Green growth in Nepal and Bangladesh: Empirical analysis and future prospects

Bishal Baniya, Damien Giurco and Scott Kelly

Energy Policy, 2021, vol. 149, issue C

Abstract: Nepal and Bangladesh aim to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions as part of their commitments to implementing the Paris Climate Agreement and United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In addition, both countries are seeking to move from being categorized as low to middle-income countries. This study analyzes the empirical evidence on greening of economic growth in Nepal and Bangladesh between 1985 and 2016, and looks ahead to 2030 to discuss the future prospects in their efforts to deliver on both environmental and economic goals. To analyze their historical progress, six green growth indicators are used, and to look ahead to 2030, energy and material consumption models are used. For both countries, energy and material productivity improvements were mainly driven by structural changes in an economy, which is a transition from agricultural to service-based economies. Yet these are found to be insufficient to deliver green growth. An increase in the share of renewable energy in the energy mix and the absolute reduction of energy and material consumption in future are found to be important not only for greening the growth but also for delivering abovementioned commitments. Technological changes such as the substitution of biomass by electricity from renewable resources can be a part of sustainable strategy for reconciling the climate mitigation actions with graduation to the middle-income country category.

Keywords: Green growth; Energy and material productivity; Structural changes; Climate mitigation; Renewable resources; Technological change (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:enepol:v:149:y:2021:i:c:s0301421520307606

DOI: 10.1016/j.enpol.2020.112049

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