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The paper examines whether a long-run relationship between financial development and economic growth exists employing panel integration and cointegration techniques for a dynamic heterogeneous panel of 15 OECD and 50 non-OECD countries over the period 1975–2000. Three different measures of financial deepening are used to capture the variety of different channels through which financial development can affect growth. Our findings support the existence of a single long-run equilibrium relation between financial deepening, economic growth and a set of control variables. Further, the evidence points to a bi-directional causality between financial deepening and growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing study argues that labour market flexibility accompanied by trade liberalisation helped in building complementary relationship between formal and informal sectors in India. However, no direct relation is established between the labour market flexibility and trade liberalisation with respect to inter- and intra-sectoral movement of labour. The present study enquires whether the extent of labour mobility between and within formal–informal sectors affects the formal–informal growth linkages due to the tariff cut on traded goods, as a part of trade liberalisation in India. The findings based on static CGE analysis indicate that in absence of labour market segmentation (i.e. in absence of both wage rigidity and skill specificity) with full mobility of labour, formal sector growth is higher vis-à-vis the growth of those activities under segmented labour market with full mobility of labour. Amongst growing informal sector activities, output growth is lower in absence of segmented labour market with full mobility of labour. Finally, restricted labour mobility leads to largest expansion of formal activities, but further exacerbates the growth of informal activities. The study reveals that improvement in functional income distribution is mixed across households, depending on the degree of labour mobility, which implies labour market adjustment is costly due to structural reforms, that pitches for government intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) data, this study assesses the employment situation in Uttar Pradesh (UP), the most populous state in India, focusing on rural nonfarm employment. The primary objective of our study is to investigate the potential reasons for the movement of the labour force from farm to nonfarm activities over time in Uttar Pradesh. In UP, we observe that a higher proportion of workers are engaged in casual employment and employment growth stagnation in the rural manufacturing sector. We further observe that there is a declining proportion of people who are self-employed and regularly employed, and this situation has contributed to the casualisation of the rural workforce in UP. We also find that the average wages in agriculture are lower than those in non-agricultural activities. These observations point to the direction of distress in the agricultural sector, causing a shift in the workforce to a rural nonfarm sector. Casual employment in the rural nonfarm sector is considered to be low-paying employment compared to self-employment and regular employment outside agriculture, which are considered better-paying options. Hence, any movement of the workforce from agriculture to rural casual nonfarm employment is possibly driven by distress in the agricultural sector. Using a multinomial logit model, this study reveals that across all employment status categories, including agricultural labour, cultivators, nonfarm regular employment, nonfarm self-employment, and nonfarm casual employment, the likelihood of working in high-paying nonfarm regular and self-employment activities increases with better educational attainment, larger landholdings, and placement among the upper castes in social groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unbalanced development and growth among regions may cause the spread-backwash effects from developed-rich areas to the poor that commonly occur in the central city to its suburbs in the regional development context. Our study estimates the long-term effects of a small city, Yogyakarta, as a special region in Indonesia towards its periphery areas. The time-series econometric method is used based on Gross Regional Domestic Product (GRDP) and population data among five regions over the last thirty years instead of the cross section model. An alternative spatial combination among regions evaluated the regional development process. Development of the central city confidently has a long-run cointegration relationship with its suburbs. This study has indicated that Yogyakarta has spread-backwash effects towards its outskirt areas, either medium or low-level suburbs. Furthermore, a central city is no longer considered a single determinant in influencing the economy of other regions. The development of Sleman tends to be a new centre and shows that it produces a spillover effect to other areas; thus, it can be a potential trigger to improve linkages and economic performance of greater Yogyakarta. Yogyakarta City and parts of Sleman and Bantul areas are directly adjacent to the Yogyakarta City formed Yogyakarta urbanised area (YUA) as an urban agglomeration in Yogyakarta. The emergence of the YUA in greater Yogyakarta urgently promotes a sustainable collaboration and spatial interaction across territorial administration to manage economic and environmental interest conflict towards sustainable development among municipalities/cities level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The majority of empirical literature acknowledges that information and communication technology (ICT) has a favourable effect on economic growth/development. Different studies, however, contend that this impact is modest or perhaps null, yielding inconsistent findings. In view of this complication, we therefore conducted a study with the aim to analyse the ICT diffusion-economic growth-development nexus for 73 countries over the period 2000–2018. The panel data was divided into three regions, namely sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), and Latin America and the Caribbean (LAAC). For the analysis, the newly developed panel vector autoregression (PVAR) in the generalised method of moments (GMM) estimation approach was applied. Our findings suggest a long-run equilibrium relationship between the three variables. The findings differ from the causality results for the overall panel and each of the regions differs. The inconsistency in the causality results across the regions suggests that the level of ICT diffusion is still underdeveloped. The PVAR-GMM results reveal that (i) ICT diffusion is a significant and positive predictor of growth across the regions, with a greater effect reported in MENA; (ii) ICT diffusion is a significant and positive predictor of development across the regions with a lesser effect noticed in MENA. The study's implication for academia and practice is that (i) it provides important information on the ICT diffusion-economic growth-development nexus within the context of the econometric approaches used, and (ii) policymakers and managers of telecom businesses should accommodate sufficient support to further establish the ICT infrastructures and expand its penetration for all round sustainable and inclusive growth and development purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the relationship between debt, foreign aid, and economic growth in three Pacific Island economies; namely