This study examines the impact of institutional quality on foreign direct investment (F.D.I.) by categorising the countries as developed or developing. We measured institutional quality by the sum of control of corruption and rule of law indicators. We provide evidence that institutional quality positively and significantly impacts F.D.I. in developed countries; specifically, we find that a one standard deviation change in governance significantly affects F.D.I. by a factor of 0.2225 (using common law and the lagged values of the independent variables as instruments). Ceteris paribus, the results for the developing countries demonstrate that the institutional quality impact is insignificant because of the weak structure of institutions. Result findings strongly support the significance of governance indicators in attracting F.D.I. inflows. From our results, we infer that the relevance of governance indicators tends to be a key point in attracting F.D.I. inflows.

This paper examines the relationship between outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) and domestic investment (DI) in China using cointegration and Granger causality analyses (including bivariate and multivariate Granger causality models). The results suggest that the conclusions drawn from a bivariate model may not be valid because of the omission of important control variables. The results of the multivariate model show that there is a positive long-run unidirectional causal relationship running from OFDI to DI In the short run, DI and OFDI do not show Granger causality.

Due to China’s massive usage of fossil fuels, climate change concerns have become serious challenges to the country’s sustainable development. Despite the fact that China has effectively employed solar technology to address these problems, there is a paucity of research examining consumers’ intention to adopt solar energy in the rural region of China. This study intends to fill this gap in the literature by studying consumers’ buying intentions for solar energy in rural China for household purposes. Additionally, the study added to the theory of planned behavior by adding three new variables, namely, environmental knowledge, environmental concern, and beliefs about the benefits of solar energy. Primary data were collected from 847 respondents in Hebei Province using a comprehensive questionnaire survey. Structural equation modeling was employed to examine the data. Empirical results revealed that attitude, environmental knowledge, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control, and beliefs about the benefits of solar energy positively influence buying intention of solar energy. On the contrary, environmental concern had no significant effect on buying intention for solar energy. Study outcomes emphasize the critical significance of changing societal norms, boosting consumer awareness, redesigning regulatory mechanisms, and stressing the benefits provided by solar power through coherent and persistent efforts while simultaneously enhancing environmental sustainability practices.

This empirical study has examined the impact of Chinese investments, namely infrastructure, energy, services, other investment sectors, and trade openness on the economies of the 25 Asian and North African countries along with the Belt and Road (B&R) Initiative for a period of 2007 to 2016 using the Johansen Fisher Panel Cointegration Test, Panel Dynamic Ordinary Least Squares (PDOLS) model, and the Toda and Yamamoto technique for testing causality. The findings revealed cointegration among the variables and that the impact of Chinese investments on economic growth in the host countries is positive, but it has a weaker effect, to a certain extent, in all sectors of the host countries while trade openness positively impacts the countries. Furthermore, there is evidence of a unidirectional causality between some FDI (foreign direct investment) economies while the investment in services and other sectors does not cause economic growth in the host countries. Based on the results, the paper proposes that the host countries increase the FDI in the sector of infrastructure, energy, and technology to enhance their economies.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions have been the key source of extreme environmental degradation and have an adverse impact on climate and human activities. Although a large number of studies have explored the determinants of CO2 emissions, the role of institutional quality has not been fully studied. Our study contributes to the existing literature by examining the influence of financial development, institutional quality, foreign direct investment, trade openness, urbanization, and renewable energy consumption on CO2 emissions over the period 1996–2020 by utilizing the dynamic autoregressive distributed lag simulations. The empirical findings of the study indicate that the indicators of governance, trade, financial development, and renewable energy consumption adversely affect CO2 emissions, while urbanization and foreign direct investment contribute to environmental degradation. The empirical results of this study indicate that in order to mitigate environmental degradation and to achieve environmental sustainability, the government should establish consistency between environmental and economic policies. Moreover, in order to achieve low carbon emissions and sustainable development, countries need viable financial institutions that focus on green growth by promoting clean production process strategies to ensure the reduction of CO2 emissions.