Analysis of the Kuznet Hypotheses on the relationship between CO2 emissions and GDP growth in Morocco

In the current context of climate change, the issue of reconciling economic growth and environmental preservation has become a major concern, especially for developing countries. This study focuses on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and examines how economic growth affects the environment by testing the validity of the Kuznets environmental curve for Morocco. For this purpose, the ARDL (Auto Regressive Distributed Lag) method, also known as "black box", is used.

The first part of this paper presents a review of the literature on the different studies that have examined the validity of the environmental Kuznets curve, as well as a brief overview of the energy demand in Morocco. It also looks at the evolution of CO2 emissions by sector and fuel type, as well as the energy strategy adopted by the country. In the second part, using econometric tools, the study examines the long-term relationship between CO2 emissions and real Gross Domestic Product (GDP), introducing other explanatory variables such as energy consumption and international trade, for the period 1990-2021.

The results of the econometric analysis confirm the existence of a positive long-run relationship between CO2 emissions and real GDP, and show that the direction of this relationship is from CO2 emissions to GDP, according to Granger causality tests. Furthermore, the ARDL regression results validate the Kuznets environmental curve hypothesis for Morocco.