Fiji, Papua New Guinea (PNG), and the Solomon Islands. Small and vulnerable island economies are dependent on foreign aid and debt for economic development. However, empirical studies on how debt and aid impact economic growth in small and fragile island economies are scarce, and this study aims to fill this gap. We use the ARDL approach and estimate the debt-growth and aid-growth relationship for each of the three economies. Our results indicate that debt reduces economic growth in both the short-run and the long-run in all three economies. Moreover, while all the three economies are also heavily dependent on foreign aid, we do not find any growth enhancing effect of aid. The findings suggest that although government borrowing and foreign aid are necessary for small island states given their lack of domestic capital, it is important that these resources be utilized efficiently for growth benefits to be realized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The asset side of Islamic banks has two different portfolios running side by side, namely risk-sharing (PLS) and non-risk sharing (non-PLS) financing. The segregation of PLS and non-PLS financing has gathered some attention recently owning to its relative importance for sustainable economic output. This study attempts to analyze the impact of decomposed Islamic financing modes (PLS and non-PLS) with a particular focus on their impact on real economic activity. In addition, we moderated the relationship with asset quality of aggregate Islamic banking sector. Quarterly data from 2014 to 2021 have been sourced from datasets of the Islamic financial service board (IFSB), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank, and Central banks' data streams. Eleven countries have been selected based on the highest local and global share in global Islamic financial assets. Panel data regression model has been used in this study. The findings indicate that PLS financing is a weaker driver to channelize funds. However, industrial production output is significantly affected by non-PLS financing. Further the results suggest, Islamic finance–output nexus found to have a stronger relationship in the presence of higher asset quality of Islamic banks. The results show that firms mostly rely on non-PLS financing, due to reduced asymmetry and higher transparency in non-PLS contracts compared to PLS modes. The results have implications for governing bodies of Islamic financial system in boosting risk-sharing contracts and firms to limit agency conflicts arising from fluctuating cost of financing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper jointly evaluates the greenhouse gas emissions and economic impacts from producing biofuels in Tanzania. Sequentially-linked models capture natural resource constraints; emissions from land use change; economywide growth linkages; and household poverty. Results indicate that there are economic incentives to convert unused lands to sugarcane-ethanol production, but only grasslands (not forests) have a reasonable carbon payback period. There are also strong socioeconomic reasons to involve smallholders in feedstock production in order to reduce rural poverty, especially since our results indicate that biofuels have little effect on food production. Yet smallholders require more land than large-scale plantations and so face more binding natural resource and emissions constraints. Overall, environmental constraints alter the socioeconomically optimal biofuel strategy for Tanzania by limiting potential poverty reduction. Unlike previous studies, our integrated assessment suggests that a mixed farming system with greater emphasis on large-scale plantations is more appropriate for producing sugarcane-ethanol in Tanzania. [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]

This paper investigates the nexus between financial inclusion and economic growth in Tunisia. It uses three dimensions of financial inclusion; the first is the access to financial services, the second is the availability of financial services, and the third is the usage of the financial services, while GDP per capita is used as a proxy for economic growth. The paper finds a low level of financial inclusion index in Tunisia by using the autoregressive distributed lag model (ARDL) for cointegration. The paper finds a negative relationship between the majority of financial inclusion indicators and economic growth during the period 2005–2017. This fact emphasizes that more efforts need to be done to enhance and extend financial inclusion in Tunisia through financial literacy, costumers protection, providing financial services to rural areas, and engagement of low-income people in formal financial services, especially via the informal sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing literature on optimizing inventory levels in pharmaceutical supply chains has focused on a limited set of drivers. However, the global supply chain disruptions produced by the Covid-19 pandemic demonstrated the need for a more nuanced picture of the inventory management drivers in this sector to identify profitable inventory configurations while fulfilling demands and safety margins. To address this gap in the literature, this paper identifies key drivers impacting inventory levels and develops a framework for assessing inventory configurations in pharmaceutical supply chains. The framework is tested using a single case study approach. The case study showed that while external and downstream supply chain factors were recognized as being critical to pursuing inventory reduction initiatives, internal factors prevailed when making inventory management decisions. The framework developed in this paper may assist practitioners in identifying the most important factors impacting inventory levels within a specific pharmaceutical supply chain configuration and is in use in the industry today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Europe, there has been a significant shift in the movement of people and things. Nonetheless, despite the fact that transportation is an important component of the supply chain, its environmental consequences pose a severe threat to the ecosystem as a whole. As a result, we intend to explore the relationship between transportation, economy, and CO2 emissions. We used the Static method with Pooled OLS, then tested the Granger causality to validate the use of dynamic approach via the GMM system. The major findings revealed that GDP and trade openness had a considerable impact on CO2 emissions. Although the three modes of transportation have different effects on CO2 emissions, road density has a positive and considerable impact on CO2 emissions. The railway network is inversely connected to CO2 emissions. While the quantity of flight passengers has no substantial effect on emissions. In terms of the impulse response function, there is an initial shock in period 2 for the response of air passengers carried to CO2 emissions, followed by convergence back to zero in period 6, whereas road density has a slight decrease in period 2 with a post shock peak in period 4, followed by convergence back to zero in period 5. The variance decomposition results reveal a little increase until the fifth period for road density, air passengers, and trade openness with coefficients equal to 0.0893, 0.636, and 1.573, respectively, after which these three variables offer decreasing coefficients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigates the sectoral version of Okun's law for oil-rich countries from 2000 to 2019. Using a panel ARDL estimation, namely the CS-ARDL and PMG methods, this