Achieving Environmental Sustainability in Africa: The Role of Renewable Energy Consumption, Natural Resources, and Government Effectiveness—Evidence from Symmetric and Asymmetric ARDL Models

Li Yang, Sumaiya Bashiru Danwana and Fadilul-lah Yassaanah Issahaku
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Li Yang: School of Economics and Management, Anhui University of Science and Technology, No. 168 Taifeng Road, Huainan 232001, China
Sumaiya Bashiru Danwana: School of Economics and Management, Anhui University of Science and Technology, No. 168 Taifeng Road, Huainan 232001, China
Fadilul-lah Yassaanah Issahaku: School of Mathematics and Big Data, Anhui University of Science and Technology, No. 168 Taifeng Road, Huainan 232001, China

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 13, 1-26

Abstract: This study investigates the symmetric and asymmetric linkages within environmental sustainability proxied by ecological footprint (EFP), natural resources (NRR), renewable energy consumption (REC), urbanization (URB), human capital (HC), and government effectiveness (GE) in 27 African countries divided into two subgroups (ecological deficit countries and ecological reserve countries) over the period 1990 to 2018. The study employs the auto-regressive distributed lag (ARDL) model to investigate the symmetric (linear) effect and the nonlinear auto-regressive distributed lag (NARDL) model to study the asymmetric (nonlinear) effects of the variables on EFP. Results of ARDL show that a 1% increase in REC is projected to reduce ecological footprint by 0.17 and 0.2% in ecological deficit and ecological reserve countries. A 1% increase in NRR is estimated to increase ecological footprint by 0.02% in ecological deficit countries but has no impact on the environment in countries with ecological reserves. Similarly, a 1% rise in GE is estimated to increase EFP by 0.04% in Africa but has no impact on the environment in ecological deficit countries. NARDL estimations decomposed REC into positive (negative) shocks, which show that a 1% increase (decrease) in REC is projected to decrease EFP by 0.16% (0.13%) in countries with ecological reserves. Similarly, a positive (negative) shock in NRR is expected to decrease EFP in ecological reserve countries and increase EFP in ecological deficit countries. Results of the Wald tests prove the existence of long-run asymmetry among the variables. The findings indicate that renewable energy consumption enhances environmental quality, while economic growth and natural resource rents reduce environmental quality in Africa over the sampled period.

Keywords: environmental sustainability; ecological footprint; renewable energy; government effectiveness; natural resources; Africa; ARDL (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

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