Examining the dynamic impact of carbon emissions, renewable energy and economic growth on healthcare expenditure in Asian countries.

This study aims to examine the impact of renewable energy, carbon emissions, and economic growth on healthcare spending in 36 Asian countries during 2000-2019. Fully Modified Ordinary Least Square (FMOLS) and Dynamic Ordinary Least Square (DOLS) models have been applied to the panel data for 36 Asian countries. The study's findings show that CO2 emissions in Asia increased due to public and private health spending, with the commercial health sector having a larger negative influence on CO2 emissions than the public sector. According to FMOLS and DOLS findings, carbon emissions and GDP are positively related to health spending, indicating that high economic growth through energy-intensive production processes leads to increased carbon emissions, but on the contrary, renewable energy consumption has decreased healthcare expenditure. This study advocates new policies to reduce carbon emissions and hospitalisation without jeopardising national economic growth. In order to achieve sustainable health services and an environmentally friendly future in Asia, health administrators must raise state and private healthcare spending while implementing an effective cost-service and energy-efficient management plan.

An environmental assessment of the impacts of corruption, foreign investment inflow and trade liberalization in the rapidly emerging Malaysian Economy.

In the wake of various catastrophic consequences of climate change, Malaysia, a rapidly developing economy, is also inevitably experiencing environmental degradation that merits prompt and serious attention from policymakers and its government. Hence, this study simultaneously highlights the short and long-run dynamic connections between carbon emission in Malaysia and the trio of corruption levels, foreign investment inflow, and trade liberalization. The study also controls for a combination of other factors including energy use, GDP, and urbanization. A robust empirical analysis was conducted on time series observations for the country based on the recent Dynamic ARDL simulation. It was observed that Malaysia's per capita pollution levels significantly reduces based on the corruption perception levels during the sampling period while the economic expansion's effect on emission levels is positive. Additionally, urbanization, trade levels and energy use all aggravate the emission levels. On the other hand, although FDI poses an insignificant environmental damage in the short run, its environmental sustainability enhancement roles were supported by its long-run negative impacts on carbon emission. Lastly, the EKC was established and as such, essential policy directions were provided for stakeholders in the rapidly emerging Malaysian economy.

Does contract farming enhance farm efficiency? A case of wheat growers of Haryana, India.

This study tries to evaluate the returns to contract farming (CF) in the form of farm efficiency for both contract and non-contract wheat growers in Haryana, North India. Applying the data envelopment analysis and endogenous switching regression model on cross-sectional survey data from 754 wheat farmers, it finds that CF adopters are significantly more efficient than non-adopters. Further, it reveals that farmers who adopt CF would reduce their technical efficiency by 16% if they do not participate in it. But non-adopters would increase their technical efficiency by 12% if they adopt instead. This is attributed to CF provisions of higher quality inputs and improved production technology. However, results also indicate that a small percentage of farmers are dealing with some financial constraints, including delayed payment, high cost of inputs, and lack of timely access to financial assistance. This needs to be addressed adequately in order to enfold the smallholders in the ambit of contracting system.

Exploring the nature of EKC hypothesis in Asia's top emitters: role of human capital, renewable and non-renewable energy consumption.

The present study uses both carbon dioxide emission and ecological footprints as proxies for environmental degradation to examine the environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis for the top three emitters from Asia, i.e., China, India, and Japan. To this end, the autoregressive distributed lag model for time series and panel estimation is used for a period spanning over 1980-2016. For carbon dioxide emission, China presents an inverted-U shape of the environmental Kuznets curve, while a U-shape relationship is found for India and Japan. Similarly, when the hypothesis is tested with the ecological footprint, Japan offers an inverted U-shape and U-shaped association is detected for China and India. The panel analysis indicates the existence of the environmental Kuznets curve with both proxies of environmental degradation. Besides, human capital and renewable energy promote environmental sustainability, while non-renewable energy use hinders environmental quality. The findings of this study suggest that in order to meet the combined goals of economic growth and environmental protection, the three economies, i.e., China, India, and Japan, should employ renewable energy-enabled technology.

