Informal economy and ecological footprint: the case of Africa

Carbon ecological security assessment based on the decoupling relationship between carbon balance pressure and ecological quality in Xuzhou City, China

Building a carbon ecological security (CES) framework helps to scientifically evaluate and manage the regional carbon cycle and eco-environment and support regional ecological security patterns. This paper adopted the pressure-state-response-immune (PSRI) model and the carbon balance index method to evaluate the ecological quality and carbon balance pressure. Then, based on the decoupling model and the improved four-quadrant model, the CES framework was constructed to evaluate the changing trend of the CES of Xuzhou City from 2005 to 2020. The results showed that the carbon balance pressure of Xuzhou City showed a pattern of "low-high-low" from east to west, and most areas tended to have a carbon balance and surplus in 2020. The ecological quality showed an overall upward trend during the study period. Protection and restoration drove the response and immune index growth from 2010 to 2020. In the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan stage, the nine districts of Xuzhou City were in a stable decoupling state, and the overall decoupling process was ideal. The CES of districts showed individual differences in the general upward trend. The carbon balance pressure of Gulou and Quanshan Districts was the main factor restricting the districts' CES. Therefore, based on the empirical results, this research proposes relevant suggestions to enhance carbon ecological security to achieve regional green and low-carbon development.

Fiscal deficit in sub-saharan Africa: A new intuition from the institution and political drivers

Motivated by the growing fiscal deficits in sub-Saharan Africa, this study examines fiscal deficit's economic, political, and institutional drivers using a panel of twenty-three sub-Saharan African countries. Panel spatial consistent correlation, dynamic fixed effects autoregressive distributed lag, and feasible generalised ordinary least squares were used as the estimation techniques. Our findings reveal that while per capita income, trade openness, population, and religious tension increase the size of fiscal deficit, bureaucracy quality, government stability, Law and order, and military in politics reduce the extent of fiscal deficit. However, corruption control, democratic accountability, and internal conflict have weaker statistical evidence. Furthermore, the study established evidence of long-run co-integration relationships among institutional factors, economic factors, and fiscal deficits in SSA. Per capita income has a significant positive influence in the short run but a negative effect in the long run. Population and religious tension positively impact fiscal deficit in both periods. However, democratic accountability, government stability, and the military in politics significantly negatively impact fiscal deficit in the long run. This study concludes that beyond economic factors, institutional and political factors are significant drivers of fiscal deficit in sub-Saharan Africa. Therefore, strengthening the institutional quality and creating a stable political environment would lessen the accumulation of fiscal deficit.

Renewable and nonrenewable energy consumption, economic growth, and CO2 emissions in Eastern and South African countries: the role of informality

This study investigates the role of informality in the relationship among renewable and nonrenewable energy consumption, economic growth, and CO₂ emissions in a panel of 19 Eastern and South African countries. The empirical strategy exploits the panel generalized method of moments, panel fixed effects models using the Driscoll-Kraay standard errors, panel method of moments quantile regressions, and the Dumitrescu-Hurlin bootstrap panel Granger causality analysis. The results are fourfold. First, nonrenewable energy consumption is positively associated with CO₂ emissions, while renewable energy consumption is not. Second, there is a nonlinear ∩ -shaped relationship between economic growth and CO₂ emissions, consistent with the environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) hypothesis. Third, the results show a nonlinear ∪ -shaped relationship between informality and CO₂ emissions, suggesting that higher informality is associated with lower CO₂ emissions up to a certain critical point beyond which further increases in informality precipitate higher CO₂ emissions. Fourth, the results show unidirectional causality from CO₂ emissions to renewable energy, from CO₂ emissions to nonrenewable energy, from informality to CO₂ emissions, and feedback causality between GDP growth and CO₂ emissions.

Exploring the nexus between economic complexity, energy consumption and ecological footprint: new insights from the United Arab Emirates

Purpose

Motivated by the 2030 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG-7: clean and affordable energy, SDG-8: sustainable economic growth, SDG-13: climate action), this study aims to investigate the role of economic complexity, disaggregated energy consumption in addition to economic growth, financial development, globalization and urbanization on the ecological footprint of United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Design/methodology/approach

This study adopts unit root tests (with and without a structural break), autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds test and dynamic ordinary least squares.

Findings

The results obtained from the ARDL model suggest that economic complexity (EC), nonrenewable energy and economic growth increase the ecological footprint in both the short and long run, thus deteriorating the environment. However, renewable energy and urbanization reduce the ecological footprint in UAE during the two periods, thus improving environmental quality. Globalization and financial development have different influences on ecological footprint during these periods. These findings are robust to other estimation techniques.

Practical implications

Based on these results, this study offers significant policy implications such as increasing renewable energy supply, particularly solar energy and aligning the product manufacturing structure and complexity toward producing environmentally friendly products which can be used to realize the nation’s agenda of reducing fossil fuels consumption to 38% by 2050 and achieving sustainable environment and growth.

Originality/value

This study provides an empirical attempt to investigate the influence of EC and renewable and nonrenewable energy on the ecological footprint of the UAE.