An empirical analysis of the energy consumption – real GDP nexus for Zimbabwe

Abstract

This study looked into causality relationship between energy consumption and economic growth in Zimbabwe using time series data spanning from 1980 to 2011. Four views explaining the causality relationship between energy consumption and economic growth include the growth hypothesis, conservation hypothesis, feedback hypothesis and the neutrality hypothesis. Whilst the growth hypothesis argues that energy consumption promotes economic growth, conservation hypothesis says that it is in fact economic growth that drives energy consumption. The feedback hypothesis argues that both energy consumption and economic growth promote each other whilst according to the neutrality hypothesis, no causality relationship exist between the two variables either in the short or long run. Using the bi-variate causality test framework, this study failed to establish any direct causality relationship between energy consumption and economic growth. However, the results imply the existence of an indirect bi-directional causality relationship between the two variables. The study therefore recommends Zimbabwe authorities not only to scale up investment into energy generation capacity improvement infrastructure but also address indirect factors like employment, human capital development, financial market development, and government consumption, among others in order to boost sustainable economic growth.