Revisiting the energy-economy-environment relationships for attaining environmental sustainability: evidence from Belt and Road Initiative countries.

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is an ambitious development project initiated by the Chinese government to foster economic progress worldwide. In this regard, this study aims to investigate the dynamics of energy, economy, and environment among 42 BRI developing countries using an annual frequency panel dataset from 1995 to 2019. The major findings from the econometric analyses revealed that higher levels of energy consumption, economic growth, population growth rate, and FDI inflows exhibit adverse environmental consequences by boosting the CO2 emission figures of the selected developing BRI member nations. However, it is interesting to observe that exploiting renewable energy sources, which are relatively cleaner compared to the traditionally-consumed fossil fuels, and fostering agricultural sector development can significantly improve environmental well-being by curbing the emission levels further. On the other hand, financial development is found to be ineffective in explaining the variations in the CO2 emission figures of the selected countries. Besides, the causality analysis shows that higher energy consumption, FDI inflows, and agricultural development cause environmental pollution by boosting CO2 emissions. However, economic growth, technology development, financial progress, and renewable energy consumption are evidenced to exhibit bidirectional causal associations with CO2 emissions. In line with these findings, several relevant policies can be recommended for the BRI to be environmentally sustainable.

The dynamics of public spending on sustainable green economy: role of technological innovation and industrial structure effects.

In order to achieve the goal of sustainable green economic development, it is necessary to conduct a comprehensive assessment of the efficiency of the green economy and compare it with emission reductions. The green economy idea is a much-discussed solution to economic growth. Therefore, this study investigated the impact of government spending on the performance of the green economy of various countries under the "Belt and Road" (BRI) initiative project. The data were analyzed using the BRI economy panel data from 2008 to 2018. The generalized method of moments (GMM) was used to estimate the effect of government expenditures on education and research and development (R&D) on green economic performance index (GEE) in BRI countries. The results reveal that during the study period, BRI countries have experienced an upward transition towards green development, except for Pakistan and Bangladesh; their GEE decreased gradually from 2010 to 2018. Further, the findings of the system GMM revealed that both education and R&D have a positive impact on the green economy. Moreover, the compositional and technological effects of the overall sample were verified with the GMM process. Nevertheless, the sub-sample results revealed a heterogeneous impact on countries with a high per capita GDP. Following the results, useful policy measures for promoting sustainable green economic development have been proposed.

Nexus between corporate social responsibility and firm's perceived performance: evidence from SME sector of developing economies.

The objective of this study is to understand the impact of corporate social responsibility on firm performance and measure the difference of this impact on local and foreign companies. The data collected from 83 companies were based on questionnaires of small and medium enterprise (SME) entrepreneurs of Pakistan in two times and each time within 2 months. The literature analysis method and structural equation theory are used to do the research. The results show that (i) there is a positive and significant relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the two determinants (corporate reputation and employee engagement) of company performance; (ii) for Pakistani companies, both social and environmental CSR contribute positively to firm performance; and (iii) environmental aspects of CSR are the most important to the reputation and employee commitment for Pakistani companies. This study intends to provide more empirical knowledge on how CSR contributes to corporate performance. It also proposes theoretical and practical implications, highlighting what local and foreign companies in developing countries still need to do in terms of CSR. The study provides valuable information for policymakers.

Analysis on Status Quo and Tendency of Chinese Materia Medica Injection Used in Our Hospital during 2002～2004 / 中国药房

OBJECTIVE:To evaluate the drug use status of Chinese materia medica injection(CMMI)in our hospital.METHODS:Chinese materia medica injection(CMMI)used in our hospital from2002to2004was analyzed statistically in terms of consumption sum,defined daily dose(DDDs)and the average daily consumption sum(DDDc).RESULTS:The consumption sum of CMMI in3years increased year by year with annual increase rates of29.7%and32.3%,respectively.The cardio-cerebral vascular CMMI steadily dominated the first place in terms of consumption sum and DDDs in3years with a steady increase year by year from a high starting point.The DDDc of antitumor CMMI ranked the toppest.As for the consumption sum for single variety,xuesaitiong steadily ranked the first place in3years.CONCLUSION:The fast increase of the consumption of CMMI shows that it has a great market demand.