Decarbonization pathways: the roles of foreign direct investments, governance, democracy, economic growth, and renewable energy transition.

The Paris Agreement has united the global nations to embark on pathways to the decarbonization of their respective economies. However, the objective of achieving low-carbon growth is not as straightforward as it seems since the rapidly emerging and fossil fuel-dependent world economies are focused on expediting economic growth at the expense of poorer environmental consequences. Against this background, this study aims to explore the effects of foreign direct investments, governance, democracy, renewable energy use, and economic growth on carbon dioxide emissions in the context of the BRICS countries over the period from 2006 to 2017. The estimation strategy involved in this study specifically accounts for addressing the issues of cross-sectional dependency and slope heterogeneity in the data set utilized for analysis. The associated findings reveal cointegrating associations between the study variables. Besides, the regression outcomes reveal that good governance (achieved by controlling corruption) and strong democracy (achieved by ensuring greater freedom for journalists) help to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the long run. More importantly, the results also confirm that both good governance and stronger democracy further reduce carbon dioxide emissions by mediating between emission-inhibiting effects of foreign direct investment inflows in the BRICS countries. In addition, good governance and stronger democracy exert moderating effects to reduce the emission-stimulating impacts associated with higher economic growth. Lastly, it is also witnessed that forgoing non-renewable energy use and adopting renewable energy instead help to curb the carbon dioxide emission levels further. Accordingly, considering these key findings, it is recommended that the BRICS countries should enhance the quality of governance and democracy, attract clean foreign direct investments, promote renewable energy use, and adopt clean economic growth strategies to decarbonize their respective economy.

Dynamic link between bilateral FDI, the quality of environment and institutions: evidence from G20 countries.

The sustenance of a clean, natural, and relatively less tampered environment is one of the most important apprehensions of contemporary households, firms, and governments in the globalized world. Both developing and developed countries rely heavily on foreign direct investments (FDI) and institutional arrangements for economic prosperity and have feedback repercussions about environmental quality. Thus, the current paper attempts to explore such a triplex integrated linkage among bilateral FDI, institutional quality, and environmental quality proxied by CO2 emissions intensity on each other for 19 selected G20 countries during 2009-2017. The empirical estimation of this paper takes into account three equations that jointly address the endogeneity problem by employing both static (such as seemingly unrelated regression and three-stage least square) and dynamic simultaneous econometric techniques (such as the system generalized method of moments) with a panel dataset considering host and source countries with 342-panel pairs for the selected sample time. The empirical results confirm that bilateral FDI reduces CO2 emission intensity and strengthens the institutional quality of G20. It also supports the idea that institutional quality has a favorable and considerable impact on bilateral FDI. This paper confirms a positive and considerable feedback between environmental and institutional quality. Further, this study establishes a triplex relationship between these three factors. This study argues that governments should use incentives like tax cuts and additional subsidies to promote greener FDI in G20 nations. This is because it facilitates the employment of more modern technology and clean energy-efficient technologies to minimize emissions and spur economic growth.

The roles of foreign direct investments, economic growth, and capital investments in decarbonizing the economy of Oman.

