Assessing the environmental sustainability gap in G20 economies: The roles of economic growth, energy mix, foreign direct investment, and population

There is serious debate among researchers regarding the sustainability implications of economic prosperity and energy dependence. Energy consumption has a critical linkage with economic growth, but it also degrades environmental quality. Therefore, it is important to investigate the relationship between economic growth, the energy mix, and environmental sustainability. However, empirical literature utilizes narrow variables to capture environmental sustainability. Because of this, this research introduces a new environmental sustainability variable using entropy weighting and combining deforestation, household carbon emissions, and life expectancy. This study examines the relationship between environmental sustainability, economic growth, and other selected variables using data from 2002 to 2019 for the G20 and its high-, upper-, and low-middle-income member countries. Since shocks in one G20 country can affect another, this study uses the Augmented Mean Group (AMG) technique for empirical analysis. The results of this study indicate that Gross Domestic Product (EG) and its square term did not support the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) theory. The energy mix has a positive impact on the environmental sustainability gap across all the samples except for the upper-middle-income group. Foreign direct investment positively affects this gap, while population growth has no significant impact. These findings demonstrate that policymakers should support environmentally friendly and clean energy sources to foster long-term economic growth and sustainability.

The key to sustainability: In-depth investigation of environmental quality in G20 countries through the lens of renewable energy, economic complexity and geopolitical risk resilience

The world is currently facing urgent climate and environmental issues, such as global warming, ecosystem collapse, and energy shortages. In this context, this study selected data from 2000 to 2021 and employed the Method of Moment Quantile Regression (MMQR) to thoroughly investigate the impact of renewable energy consumption, economic complexity, and geopolitical risks on the ecological footprint of the Group of Twenty (G20) countries. The results indicate that in countries with lower quantiles, renewable energy consumption significantly reduces the ecological footprint, whereas its effect is not prominent in countries with higher quantiles. Economic complexity has a negative impact on the ecological footprint, and this impact becomes stronger as the quantile of the ecological footprint rises. Additionally, economic complexity moderates the effect of renewable energy on the ecological footprint. Geopolitical risks facilitate the growth of the ecological footprint. Likewise, robustness tests such as DOLS, FMOLS, and quantile regression confirm these estimates in the same framework. This study has conducted a profound analysis of global environmental issues, offering innovative perspectives and recommendations for achieving goals related to sustainable energy utilization, mitigating climate change, and improving the ecological environment. The findings of this research will guide policymakers in G20 countries to adopt more effective environmental protection measures, thereby contributing to the construction of a sustainable future.

Concerned or Apathetic? Exploring online public opinions on climate change from 2008 to 2019: A Comparative study between China and other G20 countries

G20 countries, account for the majority of global carbon emissions, need to take the lead in mitigating climate change. However, there are differences in economic, political and sociocultural backgrounds amongst G20 countries, especially between China and other G20 countries. Since the implementation of climate policies largely require domestic public support, it is vital to explore similarities and differences of public opinions on climate issues between China and other G20 countries. However, little research has investigated the micro-level climate concerns from the perspective of cross-country differences. Therefore, based on big data and text mining analysis, this study crawled user-generated data on Sina Weibo (N = 271,487) and Twitter (N = 4,874,546) from 2008 to 2019 to comprehensively catalog and compare climate opinions. Results show that climate change has become a salient issue in China and other G20 countries, with climate-related surges in public opinions always occurring after major natural, social and political events. Moreover, in China, there has been a significant shift in public attention from climate impacts to climate mitigation strategies, but in other G20 countries, people are more radical by emphasizing the climate movement and calling for authoritative actions. This study provides "snapshots" of climate communication and offers a quantification-based reference for promoting climate actions and collaborative governance.

Co-movement between Covid-19 and G20 stock market returns: A time and frequency analysis

In our study, we employ DCC-GARCH and Wavelet coherence analysis to examine the co-movement between global covid-19 indicators (cases, recoveries and deaths) and stock returns of main equity markets in G20 countries using daily data spanning between February 2, 2020 and August 28, 2021. Our empirical results show that the co-movement between COVID-19 and G20 stock returns has been switching between negative and positive correlations across the entire time window. The wavelet coherence analysis further reveal that negative (positive) co-movements predominantly exist as lower (higher frequencies) for cases and deaths and are more mixed for recoveries. The findings also show that the short-frequency components correspond to periods around the initial announcement of the initial pandemic and also around the announced of subsequent variants of the COVID-19 virus. Policy and market implications from our study are also discussed.

