Observing the response of environmental and economic performances to tourism in light of structural changes

In the current study, we explored the asymmetric impact of structural changes and tourism activities on economic performance and carbon emissions in selected economies of the Asian region from 1995 to 2020. Our findings say that the long-run estimates of positive shock in tourism are positively significant in China and India. Conversely, the estimated coefficient of negative shock in tourism is positive and significant in India only. These results confer that a rise in tourism activities causes economic growth to rise in China and India, whereas a fall in tourism activities causes economic activities to fall in India only. Similarly, a long-run positive structural change improves the economic growth in Thailand, Malaysia, and India. However, surprisingly, a long-run negative structural change also enhances the economic development of Thailand and Japan. On the other side, a positive shock in the tourism industry causes CO2 emissions to fall in China, Japan, and Malaysia and rise in India. Likewise, a negative shock in tourist activities reduces in Japan and increases carbon emissions in Malaysia. Moreover, a positive structural change reduces CO2 emissions in China, Thailand, and Japan, while a negative structural change reduces CO2 emissions in China and India only.

Automated summary

In this study, the asymmetric impact of structural changes and tourism activities on economic performance and carbon emissions in selected Asian economies from 1995 to 2020 was investigated. The findings show that a positive shock in tourism significantly contributes to economic growth in China and India, while a negative shock in tourism has a positive and significant effect on India only. Moreover, positive structural changes improve economic growth in Thailand, Malaysia, and India, but surprisingly, negative structural changes also enhance economic development in Thailand and Japan. Additionally, the impact of tourism activities on CO2 emissions varies in different countries, with positive shocks reducing emissions in China, Japan, and Malaysia, and increasing emissions in India.