تقاضای انرژی و رشد اقتصادی: تجربه آفریقایی
کد مقاله | سال انتشار | تعداد صفحات مقاله انگلیسی |
---|---|---|
12124 | 2005 | 13 صفحه PDF |
Publisher : Elsevier - Science Direct (الزویر - ساینس دایرکت)
Journal : Journal of Policy Modeling, Volume 27, Issue 8, November 2005, Pages 891–903
چکیده انگلیسی
The paper investigates the long run relationship between energy use per capita and per capita real gross domestic product (GDP) for 19 African countries for the period 1971–2001 using a newly developed cointegration test proposed by [Pesaran, M. H., Shin, Y, & Smith, R. (2001). Bounds testing approach to the analysis of level relationships. Jounal of Applied Econometrics, 16, 289–325], which is capable of testing for the existence of a long run relationship regardless of whether the underlying time series are individually I(0), I(1) or mutually cointegrated. The paper also uses the [Toda, H. Y., & Yamamoto, T. (1995). Statistical inference in vector autoregressions with possibly integrated process. Jounal of Econometrics, 66, 225–250] version of the Granger causality test which is valid regardless of whether a series is I(0), I(1) or I(2), non-cointegrated or cointegrated of any arbitrary order. The empirical evidence shows that there was a long run relationship between the two series for only eight countries and causality for only 10 countries.
مقدمه انگلیسی
Despite the fact that Africa has been endowed with the widest possible range of energy resources, that far exceed its energy requirements, Africa's power sector remains severely underdeveloped in all countries and energy consumption in general and electricity consumption in particular is relatively very low (Karekezi & Kimani, 2002 and Economic Commission for Africa, ECA, 2004). The average African is still using less energy than the average person used energy in England more than a century ago (Davidson & Sokona, 2002). Per capita use of primary energy in North America was 280 GJ in 2000, more than 11 times as much as used by an average Sub-Saharan African, who used 25 GJ that year when both commercial and non-commercial energy was included (UNDP, 2004). The disparity in energy consumption let alone between Africa and the rest of the world even among African countries themselves is glaring. It ranges from as low as 262 kg of oil equivalent per capita in Uganda to as high as 1332 in Gabon (World Bank, 2004). With only 23% of its population electrified compared to the world average of 73%, Africa has the lowest electrification rate of any major world region (IEA, 2002). More than 500 million Africans are still without access to electricity. To make matters still worse, while the world electricity per capita consumption has been rising steadily over the past three decades, Sub-Saharan Africa's per capital electricity consumption has been stagnant. In fact, the electricity per capital consumption of Sub-Saharan African countries (excluding South Africa) declined from 132.6 kWh in 1980 to 112.8 kWh in 2000 (World Bank, 2004). To aggravate the problem further, less than 10% of the Sub-Saharan Africa population has access to electricity with electricity largely confined to the energy-intensive sub-sector of the commercial and industrial enterprises and to the high-income households while the electrification of the rural and urban poor is ‘woefully inadequate’ or non-existent (Karekezi, 2002). The number of people without electricity in Africa has doubled in rural areas and tripled in urban areas in the last 30 years (IEA, 2002). Most of the people without access to electricity in 2030 will still be in Sub-Saharan Africa (650 million) and South Asia (680 million) (IEA, 2002) with the population of Sub-Saharan Africa without electricity increasing steadily until 2025. It is estimated that at the rate of connections of the past decade, it would take more than 40 years to electrify South Asia and almost twice as long for Sub-Saharan Africa (IEA, 2002). Further, if the transition to modern fuels is usually complete by the time per capita income reaches US$ 1000–1500 (Toman & Jemelkova, 2003), many Sub-Sahara Africa countries have a long way to go and access to modern energy for the poor, to borrow words from Karekezi and Kimani (2002), is a dream that is unlikely to be realised in the near future.1 While the availability of modern energy is not by itself a panacea for the economic and social problems facing Africa, the supply of modern energy is nevertheless believed to be a necessary requirement for Africa's economic and social development (IEA, 2002). Electricity and other modern energy sources are necessary requirements for economic and social development (IEA, 2002). “No country in the world has succeeded in shaking loose from subsistence economy without access to the services of modern energy provides” (World Bank, n.d.). Apart from the physical availability of energy, change in the quality of energy service is one of the most important drivers of economic productivity (see Toman & Jemelkova, 2003). The process of economic development necessarily involves a transition from low levels of energy consumption to higher levels where the linkages among energy, other factor