A Source Apportionment and Emission Scenario Assessment of PM2.5- and O3-Related Health Impacts in G20 Countries

Exposure to air pollution is a leading risk factor for premature death globally; however, the complexity of its formation and the diversity of its sources can make it difficult to address. The Group of Twenty (G20) countries are a collection of the world's largest and most influential economies and are uniquely poised to take action to reduce the global health burden associated with air pollution. We present a framework capable of simultaneously identifying regional and sectoral sources of the health impacts associated with two air pollutants, fine particulate matter (PM_2.5) and ozone (O₃) in G20 countries; this framework is also used to assess the health impacts associated with emission reductions. This approach combines GEOS-Chem adjoint sensitivities, satellite-derived data, and a new framework designed to better characterize the non-linear relationship between O₃ exposures and nitrogen oxides emissions. From this approach, we estimate that a 50% reduction of land transportation emissions by 2040 would result in 251 thousand premature deaths avoided in G20 countries. These premature deaths would be attributable equally to reductions in PM_2.5 and O₃ exposure which make up 51% and 49% of the potential benefits, respectively. In our second application, we estimate that the energy generation related co-benefits associated with G20 countries staying on pace with their net-zero carbon dioxide targets would be 290 thousand premature deaths avoided in 2040; action by India (47%) would result in the most benefits of any country and a majority of these avoided deaths would be attributable to reductions in PM_2.5 exposure (68%).

Deconstructing agency in the G20 leaders' declarations in the last decade: A corpus-assisted discourse study

Investigating agency has become a pivotal issue in discourse studies, especially organizational discourse. This study aims to identify the controlling agency (who/what) behind G20 leaders' declarations in the last decade and how such agency is constructed. To this end, this study offers a concise examination of relevant literature investigating fundamental concepts like discourse and agency in light of the overlapping relationship between form and function in language studies. Further, an eclectic methodological approach has been devised to arrive at a multi-leveled analysis. Two stages of analysis were designed. First, a corpus of the declarations between 2012 and 2021 was created and analyzed using #LancsBox v.6.x. and Wmatrix. At this stage, we was established as a prime agent in the corpus and proven to collocate heavily with agentive speech acts. One sample declaration, Riyadh 2020, was used for minute discourse analysis in the second stage. Inspired by transitivity system, process type analysis, and multivalence frameworks, this stage revealed the profound presence of non-human agency alongside the human one. Nevertheless, further examination demonstrated that this sample still constrains non-human agency due to semantic and textual constraints.

Post-COP26: can energy consumption, resource dependence, and trade openness promote carbon neutrality? Homogeneous and heterogeneous analyses for G20 countries

The need to halt the pervasive issue of global warming has triggered commitments from policymakers, international organizations, and research pundits with an ambitious goal of neutralizing carbon emissions, forming the core of COP26 in November 2021. Consequently, the carbon neutrality agenda is globally debated in the environment and economic growth literature. Given the preceding narratives, this study examines the tripartite effects of energy consumption, resource dependence, and trade openness on carbon neutrality in G20 economies from 2001 to 2019. The empirical evidence relies on homogenous and heterogeneous dynamic models based on a system generalized method of moments (GMM), fully modified ordinary least squares (FM-OLS), and quantile regression estimators. The following results are evident from the empirical analyses. Among the heterogeneous indicators, nonrenewable energy, oil rents, coal rents, and imports contribute to the surge in carbon emissions, while renewable energy, gas rents, and exports moderate carbon emissions. The homogenous impacts show that total energy consumption, total natural resource rents, and trade openness promote significant carbon emissions. Further, the long-run results from FM-OLS and the disintegrated mean effects from quantile regression are robust for the main short-run results based on the two-step system GMM. Based on the empirical fallout, investing in renewable energy and diversifying from natural resource exploration are among the emanating policy that can enhance the sustainability of the G20 environment.