Oman is a Middle Eastern country that has traditionally been monotonically reliant on its indigenous fossil fuel supplies. Besides, the nation has also been a surplus producer and net exporter of oil which further highlights the prolonged fossil fuel dependency of Oman. Consequently, despite flourishing economically, environmental quality in Oman has persistently aggravated. These opposing economic and environmental performances have necessitated Oman to identify the factors which can enable Oman to decarbonize its economy for tackling the environmental concerns faced by the nation. Against this backdrop, this study aims to examine the symmetric and asymmetric effects of foreign direct investments, economic growth, and capital investments on carbon dioxide emissions in Oman during 1980-2019. Using relevant econometric estimation methods for controlling structural break concerns in the data, the findings reveal evidence of asymmetric environmental impacts associated with shocks to the nation's foreign direct investment inflow, economic growth, and capital investment figures. Specifically, it is witnessed that positive shocks to the levels of foreign direct investment inflows, economic growth, and capital investments boost carbon dioxide emissions both in the short and long run. On the other hand, negative shocks to the levels of foreign direct investment inflows and economic growth are witnessed to reduce the emissions. Besides, the findings also validate the environmental Kuznets curve and pollution haven hypotheses in the context of Oman. Hence, considering these key findings, it is recommended that Oman should ideally pursues green economic growth policies by restricting inflows of unclean foreign direct investments and green its financial sector in order to collectively minimize its carbon dioxide emission figures.

Degradation of synthetic dyes using nanoparticles: a mini-review.

The industrial revolution has marked a strong impact on financial upgradation of several countries, and increase in the industrial establishment globally has direct impact on environment because of the release of unwanted product in air and inside the water bodies. The use of dyes has increased tremendously in various industries ranging from food, leather, textile, paper, cosmetic, pharmaceuticals, etc. The problem has emerged due to disposing of the dyes in the open environment, and mostly it is disposed along with the industrial wastes into the water bodies, which becomes harmful for animals, aquatic life and human health. This review highlights the role of the nanoparticles particularly biosynthesized nanoparticles for eliminating the dyes from the industrial wastewater. There are several methods for the synthesis of nanoparticle including physical, chemical and green synthesis of nanoparticles commonly known as biological method. Among all, the biological method is considered as the rapid, easy, eco-friendly and is being performed at mild conditions. The uses of nanoparticles for removal of dyes from water minimize the hazardous impact and thus considered to be the best approach as far as water quality and safety of environment is concerned.

Growth and determinants of CO2 emissions: evidence from selected Asian emerging economies.

The study analyzes the impact of economic growth, energy consumption, foreign direct investment inflows, population, population density, labor force, and trade openness on carbon dioxide emissions in seven emerging Asian economies over the period 1991-2017. To this end, it uses cross-section dependence test, second-generation unit root test, panel cointegration, and the bound test for cointegration and the autoregressive distributed lag estimations. The findings of the study are as follows: first, the kinked exponential growth is estimated for all the variables on the individual data set of seven countries. Second, the study finds a positive association of economic growth, energy consumption, population, and population density on carbon dioxide emissions. Third, it finds that the foreign direct investment inflows are negatively associated with carbon dioxide emissions. The paper also suggests potential implications and some future research avenues.

Analyzing asymmetric impact of economic growth, energy use, FDI inflows, and oil prices on CO2 emissions through NARDL approach.

Even though numerous studies explore the impact of macroeconomic variables on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, only a few existing studies estimate the asymmetric impact and causality. By considering the significance of asymmetries, this study investigates the asymmetric impact of economic growth, energy use, and foreign direct investment inflows on CO2 emissions in India wherein oil prices are included as additional variable. The kinked exponential growth of these variables over the period 1986-2014 is also estimated. To this end, nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) model and asymmetric causality test are used. The results show that increase in economic growth would decrease CO2 emissions, while a reduction in economic growth would increase CO2 emissions which implies an inverted U-shaped link between economic growth and CO2 emissions. The positive and negative shocks in oil prices have a favorable and significant impact on CO2 emissions as well. Furthermore, the energy consumption with positive shock shows a positive and significant impact on CO2 emission. Besides, the findings of foreign direct investment inflows support the pollution heaven hypothesis. In light of these results, this study also suggested some policy implications and future research avenues in the concluding section.

Determinants of CO2 emissions in upper middle-income group countries: an empirical investigation.

