The prime objective of this study is to examine the impact of industrial output and financial development on carbon dioxide emissions for a panel of 10 newly industrialized countries, namely Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Philippines, South Africa, Thailand, and Turkey. The empirical analysis was conducted between 1982 and 2019 by employing various estimation tests and techniques. The different tests account for cross-sectional dependence in different series of the model. Therefore, the relevant panel unit root was conducted, and we found that all series become stationary after the first difference. The long run parameters were estimated, and we found that there is a significant long-run relationship between the industrial output, the financial development, and the carbon emissions. The carbon emissions are found to be significantly affected by both domestic income and industrial output, while being negatively affected by financial development. Industrial production coefficient estimates are highly elastic when compared to the other estimates. The results also indicate unidirectional short-run causality from the domestic output and trade openness to carbon emissions, urban population to domestic output, and financial development to industrial output. However, there is no evidence of bidirectional causality. The study concludes that sustainable economic growth can be achieved by using contemporary and efficient production techniques, using environmentally friendly inputs in industries, and increasing vigilance of both the public and private sectors. Both the public and private sectors should therefore be pushed to use more modern, eco-friendly, and productive processing techniques. It is recommended that both the public and commercial sectors be encouraged to embrace cutting-edge, environmentally friendly, and productive processing methods.

This study employed the revealed comparative advantage (RCA), revealed symmetric comparative advantage (RSCA) and Vollrath’s indices to measure Pakistan’s export competitiveness of cotton yarn in the world. Meanwhile, the country’s export competitiveness is evaluated using the comparative advantage by countries index in China, the world’s largest consumer of cotton yarn and Pakistan’s main export destination. Additionally, linear approximated almost ideal demand systems (LA/AIDS) is employed to anticipate the demand relations for exports of cotton yarn (Pakistan, India and the USA) in the Chinese market over the period 1991–2019. The value of RCA indices greater than one indicates that the country has comparative advantage in exports of cotton yarn in both the global and Chinese market. The findings also revealed that the nation’s comparative advantage position has decreased in global market while improved in the regional market of China. Furthermore, based on the approximation of restricted LA/AIDS model, the results affirmed that the exports of cotton yarn had high own-price sensitivity with negative signs, whereas cross-price sensitivity with positive signs. With regards to Pakistan’s exports, estimates of cross-prices indicate that China’s imports of yarn from Pakistan are substitutable for imports of yarn from India and the USA. In addition, the expenditure elasticity for India and US cotton yarn is greater than one, indicating that China viewed their exports of cotton yarn as quality good. On the other hand, the expenditure elasticity for Pakistan’s is less than one, but close enough to one, which reflects the cut-off point for exports of quality goods. Pakistan, therefore, needs to produce cotton yarn more efficiently by reducing costs and enhancing the reputation of quality to increase exports and market share.