Abstract

This paper analyzes the relationship between renewable and non-renewable energy consumption, financial development, ICT diffusion, and economic growth in MENA countries over the period 1980-2018. We use the novel Cross-Section Augmented Autoregressive Distributed Lag (CS-ARDL) estimation technique, which accounts for cross-sectional dependence and cross-country heterogeneity issues. We find a positive impact of renewable and non-renewable energy on economic growth, but a negative impact of financial development on economic growth. We also find a positive and statistically significant impact of ICT on GDP. Renewable energy and ICT diffusion can be considered as important determinants of improved economic activity, job creation and environmental quality. Pairwise Dumitrescu-Hurlin panel causality tests were used to examine the causal relationships among the variables. The results of this study have significant policy implications for the selected countries.

Keywords ICT, financial development, renewable and non-renewable energy consumption, MENA, dynamic panel CS-ARDL
Authors Mounir Dahmani, Mohamed Mabrouki, and Adel Ben Youssef
Publication Date January 2023
Journal Name Applied Economics (ISSN: 1466-4283)
Volume 55
Issue 10
Pages 1114–1128
Publisher Taylor and Francis
DOI 10.1080/00036846.2022.2096861
APA Reference Dahmani, M., Mabrouki, M., & Ben Youssef, A. (2022). The ICT, financial development, energy consumption and economic growth nexus in MENA countries: dynamic panel CS-ARDL evidence. Applied Economics, 55(10), 1114–1128. https://doi.org/10.1080/00036846.2022.2096861
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