New nonparametric measures for instantaneous and granger-causality tail co-dependence

We propose a new methodology to asses risk spillovers in a time-series framework. Firstly, we introduce an explicit nonparametric measure of cross-sectional conditional tail co-movement, which is intuitively comparable to the Conditional Value-at-Risk (CoVaR). We show that nonlinear CoVaR (NCoVaR) is able to capture even highly nonlinear dependence structures. Secondly, for the purpose of potential contagion analysis, we adapt the measure to be informative about the causality direction between the variables in the Granger causality sense. By showing that the natural estimators of the two metrics are U-statistics, we construct formal nonparametric tests for independence and Granger non-causality. Numerical simulations confirm that in common situations the nonparametric tests have better size and power properties than their parametric counterparts. The methodology is illustrated empirically by assessing risk transmissions between sovereigns and banking sectors in the euro area, which observed highly irregular co-movements between asset prices after the global financial crisis. The new measures seem to be less susceptible to these irregularities than their parametric analogues, providing a clearer overview of the underlying sovereign-bank risk feedback loops.

Exploring the performance of responsible companies in G20 during the COVID-19 outbreak

An uphill question of whether Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) directly impact firms' financial performance (FP) continues to vacillate between two opponent streams. In the present study, we argue that COVID-19 is an extreme event where the effect of ESG sharply manifests. We rely on cross-sectional data in the context of G20 countries for the year 2020. To avoid biased results due to governments support, we integrate four novel metrics provided by the Oxford Coronavirus Government Response Tracker (OxCGRT). We run sequential regressions (OLS; and quartiles to account for the Ingrained Income Bias (IIB) and ESG scores). We also perform robustness tests and account for the interaction between ESG and cash level. Our models were subsequently replicated for each ESG pillar. Findings indicate that ESG is beneficial during COVID-19, but the reward appears to be closely tied up to specific aspects of ESG, income level, and firm-specific variables. Results contribute to the burgeoning literature on ESG during COVID-19 by reflecting on firms' key attributes and the preponderance of government support.

SPINE20 recommendations 2021: spine care for people's health and prosperity

Purpose

The focus of SPINE20 is to develop evidence-based policy recommendations for the G20 countries to work with governments to reduce the burden of spine disease, and disability.

Methods

On September 17–18, 2021, SPINE20 held its annual meeting in Rome, Italy. Prior to the meeting, the SPINE20 created six proposed recommendations. These recommendations were uploaded to the SPINE20 website 10 days before the meeting and opened to the public for comments. The recommendations were discussed at the meeting allowing the participants to object and provide comments.

Results

In total, 27 societies endorsed the following recommendations. SPINE20 calls upon the G20 countries: (1) to expand telehealth for the access to spine care, especially in light of the current situation with COVID-19. (2) To adopt value-based interprofessional spine care as an approach to improve patient outcomes and reduce disability. (3) To facilitate access and invest in the development of a competent rehabilitation workforce to reduce the burden of disability related to spine disorders. (4) To adopt a strategy to promote daily physical activity and exercises among the elderly population to maintain an active and independent life with a healthy spine, particularly after COVID-19 pandemic. (5) To engage in capacity building with emerging countries and underserved communities for the benefit of spine patients. (6) To promote strategies to transfer evidence-based advances into patient benefit through effective implementation processes.

Conclusions

SPINE20’s initiatives will make governments and decision makers aware of efforts to reduce needless suffering from disabling spine pain through education that can be instituted across the globe.

The impact of human capital and bio-capacity on the environmental quality: evidence from G20 countries

This study investigates the effects of human capital, bio-capacity, energy use, and economic growth on the ecological footprint of G20 countries for the period 1970-2016, using the panel dynamic common correlated effects (DCCE) model. In the study, the G20 was considered in two groups, as developed and emerging economies. According to the DCCE estimation results, the long-term impact of human capital on the ecological footprint is negative and statistically strong in the developed economies while it is insignificant in the emerging economies. The impact of bio-capacity on the ecological footprint is positive in the short and long term in the emerging economies, and only in the short term in the developed economies. In addition, economic growth and energy use undermine the environmental quality in both groups of countries. The error correction coefficients are negative and statistically significant, which means that the deviations from the short-term equilibrium converge the long-term equilibrium level for both groups.

