The pressing global effort to tackle CO₂ emissions has brought about a strong emphasis on adopting green technology by economies striving for low-carbon development. Within this context, this research investigates the environmental significance of green technology and exports in Malaysia. By examining 30-year data from 1989 to 2019 and utilising the autoregressive distributed lag model (ARDL), this study explores these variables' long-run and short-run effects on Malaysia's environment. The outcomes reveal noteworthy insights: population growth and green technology negatively impact environmental degradation, whereas exports and economic expansion contribute to environmental depletion over the long term. However, the influences of a higher population and exports are inconsequential in the short term. Additionally, the study captures the influences of transient economic challenges, such as the COVID-19 outbreak. Consequently, the study emphasises crucial policy implications for the Malaysian government. Firstly, it strongly recommends increasing investment in sustainable technology, especially within the manufacturing sector, to mitigate the adverse environmental impact of exports. Furthermore, it suggests incentivizing companies to embrace green technology through subsidies for acquiring renewable energy and imposing higher taxes on non-renewable energy sources. Additionally, policymakers are urged to prioritise human capital development by raising public awareness about the dangers of heightened CO₂ emissions. Malaysia can leverage its expertise to foster economic expansion without compromising the environment by engaging the working population in environmentally sustainable economic activities. These policy recommendations aim to expedite the shift towards a decarbonised economy, promote sustainable development, and safeguard Malaysia's natural resources.

Foreign direct investment (FDI) plays a vital role in boosting economic growth and providing more job opportunities. Hence, it is imperative to investigate the factors that can spur FDI inflows in the Southeast Asia region (ASEAN) and its three largest trading partners: China, Japan, and South Korea (ASEAN+3). Besides, whether corruption can boost or decrease FDI inflows, and whether larger environmental degradation triggers FDI inflows have been sparsely explored by previous studies. The panel Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) approach is employed to analyze the period from 1995 to 2020. The results show evidence of the grabbing hand hypothesis in ASEAN+3 as decreasing corruption can positively impact FDI inflows in the long run. However, the results support that increasing environmental degradation has spurred FDI in the region, suggesting reformulating investment promotion policies towards more environmentally friendly ones. These findings are important for policymakers to formulate the right policies for boosting FDI. Punishment for those who act in a corrupt manner may act as a deterrent to would-be offenders. Using more renewable energy could help to reduce environmental degradation and boost FDI simultaneously.

We investigate whether a nexus exists between income inequality and criminal activity in Indonesia. Additionally, we examine socioeconomic variables and potential links with criminal actions (i.e., crime rate, murder, rape, physical abuse, robbery, and fraud). We use the generalized method of moments (GMM) approach, employing data for 34 provinces in Indonesia over the period of 2010–2019. The results indicate that income inequality is associated with higher criminal activity. Overall, lower unemployment, larger investment (foreign and domestic), and higher human development (education and health) can help reduce crime in Indonesia. However, higher income can reduce physical abuse and crime rates, but theft and fraud increase with income growth. Rising unemployment increases rape, abuse, robbery, and fraud. Still, unemployment does not affect murder, suggesting that non-economic factors are dominant in explaining murder and violent crimes. Furthermore, income inequality can increase robbery and fraud, although it has no significant effects on murder, rape, and abuse. Government spending on social assistance and more efficient settlement of criminal acts can lower crime rates.

The global push for sustainable development has brought environmental issues to the fore. As minimizing environmental deterioration implies reducing energy consumption, this has come under intense discussion among economists and policymakers. This is because it may affect productivity, and thus slow economic growth ensues. Most earlier studies focused on overall energy consumption rather than energy use by sector to see how it can affect CO₂ emissions. However, little research has been conducted on the connection between energy use in particular sectors, such as agriculture and transportation, and CO₂ emissions. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the impacts of energy use in Malaysia’s transportation, industrial, and agricultural sectors and foreign direct investment (FDI) on CO₂ emissions between 1989 and 2019. The ARDL technique is employed, and the results demonstrate that energy consumption in the transportation sector has a greater impact on CO₂ emissions than in the industrial sector. On the other hand, energy use in the agricultural sector reduces CO₂ emissions. These findings may help policymakers formulate the right policies in specific sectors to benefit communities. They will be at low risk of suffering from diseases attributed to environmental degradation.

Despite the recent reduction in the poverty rate in Indonesia, income inequality has not shown any improvement. Income inequality, also known as income disparity, has been a prolonged issue in Indonesia and has caused great dissatisfaction among the public. Many of them do not feel an improvement in their wellbeing. Most studies explore these issues based on microeconomics perspectives, and limited studies focus on macroeconomic determinants. Thus, it is imperative to investigate the potential macroeconomic determinants of income inequality in Indonesia, particularly energy consumption (ENC), corruption (COR), foreign direct investment (FDI), and other supporting determinants such as economic growth (GDP), financial development (FD), and CO₂ emissions. Data from 1984 to 2020 were collected and analyzed, employing the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach. The findings indicate that economic growth, corruption, and FDI can contribute to a smaller gap between the rich and the poor. At the same time, greater CO₂ emissions can intensify income inequality in Indonesia both in the short and long run. Pollution, as captured by CO₂ emissions, can affect the health of the poor. Health problems create difficulties for poor people to work and reduce the probability of earning income, ultimately widening income inequality. FD and energy use, on the other hand, do not influence income distribution in the long and short run. The findings indicate that boosting economic growth and FDI significantly reduce income disparity in Indonesia. Various policy recommendations are suggested in these studies based on the long-run outcomes.

Previous studies have investigated various determinants of CO₂ emissions, such as energy use, economic expansion and population growth. However, foreign workers have not been treated as a potential determinant. Therefore, this research embarks on an investigation into the impacts of energy use, foreign workers and tourist arrivals on CO₂ emissions in Malaysia from 1982 to 2018. An ARDL approach was employed, and the findings showed that natural gas and electricity use insignificantly influence CO₂ emissions. Tourist arrivals, coal use and oil use were found to positively influence CO₂ emissions, while foreign workers and population growth insignificantly influence CO₂ emissions. It was found that in the early stages of development, higher GDP negatively influences CO₂ emissions, but in the final stages, higher GDP positively influences CO₂ emissions. These findings are important for formulating policies to reduce environmental degradation stemming from higher CO₂ emissions. Malaysia should use more renewable energy sources, and a carbon tax could be imposed to reduce environmental degradation.