study confirms the negative association between the sectoral level of output growth and the unemployment rate. Our findings indicate that the unemployment rate is affected more by the output growth of the services sector than by that of the manufacturing and agriculture sectors. Moreover, we show that the relatively higher proportion of the services sector to the total output growth seems to explain these results. Furthermore, we revealed that oil rents play a significant role in the sectoral Okun's coefficient difference. Finally, this study suggests that the importance of the manufacturing and agriculture sectors should be a crucial factor to be considered in the economic policy agenda in resource-rich countries. Hence, the significant implications for these countries' policymakers are to gain additional benefits from oil sector output, support and strengthen their manufacturing and agriculture sectors, achieve sustainable economic growth, and minimize the adverse effects of oil dependence on the economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study endeavors to investigate the environmental cost of FDI inflows in the Sub-Saharan African (SSA) region over the period of 2006 to 2020. There are two opposing theories about how FDI impacts the environment, namely, the pollution halo hypothesis (PHH) and the pollution haven hypothesis (PH). Given the SSA region's poor environmental performance and potential spatial spillover effects on neighboring nations, the study underlines the necessity to look into the pollution hypotheses in the region. The examination is carried out through non-spatial and spatial panel data econometric approaches. The empirical findings provide evidence that an increase in FDI inflow by 1% in SSA is positively associated with increasing levels of CO2 emissions by 0.03% on average, thus validating the notion of a pollution haven in the region. Furthermore, the study reveals that the environmental spillovers of CO2 emissions are not confined to the host country alone, but also extend to neighboring nations. Other key determinants of CO2 emissions, including GDP, population, and urbanization, were also found to be positively linked to CO2 emissions, whereas the use of renewable energy resources was found to have a mitigating effect. The empirical findings offer valuable insights for policymakers and stakeholders in the SSA region. These insights highlight the importance of the adoption of renewable energy sources and enacting regulatory measures to monitor the environmental cost of FDI, with the aim of mitigating the deleterious consequences of CO2 emissions, not only in the host nation but also in the neighboring nations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

All around the world, but particularly in developing nations, carbon dioxide emissions are on the rise, and climate change and global warming are brought on by an increase in CO2 emissions. This article provides an overview of the technological effect on energy consumption in the residential, transport, and industrial sector and its ultimate effect on the environment. Using the STIRPAT-Kaya-EKC model for the years 1990 to 2020, this study looked at the threshold impact of technological advancements on the link between disaggregated energy use and CO2 emissions for a panel of 10 Asian countries using the panel threshold regression. Findings demonstrate that the EKC phenomenon is present in the chosen Asian region. Findings also suggest that technology has a threshold influence on the relationship between energy use and carbon emissions; however, this effect varies across sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Saudi Arabia is the leading economy in the Arabian Gulf region; it accounts for a significant amount of remittance outflow (RMO) to the rest of the world. The objective of the study is to investigate the impact of remittance outflow on the economic growth (EG) of Saudi Arabia by utilizing time-series data from 1985 to 2019 controlling trade, labor force, human capital, and physical capital. It employs the non-linear autoregressive distributive lag (NARDL) model, cointegrating regressions, and vector error correction (VEC) Granger causality check to accomplish the study. The outcomes of the NARDL exercise confirm a cointegrating association among variables and reveal that RMO has mixed but negative resultant impacts on the EG in the short run, while in the long run, EC growth is augmented if remittance outflows decline. Both trade and labor force positively contribute to EG, while neither human nor physical capital significantly influences the latter. The cointegrating regression outcomes precisely authenticate the NARDL findings and acknowledge their robustness. Moreover, the VEC Granger causality test also supports the NARDL outcomes. The outcome suggests that the policymakers may allure the expatriates through pragmatic labor laws, policies, and smart incentives to direct their savings to domestic consumption and investments. Moreover, the quality of education in general and tertiary education, in particular, needs to be upgraded in the real sense to develop the practical skills and efficiency of the Saudi labor force so that they can replace the expatriates. This will eventually reduce outbound remittances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effects of carbon emissions, renewable energy consumption, FDI, and exports on economic growth in BRICS countries from 2000 to 2018. The study uses other variables such as interest rates, labor force, trade openness, and gross domestic savings to determine the long-run relationship among variables. We employ several econometric techniques, such as ARDL, pool mean group (PMG), mean group (MG), and the Dumitrescu Hurlin panel causality tests, to draw empirical inferences. The estimation of the PMG model indicates that carbon emissions, renewable energy consumption, exports, FDI, and savings have a significant positive long-run impact on economic growth, while interest rates and trade openness affect economic growth negatively. FMOLS and DOLS results also confirm the robustness of PMG long-run results. Moreover, the Dumitrescu Hurlin panel causality results indicate a bi-directional causal relationship between carbon emissions and economic growth and between economic growth and foreign direct investment, also one-way causality from exports and labor force to economic growth. It implies that an increase in carbon emissions and FDI leads to an increase in economic growth, also increase in economic growth, the CO2 emissions and FDI increase in BRICS economies. Finally, the current study recommends a vital policy that the primary focus should target toward promoting renewable energy consumption, FDI, exports, and savings to boost economic growth in BRICS countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The global warming issue arises from climate change, which draws scientists' attention toward cleaner energy sources. Among clean sources, renewables and nuclear energy are getting immense attention among policymakers. However, the significance of nuclear energy in reducing CO2 emissions has remained ambiguous, necessitating further research. Therefore, the present study draws impetuous attention to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals-7 (affordable clean energy) & 13 (climate change mitigation) by looking at the relationship between energy mix (fossil fuels, renewables, and nuclear), economic growth, technological innovation, and CO2 emissions in Mexico from 1980 to 2019 using the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model. In addition, to assess the direction of causality, this study applied wavelet techniques and spectral causality. The findings affirm that renewable and nuclear energy use and technological innovation tend to curb CO2 emissions, whereas fossil fuel consumption and economic expansion trigger CO2 emissions. The study lends support to the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) phenomenon in Mexico. The FMOLS and DOLS tests show that our long-run estimates are reliable. In different time scales, the wavelet coherence result is also consistent. Finally, the results of the spectral causality approach demonstrate a significant causal association between the variables tested at various frequencies. As a result, in order to achieve SDGs 7 and 13 and support an environmentally friendly ecosystem, Mexico's energy mix must be changed to renewables and nuclear. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates empirically changes in domestic summer tourism demand following the Covid-19 pandemic in 305 regions across six European countries (Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Spain and Sweden) based on official data. Five different groups of NUTS 3 regions are identified in accordance with a typology suggested by the OECD where density and connectivity are aspects of importance. Dynamic panel data estimations show that large metropolitan regions experience strong decreases in demand (approximately 30 per cent) both in July and August 2020. There are, however, clear differences between the Northern and Southern European countries. In the North, the remote regions encounter an increased demand that is partially offsetting losses in the large metropolitan regions. This pattern cannot be found in the South. The decline in domestic tourism flows to the major metropolitan areas is also more pronounced in the South of Europe, approximately 50 per cent per summer month compared with 20 per cent (July 2020) and stagnation (August 2020) in the North regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context and Purpose: In a context of recent introduction of Rhipicephalus (Boophilus) microplus tick species in West Africa, the purpose of the authors is to estimate incidence density of cattle babesiosis either caused by Babesia bigemina or Babesia bovis, and cattle anaplasmosis. Incidence density represents how quickly a disease or a condition is occurring amongst a group of individuals at risk. Methods: The longitudinal and prospective study design took place in south, centre, east, west and north of Côte d'Ivoire. Cattle have been followed for 12 months. At the end of each month, each animal has been RT-PCR tested for new infection by Babesia bovis, Babesia bigemina, and PCR–RFLP tested for new infection by Anaplasma marginale. Results: Findings show for the study area that incidence densities of Babesia bovis, Babesia bigemina and Anaplasma marginale infections in Côte d'Ivoire are, respectively, 15.3 new infections [95% CI 13.1–17.88] per 100 cattle, 32.2 new infections [95% CI 28.5–36.3] per 100 cattle, and 25.9 new infections [95% CI 22.5–29.6] per 100 cattle. Conclusion: Finally, there is increasing of infection incidence density following the region distance from the coast or elevation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ghana shows remarkable differences in employment and welfare between the southern and northern regions. The promotion of policy focus on the development of the northern regions requires the elaboration of specific databases describing the regional economies. Hence, this work outlines the construction of a Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) for Ghana for the year 2015 with a high disaggregation of sectors, household income groups and education levels across 10 administrative regions. Linear multisectoral models have been applied to this SAM to estimate socio-economic impacts of potential final demand policies down to a regional level in the Ghanaian economy. Further on, the structural path analysis is used to investigate the role played by different agriculture commodities in transmitting income to different types of households. The results allow for an identification of the most suitable sectors to be promoted due to their ability to generate the highest increases in output, employment and value added in the rest of the economy, as well as those with a significant impact on household income generation. As a result, the primary sector will play a key role in the economic and employment growth of the country. Notably, sorghum and millet, pulses, tobacco, cotton and fibres can be considered favourable crops for development in the Northern region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study empirically examines the association between electricity demand and economic growth in China in a time–frequency framework. Wavelet coherence analysis and phase difference methods are applied to find the co-movement and causality between variables using monthly data for 1999 to 2017 time period. The results of the wavelet power spectrum show that both series have high fluctuations at high frequencies. The findings of wavelet coherence reveal co-movements between electricity demand and economic growth at different frequency levels. However, this association is stronger at low-frequency levels. Evidence from the phase difference indicates that electricity is causing economic growth with a positive sign. The results of wavelet-based correlation also show a high correlation between these two variables. For robustness analysis, linear and nonlinear causality tests are applied to find causality between variables over time. Both linear and nonlinear causality tests reveal bidirectional causality between variables. It corroborates the result of wavelet causality that both variables cause each other at different frequency levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to urbanization and the need for people to go from one country to another either for commercial purpose or tourism, it is therefore important to determine the extent to which tourism contributes to growth. This article aims to investigate the tourism-led growth hypothesis in a sample of 34 European countries utilizing the yearly data from 1995 to 2015. The research work makes use of 8 tourism indicators, which cover different dimensions of tourism sector development such as foreign visitors' spending, and international tourist arrival. For empirical analysis, the study accounts key determinants of growth such as capital, labor and energy (renewable and non-renewable) consumption. The results from common correlated effects (CCE) augmented mean group (AMG) and groped-mean estimators confirms that there is a positive relationship between tourism, labour, capital and GDP insinuating the presence of tourism-led growth hypothesis in the European countries. Also, findings from the FMOLS show that changes in the variables leads to a proportional change in GDP. Specifically, the evidence shows that the tourism indicators play an indispensable role in promoting economic development, along with energy consumption, capital, and labor. Sustainable Combating environmental issues associated with foreign arrivals, renewable energy consumption should be encouraged to reduce environmental externalities to ensure sustainable environments for businesses and tourists' arrivals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the role of the enforcement of property rights, human capital formation, and the efficiency of various components of state governments' developmental expenditure on states' economic growth and interstate