Constructing a positive sentiment index for COVID-19: Evidence from G20 stock markets

The present study investigates the degree of market responses through the scope of investors' sentiment during the COVID-19 pandemic across G20 markets by constructing a novel positive search volume index for COVID-19 (COVID19⁺). Our key findings, obtained using a Panel-GARCH model, indicate that an increased COVID19⁺ index suggests that investors decrease their COVID-19 related crisis sentiment by escalating their Google searches for positively associated COVID-19 related keywords. Specifically, we explore the predictive power of the newly constructed index on stock returns and volatility. According to our findings, investor sentiment positively (negatively) predicts the stock return (volatility) during the COVID-19. This is the first study assessing global sentiment by proposing a novel proxy and its impacts on the G20 equity market.

Considerations on the sidelines of the second principle of the Rome Declaration: The challenge of the One Health concept on the health of the future

BACKGROUND

The COVID-19 pandemic represented a global earthquake that made the review of health policies aimed at strengthening common governance necessary.

OBJECTIVE

The paper analyses the reasons for which the One Health approach has become fundamental in the control of pandemic phenomena, by arguing the necessity to place it at the basis not only of health policies but also of intersectoral policies.

METHODS

The documents of the world organizations published before and after the pandemic were analyzed and studied in order to unpack the close relationship between new lifestyles and the increase of health risks.

RESULTS

It emerged that the One Health approach is a paradigm that has been advanced for more than 30 years, but due to the inadequacy of local and world health policies, this approach was never translated into concrete actions to protect health, feeding problems at the cause of the COVID-19 pandemic.

CONCLUSIONS

Having ascertained that the adoption of a One Health approach can no longer be postponed, this must be insisted on several interconnected sectors that establish the new concept of healthcare which, in addition to being interdisciplinary, necessarily takes on a global perspective.

Can the emergency response be coordinated?

BACKGROUND

In the COVID-19 pandemic, coordination was certainly late, also due to the scarcity of information disseminated at the very beginning of the pandemic, when countries were inevitably taken by surprise. The lack of information, mainly attributable to the country from which everything seems to have started, has produced a huge delay and numerous uncertainties in the feedback of the WHO and international organizations.

OBJECTIVE

The inevitably relevant issue, from a legal point of view, concerns the legitimacy, formal or in any case shared, of the authority in charge of coordinating reactions and policies. The paper analyses the current legislation, soft and hard law, and the undertaken policies concerning emergency responses.

METHODS

International and EU legislation analysis.

RESULTS

The G20 understood that sustainable, flexible and agile funding systems for health emergencies are essential elements of pandemic prevention, preparedness and response. In EU there are many regulations about coordination and response to emergencies in practice in the EU and the Regulation (EU) 2021/522 (EU4Health programme), broadly extends the Union's competence in the field of health and has the objective of strengthening the Union's capacity for prevention, preparedness and rapid response in the event of serious cross-border threats to health.

CONCLUSIONS

It is essential to formalize, within international agreements, the institutionalization of relationships, procedures, and the possible recognition of the reference figure. If in the European Union, at least partially, the protocols are there (even if the COVID-19 emergency has blown them up in principle), certainly in relations with non-EU countries the story is complicated, requiring specific agreements. This is the goal of the path started by the Rome Declaration of 21 May 2021 within the G20 - Global Health Summit.

The nexus between road transport intensity and road-related CO2 emissions in G20 countries: an advanced panel estimation

This study determines the dynamic linkages between road transport intensity, road transport passenger and road transport freight, and road carbon emissions in G20 countries in the presence of economic growth, urbanization, crude oil price, and trade openness for the period of 1990 to 2016, under the multivariate framework. This study employs the residual-based Kao and Westerlund cointegration technique to find long-run cointegration, and continuously updated bias-corrected (CUP-BC) and continuously updated fully modified (CUP-FM) methods to check the long-run elasticities between the variables. The long-run estimators' findings suggest a positive and significant impact of road transport intensity, road passenger transport, road freight transport on road transport CO₂ emissions. Economic growth and urbanization are significant contributing factors in road transport CO₂ emissions, while trade openness and crude oil price significantly reduce road transport CO₂ emissions. The Dumitrescu and Hurlin causality test results disclose unidirectional causality from road transport intensity and road transport freight to the road transport CO₂ emissions. However, the causality between road passenger transport and road transport CO₂ emissions is bidirectional. Finally, comprehensive policy options like subsidizing environmental-friendly technologies, developing green transport infrastructure, and enacting decarbonizing regulations are suggested to address the G20 countries' environmental challenges.

