Search

Environmental degradation caused by various human activities has been a subject of attention over the globe. There is a concern on how to maintain a clean environment and at the same time achieve optimum production of food and non-food products amidst global energy demand. To this end, this study examines the impact of agricultural development, energy use, and economic growth on CO 2 emissions in the emerging seven countries that comprises China, India, Brazil, Mexico, Russia, Indonesia, and Turkey for the annual time frequency from 1990 to 2016. The study uses a battery of econometrics techniques for soundness of analysis the consist of pooled mean group autoregressive distributed lag methodology, dynamic ordinary least squares, and fully modified ordinary least squares as estimation techniques alongside Dumitrescu and Hurlin causality test for the direction of causality analysis. Empirical results revealed that value-added agriculture and economic growth are drivers of CO 2 emission in the E7 countries, and the rise in renewable energy causes a reduction in CO 2 emissions, while in the short run, economic growth has a positive impact on emissions in the focus countries. Causality analysis shows that there is a feedback causality between economic growth and emissions, between value-added agriculture and energy usage, between emission and value-added agriculture, and between economic growth and agricultural development. Furthermore, energy use does not cause emissions directly; it causes economic growth and value-added agriculture which causes emissions. This position aligns with the advocacy of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (UN-SDG) Targets 7 and 13 of clean energy access and mitigation of climate changes issues., (© 2021. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

This research work examines the nexus among renewable, non-renewable energy consumption, CO 2 emissions, and economic growth in 26 European countries with data obtained from the World Bank database within the time period of 1990 to 2018. Firstly, unit root and panel cointegration approach analyses are conducted to test the stationary. The results indicate that there exists a long-run nexus among non-renewable, renewable energy, carbon-monoxide, and economic growth. Granger causality test was also used to explore the direction among economic growth, carbon emissions, and energy consumption. The results from this test are inconsistent, while it indicated bidirectional causality between economic growth and renewable energy consumption, there was also a unidirectional causality between renewable energy and non-renewable energy consumption as well as renewable energy and CO 2 emissions. This result proves an interdependency and substitutability between both renewable and non-renewable sources of energy.

The debate on ecological matters that relate to the biomass emissions nexus has gained prominence and different scholars have suggested various forms of policy directions to tackle the menace. This study seeks to contribute to this subject by examining the impact of biomass energy use on carbon dioxide pollution in the G7 economies context. Thus, to this end, we employed energy usage and GDP measured as economic growth which adds factors that can influence pollution for annual time-frequency between1995 and 2016 for the case of G7 economies. The present study adds to the extant literature by the adoption of the novel econometric techniques such as the panel cross-section augment ARDL and common correlated estimate mean group (CCEMG) to evaluate the impact of biomass energy on pollutants. The empirical results from all the techniques show that biomass energy consumption significantly and negatively correlates to CO 2 emissions meaning that it helps to reduce pollution in the long run. On the other hand, there is a significant positive relationship between energy use and pollutants implying that the primary energy use is not favorable for environmental sustainability over the sampled period. Finally, the results proved that GDP increases CO 2 emissions in the long run with respect to the G7 context. Thus, validating the growth-induced pollution hypothesis in G7 blocs. On causality relationship, we observe a unidirectional causal relationship between these variables: biomass and pollutants, pollutants and output, biomass and output, biomass and energy use, and output and energy use. While there was a bidirectional causality between energy use and pollutant, these results suggest policy implication for the G7 countries which indicates that stakeholders should give much attention to technological know-how and energy mix particularly biomass energy which is environmentally friendly as well as more paradigm shift to renewables.

The environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis is of great importance to understanding the relationship between economic activity and environmental degradation. Given the current wave of climate change and environmental crisis traced to rising environmental pollution from economic activities, it has become important to investigate the impact of economic expansion on the environment especially in the emerging-7 countries that are responsible for a large amount of global economic activity. This study investigates the N-shaped EKC for the E-7 countries using data spanning the period 1995-2018. The study employs the use of PMG-ARDL estimator and heterogeneous causality tests to establish the long run and short run and direction of causality respectively regarding the variables of interest. According to study empirical results, the long-run results fail to confirm the presence of an N-shaped EKC in the emerging 7 countries but rather confirms the existence of an inverted U-shaped EKC in the study countries. While renewable energy and non-renewable energy have a positive and significant relationship with CO 2 emissions, short run results show that there is no significant relationship between economic expansion, renewable energy, non-renewable energy and CO 2 emissions. Causality tests showed a bi-directional causality between GDP- and GDP-squared and a uni-directional causality from CO 2 emissions to GDP-cubed, non-renewable energy and CO 2 emissions, renewable energy, and CO 2 emissions. The study suggests increased use of renewable energy to mitigate pollutant emissions in the E-7 countries.

Improving wellbeing and livelihoods exemplify the third Sustainable Development Goal. Literature related to the tourism-renewable energy-quality of life nexus is limited and lacks consensus. This study contributes to the debate and examines the influence of international tourism arrival (TA), real international tourism receipts (TR), and renewable energy consumption (REC) on quality of life (QoL) by using a panel of 8 Southern African countries spanning 1995-2017. The results found a significant positive and long-run relationship between TA, TR, and QoL. A significant negative effect was found between REC, trade openness (TO), and QoL while urbanization (Urb) had an insignificant negative impact on QoL. A unidirectional causal relationship was found running from QoL to TR and bidirectional causality between QoL and REC. Feedback causality was found between QoL and Urb and unidirectional causality from QoL to TO. The results imply that tourism is an effective economic tool for improving human development in Southern Africa., (© 2020 The Author(s).)

