The Effects of Climate Change and Technological Advancement on Economic Recovery in Sub‐Saharan Africa
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: ABSTRACT Sub‐saharan Africa's (SSA) economy is slowly recovering from the COVID‐19 pandemic, which has led to a global economic slowdown. This study aims to investigate whether climate change factors, such as temperature and carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions along with technological innovation (measured by total patent applications) can predict the economic recovery of 19 selected SSA countries from 2000 to 2022. To address this study gap, we use the kernel‐based regularized least squares (KRLS) regression not previously applied in studies examining these relationships. We account for financial development, human capital, and inflation rates in the model to enhance the analysis. KRLS is well‐suited for this study as it can handle nonlinearity, cross‐sectional dependency, reduce misspecification bias, address model overfitting, and consider variable heterogeneity. Our results show that climate change has a negative and considerable effect on SSA's economic recovery. Specifically, a 1% rise on average annual surface temperature change and CO 2 emissions corresponds to a 0.17% and 0.15% decrease in economic recovery, respectively, indicating that climate change is impeding recovery efforts. Conversely, a 1% rise on average technological innovation is linked with a 0.18% increase in economic recovery (GDP). Policy recommendations should focus on reinforcing technological innovation strategies in SSA to foster higher and more sustainable economic growth, while implementing measures to mitigate surface temperature changes and CO 2 emissions to safeguard the economy from climate‐related harm. We delve into the mechanisms through which technological innovation and climate change affect the SSA economy, proposing actionable policy insights.
Source: World Affairs
DOI: 10.1002/waf2.12075
Authors: Mwoya Byaro, Anicet Rwezaula
Institution: Institute of Rural Development Planning
Language: English
Subfield: Economics and Econometrics
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W4410040189