Reza Sultanuzzaman

This study investigates the determinants of green energy penetration in the Next Eleven (N-11) economies over the period 2000–2022, with a particular focus on the roles of foreign direct investment (FDI), green transition, governance quality, industrial growth, and urbanization. The primary objective of the study is to assess how investment flows, structural transformation, and institutional capacity jointly shape the adoption of renewable energy in fast-growing emerging economies. To achieve this goal, the study employs a second-generation panel econometric and machine-learning framework that accounts for cross-sectional dependence, slope heterogeneity, and long-run equilibrium relationships. Specifically, cross-sectional dependence and slope homogeneity tests are conducted, followed by CADF and CIPS unit root tests and the Westerlund cointegration approach. Long-run effects are then estimated using Partialing-Out LASSO and Cross-Fit machine-learning estimators, complemented by SHAP analysis to interpret nonlinear and heterogeneous effects. The results indicate that green transition, governance quality, and urbanization significantly promote green energy penetration. In contrast, FDI and industrial growth exert adverse effects, reflecting carbon-intensive investment and production structures. The findings highlight the importance of coordinated investment strategies, institutional strengthening, and urban planning in accelerating renewable energy transitions in emerging economies. These results provide policy-relevant insights for achieving sustainable energy development while supporting long-term economic growth in the N-11 countries.

This study explores the impact of Monetary Policy Uncertainty (MPU) on Agricultural Climate Risk (AGCR) in China, particularly in light of recent climate vulnerabilities in the agricultural sector, highlighted by recent floods. Using balanced panel data from 31 provinces between 2010 and 2022, diagnostic tests confirm cross-sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity, and the Westerlund cointegration test indicates a long-term relationship among variables. Results from generalized panel quantile regression show that MPU positively affects AGCR, especially at lower quantiles, but this effect can be moderated by agricultural insurance. The findings also confirm an agricultural Kuznets curve, where agricultural productivity initially increases AGCR before reaching a turning point that reduces it. Furthermore, a unidirectional causality flows from MPU to AGCR, while a bidirectional causality exists between AGCR and productivity, underscoring the need for targeted resilience strategies for vulnerable provinces.

Bangladesh, a lower-middle-income country in South Asia and expected to be a developing country by 2024, is one of the most densely populated countries in the world, with 166.30 million (WDI, 2021) people. Foreign Aid (FA) plays a vital role in the economic development of Bangladesh. Foreign Aid, loans, and grants generally, which we call Official Development Assistance (ODA) (in this study, we have used the term 'Foreign aid') have increased gradually over the years after the liberation of Bangladesh with the increase of per capita GDP. In our study, we have conducted a single country investigation on Bangladesh and examined the impact of Foreign Aid on the Economic growth of Bangladesh from 1971 to 2019. The ARDL bounds test methodology was applied in the study, followed by the unit root test and the bound test for cointegration. Several diagnostic tests were conducted to check the stability and reliability of the model. The obtained results revealed that Foreign Aid has a significant and positive impact on the Economic growth of Bangladesh in the long- and short-run. The coefficients of the variables of our study refer that a 1(one) unit increase in foreign Aid would intensify 0.24 units of Economic growth in Bangladesh. In line with Foreign Aid, Gross capital formation also has a significant positive impact on the country's economic development. On the contrary, trade openness has a negative but insignificant impact both in the short and long run. Besides, population growth negatively and significantly impacts economic growth in the long run. In this study, finally, we have recommended some policy implications for the Government of Bangladesh.

In the arena of economic analysis, the wealth of a nation is getting more and more attention to be a better indicator to evaluate the status of an economy. This paper had studied the aggregate household wealth of different nations of the world, 106 countries, for the year 2009-2018. During these years, only two countries of the world, China and the USA have managed to increase their wealth tremendously over the last decade while others experienced a slow pace in the growth of wealth. To satisfy the query of how efficient these countries were in maximizing their wealth, a stochastic frontier approach (SFA) has been used to predict the technical efficiency dependent variable and then generalized methods of moments (GMM) and other models have been used to find out the determinants of this efficiency. The study had come up with the result that land, labor, and capital mainly contributed to the output of wealth maximization while past year level of efficiency, export, and import played the main roles in determining the wealth maximizing efficiency status of a nation. It is found that there is a negative relationship between past-year efficiency with current years and the more a country imports, the less efficient the country is while the more it exports, the more efficient the country is in maximizing wealth.