School of Management, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang City, Jiangsu Province, P.R. China.
School of Management, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei City, Anhui Province, P.R. China.
Environ Sci Pollut Res Int. 2023 Aug;30(37):87028-87048. doi: 10.1007/s11356-023-28548-z. Epub 2023 Jul 7.
This paper investigates the factors driving food security in West African countries. Specifically, it examines the impact of natural resource rents, institutional quality, and climate change on food security while controlling for industrialization and economic growth. Our research is motivated by the urgent need for swift policy action to address the escalating food crisis in the region and prevent any potential catastrophic consequences. Second-generation econometric techniques are utilized for accurate and reliable outcomes based on yearly datasets from West African countries from 2000 to 2020, and the countries are sub-grouped into low-income and lower-middle-income. The findings unveil the panel as heterogeneous and cross-sectionally based, and all the study variables are first differenced stationary and co-integrated in the long run. Hence, the Augmented Mean Group and Common Correlated Effects Mean Group estimators are utilized to explore the relationships between the variables, and the findings reveal that natural resource rents, climate change, and industrialization are detrimental to food security across the sub-groups. However, the outcomes affirm institutional quality and economic growth as beneficial drivers of food security across the sub-groups. Therefore, this study recommends that authorities of both low-income and lower-middle-income countries make substantial investments in sustainable natural resource utilization and also work towards enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of their institutions, as well as investing in environmental research to explore climate change mitigation possibilities that could enhance food security in West Africa.
本文探讨了推动西非国家食品安全的因素。具体而言，本文考察了自然资源租金、制度质量和气候变化对食品安全的影响，同时控制了工业化和经济增长。我们的研究旨在为解决该地区不断升级的粮食危机和防止任何潜在的灾难性后果提供迅速的政策行动。基于 2000 年至 2020 年西非国家的年度数据集，使用第二代计量经济学技术来获得准确和可靠的结果，并将这些国家分为低收入和中下收入两类。研究结果表明，面板具有异质性和横截面基础，所有研究变量在短期内都是一阶差分平稳且长期内是协整的。因此，使用了广义均值组和共同相关效应均值组估计量来探讨变量之间的关系，研究结果表明，自然资源租金、气候变化和工业化对低收入和中下收入国家的食品安全都有不利影响。然而，结果肯定了制度质量和经济增长是这些国家食品安全的有益驱动因素。因此，本研究建议低收入和中下收入国家的当局在可持续自然资源利用方面进行大量投资，并努力提高其机构的效率和效果，同时投资于环境研究，以探索减轻气候变化的可能性，从而提高西非的食品安全。
