Developing environmental policy framework for sustainable development in Next-11 countries: the impacts of information and communication technology and urbanization on the ecological footprint

This study is structured on the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) framework to explore the impacts of economic growth, energy consumption, information, and communication technology (ICT), and urbanization on the ecological footprint for the Next-11 (N-11) countries. To accomplish the objective, the Driscoll--Kraay standard error and Feasible General Least Squares (FGLS) methods were applied to investigate the long-run relationship between the highlighted variables. In addition, the Dumitrescu and Hurlin panel causality test was employed for exploring the causality path of the variables under consideration. These methods used in this study circumvent issues of cross-sectional dependence. To accommodate the panel data analysis in this study, the annual frequency data from 1992 to 2015 was used. Empirical results lend an invalid of the EKC behaviour in the N-11 countries. Hence a positive relationship is observed between energy consumption, ICT with the ecological footprint while a negative relation between urbanization and the ecological footprint was found. On the direction of causality, a unidirectional causality is observed running from economic growth, energy consumption, ICT, and urbanization to the ecological footprint. Additionally, feedback causality is observed between (1) urbanization and economic growth and (2) urbanization and ICT. These results have implications on environmental sustainability which are elucidated in the concluding remark.