income inequality. Together with private sector investment in rural areas, property rights enforcement, human capital, government expenditures on economic services, and health and education are found to have positive effects on states' growth. We also observe that the interstate difference in the provisioning of government economic services is the leading factor in contributing to interstate income divergence in India. These findings can serve as vital technical inputs for formulating economic policies to achieve faster economic growth and mitigate regional income inequality in transitioning developing economies like India and hold greater relevance for other developing economies on their way to experiencing similar social and economic transitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the role of financial inclusion on the environment-economic performance in the top five Asian emerging economies. The data used for empirical investigation covers the time period from 1995 to 2019. Financial inclusion is measured through bank branches, bank credit, and insurance premiums. To check long-run associations, the panel ARDL approach has been employed for empirical analysis. The empirical evidence confirms the significant associations between financial inclusion-GDP nexus and financial inclusion-CO2 nexus. The findings show that bank branches and bank credit have a significantly positive impact on economic growth and CO2 emissions in the long run. However, insurance premium has no impact on economic growth but it exerts a significant negative impact on carbon emissions in the long run. Furthermore, energy consumption is highly sensitive to economic growth and carbon emissions. The study delivers imperative points for pollution eradication and attaining sustained economic growth. There is a need for government-level efforts to align the targets of financial inclusion with economic growth and environmental policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ocean economy and marine tourism policies are global economic concerns being looked at from a deeply holistic viewpoint. For South Asian countries, the ocean economy and marine tourism have successive socio-economic importance. The quantification of the ocean economy and marine tourism also poses some major challenges, and these challenges pose limitations for policymaking by the government and other relevant agencies. The study has used the newly developed hidden panel cointegration test, and the nonlinear panel autoregressive distributed lag (NPARDL) model for a relationship between economic growth and tourism is assessed. This study offers consistent and reliable results of cointegration by incorporating the findings of four approaches to cointegration. The empirical results illustrate the asymmetric relationship between ocean and marine tourism and economic growth. The findings showed that 1% increase in long-term tourism economic growth is adjusted by 2.95% annually. This research paper aims to provide a policy related to South Asia's economic activities and ocean and marine tourism economic significance. Protecting local marine protected areas (MPAs) will improve the economic benefits of the ocean and the marine economy. The policy suggests that there should be a law ensuring that marine tourism is of high quality and environment friendly. This paper provides a guideline for further research with a strong emphasis on ocean- and marine-related economic development and tourism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the trade-led growth (TLG) hypothesis for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Using time-series annual data for the period 1985–2019, the ARDL approach and Toda-Yamamoto Granger causality test are applied to accomplish the study. The ARDL estimation reveals that trade openness positively causes economic growth in both the long and short run, and the TLG hypothesis is found valid for the Kingdom. The Toda-Yamamoto Granger causality test results have evidenced several unidirectional causalities. Of them, trade openness causes economic growth and supports the ARDL finding and hence the TLG hypothesis for the Kingdom. Moreover, trade openness causes gross fixed capital formation, and the labor force stimulates both economic growth and trade volume. The findings recommend that the Kingdom may increase its trade to reap further benefits and enhance its income growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the nonlinear ARDL approach is introduced in advanced econometric, some old relationships are getting new empirical attention. Therefore, we examine the asymmetric macroeconomic determinants of carbon dioxide (CO2) emission in China, covering the time from 1971 to 2019 and using a nonlinear ARDL model. The study results show that GDP and industrialization have an asymmetric effect on CO2 emission in long-run in direction and magnitude, while agriculturalization has also an asymmetric effect on environmental pollution in magnitude, but not in the direction. In short, GDP and industrialization have also asymmetric response on CO2 emissions in the short term only in magnitude, but agriculturalization has an asymmetric response in magnitude and direction in short-run. Therefore, this empirical research is more applicable for policymakers in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This empirical study investigates the dynamic effects of economic freedom on economic growth and air quality for Pakistan over the period 1990–2019. The ARDL results suggest that economic freedom and other variables do not have any visible impact on economic growth and pollution in the short-run. However, in the long-run, economic freedom significantly mitigates air pollution whereas inflation instability increases emissions. The NARDL results show that a partial sum of positive change in economic freedom is negatively linked with economic growth in the short term but has positive effect in the long term. However, the negative change in economic freedom has negative but insignificant impact on growth confirming asymmetric effects. The results for the pollution model show that a partial sum of positive change in economic freedom has positive impact on emissions both in the short and long-runs, whereas a negative change has no significant effect in the short-run and has negative impact in the long-run. Thus, economic freedom supports economic activities that, in turn, escalate emissions in the atmosphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the international interdependency of macroeconomic activities, this study attempts to examine three fundamental questions; (i) what is the time pattern of international interdependency?, (ii) what is the magnitude of international interdependency?, and (iii) which are the major channels through which international interdependency occur?. These questions are investigated among major economies viz. the US, Japan, Germany, China, India and Russia. Employing generalized impulse response of unrestricted VAR model, the Diebold and Yilmaz (Int J Forecast 28(1):57–66, 2012) spillover method and orthogonal impulse response of restricted VAR model, the study found that the global economies are highly interdependent. Therefore, we strongly argue that channels through which interdependency between countries occur are based on economic structure of respective economies. From the findings, it explicitly indicates that if there is rise or fall of macroeconomic activity in any specific economy, it may lead to rise or fall in economic activity of other individual economies. It shows a positive correlationship between the