inputs and economic activity change significantly as an economy moves through different stages of development (see Toman & Jemelkova, 2003). Furthermore, as the economy progresses, commercial fossil fuels and ultimately electricity becomes predominant (see Toman & Jemelkova, 2003). Thus, although currently Sub-Saharan African countries consume a mere fraction of the energy consumed by industrial countries, rapid urbanisation combined with economic growth is likely to accelerate the energy transition from traditional to commercial energy use (Ebohon, Field, & Pugh, 2000; IEA, 2002). It is now widely accepted that if Sub-Saharan African countries are to pursue sustained economic growth which is vital to their efforts of eradicating poverty and social development, the availability of financially feasible, reliable and efficient supply of modern energy, including electricity is crucial (Turkson & Wohlgemuth, 2001; ECA, 2004). Further, the expansion of modern energy supply is important for Sub-Saharan Africa in order to minimise the consumption of traditional fuel (biomass) that has been responsible for the massive deforestation, desertification and the health problems associated with wood fuel and charcoal consumption (IEA, 2002). The exploitation of Africa's energy potential and the making efficient of Africa's existing supply and use of energy can not only minimise the vagaries of depending on imported energy but also can save Africa badly needed foreign exchange. The ubiquitous power restructuring that is currently taking place in many African countries is part of the process of the recognition that the quality and quantity of modern power supply can play a pivotal role in Africa's social and economic development.2 Implicit in this restructuring process is the assumption that investment in modern energy and the drive towards making the modern energy sector more efficient can promote economic growth. Therefore, knowledge of the direction of causality between energy consumption and economic growth is of prime importance if appropriate energy policies and energy conservation measures are to be devised. Central to the debate is whether energy consumption stimulates, retards or is neutral to economic growth. Some argue that modern energy use is a prerequisite for economic, social and technological progress where it complements labour and capital in the production process (see, Dunkerley, 1982; Ebohon, 1996 and Templet, 1999). For the proponents of the above hypothesis, lack of energy is a limiting factor to economic growth and technological progress. They believe that modern energy and in particular electricity has been a major source of betterment of the standard of living of advanced countries and has played a crucial role in the technological and scientific advancement of these countries (see Rosenberg, 1998). Even in poor countries, it has been found out that the use of electricity is associated with improving the health and educational standards of the poor (IEA, 2002). At the individual level, research shows that electricity service appears to be one of the most important services for improving the welfare of the poor (IEA, 2002). At the national level, in this era of the digital economy, it is really difficult to envisage development without the use of modern energy and in particular electricity. Further, the evidence suggests that good and reliable energy infrastructure is a prerequisite for export diversification and sustained growth but the inability of many African countries to provide good and adequate energy services has been a major constraint for their export diversification and growth (ECA, 2004). Others however, contend that the role of energy is minimal or is neutral to economic growth. This is because the cost of energy is very small as a proportion of GDP and thus energy consumption is not likely to have a significant impact on output growth. Moreover, they argue that as the economy grows, its production structure is likely to shift to the service sector that is less energy intensive relative to industrial sector (see Ghali & El-Saka, 2004). This however, may not be true for the electricity sector as the evidence from the US experience suggests that the US economy is becoming simultaneously less energy intensive but more electricity intensive (Rosenberg, 1998). The above contrasting hypotheses have motivated many researchers to seek the direction of causality between energy consumption and economic development. The empirical evidence is mixed ranging from bi- and uni-directional causality to no causality (see Chontanawat, Hunt, & Pierce, 2004; Fatai, Oxley, & Scrimgeour, 2004; Ghali & El-Saka, 2004; Jumbe, 2004; Wolde-Rufael, 2004). These conflicting evidences have major implications for energy policy. If there is a uni-directional causality running from energy consumption to economic growth, reducing energy consumption could lead to a fall in economic growth (see Asafu-Adjaye, 2000). In contrast, if there is a uni-directional causality running from economic growth to energy consumption, it could imply that policies for reducing energy consumption may be implemented with little or no adverse