Empirical evidence on the conditional effects of migrant remittances on environmental quality in West Africa: A cross-sectional autoregressive distributed lag model

Abstract

This research aims to analyze the conditional effects of migrant remittances on environmental quality, highlighting the crucial role of urbanization and primary energy consumption. This research adopts a dual perspective, using both the ecological footprint and the carbon footprint to assess these effects. The empirical analysis is based on an annual panel dataset of 09 West African countries, covering the period 1985 to 2023. The results obtained using the CS-ARDL, AMG, and Lewbel estimators reveal a negligible effect of migrant remittances on environmental quality. However, quantile regressions show significant effects in countries with the highest ecological footprint levels (50th, 75th, and 95th quantiles). Furthermore, the results indicate that an increase in migrant remittances exacerbates the negative effects of urbanization on the ecological footprint. Looking at the energy channel, the results indicate that these funds deteriorate the ecological footprint through the consumption of non-renewable energy. The renewable energy consumption channel reveals a negligible effect on the ecological footprint. However, these results diverge if we consider the carbon footprint as an indicator of environmental quality. These results call on policy makers to recognize the potential of migrant remittances for sustainable development by integrating an environmental dimension into their management, necessitating sustainable urban planning and an accelerated energy transition to mitigate environmental effects.