This study investigates the kinked exponential growth, degree of association, and causation between economic growth, energy consumption, population, trade openness, and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in 25 upper middle-income group countries spanning data from 1985 to 2014. The study employed first-generation and second-generation unit root tests; prior to that, the cross-sectional dependence test is also applied and panel cointegration techniques, panel FMOLS and DOLS, and panel causality techniques are employed to test the degree of association and causation among the variables. The study reveals a long-run cointegration among the variables. Results of FMOLS declare that there are negative associations between economic growth and CO2 emissions, trade openness, and carbon dioxide emissions respectively, whereas it was found that there are positive relations between energy consumption and CO2 emissions, population, and CO2 emissions. While analyzing the association through DOLS, we find that all the selected determinants of carbon dioxide emissions are directly proportional to CO2 emissions in these countries. The panel Granger causality test indicates that there is bi-directional causality between population and economic growth and between trade openness and economic growth. Finally, the study ends with some policy suggestions and new avenues for future research.

Maternal health outcomes of socially marginalized groups in India.

PURPOSE: The present study delves into the health inequalities between the two most socially deprived groups namely Scheduled Tribes (STs) and Scheduled Castes (SCs) in rural India. DESIGN/METHODOLOGY/APPROACH: This study used health-specific three rounds of National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) unit-level data for analyses. Probit model has been used to predict the differences in access to maternal healthcare services. Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition method is used to explore the inequality in health of rural population in India and assess the estimated relative contribution of socioeconomic and demographic factors to inequalities in maternal health. FINDINGS: The study establishes that STs women often perform poorly compared to SCs in terms of maternal health such as antenatal care, postnatal care and institutional delivery. Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition method shows that there exist health inequalities between STs and SCs women. Difference in household income contributes 21-34 percent and women's education 19-24 percent in the gap of utilization of maternal healthcare services between SCs and STs women. A substantial part of this difference is contributed by availability of water at home and geographical region. Finally, the study offers some policy suggestions in order to mitigate the health inequalities among socially marginalized groups of SCs and STs women in rural areas. ORIGINALITY/VALUE: This study measures and explains inequalities in maternal health variables such as antenatal care, postnatal care and institutional delivery in rural India. Research on access to maternal healthcare facilities is needed to improve the health of deprived sections such as STs and SCs in India. The results of this study pinpoint the need for public health decision-makers in India to concentrate on the most deprived and vulnerable sections of the society. This study thus makes a detailed and tangible contribution to the current knowledge of health inequalities between the two most deprived social groups, i.e., SCs and STs.

Trends, Differentials, and Social Determinants of Maternal Health Care Services Utilization in Rural India: An Analysis from Pooled Data.

Background: Millennium development goal 5 aimed at reduction of maternal deaths by three-quarters from 1990 to 2015: a target India commendably achieved, but this milestone remains overshadowed by inequalities in utilization of health services that are driven by determinants both at community and at individual level. Materials and Methods: We studied the utilization trends using descriptive statistics and analyzed the relative contribution of various socioeconomic predictors on the use of maternal health care services in rural India using binary logistic regression analysis on pooled data from three rounds of National Family Health Survey. Outcome variables included four or more antenatal care visits, skilled birth attendance, and postnatal care. Results: Although utilization of maternal health care services showed an upward trend from 1998-1999 to 2015-2016, factors such as illiteracy, female age ≥40 years, having five and more children, belonging to scheduled tribes, rural residence, and not possessing a health card were associated with significantly low utilization of maternal health care services. However, partner's education, good economic status, women's autonomy, and infrastructure at village level were associated with better odds of availing these services. Conclusions: The study generates evidence on the role of various socioeconomic determinants in maternal health care utilization and identifies gaps that must be strategically addressed to reach sustainable developmental goal maternal mortality target of 70 deaths per 100,000 live births by 2030. It reemphasizes the need for ensuring convergence among different stakeholders while structuring maternal health policies so that health reforms can be accomplished effectively at all levels of health care.