Intraindustry Trade and the Environment: Is There a Selection Effect?

Replaced with revised version of paper 08/06/10.Environment, Trade, Monopolistic Competition, Selection effect, Environmental quality, Panel data, OECD, Pollution, Environmental Economics and Policy, International Development, International Relations/Trade, Q56, Q51, Q53, Q58, F12, F18,

Relationship between environmental regulation and the volume of import in OECD countries

The Pollution Haven Hypothesis (PHH) is now the concern of various parties. The migration and growth of dirty industries will cause the occurrence of massive pollution resulting in the occurrence of unlimited environmental pollution that will affect not only human health, but also the economic activities of a country that needs to be emphasized. Therefore, this study examines the relationship between environmental regulation and the volume of imports whether the migration of developed countries to developing countries or third countries occurs to the destination country or vice versa. By using panel data, involving OECD countries from 2002 to 2020 and the fixed effect test applied, the results indicate that there has a negative relationship between the volume of imports and environmental regulation. The study proves that environmental regulation is influenced by the volume of imports. It can be concluded that there is the existence of PHH in OECD countries. By tightening the environmental laws will be able to prevent excessive pollution

Demystifying the Issue of House Affordability in Malaysia: The Bi-Directional Relationship Between House Prices, Economic Growth, and Income Inequality

To understand the issue of house affordability in Malaysia, this study investigated the relationship between house prices and economic growth based on the data from the year 2000 to 2020. By utilizing the Toda-Yamamoto Granger causality test, it is identified that the relationship between the variables is bidirectional where house price movement is explained by economic growth. It implies that economic development drives house prices upward in the country. Conversely, the level of economic growth is also determined by house prices, and this clarifies the significant role of the housing market in stimulating the economy. The analysis also indicates that there is a mutual interaction between house prices and income inequality. Although the increase in house prices leads to higher economic growth, the rise in aggregate income that comes with it is enjoyed mainly by the top income earners of society. These findings are important for policymakers in addressing the issue of house affordability since it suggests that the issue of house affordability is partly contributed by income disparity. Since house price moves together with economic development, houses in Malaysia should remain affordable as long as income disparity is lessened if not diminished by ensuring that the economic prosperity is equally distributed among the society

Kes perniagaan Sabah : kajian intensification of research in priority areas (lRPA)

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Achieving sustainable development goals in small and medium companies in Malaysia

This paper presents findings on the firm’s efforts to achieve sustainable development goals in its operations. A survey of small and medium sized manufacturing firms elicited responses from 67 companies on questions encompassing the seventeen sustainable development goals as defined by the United Nations. Small and medium sized Malaysian companies in the states of Johor, Kedah, Kelantan, Melaka, Negeri Sembilan, Perak, Pulau Pinang, Selangor and the federal territory of Kuala Lumpur were surveyed in the year 2019. This paper presents results on eight of the seventeen sustainable development goals, namely, the goals to end poverty, end hunger, ensure healthy lives, ensure inclusive education, ensure access to sustainable energy, ensure sustainable development, take urgent actions to combat climate change, protect terrestrial ecosystem, and strengthen global partnerships to achieve goals. Results based on descriptive analysis show that most of the surveyed firms have yet to achieve progress in the listed sustainable development goals. As Malaysia is a developing country, these results may be consistent with the country’s economic development path that prioritise the attainment of higher income growth

Do small and medium companies in Malaysia prioritise sustainable development goals?

Sustainable development goals of the 2030 agenda adopted by the United Nation are intended as a shared blueprint for developing and developed countries to achieve sustainable development that brings peace and prosperity to all nations now and into the future. The 17 sustainable development goals include targeted objectives of achieving zero poverty, zero hunger, good health and well-being, quality education, gender equality, and clean water and sanitation. This paper presents the results of a survey of 67 small and medium sized Malaysian companies on the progress they are making towards achieving the goals of sustainable development. Our findings show that companies are making some progress on the desired outcome of attaining the 17 sustainable development goals. However, greater effort is required for sufficient progress to achieve the goals. Such effort implies the requisite to prioritize sustainable development goals in the firm’s business actions and practices. There is a need to increase awareness of the importance of the sustainable development goals to achieve the 2030 agenda as set by the global community

The service sector and carbon emission nexus: revisiting environmental Kuznets curve

This study aims to examine the expansion effects of the service sector on the carbon emission in a dynamic nonlinear model. Using data of 34 Asian countries ranging from 1990 to 2016, this study adopts non-linear model of the Environmental Kuznets Curve and the GMM estimator. The finding provides evidence of an N-shape association between the service sector and carbon emission which indicates that the growth of the service sector fails to reduce the carbon emission perpetually. The elasticity of urbanisation and trade openness are found to be positive which indicates that an increase in urbanisation and trade openness significantly intensifies carbon emission. Meanwhile, an increase in the ageing population tends to mitigate carbon emission in Asian countries. This current study facilitates the understanding of the impact of the services sector on carbon emission as well providing a solid ground in designing a policy that incorporates the environmental standard in line with increased economic growth

The effects of capital account liberalization and macroeconomic factors on firm-level stock returns volatilty in Malaysia

There are a number of research that have analysed the impact of financial liberalisation and macroeconomic factors on stock returns volatility. However, the results have been somewhat mixed. In the case of Malaysia, the current research estimates volatility using an EGARCH model where risk factors of stock returns are defined based on CAPM. Using dynamic panel data analysis from the years 1995 to 2013, our results suggest that interest rate has a positive relationship with stock returns volatility. In addition, economic development and exchange rate are found to have negative relationships with volatility. On the other hand, Consumer Price Index and money supply are found to be not statistically significant in influencing volatility. Further, the effect of capital account liberalisation is mixed, and dependent on the liberalisation indices used to measure liberalisation

The service sector and carbon emission nexus: revisiting Environmental Kuznets Curve

This study aims to examine the expansion effects of the service sector on the carbon emission in a dynamic non-linear model. Using data of 34 Asian countries ranging from 1990 to 2016, this study adopts non-linear model of the Environmental Kuznets Curve and the GMM estimator. The finding provides evidence of an N-shape association between the service sector and carbon emission which indicates that the growth of the service sector fails to reduce the carbon emission perpetually. The elasticity of urbanisation and trade openness are found to be positive which indicates that an increase in urbanisation and trade openness significantly intensifies carbon emission. Meanwhile, an increase in the ageing population tends to mitigate carbon emission in Asian countries. This current study facilitates the understanding of the impact of the services sector on carbon emission as well providing a solid ground in designing a policy that incorporates the environmental standard in line with increased economic growth

Firm level stock returns volatility in Malaysia: a sectoral study

This paper analyzes the level of stock returns volatility and identifies causal relationships across different economic sectors in Bursa Malaysia. We found dissimilarities of average stock returns volatility between sectors where firms in the Technology sector exhibit the highest stock returns volatility while firms in Telecommunication sector show the lowest volatility. Stock returns volatility is identified to be highly persistent, which suggests the influence of preceding shocks on current volatility level. In addition, there is evidence of leverage effects for the majority of the economic sectors, where negative news produces larger volatility when compared to positive news. Further, in the short run, the relationship of stock returns volatility between several economic sectors is found to be not statistically significant, this supports the possibility of portfolio diversification strategy to minimize risk and optimize return. However, the approach is ineffective in the long run since stock returns volatility of the economic sectors move together