ICT-trade and pollution in Africa: Do governance and regulation matter?

ICT has become a significant factor in the transition towards a low-carbon society in the modern era of increased digitalisation and clamour for environmental sustainability. Considering the significance of this digital transition in pollution abatement, we investigate the moderating effects of effective governance and regulation on the re-lationship between ICT-trade and pollution for 31 African countries from 2000 to 2020 by employing dynamic heterogeneous panel models robust to cross-sectional dependence. The empirical result suggests that, without adjustment for cross-sectional dependence, ICT-trade increases short and long-run pollution. Also, effective governance enhances pollution over the short and long run, while regulation lowers environmental pollution in the short term but increases long-run pollution. Further, government effectiveness moderates the effect of ICT-trade on pollution in the short and long run, whereas regulation only moderates the effect of ICT-trade on pollution in the long run. Conversely, having adjusted for cross-sectional dependence, ICT-trade, effective governance and reg-ulation substantially lower pollution. Further, effective governance and regulation play essential roles in fostering the effects of ICT-trade on environmental pollution. Therefore, we recommend sensitivity to ICT-trade and fos -tering government effectiveness and regulation to curtail the adverse impact of ICT-trade on the environment.(c) 2022 The Society for Policy Modeling. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.