This paper investigates the impact of renewable energy sources (RESs), CO2 emissions, macroeconomics, and the political stability in a country on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The authors analyse the dynamics of RESs use, CO2 emissions, and GDP development and also test the following hypotheses: (1) The country’s economic growth is related to the energy consumption, in terms of both human resources and capital; (2) the share of the renewable energy consumption of the total energy consumption has a positive impact on the economic growth; and (3) the share of the renewable energy consumption of the total energy consumption is unrelated to the economic growth. To test the above hypotheses, the authors use the modified Cobb-Douglas production function, which also considers RES production volumes, CO2 emissions, and economic growth. The study employs data between 1995 to 2015 from the candidate and potential candidate countries for the EU membership. The data are drawn from the World Bank and Eurostat. The analyses entail panel unit root tests, Pedroni panel cointegration tests, fully modified OLS (FMOLS), dynamic OLS (DOLS) panel cointegration techniques, and the Vector Error Correction model (VECM). The findings confirm the relationship between RESs, CO2 emissions, and the GDP. For the EU countries, RESs as human resources and capital have an impact on the GDP. Moreover, the results reveal a correction retraction when the economic growth leads to an increase in renewable energy consumption. The investigation also finds that candidate and potential candidate countries for the EU membership should foster renewable energy development. The authors conclude that developing affordable and effective instruments and mechanisms to boost the RES implementation is necessary to decrease the anthropogenic impact on the environment (in particular, decreasing CO2 emissions) without any attendant reduction in the economic growth.

The paper investigates the relationships between economic, social, and environmental dimensions of sustainable development. GDP growth represents the main economic dimension, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and renewable energy consumption the environmental dimension, and corruption the social dimension of sustainable development. The investigation of these relationships is based on the concept of the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis about the non-linear relationship between economic growth and environmental pollution. The authors used the panel data of EU countries and Ukraine for 2000–2016 years from the Eurostat database. The obtained results confirmed the Environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis for the EU and Ukraine. All the indicators were statistically significant at 1% and 5% levels. The findings proved that increasing renewable energy (RE) by 1% led to a decline of GHG in the interval (0.166103, 0.220551), and аn increase of the Control of Corruption Index by 1% provoked a decline of GHG by 0.88%. The conducted study enabled the authors to conclude that Ukraine needs to increase the GDP level per capita given the economy diversification and via the introduction of more effective and “clean” production technologies.

The main purpose of this research is to study the role and impact force of macroeconomic stability on economic growth in the period from 2000 to 2016, using the modified Cobb-Douglas production function. The results of Global Competitiveness Report, published by World Economic Forum, demonstrated that at the existing level of economic growth in Ukraine the basic drivers for improvement of the country's competitiveness are necessary to be considered for building of the production function. Basing on the analysis performed, the author created odified Cobb-Douglas production function where Macroeconomic stability, openness of the economy and foreign direct investments are used as additional explanatory variables of Cobb-Douglas production function. Obtained findings indicate the high level of compliance of the built model with the initial data. Herewith, the assessment of the elasticity of macroeconomic stability is positive and statistically significant.

The overcoming of the issues on energy crisis and inequality have become the priorities as far developing as developed countries are concerned. Moreover, energy inequality has increased due to the shortage of natural gas and rising energy prices in retaliation to the economic recovery affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. This study aims to verify the linkage between the growth of renewable energy consumption and the country’s economic advancement. In this context, this paper determines the main driving forces of renewable energy consumption in European countries during 2000–2018. The annual data for panel regression analysis are retrieved from the OECD. Stat and World Bank Open Data. This empirical analysis employed a set of estimation procedures such as the panel unit root test (Levin, Lin & Chu; Im, Pesaran, Shin W-Stat; ADF-Fisher Chi-square; and PP-Fisher Chi-square methods), the Pearson correlation, fixed- and random-effects models, generalized method of moments (GMM), Hausman and the robustness tests. The results from the Hausman test ratified that the fixed-effects regression model is more suitable for involved panel balanced data. The results of fixed-effects regression and GMM identified the statistically significant and positive relationship between the share of renewable energy consumption of total final energy consumption, GDP per capita, and CO2 emissions per capita for the overall sample. In turn, the total labor force, the gross capital formation, and production-based CO2 intensity are inversely related to renewable energy consumption. The identified effects could provide some insights for policymakers to improve the renewable energy sector towards gaining sustainable economic development.

