Does Environmental Stress Affect Economic Growth: Evidence from the Gulf Cooperation Council countries?

Abstract This paper empirically investigates the influence of environmental stress on economic growth in the GCC countries during (1995-2016). We use a panel cointegration analysis and compute an autoregressive distributed lag model. Our paper is motivated by the high CO2 emissions per capita and environmental stress in these countries relative to other countries. We assume that the income per capita is a function of the natural resource’s rents and environmental stress. Our findings show that environmental stress has a positive and significant effect on economic growth, mainly in the long run. Further, the natural resources’ rents have a significant positive effect in the short run, while the long run impact is negative. Our paper’s policy implication states that economic policymakers should monitor and evaluate future environmental stress outcomes in these countries. There is no guarantee that the positive influence prevails. Therefore, they should diversify their economies and energy resources.Jel Classification: Q51, Q56.