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Since there is only one planet available for humanity, efforts are being made from different quarters to ensure its sustainability. One of such efforts is the enactment of environmental regulations (ER). The effectiveness of such regulations in mitigating pollution is shrewd in obscurity, especially in developing/emerging economies. This study focuses on the impact of ER, trade, economic growth, and energy consumption on the ecological footprint (EF) in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries using advanced panel data econometric techniques that consider heterogeneity and crosssectional dependence. Thus, we applied second-generation unit root tests to explore the unit root properties of the variables. To examine cointegration between the variables, we apply the Westerlund's (Westerlund, Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, 2007, 69, 709-748) approach. The empirical results show the presence of cross-sectional dependence and cointegration between EF and its determinants.Further findings confirm that ER has no significant influence on EF. This suggests that ER in MENA is not yet at a desirable level where it can effectively enhance environmental sustainability. ER contributes to maintaining environmental quality (significantly) only in Bahrain and Israel. Trade, economic growth, and energy consumption increase EF. The causality test reveals that economic growth is actually energy dependent in MENA. The directions for future research have been proposed. The limitations of the study and relevant policy directions are highlighted. | INTRODUCTIONEnvironmental issues have raised so much concern all over the world as no country is immune to the menace associated with climate change. When production and consumption pattern are not sustainable, the consequences are environmental pollution, land degradation, climate change, ozone depletion, and loss of biodiversity (Ahmed,

Large scale development of tight oil resources in the USA started after 2010 with a following fi ve-year period of favourable steady increase in crude oil price. During this relatively short expansion cycle, operating and capital expenses changed drastically for main tight oil plays due to technological improvements in both well drilling and completion, the expansion of the service sector as well as the loose government monetary policy which allowed favourable fi nancing. This paper analysed trends in costs during the expansion period, as well as the correlation of oil price to a number of operating rigs and production quotas. After 2008/2009, the world fi nancial crisis economy recovery in the USA was somewhat sluggish and it caused an extremely volatile environment in both equity and commodity markets. In such a volatile environment intraday crude oil prices, as well as other commodities and equities, show a signifi cant reaction to monthly published macroeconomic indicator reports, which give better overviews of trends in economic recovery. Prior to the announcement , these reports have always forecasted value determined by a consensus among market analysts. Therefore, any positive or negative surprise in real value tends to infl uence the price of oil. This paper investigated the infl uence of such macroeconomic reports to closing intraday oil price, as well as the eff ect of other important daily market indices. Analysis showed that only the Producer Price Index (PPI), among other indicators, has a statistical signifi cance of aff ecting intraday closing oil price.

This paper explores the relationship among trade openness, economic growth and poverty level in 40 sub-Saharan Africa countries from 1990 to 2017. Panel Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model, Panel Vector Auto-regression (VAR) and the System of Generalised Method of Moments (SYS-GMM) were employed. A robustness test was also applied. The sensitivity analysis was done through the Panel ARDL model. The results revealed that trade openness, foreign direct investment and institutional quality significantly increase economic growth in the long term, while institutional quality reduces economic growth in the short run. Furthermore, trade liberalisation, institutional quality and population growth rate lead to poverty reduction in the long run, while trade openness has adverse effects in the short run. Moreover, poverty does not have a significant response to trade and growth shocks. Poverty presented a positive change but the level was not significant. The Pairwise Dumitrescu Hurlin Panel Causality results highlight feedback effects among trade, economic growth and poverty level in the region. Based on these findings, the study recommends that governments in Africa should reviewed their poverty reduction programmes in order to move towards achieving the sustainable development goals.

Fiscal policy in oil-centred economies is facing specific challenges, both in the long run, as regards intergenerational equity and fiscal sustainability, and in the short run, as regards macroeconomic stabilisation and fiscal planning. Specifically, fiscal policy in most oil-exporting countries in Africa has been expansionary over the past years in the wake of high oil prices. Fiscal expansion has added to inflationary pressure, and monetary policy has been constrained in tackling inflation as a result of prevailing exchange rate regimes. The sharp fall in oil prices since mid-2008 has brought to the fore a different question-whether oil exporters in Africa can sustain spending levels reached in previous years. The study makes use of quarterly data that span between 1990:q1 and 2010:q4. A panel vector autoregressive technique was employed to examine the impact of oil price volatility on economic performance of five oil-exporting countries in Africa. The countries are Algeria, Angola, Egypt, Libya and Nigeria. In order to study the responses of shocks, the study identifies oil price volatility, real gross domestic product (real GDP), fiscal deficit, gross investment and money supply shocks by ordering the variables in this way and using a standard Choleski factorisation. The impulse response function's result shows that of all the macroeconomic variables considered, gross investment respond more effectively to oil price volatility. However, the responses of fiscal deficit, real GDP and money supply are less effective. Overall, these findings suggest that gross investment is the main route through which volatility in oil price influenced the real sector of these economies.