| Abstract [eng] |
Climate change is one of the most relevant problems of the modern world, posing a threat to the environment, food chains, public health and even the security of states. At the same time, economic challenges arise - supply chains are disrupted due to damage to the agricultural and forestry sectors, losses are incurred due to the increasing frequency of natural disasters, which may manifest themselves in the loss of infrastructure, impairment of people's health and loss of working capacity, migration from vulnerable regions, and increased insurance costs. Combating the effects of climate change requires systemic solutions and international cooperation, which is already manifested in international agreements, such as the Kyoto Protocol or the Paris Agreement and the European Green Deal signed after it. Measures to reduce the damage of climate change and stop the rise in global temperatures require innovation and economic transformation, for example, by reducing dependence on fossil fuels, which require considerable financing. One of the main and most popular instruments for this financing is green bonds - debt securities, the funds of which can be used only to finance environmental projects. Over the past decade, the popularity of these bonds has been growing and more and more of them are being issued, so the question arises, how can these financial instruments affect the economies of countries? The aim of this study is to analyze the impact of green bonds on the economyo of the European Union. Objectives of the study: 1. To study the trends of the green bond market and the issues of their impact on the economy; 2. To analyze the existing scientific literature on green financial instruments and their potential impact on economic indicators; 3. To develop a methodology for evaluating the impact of green bonds on the macroeconomic indicators of the European Union; 4. To empirically evaluate the impact of green bonds on the main macroeconomic indicators of the European Union. Research methods: analysis of scientific literature, statistical analysis, correlation analysis, econometric evaluation, carried out by assessing stationarity (according to the unit root test), causality relationships (according to the Granger causality test), creating autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) and pairwise nonlinear regression models and evaluating their residual errors. After conducting the literature analysis, it was determined that through financed projects and initiatives, the issuance of green bonds can positively affect the gross domestic product of countries or its growth rate, the creation of new jobs can positively affect the employment level, and by attracting investors from abroad, green bonds can also lead to an increase in the flow of incoming foreign direct investment, although the latter relationship has been relatively little studied. For this reason and due to data availability, three dependent indicators were selected for the study - gross domestic product, its change and the unemployment rate across all European Union countries. Separate econometric assessment was also conducted for the three European Union countries where green bonds are issued the most. The results of the study showed that the impact of green bonds on macroeconomic indicators varies depending on the country being analyzed. A significant impact of bonds on both the unemployment rate and the change in gross domestic product was identified only in one country, in other countries and in the European Union as a whole, no significant relationships were identified. The study allows us to formulate recommendations for further research - to analyze the impact of green bonds on macroeconomic indicators of individual sectors where their funds are used the most. |