movement of economic actvities among the countries. Given the higher degree of international interdependency, it may sometimes lead to larger cost for the individual economies. Therefore, it suggests that the formulation and implementation of rigorous macroeconomic policies are the need of the hour for respective economies. Considering the gaps in the previous literature, this study tries to contribute to the literature by investigating cross-country time profile of interactions, magnitude of interactions and channels through which interactions occur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study empirically explores the long-run dynamic influence of output, tourism, energy use, trade, financial development, and urbanization on CO2 emissions in the framework of EKC for Asian economies for the time period 1995–2017. In this study, we tackle cross-sectional dependence problem and use CADF and CIPS unit root tests in contrast to conventional unit root tests. Moreover, we employ LM bootstrap panel co-integration test. The results of DOLS show that GDP and GDP squares have opposite signs which shows inverted u-shaped hypothesis between GDP growth and carbon emissions. We find an evidence of EKC proposition in case of Asian economies. Tourism has a vital role in increasing environment degradation of Asian economies as magnitude of coefficient is 0.132. Moreover, energy use, urbanization, trade, and financial development have direct and a profound impact on environmental degradation. The empirical results thus point to the fact that tourism, trade openness, and urbanization have contributed to the environmental degradation in the Asian region. Hence, the counties of the region should harness renewable energy sources along with environment-friendly technologies to support the tourism at a sustainable level that may be conducive to economic growth and environmental quality as well. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The status of pinnipeds on mid-Atlantic ridge islands is reviewed to detect trends that may relate to climate change. Small numbers of southern elephant seals Mirounga leonina breed on Gough Island (40°S, 10°W) and at Bouvetøya (54°24′S, 03°21′E) where numbers remained small over ~ 68 years. Vagrant southern elephant seals wandered farther north to tropical Saint Helena Island (15°57′S, 5°41′W) in historical times but have not been recorded there more recently. This suggests a contraction of their distributional range, as manifested in the decline in numbers to imminent extinction at Gough Island. At Gough Island and at Tristan da Cunha (37°05′S, 12°17′W), leopard seals Hydrurga leptonyx and Antarctic fur seals Arctocephalus gazella are occasional seasonal transients from Antarctic and sub-Antarctic islands and the circumpolar sea ice farther to the south. Large populations of Antarctic fur seals A. gazella and sub-Antarctic fur seals A. tropicalis breed at Bouvetøya and Gough Island, respectively. The current state of both populations is uncertain as other populations of conspecifics in the South Atlantic and South Indian oceans are in decline ostensibly contingent upon reduced food availability, likely precipitated by climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to investigate the asymmetric fiscal decentralization effect on economic growth and environmental quality by using Pakistan data from 1984 to 2018. Our findings demonstrate that expenditure decentralization has asymmetric effects on economic growth and CO2 emissions in short- and long-run in Pakistan. Therefore, positive and negative fluctuations in expenditure decentralization affect economic growth and CO2 emissions differently in Pakistan. The results of asymmetric ARDL suggested that negative shock of revenue decentralization is reduced the economic growth and CO2 emissions in the short and long-run, while positive shock of revenue decentralization is reduced the economic growth and CO2 emissions. Our asymmetric results are country-specific and more effective in policy analysis in Pakistan. The outcomes of this study may also help Pakistan's local governments and the central government in addressing the problem of economic growth and environmental pollution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, a village input–output table (VIOT) is built from household survey data from a rural village in a developing country to capture the interdependency between households through their transactions in 2016. This VIOT is a simple, but useful tool for understanding the economic transactions among villagers. The main findings of this work are that lower- and middle-income households mainly depend on commodities supplied by non-poor counterparts, especially by four higher-income households, who are not only producers, but also traders of commodities in the village and play key roles in the village economy, and that the IO interdependency among non-poor households is stronger than that among poor households. Additionally, this paper describes a first trial application of the VIOT method to develop economic policies with goals such as poverty reduction and trade expansion in the village. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data from China's Ministry of Civil Affairs show that more than 75% of the country's poor live in rural areas. Therefore, to achieve the goal of poverty alleviation by 2020, the problem of rural poverty requires urgent attention. Based on the entropy method, we herein assess the level of poverty vulnerability in each province in China to guide the direction of future poverty alleviation efforts. In addition, based on the logarithmic mean Divisia index method and the grey relational analysis method, we studied the effects and contributions of rural poverty incidence, rural agricultural outcomes per capita, the proportion of agricultural outcomes, gross domestic product per capita, and total population on rural poverty. We found that, when it comes to natural resources, human resources, physical assets, financial assets, and social resources, the most vulnerable areas are concentrated in western China. We suggest the government pay close attention to the interests of individuals in this region to balance economic development, distribute the benefits of economic development to the rural poor, and narrow the income gap between urban and rural areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The contemporary study takes under consideration some countries of Asia to find the co-integration and causal association between industrial growth and environmental degradation. To achieve this object, the data have been collected from 1986 to 2015. Study incorporates panel autoregressive distributed lag model and Pedroni co-integration method. All the variables are found to be stationary at first difference. In order to explore long-run relationship, we include the estimates of pool mean group. Findings demonstrate that industrialization, energy consumption and trade volume deteriorate the quality of environment in long-run. However, short-run results indicate unidirectional causality running from industry value added per capita to CO2 emission, while energy consumption exhibits bidirectional causality with CO2 emission. The study asserts that there is need of hour to formulate and execute efficient environmental-friendly policies, specifically in industrial sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper has the aim to treat the interaction between the pillars of the sustainable development issue. We also attempt to build an index which is used as a measure of sustainable development by including