Exploring the dynamic impacts of natural resources and environmental pollution on longevity in resource-dependent African countries: does income level matter?

This research probes the functional association between natural resources, environmental pollution, and longevity in selected resource-dependent African countries with the intervening role of income level from 1980 to 2019. The empirical evidence relies on first-generation stationarity test, Kao (1999) co-integration test, fully modified OLS (FMOLS), dynamic OLS (DOLS), and quantile regression (QR) estimators. To ensure more precision on the stated nexus, natural resources are captured by four indicators comprising fuel, coal, gas (disaggregated), and fossil fuel (aggregated). Longevity is equally decomposed into life expectancy female, life expectancy male, and life expectancy total. Based on this segregation, the empirical analyses reveal the following findings: First, the impacts of natural resources are statistically negative on longevity. Second, environmental pollution turns out to be a negative predictor of longevity. Third, income significantly promotes longevity, and its interaction with natural resources moderates their adverse effects on longevity. Fourth, the severity of natural resources and environmental pollution proves to be intense across the low, middle, and upper quantiles except for natural gas. Fifth, the causal relationships among the variables are divergent, ranging from no causality to unidirectional and bidirectional. Following the empirical findings, the study recommends promoting cleaner energy resources through subsidizing renewable energy and enhancing the income level of the people through investment in capital projects to promote healthy life expectancy in the selected African countries and beyond.