effect on economic growth. On the other hand, if there is no causality running in any direction between energy consumption and income, reducing energy consumption may not affect income and energy conservation policies may not affect economic growth. In contrast, if there is a bi-directional causality, economic growth may demand more energy while more energy use may induce economic growth; energy consumption and economic growth complement each other and energy conservation measures may negatively affect economic growth (see Asafu-Adjaye, 2000, Jumbe, 2004 and Wolde-Rufael, 2004). The diversity of the empirical findings together with the important role energy plays in economic development not only necessitates further research but also new methodologies for testing the relationship. In addition, despite the burgeoning literature on the study of causality between energy consumption and economic growth, there are not many time series studies concerning African countries (see Ebohon, 1996, Jumbe, 2004 and Wolde-Rufael, in press).3 One of the purposes of this paper is therefore to fill this gap by attempting to extend the energy economic growth nexus literature into two ways. First, we test for long run relationship for 19 African countries using the newly developed cointegration test due to Pesaran et al. (2001). Second, we examine causality using a modified version of the Granger causality test proposed by Toda and Yamamoto (1995). With these objectives in mind, the paper is organised as follows. An outline of the methodology is presented in Section 2 followed by the empirical evidence in Section 3. Some concluding remarks are outlined in Section 4.
نتیجه گیری انگلیسی
In this paper a recently developed cointegration test and a modified version of the Granger causality test were applied to investigate the long run and causal relationship between real GDP per capita and energy use per capita for 19 African countries for the period 1971–2001. This paper did not provide a definite stand on the existence or non-existence a long run nor a causal relationship between energy consumption and economic growth; but our results show the following: there was evidence of a long run relationship for only eight of the 19 countries and causality for 12 countries. Broadly speaking, our results are as mixed as the other results in the literature: (1) past values of economic growth have a predictive ability in determining present values of energy consumption in some countries, (2) past values of energy consumption have a predictive ability in determining present values of economic growth; (3) there was feedback in some African countries and (4) there was a lack of causal relationship for other countries. What the evidence may suggest is that there may be a number of factors at work that differ significantly across countries that account for the different directions of causality detected in this paper. Finding some of these factors that can help to explain this disparity may be another line of inquiry that can help us to understand the relationship between energy consumption and economic development. It is also important to note that the results of this study should be interpreted with care, as energy used here may not reflect the total energy used in these countries. Energy related problems are and will be among the crucial policy issues facing all Sub-Saharan African countries. Poverty and modern energy use may be intrinsically related and solving the energy needs of the poor will be crucial both for poverty alleviation and for saving Africa from environmental disasters. A major challenge facing many African countries is how to overcome the lack of access to modern energy services by the vast majority of their population. Lack of access to modern energy is a major obstacle to tackling poverty and sustainable development. Improved access to modern energy would not only improve the standard of living of the substantial majority of Sub-Saharan African population but can also boost overall industrial and agricultural development. Africa’s inability to take-off into sustained growth is to a large extent is attributed to the continent’s inability to invest in infrastructure including energy but also to the continent’s inability to use energy efficiently. Scarcity of energy supply is not the fundamental problem Sub-Saharan Africa is facing but its management is. Africa’s problem is not lack of energy resource but its development and utilisation. It is encouraging to see Africa is trying to make strides in restructuring its power sector industry with the view to making this sector efficient and accessible. It hoped that this restructuring which seems to be pervasive in many African countries could encourage and attract domestic and foreign capital to exploit Africa's immense energy potential. However, without a well though energy strategy that tackles the fundamental constraints that are restraining the development of an efficient energy sector such as energy pricing and the role of the state the talk about making energy as an harbinger of change in Africa’s economic development and social development may not materialise in the near future.