Energizing sustainable development: renewable energy's impact on South Asian environmental quality.

This study examines the impact of CO2 emissions, globalization, economic growth, and renewable and non-renewable energies consumption in South Asian countries between 1985 and 2019. We employ a fully modified ordinary least squares (FMOLS) method to achieve the purpose of this study. The empirical results of this study indicate that globalization positively impacts CO2 emissions. Furthermore, the study indicates that the consumption of non-renewable energy contributes to environmental pollution. Moreover, the findings support the existence of the EKC hypothesis in these countries. As economic growth increases, environmental degradation will also increase, and vice versa. Environmental degradation, however, decreases as economic growth increases after a certain threshold. For countries to cope with the problem of environmental degradation, the pragmatic results recommend that they promote and subsidize all green energy sources.

The impact of public awareness, infrastructure, and technological development with economic growth on solid waste management of European countries: does governance quality matters.

Solid waste generation is a significant problem affecting the ecosystem, human health, and safety. However, the issue is not given the attention it truly deserves. Consequently, this study is aimed at assessing the impact of various factors, such as economic growth, public awareness, infrastructure, and technological advancements, on generating municipal waste in the European Union (EU) for the period 1995-2020. Furthermore, the study incorporated the mediating effect of economic growth and government effectiveness with public awareness, infrastructure, and technological development to reduce waste generation. By employing the bias-corrected method of moments, the study finds that overall waste generation does not decrease over time in EU economies. Furthermore, Denmark is the top-ranked country among the sampled countries to generate waste. However, Finland is at the top in government effectiveness. The empirical findings showed that economic growth is the significant reason for the increase in solid waste production. Additionally, the interaction effects of economic growth with public awareness, infrastructure, and technological development are positive. However, the individual impact of public awareness, infrastructure, and technological development is positive in reducing waste generation. Governance effectiveness is a significant tool to lower waste generation in European economies.

Does sectoral energy consumption depend on trade, monetary, and fiscal policy uncertainty? Policy recommendations using novel bootstrap ARDL approach.

Since the inception of the twenty-first century, there has been a profound upsurge in economic policy uncertainty (EPU) with several economic and environmental impacts. Although there exists a growing body of literature that probes the economic effects of EPU, the EPU-energy nexus yet remains understudied. To fill this gap, the current study probes the impact of disaggregated EPU (i.e., monetary, fiscal, and trade policy uncertainty) on energy consumption (EC) in the USA covering the period 1990M1-2020M12. In particular, we use sectoral EC (i.e., energy consumed by the residential sector, the industrial sector, the transport sector, the electric power sector, and the commercial sector) in consort with total EC. The findings from the bootstrap ARDL approach document that monetary policy uncertainty (MP) plunges EC, whereas trade (TP) and fiscal policy uncertainty (FP) escalate EC in the long run. On the contrary, there is a heterogeneous impact of FP and MP across sectors in the short run, while TP does not affect EC. Keeping in view the findings, we propose policy recommendations to achieve numerous Sustainable Development Goals.

New insights into corporate sustainability, environmental management and corporate financial performance in European Union: an application of VAR and Granger causality approach.

The paper examines how environmental, social, and governance (ESG), including management incentives, influence a firm's financial performance. The study method is based on an empirical analysis of data describing firm-level information about corporate financial performance and corporate sustainability performance between 2001 and 2020, summing up 6291 observations related to 422 analyzed firms from the European Union (EU). The study findings emphasize that firm size is highly influenced by sustainable economic development and significantly conditioned by a CSR strategy and a capable management team. We also prove a long-term relationship between the measures of corporate financial performance and the scores reflecting corporate ESG performance. Our results show a co-integration relationship between corporate financial performance metrics and corporate sustainability performance scores. ESG corporate performance is highly conditioned by the level of resources affected for this purpose, directly impacting firms' cash flow.

Does energy use and economic growth allow for environmental sustainability? An empirical analysis of Pakistan.

The rapid growth of environmental pollution and the destruction of eco-systems force every individual economy to focus on environmentally friendly economic development. This research explores economic growth, energy use, foreign direct investment, agriculture, industrialization, and urban population growth with environmental sustainability proxied as CO2 emissions from 1971 to 2018. Econometric methods are employed for different purposes as the unit root for the stationary check. ARDL determines the long-run relationship, while the Decoupling Index examines the growing speed of variables and CO2 emissions, and VECM has been used for short- and long-run causalities. The study's findings confirm the long-run impact of all environmental pollution variables as ECM-1 is negatively significant. The short-run causality test shows CO2 emissions because of economic growth (GDP = > CO2 ≠ GDP), energy use (ENU = > CO2 ≠ ENU), and foreign direct investment (FDI = > CO2 ≠ FDI) at a 1% level. In contrast, CO2 emissions are not the Granger cause of GDP, ENU, and FDI. Economic growth, energy use, and foreign direct investment will increase CO2 emission, not vice versa. The study findings suggest that governments should move toward adopting green technology by implementation of green fiscal policies.

Signifying the Relationship between Fear of COVID-19, Psychological Concerns, Financial Concerns and Healthcare Employees Job Performance: A Mediated Model.

The coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) has undoubtedly created immense health problems in the global healthcare sector. Apart from its impact on physical health, it has devastatingly affected the psychological well-being of individuals. Based on Affective Events Theory (AET), the current study aims to contemplate the relationship between Fear of COVID-19 (CVF), psychological concerns (PC), and financial concerns (FC) while considering the impact on the healthcare employees' job performance (JP). Moreover, this study investigates the mediating role of job anxiety (ANX), stress (ST), and depression (DEP). The data were collected through an online structured questionnaire (Google Forms) from 489 employees working in the healthcare centers of Pakistan. The structured equation modeling (partial least square) approach is adopted for data analysis. The study results showed that Fear of COVID-19, psychological and financial concerns positively and significantly affect healthcare workers' job performance. Depression, anxiety, and stress mediated the relationship between Fear of COVID-19, psychological concerns, financial concerns, and job performance. The study theoretically and practically contributes to the existing literature on psychological and mental health by providing a better understanding of the individual variables that affect employees' job performance.

Recent analytical tools to mitigate carbon-based pollution: New insights by using wavelet coherence for a sustainable environment.

Anthropogenic activities are a ubiquitous source of carbon-based pollution. A sustainable environment is endangered due to inefficiently regulated pollution policies, and the rise in world population further enhances the severity of this formidable challenge. This study has investigated the impact of the annual CO2 emissions in Pakistan on electricity production from different sectors, GDP, and the population by focusing on the control of carbon-based pollution. This research study intends to fill the gap in previous studies by providing significant measures to link the control of carbon-based pollution, increased GDP, and Pakistan's population, using data from 1990 to 2020. A set of 15 variables are mainly used to investigate all of these relations. Carbon pollution drastically impacts both the external and internal environment. The graphical analysis undertaken in this study finds an upward trend and significant positive correlation among the variables. It demonstrates that Pakistan shows minimal contribution in CO2 emission compared to other Asian economies, but in recent decades, an increasing growth rate has been noticeable and needs to be controlled. The ECM and ARDL approaches confirm that all the variables positively affect CO2 emission both in the long- and short-term, except for electricity production from gas and hydro in the long term, which shows negative relation. The long-term shifts also indicate that high CO2 emissions can be recovered from by adjusting these variables. The study also suggests that the government should convert high carbon use to low carbon energy use to control CO2 emissions in Pakistan.

A blessing in disguise: new insights on the effect of COVID-19 on the carbon emission, climate change, and sustainable environment.

COVID-19, declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) to be a pandemic, has affected greenhouse gas emissions and contributed to the uncertainty of environmental activities. This study demonstrates the effect of lockdowns, the number of new confirmed cases, and the number of newly confirmed deaths due to COVID-19 on CO2 emissions. The data series used are for the UK from 23 March 2020 to 31 December 2020 and for Spain from 14 March 2020 to 31 December 2020. This research adopted the Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) test for a stationarity check of the data series, the Johansen cointegration test for determining cointegration among variables, and the vector error correction model (VEC) Granger causality test for directional cause and effect between exogenous and endogenous variables. The VEC model shows a bidirectional relationship between CO2 emissions and lockdown and a unidirectional relationship with newly confirmed cases and deaths for the UK. The results of Spain confirmed the unidirectional relationship of CO2 emissions, lockdown, new confirmed cases, and deaths. The Granger causality test reconfirms the relationship of variables except for newly confirmed deaths for the UK and newly confirmed cases for Spain. Conclusively, the pandemic breakout reduced the emission of CO2. The directional relation of variables supported the short-run relationship of CO2 emissions with newly confirmed cases and deaths, while a long- and short-run relationship was shown with lockdown. The directional and relational behavior of lockdown potentially linked the CO2 emissions with daily life activities.

The influence of energy consumption and economic growth on environmental degradation in BRICS countries: an application of the ARDL model and decoupling index.

The multi-dimensional pollutions in the earth zone due to the degradation of the environmental levels have been emerging as an urgent issue in the developing economies. The BRICS group of countries holds a unique position in the emerging economies, playing a leading role in reinforcing political power globally and domestically. This study examines the annual time series over the period of 1971-2017 for Brazil, India, China, and South Africa, and 1990-2017 for Russia, to explore the relationship between environmental quality and economic growth in correspondence with the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) hypothesis as well as the Decoupling Index (DI). The presence of an EKC strongly supports any of the individualistic environmental determinants effected in the long run by Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL), building linkage with the approach of the co-integration and the DI, which brings about economic growth as well as CO2 emission and environmental degradation simultaneously. A short-run relationship and presence of the EKC hypothesis are observed in Brazil, Russia, and India with 92%, while China's (55%) and South Africa's (79%) have a slower speed of adjustment to long-run equilibrium. This study concludes that economic expansion and environmental degradation are interrelated in the long run. Environment degradation (CO2 emission) can be eradicated by continuous economic growth, management of energy demands and energy crises, implementation of environmentally sustainable policies, application of green technologies for the use of natural resources, and controllability of urban population growth with immediate and effective actions.

