| Over the past three decades,economic activities due to international trade have resulted in increased carbon dioxide emissions which have ultimately triggered global warming.In 2015,in order to confront the increasing global warming and reduce global temperature to 2~oC above preindustrial level,while undertaking initiatives to hold the global warming to 1.5~oC,the 21st Conference of Parties of the UNFCCC approved a new legal document called the Paris Treaty(UNFCCC,2015).The main purpose of this study is to analyze the environmental consequences of international trade on carbon dioxide emissions and environmental efficiency across different regions worldwide.This study adopted a series of panel data robust econometric techniques and DEA methods to achieve the objectives of this study.This study comprised three essays.In essay1,different effects of export,import and the role of indigenous innovation are investigated on carbon dioxide emissions under the framework of EKC across 7 ASEAN member countries during1990-2018.The results of panel quantile regression confirmed that export and import both have induced carbon dioxide emissions.Whereas,indigenous innovation played a significant role in carbon dioxide emissions reduction through augmenting energy efficiency in production operations.Essay 2 of this study mainly examined the dynamic impacts of trade openness and FDI on carbon dioxide emissions in four member countries of ASEAN region during 1970-2018.Moreover,this essay also explored the nonlinear impact of urbanization on carbon dioxide emissions.The results of panel GMM method claimed that trade openness and FDI both have increased carbon dioxide emissions.The results further stated that urbanization and carbon dioxide emissions have an Inverted-U shape relationship.At country specific,the results of simultaneous quantile regression showed that trade openness mainly enhanced carbon dioxide emissions in Indonesia,Malaysia and Thailand and it has reduced carbon dioxide emissions in Philippines.Regarding FDI,pollution heaven hypothesis is validated in Indonesia,Malaysia and Thailand while it has insignificant effect on carbon dioxide emissions in Philippines.The results also confirmed an inverted U-shaped curve between urbanization and carbon emissions in Malaysia and Philippines while U-shaped curve found between the two variables in Indonesia and Thailand.Essay 3 analyzed the role of FDI on environmental efficiency across 100 countries classified into six regions namely the Americas,Asia-Pacific,East Europe,West Europe,MENA and Sub-Sahara Africa over the period 1990-2018.The results of meta-frontier Epsilon-based model showed that the environmental efficiency disparity among these regions continued to diverge,with West Europe having the highest environmental efficiency followed by East Europe and Americas.In second stage of essay 3,the role of FDI and the policy impact of Paris Climate Agreement were examined through regression discontinuity analysis.The results found that FDI positively impacted environmental efficiency in Americas,Asia-Pacific,and negatively affected environmental efficiency in MENA region.The results further observed a positive discontinues jump at the cut-off point,claiming that Paris Climate Agreement has significantly improved environmental efficiency across all regions.Among the regions,the impact of Paris Climate Agreement is higher in East Europe followed by Americas,Asia-Pacific and MENA regions.Finally,this study suggests some important policy recommendations to achieve the targets of Paris Climate Agreement for global sustainable development.The policy makers should augment environmental innovation mechanism,value foreign trade,promote green economy,substitute energy sources and their efficiencies in the manufacturing processes,discourage the efficient investor lobbying,thus increase energy-efficient technology transfer and knowledge spillover,efficient use of land,electric vehicles should be promoted in transport sector and photovoltaic system should be installed in residential buildings. |