SPINE20 A global advocacy group promoting evidence-based spine care of value

PURPOSE

The Global Burden of Diseases (GBD) Studies have estimated that low back pain is one of the costliest ailments worldwide. Subsequent to GBD publications, leadership of the four largest global spine societies agreed to form SPINE20. This article introduces the concept of SPINE20, the recommendations, and the future of this global advocacy group linked to G20 annual summits.

METHODS

The founders of SPINE20 advocacy group coordinated with G20 Saudi Arabia to conduct the SPINE20 summit in 2020. The summit was intended to promote evidence-based recommendations to use the most reliable information from high-level research. Eight areas of importance to mitigate spine disorders were identified through a voting process of the participating societies. Twelve recommendations were discussed and vetted.

RESULTS

The areas of immediate concern were "Aging spine," "Future of spine care," "Spinal cord injuries," "Children and adolescent spine," "Spine-related disability," "Spine Educational Standards," "Patient safety," and "Burden on economy." Twelve recommendations were created and endorsed by 31/33 spine societies and 2 journals globally during a vetted process through the SPINE20.org website and during the virtual inaugural meeting November 10-11, 2020 held from the G20 platform.

CONCLUSIONS

This is the first time that international spine societies have joined to support actions to mitigate the burden of spine disorders across the globe. SPINE20 seeks to change awareness and treatment of spine pain by supporting local projects that implement value-based practices with healthcare policies that are culturally sensitive based on scientific evidence.

Exploring the nexus between tourism development and environmental quality: Role of Renewable energy consumption and Income

Tourism appears as a catalyst for growth and development; however, recent studies have documented that this sector heavily depends on energy sector and as a consequence, entire tourism industry has been blamed for CO₂ emissions. This study aims to investigate the impact of tourism develop, renewable energy and real GDP on CO₂ emissions for G20 economies during the period of 1995-2015. In the presence of panel unit root, Pedroni and Kao methods confirm long-run cointegration among variables. FMOLS results show that a 1% increase in tourism development decreases pollution emissions by 0.05% in long run. The results show that the increase in renewable energy consumption reduces pollution emissions. A 1% increases in renewable energy reduces pollution emissions by 0.15% in long run. There was an inverted U-shaped relation between pollution and real GDP in long run confirming the validity of environmental Kuznets curve. Paper concludes that tourism development can be driving force for CO₂ emissions reduction.

Mental health and well-being during the COVID-19 pandemic in higher education: Evidence from G20 countries

Background: The spread of coronavirus (COVID-19) has resulted in a drastic alteration to billions of individuals' emotional, physical, mental, social, and financial status. As of July 21st, 2020, there had been 14.35 million confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 0.60 million deaths in 216 countries. Design and Methods: The study explores health and wellbeing in universities within the G20 countries (19 member countries and the European Union) during the COVID-19 pandemic. The sample selection of these countries was considered since it serves around 80% of the world's economic output, two-thirds of the global population (including more than half of the world's poor), and 75% of international trade. Specifically, due to this public health concern, schools' nationwide closures are impacting over 60% of the world's student population to promote their quality of life and well-being. Results: This study investigates the G20 policies and procedures within higher education regarding health and well-being measures during the COVID-19 epidemic. The findings reveal that the lockdown, social distancing, and self-isolation requirements are stressful and detrimental for many individuals and have caused students' health and well-being concerns. Conclusions: Several countries within the G20 have taken significant steps to support health and well-being issues for university students; however, numerous countries are far behind in addressing this issue. Hence, government leaders of G20 countries, policymakers, and health providers should promptly take the necessary measures to regulate the outbreak, improve safety measures to decrease disease transmission, and administer those who demand medical attention.

