Unlocking the sustainable tourism development in the USA: what are the effects of carbon emission?

Abstract

Purpose

This study is carried out to investigate the effects of tourism expenditure, technological development and foreign direct investment on tourism development in the United States of America, a top international tourism destination in the world, from 1995 to 2021.

Design/methodology/approach

To this end we use the Autoregressive Distributive Lag method which captures short and long run effects. This method is also fundamental in presenting robust results when time series data with short time periods is used. The FMOLS and DOLS methods are used to ensure the robustness of the findings.

Findings

The results of the Autoregressive Distributive Lag indicate that spending on tourism contributes to the growth of the tourist industry in the country. The study reveals that economic growth has a detrimental impact on the development of tourism. Furthermore, carbon emissions are exclusively impeding the long-term progress of tourism development. The country's prioritization of economic growth has led to a rise in carbon emissions, disregarding the desire of tourists to experience a pollution-free and natural environment. Moreover, foreign direct investment exerts a beneficial impact on the advancement of tourism.

Originality/value

Although there has been numerous research on the factors that influence tourism, there is less documentation on the specific factors affecting tourism development. The research examines the effect of carbon emission of tourism development of United States, the World's top tourism destinations. Few studies have attempted to unlock this association in the United States; hence, the research originality.

Citation

Alabi, J.B. and Deka, A. (2024), "Unlocking the sustainable tourism development in the USA: what are the effects of carbon emission?", Management of Environmental Quality, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/MEQ-03-2024-0128