IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/eneeco/v126y2023ics0140988323005170.html

Foreign direct investment and inclusive green growth in Africa: Energy efficiency contingencies and thresholds: Comment

Author

Listed:
  • Acheampong, Alex O.

Abstract

In this paper, I provide an econometric audit and comment on the paper by Ofori, Gbolonyo, and Ojong (2023), which examined whether there is a synergy between energy efficiency and foreign direct investment in inclusive green growth using panel data for 23 African countries from 2000 to 2020. In their paper, the authors showed that the negative effect of foreign direct investment on environmental quality is reduced when conditioned by energy efficiency. The authors further presented threshold analysis, which showed that improving energy efficiency conditions foreign direct investment to improve inclusive green growth and socioeconomic sustainability. In this paper, I argue that their conditional effect hypothesis results, which are the basis of their paper, hold because of “model misspecification” and the “misreporting of some estimates.” Thus, after correcting for the misspecification, I found no significant synergistic and threshold effect of energy efficiency and foreign direct investment on inclusive green growth and socioeconomic sustainability. I also found evidence during the replication that some variables' coefficients and post-estimation statistics in the authors' paper are inconsistent with what I found. The flaws in the paper suggest that no appropriate conclusion and policy implications can be drawn from the paper.

Suggested Citation

  • Acheampong, Alex O., 2023. "Foreign direct investment and inclusive green growth in Africa: Energy efficiency contingencies and thresholds: Comment," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:eneeco:v:126:y:2023:i:c:s0140988323005170
    DOI: 10.1016/j.eneco.2023.107019
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140988323005170
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.eneco.2023.107019?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hansen, Lars Peter, 1982. "Large Sample Properties of Generalized Method of Moments Estimators," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(4), pages 1029-1054, July.
    2. Ofori, Isaac K. & Gbolonyo, Emmanuel Y. & Ojong, Nathanael, 2023. "Foreign direct investment and inclusive green growth in Africa: Energy efficiency contingencies and thresholds," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    3. Brambor, Thomas & Clark, William Roberts & Golder, Matt, 2006. "Understanding Interaction Models: Improving Empirical Analyses," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(1), pages 63-82, January.
    4. repec:aen:journl:1980v01-04-a02 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Brookes, L. G., 1992. "Energy efficiency and economic fallacies: a reply," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 20(5), pages 390-392, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kamguia, Brice & Tadadjeu, Sosson & Ndoya, Hermann & Djeunankan, Ronald, 2025. "Assessing the nexus between industrialization and inclusive green growth in Africa. The critical role of energy efficiency," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    2. Philémon Votsoma & Sem I-dé Dringa . & Mohammadou Nourou, 2025. "Inclusive green growth in Africa: does institutionalized democracy matter?," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 45(4), pages 1944-1962.
    3. Khalid, Hassam & Ahmad, Khalil & Ali, Amjad, 2025. "The Impact of Information Technology Audits on Audit Efficiency and Effectiveness: Evidence from UK Firms," MPRA Paper 127542, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Gao, Zhiyuan & Zhu, Yingnan & Wei, Yihang & Hao, Yu, 2025. "The green circuit: Tracing digital inclusive finance's role in sustainable urban development," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ofori, Isaac K. & Veling, Louise & Cullen, John, 2026. "Frontier Technology Adoption and Inclusive Green Growth in the EU: A Double-edged Sword?," EconStor Preprints 335106, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    2. Ofori, Isaac K. & Figari, Francesco, 2022. "Economic Globalisation and Inclusive Green Growth in Africa: Contingencies and Policy-Relevant Thresholds of Governance," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, issue Forthcomi, pages 1-1.
    3. Kerstin Lopatta & Thomas Kaspereit, 2014. "The World Capital Markets’ Perception of Sustainability and the Impact of the Financial Crisis," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 122(3), pages 475-500, July.
    4. Ofori, Isaac K., 2026. "Distributional energy justice and the inclusive human development Agenda in Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    5. Ly Slesman & Ali Kole & Rizgar Abdlkarim Abdlaziz & Ibrahim D. Raheem, 2024. "Taming the Tides of Internal Conflicts in Sub-Saharan Africa: The Role of Political Institutions and Natural Resources," Global Journal of Emerging Market Economies, Emerging Markets Forum, vol. 16(2), pages 188-211, May.
    6. Nick Drydakis, 2015. "The effect of sexual activity on wages," International Journal of Manpower, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 36(2), pages 192-215, May.
    7. Ofori, Isaac K. & Gbolonyo, Emmanuel Y. & Ojong, Nathanael, 2024. "Heterogeneous Effects of Frontier Technology Readiness on Economic Growth in Africa," MPRA Paper 121247, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Dong-Hyeon Kim & Yi-Chen Wu & Shu-Chin Lin, 2022. "Carbon dioxide emissions, financial development and political institutions," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 837-874, May.
    9. Hou Renyong & Aman Ali Sedik, 2023. "Environmental Sustainability and Foreign Direct Investment in East Africa: Institutional and Policy Benefits for Environmental Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-22, January.
    10. Jérôme Valette, 2018. "Do Migrants Transfer Productive Knowledge Back to Their Origin Countries?," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 54(9), pages 1637-1656, September.
    11. Yanpeng Chen & Wenjun Mai, 2024. "Investor attention and environmental performance of Chinese high-tech companies: the moderating effects of media attention and coverage sentiment," Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-16, December.
    12. Kamguia, Brice & Tadadjeu, Sosson & Ndoya, Hermann & Djeunankan, Ronald, 2025. "Assessing the nexus between industrialization and inclusive green growth in Africa. The critical role of energy efficiency," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    13. Gbolonyo, Emmanuel Y. & Ofori, Isaac K. & Ojong, Nathanael, 2024. "Does Economic Complexity Promote Inclusive Green Growth," EconStor Preprints 298785, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    14. Emeka, Ekene ThankGod & Asongu, Simplice A. & Bouanza, Jean R.F.K., 2025. "Lifelong gender inclusive education, productive capacity, and governance quality in Africa," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    15. Johanna Vogel, 2015. "The two faces of R&D and human capital: Evidence from Western European regions," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 94(3), pages 525-551, August.
    16. Ofori, Isaac K. & Figari, Francesco, 2022. "Economic Globalisation and Inclusive Green Growth in Africa: Contingencies and Policy-Relevant Thresholds of Governance," MPRA Paper 114377, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Julia Püschel, 2013. "Wage effects of U.S. service offshoring by skills and tasks," FIW Working Paper series 107, FIW.
    18. Chi Yao & Yong Ma, 2025. "Financial openness, trade openness, and the size of local government: evidence from China," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 42(3), pages 625-648, October.
    19. Braunfels, Elias, 2014. "How do Political and Economic Institutions Affect Each Other?," Discussion Paper Series in Economics 19/2014, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics.
    20. Osarumwense Osabuohien-Irabor & Igor Mikhailovich Drapkin, 2022. "The Impact of Technological Innovation on Energy Consumption in OECD Economies: the role of Outward Foreign Direct Investment and International Trade Openness," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 12(4), pages 317-333, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:eneeco:v:126:y:2023:i:c:s0140988323005170. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eneco .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.