Africa Countries’ Energy Efficiency: Evidence from a Directional Distance Function Approach

Alastaire Sèna Alinsato,Calixe Bidossessi Alakonon,Nassibou Bassongui

doi:10.4236/me.2021.1210077

Abstract

Energy is recognized as the backbone of economic development while at the same time it is the most contributor to global warming. This paper aims to assess energy-efficiency of a sample of African countries over the period from 1971 to 2014. Through a directional distance function approach, we estimated both the energy efficiency and the environmental energy efficiency scores in the sample. The results showed that ignoring the undesirable output, i.e. dioxide carbon emissions associated with environmental degradation, overestimates countries’ energy inefficiency. Besides, from a non-parametric approach, we shed light on the sensitivity of countries environmental energy efficiency to the income level. Our findings confirmed the sensitivity of environmental-energy efficiency to the Kuznets curve hypothesis. In particular, countries with high-level income are the most environmental-energy efficient in the sample over the period of study. The paper ends with some policy implications and some research perspectives.

Highlights

The debate among economists on energy efficiency originated after the 1973 oil crisis when the energy security of importing countries was threatened due to the oil embargo proclaimed by the world’s major oil producers
These results show that countries tend to be more inefficient when the CO2 emissions are not taken into account in the evaluation of the energy efficiency performance
These results suggest that African countries have to invest more in energy-saving potential

Summary

Introduction

The debate among economists on energy efficiency originated after the 1973 oil crisis when the energy security of importing countries was threatened due to the oil embargo proclaimed by the world’s major oil producers. An important concern of the public authorities is to find appropriate strategies to satisfy the energy demand which is still growing at high rates. The recent increases in global energy demand of 1.9% in 2017 and 2.3% in 2018 which is the biggest increase of the last three decades confirmed the need for countries to worry about their. Recent studies in developing countries, as well as industrialized countries, found that the greater the energy efficiency is, the lower the energy demand issues are. Agyarko et al (2020) and Van Buskirk et al (2007) indicated that households’ appliance subsidy policies electricity sector reforms, institutional quality could be used for improving countries energy efficiency Recent studies in developing countries, as well as industrialized countries, found that the greater the energy efficiency is, the lower the energy demand issues are. Agyarko et al (2020) and Van Buskirk et al (2007) indicated that households’ appliance subsidy policies electricity sector reforms, institutional quality could be used for improving countries energy efficiency

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