Impact of natural resources, trade openness, and economic growth on CO2 emissions in oil‐exporting countries: A panel autoregressive distributed lag analysis

This study explores the impact of natural resource exploitation, trade openness, and economic growth on carbon emissions in a sample of oil‐exporting nations for the period 1971–2014. To examine this relationship, we used the panel autoregressive distributed lag model and a set of econometric techniques accounting for cross‐sectional dependence. Our results indicate that the exploitation of natural resources and trade openness have a long‐term negative impact on environmental quality. Furthermore, our analysis confirms the validity of the Kuznets Environmental Curve for oil‐exporting countries. An assessment of causality reveals a bidirectional link between natural resources, economic growth, and CO2 emissions, as well as a unidirectional link between trade openness and CO2 emissions. In the light of our findings, appropriate policies could include the imposition of more stringent regulations on the exploitation of natural resources, the application of taxes on carbon emissions, and the promotion of clean and renewable technologies. Greater international cooperation is also needed to address these environmental issues on a global scale.