The transition of most economies especially heavily industrialized nations like China, Turkey, Russia, India, Indonesia, Brazil, and Mexico fondly known as E7 are fast emerging economies with its impact on economic growth and ecosystem. On the above highlight, the present study explores the dynamic interaction between hydroelectricity energy, renewable energy consumption, nonrenewable energy consumption on economic growth over annual time frequency data from 1990 to 2018. To this end, Kao co-integration technique is adopted in conjunction with panel ordinary least squares, dynamic ordinary least squares, and fully modified ordinary least square estimators over the identified blocs while the heterogeneous causality test of Dumitrescu and Hurlin is employed to detect the direction of causality among the variables. Empirical result shows long-run analysis reveals long-run equilibrium relationship between the examined variables. Furthermore, a one-way causality relationship is observed between economic growth and nonrenewable energy, economic growth and renewable energy, and economic growth and pollutant emission. The present study identifies a U-shaped pattern among nonrenewable energy consumption and economic growth in the long-run. These findings suggest that as economic growth increases, there is less strengthening of energy from the nonrenewable energy consumption hence, portentous deterioration in nonrenewable usage while authenticating the proficiency of nonrenewable energy consumption in the E7 countries. Further policy prescriptions are rendered in the concluding section.

This study empirically examined the relationship between CO 2 emissions and good governance in oil- and non-oil-producing countries in the SSA region. The findings from this paper revealed very interesting results proving that good governance has a negative relationship with CO 2 emissions. Oil-producing countries have good governance system to help control and reduce CO 2 emissions as compared to non-oil-producing countries. Particularly, in oil-producing countries, business regulatory environment, budget and fiscal management, as well as fiscal policy have a significant negative relationship with CO 2 emissions. But there is rather a positive relationship between these indicators and CO 2 emissions in non-oil-producing countries as they do not have the required structures and arrangements to control CO 2 emissions. Also, in oil-producing countries, property rights and rules have positive relationship with CO 2 emissions but in the case of non-oil-producing countries, there is a negative relationship, meaning that non-oil-producing countries have good legal system and rule-based governance structures that is capable of protecting property rights. There is positive relationship between quality of government administration and CO 2 emissions in oil-producing countries but negative for non-oil-producing countries. Trade liberalization and economic growth have positive relationship with CO 2 emissions in both categories. But urbanization has a negative relationship with CO 2 emissions in non-oil-producing countries but positive for oil-producing. The findings point that effective and efficient institutions is a vital element for SSA countries to help combat the increased emissions of CO 2 to engender growth.

Increasing healthcare expenditure in West African countries cannot be over-emphasized. There is need for urgent improvement of healthcare, healthcare equipment and facilities, and human resources with qualified healthcare givers. It is important to have clarity on which healthcare sector to invest in, to maximize impact, effectiveness and efficiency. This study investigated the private, public, and public-private healthcare sectors of West Africa. Data was obtained from World Bank Indicators within the period of 16 years (from 1999 - 2014). Using pooled regression and pairwise correlation, empirical results were obtained. Female population lived longer than the male population and a positive relationship was obtained between the variables of healthcare spending and life expectancy for the public healthcare sector. The results showed a negative relationship between these variables for the private healthcare sector. The government, policy and decision-makers are recommended to focus on increasing the expenditure on the public healthcare system to achieve positive outcomes for increased life expectancy against other healthcare sectors that remain expensive and inaccessible to the population.

Background: Over the last decade, total healthcare expenditures, comprised of both public and private healthcare expenditures, have increased in most East African countries. At the same time, health outcomes such as infant mortality rates, life expectancy at birth and other health outcome indicators have improved., Objectives: This paper examines the association between healthcare expenditures and health outcomes for eight East African countries: Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda. In this study, health outcomes are defined as an improvement in adult life expectancy and a reduction in the number of neonatal, infant, and under-five deaths., Methods: We implemented a panel data regression technique, analyzing both cross-sectional and time series information. This combined method has been used in healthcare studies by several authors. Data obtained from world development indicators for the years 2000-2014 was used for the panel study., Results: First, we documented that there is a strong, positive association between total healthcare expenditures and total life expectancy. While we identified a positive relationship between healthcare expenditures and female and male life expectancy, we found that healthcare had a stronger effect on improving life expectancy in females than in males. Moreover, we found a negative relationship between healthcare expenditures and the number of neonatal, infant, and under-five deaths., Conclusion: The results of this study have important policy and management implications for the eight East African countries. From a policy perspective, it is necessary to understand if a greater allocation of resources to the healthcare sector is worthwhile and to determine whether to encourage private healthcare investment. From the management perspective, investing in more private institutions, such as hospitals and clinics, is essential for health outcomes in the average country. The results of this study can be used by the World Health Organization as well as other non-governmental organizations that provide financial assistance to East African countries.