G20 Okayama Health MinistersMeeting: lessons learned and way forward

The third G20 Health Ministers' Meeting was held in Okayama, Japan on October 19-20, 2019. The authors were involved in the decision making of the substantial issues of this meeting including theme setting, schedule management, facilitating the discussion, and preparation for the ministers' meeting. Here, we summarize our lessons of experience from hosting G20 Okayama Health Ministers' Meeting as: i) Utilizing the occasion of existing major health related meeting to gain efficiency; ii) Collaboration with other G20 tracks such as finance can function as a tool to facilitate inter-sectoral collaboration within other G20 members; iii) Two-day Health Working Group before the ministerial meeting provides sufficient time for negotiation of the declaration text; and iv) Inclusion of residents and representatives of the host city provides great opportunity to create G20 legacy. Such an experience of Japanese policymaking is rarely shared in English and the lessons learned from our experience shall provide meaningful advice for Saudi Arabia colleagues who are to hold the next G20 Health Ministers' Meeting as well as for the preparation of other G20 ministerial meetings.

The role of the G20 economies in global health

The Meetings of Health Ministers of the Group of Twenty (G20) that started at the G20 Summit in Berlin, Germany in 2017 have provided a platform for the discussion of global health matters such as antimicrobial resistance (AMR), public health emergencies, and universal health coverage. Similar issues are also discussed at meetings of the G7 and the World Health Assembly (WHA). This article will examine recent data to explore the characteristics of the G20 and its potential for improving health outcomes. G20 countries have a leading role to play in helping other countries improve global health outcomes because member countries have already faced many issues associated with aging society and increased prevalence of non-communicable diseases (NCDs). Indeed, 71% of the world's elderly population lives in the G20 countries and most of these countries have a high proportional mortality from NCDs of more than 70%. G20 countries are also responsible for a disproportionate share of global impacts. For instance, 72% of CO2 emissions are produced by G20 countries. Migration dynamics and its consequences also need to be considered from the perspective of optimizing health outcomes. Moreover, 78% of the world's top 50 pharmaceutical companies are located in the G20 countries. There is ample room for G20 countries to pursue collaborative and cooperative approaches that can complement the roles of the G7 and WHA in similar health issues. The G20 could, for example, share experiences on dealing with aging and NCDs, reduce their CO2 emissions, prohibit the production of low-quality medicines, and use standardized health check-up formats for migrants and refugees to transfer their own health information. As a group, the G20 countries have the potential to solve global health problems and other issues. The convening of high-level health meetings at G20 summits has the potential to facilitate such endeavors.

Fundamentals of safety hazards: A scientific perspective

Current theory on safety hazards and the origin of safety risk is often unstructured, misleading and ambiguous. Essentially, it is ambiguous, as definitions and descriptions refrain from stating a formal common basis upon which one can rely to fundamentally and rightfully conclude what a safety hazard is. As a result, it is quite an effort to set a scientifically valid base for precisely what safety hazards are. The objective of this study was to outline the questionable bases of current views on safety hazards and identify the real nature of safety hazards. The characteristics of safety hazards inform the verification of the scientific nature of the different perspectives on safety hazards. Through a quantitative survey, an assessment was performed regarding the cognisance of South African small business owners and managers related to safety hazards. This study found that safety hazards need to unambiguously remain safety hazards under all circumstances in life. Small business owners and managers require further education to develop their cognisance of safety hazards in order to manage the related safety risk. This research has indicated that not all small business owners or managers are compliant with this legal responsibility and that assistance should be provided to small business owners or managers to assist them in realising the importance of safety hazards in the workplace. Proper cognisance of safety hazards leads to enhanced compliance with legislative requirements.

Soft power and global health: the sustainable development goals (SDGs) era health agendas of the G7, G20 and BRICS

Background

In 2017, the G20 health ministers convened for the first time to discuss global health and issued a communiqué outlining their health priorities, as the BRICS and G7 have done for years. As these political clubs hold considerable political and economic influence, their respective global health agendas may influence both global health priorities and the priorities of other countries and actors.

Methods

Given the rising salience of global health in global summitry, we analyzed the health ministerial communiqués issued by the BRICS, G7 and G20 after the SDGs were adopted in 2015. We compared the stated health priorities of the BRICS, G7 and G20 against one another and against the targets of SDG 3 on health, using a traffic light system to assess the quality of their commitments.