good governance as the fourth pillar of sustainable development. We use the simultaneous equations panel data models to check for the nexus between the four pillars of sustainable development for 26 African countries over a time span 1990–2013. In addition, we applied the principal component analysis to construct a sustainable development index. The main conclusion is the existence of feedback causality among the economic, social, ecological, and the institutional pillar. Our findings record the fact that these four pillars can be seen as interrelated rings that are all required to reach sustainability. Sustainable development is an open-ended phenomenon, and it continues to be the most controversial dilemma for the entire world, which Africa should beat the third-millennium challenge and join up the developed globe. This debate is the main goal for African governments and their highlights seem to be the legacy for the future generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, poverty and food deficiency are prevalent in the region where two-thirds of the population is resided according to World Bank estimates [Klytchnikova (2017). Counting calories: the data behind food insecurity and hunger. The World Bank Data Blog. Available at http://blogs.worldbank.org/opendata/counting-calories-data-behind-food-insecurity-and-hunger?CID=POV%5fTT%5fPoverty%5fEN%5fEXT]. This panel data study is set to analyze the effect of competitiveness, governance and globalization on poverty in case of 73 developing countries from 2005 to 2016. The indicators of governance are extracted from World Governance Indicators, and an overall index is constituted using factor analysis. This study has estimated eight models with different proxies of governance and one without governance. The results estimated using feasible generalized least squares approach which confirmed that all governance indicators have a negative impact on poverty. Similarly, globalization, competitiveness and development expenditures also assist in poverty alleviation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Belt and Road initiative has been proposed by China to initiate the cooperation among relevant countries in sector of energy and Trade. The study investigate highlighting the relationship between industrial value added per capita, transport freight and CO2 emission among the partner countries of Belt and Road initiatives by using panel of 33 economies from 1986-2017. Study includes panel autoregressive distributed lag model (ARDL) to estimate the long-run relationship among variables. Estimated results of pool mean group (PMG) indicates that increase in industrial value added per capita and transport freight deteriorates the quality of environment in long-run. However, short-run results of granger causality reveals positive and unidirectional causality running from industrial value added per capita to emission of CO2 while transport freight and CO2 emission shows bidirectional causality. The study emphasized to formulate environment friendly policies in industrial and transport sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last 3 decades, oil rent seeking has emerged to be a key driver of most economies around the globe. Prior to the oil boom, agriculture remain main stay of most economies especially developing economies. This present study seeks to revisit the contribution of both oil and agriculture sector in Nigeria by augmenting the neoclassical growth model by the inclusion of agriculture and oil rent as growth drivers. To do this, recent time series data from 1990 to 2017 is employed. This study adopts the use of contemporary econometrics test to investigate the theme holistically. First, stationarity test was conducted with a battery of both stationarity and unit root tests. Subsequently, Pesaran's auto regressive distributed lag bounds testing traces long-run equilibrium relationship between agriculture, oil rent, capital, labor and economic growth over the sampled period. Empirical piece of results validate the agriculture induced economic growth hypothesis, which aligns with the physiocracy school of thoughts ideology. This is against previous study; the resource curse hypothesis was not validated for this current study. Our study results show statistical significant relationship in both long- and short-run between oil rent and economic growth. These outcomes are quite revealing for decision makers and stakeholders since both sector contributes to economic growth. Based on these results, policy mix strategies were suggested in the course of the main text. Among such policies are reinforcing government and private sector participation in both sector given they show complementary role and not substitute to economic output. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Should job creation be targeted to big cities or to small towns, if the objective is to minimize national poverty? To answer this question, we develop an equilibrium model of migration from rural areas to two potential destinations, small town and big city. We develop sufficient statistics for policy decisions based on the parameters of the model. The empirical remit of the theoretical model is illustrated with long running panel data from Kagera, Tanzania. Further, we show that the structure of the sufficient statistics is maintained in the case where the model is generalized to introduce heterogeneous workers and jobs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the study, the nexus among energy consumption, foreign direct investment (FDI), economic growth, and trade openness is examined by newly developed Fourier ADL (2017) and ARDL tests cover the period 1980–2015 in Turkey. Findings indicated that energy consumption, FDI, economic growth, and trade openness are cointegrated. In addition, it is determined that an increase in economic growth and trade openness positively affects energy consumption both in the long-term and short-term but FDI has only a positive effect in the long-term. VECM causality results indicated that FDI, economic growth, and trade openness are the causes of energy consumption in the long-term. In this context, Turkish policymakers should change the composition of FDI through various incentive policies to provide energy efficiency. FDI inflows should be shifted from sectors using dirty technology to clean technologies such as the information technology and services sector. In addition, increasing FDI that included green technology and renewable energy sources may promote energy efficiency in Turkey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores whether the validity of infrastructure investment serves as a procyclical or anticyclical instrument to counter a recession in the case of the Japanese economy. Infrastructure consumption is usually financed by taxes. For that reason, this paper accounts for the presence of alternative tax regimes. Namely, we have chosen regimes under Total Taxation, Capital Taxation, Corporate (Income) Taxation, Household Income Taxation and Indirect Taxation (valued added tax) to identify different policy outcomes under different regimes. The results indicate that when infrastructure is financed by different taxation across all its variations there is a negative relationship with GDP which is robust when the same estimation procedure is explored for industrial production. The trade-offs of a negative relationship, however, come with a lesser duration of the industrial production recession. The empirical results indicate that trying to get out of recession with infrastructure investment is underutilization of resources and