Digitalization has become a key driver of business innovation in recent years. It provides businesses with new opportunities to innovate and create value. Digital technologies, such as cloud computing, big data analytics, and artificial intelligence, have helped businesses boost the development of new products and services, optimize their operations, and improve customer engagement. This study aimed to analyze the impact of digitalization on business performance within business innovation. This study applied an ordinary least square regression model and an intermediary to explore relationship in the chain of digital capability–business model innovation–company performance. The object of investigation was 1663 listed A-share companies Shanghai and Shenzhen in the software and information technology service sectors. The results showed that digital capabilities could be divided into three dimensions according to the hierarchical relationship: (1) basic digital capabilities, (2) digital operation capabilities, and (3) digital integration capabilities, all of which significantly positively affected enterprise performance. Furthermore, while business model innovation significantly positively affected corporate performance, it was also driven by the preceding variables of digital capabilities. Business model innovation enhanced the positive impact of basic digital capabilities, digital operation capabilities, and digital integration capabilities on company’s performance. Considering the empirical results, this study underlines that the government should promote digital skills development, create supportive regulatory environments, promote access to funding for innovations, foster partnerships between businesses and technology providers, and promote collaboration between businesses, which are conducive to extending digitalization within the business innovation model and improving business performance.

The bullet point of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030 is improving of countries food security through decreasing of hungry level and providing equal conditions for food to everyone. Besides, according to the findings the issues with hungry index could be solved through developing the agricultural sector corresponding of SDGs principals. The findings showed that the agricultural sector is start point of decreasing the hungry. The authors proved the type of the political regime had impact on the efficiency of achieving of SDGs and countries’ food security. The hypothesis of investigation was checking the relationship between political profile of the countries and level of sustainable development of the agricultural sector (ASI). The assessment of the relationship between average level of ASI and countries' democratic profile (democracy level of public relations) for 28 countries of Post-Soviet bloc proved the non-existence of differences between countries with authoritarian and transitional regimes opposed to other political regimes (imperfect and full democracy). The authors allocated three segments of countries: authoritarian and transitional regimes, imperfect democracy and full-fledged democracy. The findings proved the hypothesis that democracy level had a statistically significant impact on the average level of ASI. Using the bivariate and multivariate models the authors empirically proved that the democracy level increase by 1-point leads to the increase of the target index by 0.087 points for countries with authoritarian and transitional regimes (to which Ukraine belongs). Thus, the transition to a more democratic model of the political regime will partially offset the threats to food security.

The paper deals with analysis of the preconditions of alternative energy market development in Ukraine. In this case study, the authors analyzed the EU experience. The results of analysis showed that the leader of the EU countries in renewable energy has already achieved the target (20%), which had been indicated. In addition, the findings showed that the share of renewable energy in gross final energy consumption has been increasing from year to year. The authors allocate that, according to the Ukrainian potential, biogas is the most perspective one among alternative resources. Moreover, results of analysis showed that Ukraine has the huge potential of agricultural sector. In this direction, the authors allocated the main types of the agricultural activities, which have the highest potential of biogas production: sugar factories, corn silage and poultry farms. The authors underlined that biogas spreading is restrained by the stereotypes that green investments are not attractive for investors. In order to analyze the economic efficiency of investments to the biogas installation, the authors calculated the profit from the biogas installation for poultry farm. The authors made two scenarios for calculation. The first -the whole volume of energy, which was generated from the biogas unit, will be sold with feed-in tariff. The second -the farm covers its own needs in electricity, the rest will be sold with feed-in tariff. The findings showed that the first scenario is more attractive. Moreover, the farm could receive higher profit if it installed the biogas in 2016, not in 2017. In addition, based on the EU experience and features of farm functioning, the authors approved that the biogas installation has not only the economic effect (profit and additional profit) for company, but also ecological and social effects for rural area, where this farm was located.

AUTHORSOleksii Lyulyov https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4865-7306 Hanna Shvindina ARTICLE INFOOleksii Lyulyov and Hanna Shvindina (2017) AbstractThe problem of instability of industries, clusters and states influences the countries' economies. Unavoidable changes became an attribute of the strategic planning at every level. As a result, an effective tool is needed to evaluate stability at different levels in such a way that will make it possible to manage the changes. In this paper the concept of Macroeconomic Stabilization Pentagon (MSP) was analyzed for its applicability for the EU countries of low-an-middle-income economies including Ukraine. The data analysis brought new understanding of the assessment of the public policies' effectiveness. The model has proven its efficiency not just in the sphere of public administration, but also for the micro level management. The authors proposed the Microeconomic Stabilization Pentagon to be implemented in the research at the level of enterprises.