Results

With regard to the SDG 3 targets, the BRICS, G7 and G20 priorities overlapped in their focus on emergency preparedness and universal health coverage, but diverged in areas of environmental pollution, mental health, and maternal and child health. Health issues with considerable associated burdens of disease, including substance use, road traffic injuries and sexual health, were missing from the agendas of all three political clubs. In terms of SDG 3 principles and ways of working, the BRICS, G7 and G20 varied in their emphasis on human rights, equity and engagement with non-state actors, but all expressed their explicit commitment to Agenda 2030.

Conclusions

The leadership of BRICS, G7 and G20 on global health is welcome. However, their relatively narrow focus on the potential impact of ill-health primarily in relation to the economy and trade may not be sufficiently comprehensive to achieve the Agenda 2030 vision of promoting health equity and leaving no-one behind. Recommendations for the BRICS, G7 and G20 based on this analysis include: 1) expanding focus to the neglected SDG 3 health targets; 2) placing greater emphasis on upstream determinants of health; 3) greater commitment to equity and leaving no-one behind; 4) adopting explicit commitments to rights-based approaches; and 5) making commitments that are of higher quality and which include time-bound quantitative targets and clear accountability mechanisms.

Non-linear effects of heterogeneous environmental regulations on green growth in G20 countries: Evidence from panel threshold regression

A comprehensive understanding of the relationships between environmental regulations and green growth of economy is essential for policy design and decision-making. This paper combines hybrid measure with Global Malmquist Luenberger index to estimate national green growth level. A panel threshold regression technique is then employed to observe the non-linear impacts of both the formal and informal environmental regulations on green growth in Group 20 countries during 2001-2015. Results from empirical tests reveal that, for the formal environmental regulations represented by Environmental Policy Stringency (EPS), the market-based EPS is only significant at high-level phase while this is not the case in the low-level counterpart; non-market based EPS witnessed significant signs across the three phases, but in varied coefficients and significance levels. By comparison, the informal environmental regulations represented by environmental-related technologies and education levels show positive and significant impact on green growth, except for the case when countries have higher level of technologies. In addition, income per capita and gross Research & Development (R&D) expenditures present significant positive impacts on the dependent while share of service sector to the economy and investment on transport infrastructure witnessed negative effects across the models. Policy implications are proposed thereafter, although both the formal and informal environmental regulations are important to promote green growth, but they show different impacts at different phases.

Dynamics of renewable energy consumption and economic activities across the agriculture, industry, and service sectors: evidence in the perspective of sustainable development

This study aims to examine the impact of renewable and non-renewable energy consumption on the agriculture, industry, services, and overall economic activities (GDP) across a panel of G20 nations. The study makes use of annual data from 1980 to 2012 on 17 countries of the G20. To achieve the study objectives, we apply several robust panel econometric models which account for cross-sectional dependence and heterogeneity in the analysis. The empirical findings confirm the significant long-run equilibrium relationship among the variables. The long-run elasticities indicate that both renewable and non-renewable energy consumptions have significant positive effect on the economic activities across the sectors and also on the overall economic output. These results also imply that the impact is more from renewable energy on economic activities than that of non-renewable energy. Given that, our results offer significant policy implications. We suggest that the policy makers should aim to initiate effective policies to turn domestic and foreign investments into renewable energy projects. This eventually ensures low carbon emissions and sustainable economic development across the G20 nations.

Mental health services planning for G20 summit in Brisbane and assessment of impact

OBJECTIVE

The objective of this study was to inform planning for similar events, our aim was to describe planning undertaken by Brisbane Mental Health Services for the 2014 G20 Summit and the impact of the Summit on service use.

METHODS

We analysed routinely collected service data comparing presentations and discharges for the same time period in two consecutive years.

RESULTS

While presentations to mental health services increased from the previous year across a five-month period (including the month of G20), the week of the G20 Summit showed little change.

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings will be useful to other services that prepare for major events, such as G20. Our experience shows that, with detailed planning and extra resources, the G20 Summit passed without any major mental health incidents or major increase for mental health presentations.