does not touch the real issues that caused the recession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the moderating effect of inflation on the finance–growth nexus in the West African region during 1980–2014. We find that the linear financial development has a positive impact on economic growth, while the interaction term between financial development and the inflation rate has a negative impact on growth. The marginal effect of financial development evaluated at the minimum level of inflation rate is positive, while that evaluated at the maximum level is negative, suggesting that the impact of finance on growth varies with the level of inflation. The inflation threshold level is found at 5.62%. When inflation rises above this level, the total effect of finance on growth turns negative. We also find that the marginal effects of financial development computed at the maximum level of inflation are negative in the high-inflationary countries but positive in the low-inflationary countries. The implication of these findings is that, in the West African region, an increase in financial development and a decrease in inflation appear to have greater long-run economic benefits than a simultaneous increase in both variables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pressure of freshwater resources has intensified in recent decades, stressing agricultural communities worldwide. Research is needed to advance our understanding of the factors that support resilience. Past research suggests that social capital positively predicts health and well-being; yet, we know surprisingly little about the relationship between social capital and resilience to environmental stress. Some scholars have cautioned that tight-knit social relationships can also constrain behavior and undermine flexibility, which could undermine adaptive responses to environmental stress. In this analysis, we use survey data from 225 smallholding rice farmers in Sri Lanka to examine the relationship between individual-level measures of cognitive and structural social capital measured before a drought-affected season, and livelihood outcomes (rice yields and income loss) measured after the season. We also examined if membership in less powerful groups (landless, female, and poor farmers) moderated the relationship between social capital and livelihood outcomes. Higher levels of perceived social cohesion (a measure of cognitive social capital) were associated with poorer yields for both female and landless farmers; yet, the yields of male and landowning farmers were unrelated to perceived social cohesion. Likewise, landless farmers with higher levels of community participation (a form of structural social capital) experienced a marginally higher rate of lost income due to the drought. These data suggest that the relationship between social capital and resilience operates differently for different members of the community. Importantly, some community members may face a difficult tradeoff between agricultural productivity and maintaining social relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study emphasizes to examine the causal relationship among CO2 emission, agricultural value added, industrial production, urbanization, nuclear energy consumption, and economic growth across the panel of 59 countries. The data is collected from World Bank database over the period of 1982–2015. For econometric estimations, we have divided the sample into different income groups: low income, lower middle income, upper middle income, and higher income. In case of higher income countries, empirical results have reported the unidirectional causality from agricultural value added to CO2 emission, whereas, bidirectional causality between nuclear energy consumption and CO2 emission. Upper-middle-income countries have confirmed the bidirectional causality between CO2 emissions and agricultural added; however, unidirectional causality runs from nuclear consumption to CO2 emission. According to Granger causality estimations, agricultural value added and nuclear energy consumption do not cause the CO2 emission in low income and lower-middle-income countries. Long-run estimations have mentioned that higher agricultural value added leads to increase the CO2 emission, in upper middle income and higher income countries. On contrary, in case of low-income and lower-middle-income countries, agricultural value added has inverse relationship with CO2 emission. Higher nuclear energy consumption tends to reduce the CO2 emission, except the upper-middle-income countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research was designed to understand better the patterns of agricultural intensification and transformation occurring in Africa south of the Sahara using the Ghanaian case. The paper examines changes in farming systems and the role of various endogenous and exogenous factors in driving the conversion of arable lands to agricultural uses in four villages within two agro-ecologically distinct zones of Ghana: the Guinea Savannah and Transition zones. Using historical narratives and land-cover maps supplemented with quantitative data at regional levels, the research shows that farming has intensified in the villages, as farmers increased their farm size in response to factors such as population growth, market access, and changing rural lifestyle. The overall trend suggests a gradual move toward intensification through increasing use of labor-saving technologies rather than land-saving inputs—a pattern that contrasts with Asia’s path to its Green Revolution. The findings in this paper provide evidence of the dynamism occurring in African farming systems; hence, they point toward a departure from stagnation narratives that have come to prevail in the debate on agricultural transformation and intensification in Africa south of the Sahara. We conclude that it is essential for future research to expand the scope of this work, while policies should focus on lessons learned from these historical processes of genuine change and adaptation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades, in the wake of accelerated globalization, the issue of output coupling/decoupling has assumed considerable importance in academic as well as in policy debates. Special attention has been focussed on the following four issues (i) whether economies are getting increasingly synchronized in their cyclical behaviour and in particular whether EMEs are getting synchronized with the advanced group of countries (or otherwise) and/or among themselves ? (ii) whether similar synchronization is also evident in the growth profiles of EMEs and advanced economies ? (iii) what are the main factors driving this two types of synchronization ? and (iv) are the factors driving growth synchronization different from those driving business cycle co-movements? This is a single-country study which examines the decoupling issue from the perspective of the Indian economy over a fairly long time span viz. 1961-2008, dividing the same into three sub-periods characterized by relative insularity (1961-1978), restricted globalization (1979-1993) and full-scale globalization (1994-2008). Among the important potential determinants of co-movements suggested by the available literature are inter-industry and intra-industry trade intensities, co-ordination of fiscal and monetary policy, financial integration etc. Our key finding is that the economic determinants for India's cyclical synchronization differ across short (16-32 months) and medium cycles (32-64 months) and vis-a-vis growth spillovers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]