The Causes of Occupational Accidents and Injuries in Romanian Firms: An Application of the Johansen Cointegration and Granger Causality Test.

Organizational risks are present in any activity, so it is important to manage them properly. The jobs are dynamic and involve a series of processes and activities. The entire human resource is exposed to several risks. If these risks are approached correctly, the organizational capacity to achieve its objectives and vision will increase considerably. This paper aims to investigate the relationships between work accidents (fatal and non-fatal) and the causes that contribute to their occurrence (causes dependent on the executor, causes dependent on the means of production, workload-dependent causes, and work-dependent causes-the work environment). The augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) test is employed to check the data stationarity series, while the Johansen test determines the cointegration relation of variables. The data have been collected from Romanian organizations. The vector error correction model (VECM) and Granger causality test are applied for speed of adjustment, nature, and direction of variables' relationship. This research demonstrated that both data series are free from the unit-root problem at first difference. The lag length criterions select the third lag for model fitness, and Johansen cointegration declares that variables are cointegrated for the long term. The vector error correction model shows the speed of adjustment from the short to the long run is 83.35% and 42.60% for work and fatal accidents. The study results show that fatal accidents have a series relationship with selected cases for the short run and have a long-run relationship with the means of production. Fatal accidents are directly related to means of production. Fatal accidents are not designed by executors, workload-dependent causes, or work environments in the short run. Fatal accidents are directly related to the means of production and sudden incidents happening in the long run. Fatal accidents are considered by executors, workload-dependent causes, or work environments in the short run. In the long run, fatal accidents are directly related to the means of production and sudden incidents happening.

Consumer Purchasing Behavior Toward Green Environment in the Healthcare Industry: Mediating Role of Entrepreneurial Innovation and Moderating Effect of Absorptive Capacity.

Entrepreneurial innovations lead to transformations in the existing business model, involving them integrating the new knowledge into the established entrepreneurial activities. The current study combines marketing strategies, entrepreneurial innovation, absorptive capacity, and consumer purchasing behavior in the health sector. This study investigates the impact of packaging and labeling strategies on entrepreneurial innovation and consumer purchasing behavior. Therefore, this study also investigates the mediating effect of entrepreneurial innovation between packaging and labeling strategies and consumer purchasing behavior. The study examines the moderating role of absorptive capacity between entrepreneurial innovation and consumer purchasing behavior. While using convenience sampling, this study used the consumer of medications as a sample from China. The research adopted a quantitative method to conduct the study analysis. A well-structured questionnaire with a 5-point Likert scale has used for the study analysis. The adopted questionnaires were utilized in data collection with 702 with a 70% response rate, and Smart PLS was used to analyze the data. The findings of this study indicate that packaging and labeling strategies significantly influence entrepreneurial innovation and consumer purchasing behavior. Entrepreneurial innovation significantly mediates the packaging and labeling strategies and consumer purchasing behavior. The moderating role of absorptive capacity significantly affects entrepreneurial innovation and consumer purchasing behavior. The implications of the investigated model with innovative marketing strategies give new insights for managerial, policymakers, and research perspectives.

Contemplating the Impact of the Moderators Agency Cost and Number of Supervisors on Corporate Sustainability Under the Aegis of a Cognitive CEO.

The social cognitive theory emphasizes the risk-taking behavior of an entrepreneur, which leads him to make the right decisions. In this regard, this study formulates the concept of the cognitive CEO through the DAE statistical technique. Specifically, CEO attributes such as CEO age, CEO compensation, CEO tenure, goodwill, and the number of CEO-attended meetings are used as inputs that influence the intangible assets, the output. Chinese SMEs have been selected for empirical analysis for the years 2014-2018. The empirical results reveal that having a cognitive CEO augmented corporate sustainability, while agency cost and the number of supervisors strongly diminished corporate sustainability. Meanwhile, high earnings per share and high total assets are vehicles for maintaining the sustainable growth of firms. Additionally, it is indicated that firms with a loan burden cannot maintain sustainable corporate growth. Lastly, the execution of 2SLS and GMM instrumental regressions authenticate the veracity of results.

Signifying the imperative nexus between climate change and information and communication technology development: a case from Pakistan.

The globe has faced technological affluence that enormously revolutionized the lives of humankind. Today, the manufacturing process of the energy sector, production sector, agriculture sector, and service sector is exclusively or partially based on ICT tools. The key intention of this investigation is to find out the impacts of the utilization of ICT on CO2 emission. However, this investigation also evaluates the influence of investment in ICT and the trade of ICT tools on CO2 emission. Further, the estimation examined the subsistence of environment Kuznets curve (EKC) theory, for the nation of Pakistan. The investigation employed an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model and found that the utilization of ICT has a negative impact on CO2 emission. Moreover, the long-run results revealed that the import of ICT equipment is more beneficial for the environment quality of Pakistan. However, ICT apparatus manufactured in Pakistan might produce electronic waste due to non-utilization of green technology. The study reported bidirectional causality between ICT and CO2 emission. These results point towards that the emergence of ICT in industries and daily life possesses a significant and positive role in climate change in Pakistan. Also, this study corroborates the veracity of EKC in Pakistan.