, and a unidirectional linkage running from services value added to CO2 emissions in both short and long runs. Therefore, governments must focus their actions on environmental policies of a green and inclusive economy that combine tools of environmental economics with those of the ecological economy. This can be considered a call for policymakers to take relevant and quick policies and actions towards low-carbon energy to reach these dual objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This inquiry contributes to the previous literature by analyzing the empirical linkage between the development of the financial sector and carbon emissions in the presence of good governance. Specifically, we examine the ability of good governance in moderating the negative effect of financial development on environmental quality in Saudi Arabia over the period 1996–2016. Different indicators of financial development and governance quality are included in the analysis. Using the Dynamic Ordinary Least Squares (DOLS) estimator, we find (i) the exostence of unconditional effects of the three indicators of financial sector development on increasing carbon emissions in most models; (ii) the indicators of governance quality increase carbon emissions in most models; (iii) the net effects on CO2 emissions are negative from the complementarity between the indicators of financial sector development and political and institutional governance, meaning that the development of financial sector reduces carbon emissions if it is accompanied by good institutional and political governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the links between FDI inflows, environmental quality, human capital, and economic growth in the Mediterranean region for the period of 1990–2013. Using both dynamic OLS and fully modified OLS methods, we find that (i) there is bidirectional causality between economic growth, FDI inflows, CO2 emissions, and human capital for all the considered panels, except in the Euro and Asian Mediterranean countries panel there is a unidirectional causality from FDI inflows to human capital as well as from human capital to FDI inflows; (ii) with the exception of the African Mediterranean countries panel, there is unidirectional causality running from GDP to FDI inflows as well as from GDP to human capital, from FDI to human capital, and from human capital to CO2 emissions. These empirical insights are of particular interest to policymakers to build sound policies to promote economic growth and improving environmental quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainability has become an important and widely applied concept in the environmental economics literature. Despite the numerous studies employing an environmental Kuznets curve (EKC), this model has been critiqued for its incompleteness. This article builds a modified EKC model to examine the contribution of financial development for achieving sustainable development in the case of 14 selected Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries. Using the Augmented Mean Group (AMG) and Common Correlated Effects Mean Group (CCEMG) estimators, our empirical results show that the EKC hypothesis is valid for per capita CO2 emissions and ecological footprint. The results provide evidence also of the presence of linear and non-linear relationships between financial development and non-sustainability and indicate that financial development is likely to have a small long-term impact on sustainable development. This suggests that current efforts aimed at protecting the environment and achieving sustainability will be ineffective given the extent of the problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of foreign capital (foreign direct investment and foreign aid) on poverty reduction and food security in the case of 50 developing countries over the 1995–2015 period. Four types of foreign aids are included in the analysis, namely: social-infrastructure-aid (SIA), investment aid (IA), non-investment-aid (NIA), and agriculture-forestry-fishing-aid (AFFA). The following findings are obtained through the TOBIT estimations: (i) FDI has a positive impact on food security and poverty reduction, (ii) SIA and NIA have positive impacts on poverty reduction; however, the impacts of IA and AFFA on poverty reduction is insignificant, (iii) SIA, IA, and AFFA positively contribute to food security, and (iv) the impacts of FDI and foreign aids on food security and poverty reduction increases when they are working together, i.e., a great collaboration between FDI and aids will be more effective in reducing poverty and assuring food security in developing countries. This complementarity is also confirmed using the system Generalized Method of Moments method. Policy implications and future research directions are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the high flow of foreign assistance and foreign direct investment (FDI) to developing countries, the potential of agricultural production remains low and stagnant. Accordingly, it is interesting to know how each type of foreign capital (FDI and foreign aid) affects the agricultural output? And what are the most effective forms of aid that increase agricultural production? The main objective of this study is to give answers to these equations using data for 50 developing countries over the 1995–2015 period. Our results indicate, first, that the effect of FDI only (without foreign aid) has a positive and significant effect on agricultural production. Second, we found that the four forms of foreign aids [notably social-infrastructure-aid (SIA), investment aid, non-investment-aid, agriculture–forestry–fishing-aid (AFFA)] have positive and significant effects on agricultural production. Finally, when we introduced both variables in the model, we found that FDI and two types of foreign aids (SIA and AFFA) have positive and significant effects on agricultural production. In conclusion, the synergies inherent between FDI, SIA, AFFA, increase twice the agricultural production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the four-way interrelationship between renewable energy, environment, foreign trade and growth using simultaneous-equation panel data models for 24 middle- and high-income countries over the period 1990-2011. Our findings show that, for the high-income countries, there is a bidirectional causality between renewable energy and growth, between CO $$_{2}$$ emissions and economic growth, between foreign trade and growth and between renewable energy and CO $$_{2}$$ emissions. However, there is a unidirectional causality between foreign trade and renewable energy and between emissions and trade. In the case of middle-income countries, there is also a bidirectional causality between renewable energy and growth, between CO $$_{2}$$ emissions and growth, between trade and growth, between trade and renewable energy and between CO $$_{2}$$ emissions and trade. On the other hand, there is a unidirectional causality, running from renewable energy to CO $$_{2}$$ emissions. Understanding these controversial scenarios is prerequisite to reaching an international agreement on climate change in order to build sound economic policies and improving the environmental quality to sustain economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tries to examine the interrelationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows and the economic growth for three African economies, namely, Tunisia, Morocco, and Egypt during 1985-2011. Our analysis, which is based on a simultaneous equations model, reveals that in overall terms a mutually promoting two-way linkage between FDI and economic growth exists in these countries. Using the generalized method of moments (GMM), we find that the two-way linkage between FDI inflows and economic growth has been verified in all three economies, i.e., high level of foreign direct investment inflows had accelerated economic growth and high economic growth in these economies does send positive signals to prospective foreign investors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to develop a mediational model of small business growth. It evaluates the links between human, social and financial capital of entrepreneurs, innovation and firm growth. Our goal through this model is to demonstrate that it is through the process of innovation these capitals are converted into growth. Based on an analysis of data from 228 Tunisian micro-enterprises, we concluded the mediation possibility of innovation on small business growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water pricing reform is crucial because it must increase consumers’ well-being and enhance the incentive role of tariff. This paper proposes a scenario-based modeling approach to simulate the impact of water pricing reform and water supply restriction policy on consumers’ welfare. To do so, we estimated the Algerian households’ water demand function using an original survey. The estimation results are used to simulate seven scenarios and calculate the variation in consumers’ welfare. We show that reforming water pricing policy will lead to a significant reduction in consumers’ welfare (i.e., −2.4% of household net income per month). Furthermore, a restriction of daily water supply hours results in a welfare loss equivalent to a water price increase by 10%. However, by increasing the second tariff block to production cost (i.e., 28.45 DZD/m3), welfare loss, in terms of net income, is evaluated at only 52 Algerian dinars, which is the lowest loss compared the other scenarios. The paper calls for the adoption of the policy option that causes the lowest losses in term of consumers’ welfare. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]