| Environmental problems such as global warming,ozone layer depletion and acid rain,as well as economic and social development problems such as population explosion,resource depletion,environmental pollution,and unbalanced social development,are constraining human development and progress,and the promotion of sustainable development has become the consensus of all countries in the world.As the continent with the highest number of developing countries,sub-Saharan Africa has developed significantly in recent years,and its sustainable development process has been put on the agenda under the impetus of the global wave of sustainable development,but the sustainable development process is facing serious challenges.As one of the key factors influencing sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa,is foreign direct investment(FDI)promoting or inhibiting sustainable development in the region? Through which channels and pathways does FDI impact sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa? Does the heterogeneity of FDI have varying effects on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa? Do the effects of FDI on sustainable development in subSaharan Africa differ under different conditions? How can sub-Saharan Africa effectively utilize FDI to promote its sustainable development? The research and in-depth exploration of these theoretical and practical questions have profound implications for the achievement of global sustainable development goals.According to IMF data,the main sources of FDI in sub-Saharan Africa have been adjusted from the Netherlands,the United Kingdom,the United States and France to the Netherlands,China,France and the United States.Development to date,China has become the second largest source of investment in sub-Saharan Africa after the Netherlands.As an underdeveloped region,sub-Saharan Africa urgently needs the inflow of FDI to promote regional economic and social development,but at the same time they may become the preferred area for resource utilization and pollution transfer from other countries or face the problem of national industrial security brought about by FDI due to monopoly advantage,etc.,which will have a negative impact on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa.As a result,it has also triggered the West’s questioning of China’s fast-growing investment behavior in sub-Saharan Africa.Based on this,selecting the impact of FDI on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa as a research theme is not only conducive to objectively evaluating how FDI,including China,affects the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa,but also conducive to promoting the process of sustainable development in the world,and realizing the global sustainable development goals proposed by the United Nations.This thesis takes sub-Saharan Africa as the research area,establishes a research framework for the impact of FDI on the sustainable development of the host country based on the theory of international investment and the relevant theoretical foundations of sustainable development,theoretically clarifies the mechanism of the impact of FDI on the sustainable development of the host country,and designs an indicator system applicable to the assessment of the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa,including the four dimensions of economy,society,resources and ecology.Using methods such as nonlinear fixed effects panel data analysis,nonlinear mediation analysis,and nonlinear moderation analysis,this empirical study examines the direct and indirect effects of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa.It also investigates the impact of FDI heterogeneity on sustainable development in the region and the heterogeneity of FDI’s effects on sub-Saharan Africa’s sustainable development under different conditions.The research provides theoretical guidance and decision-making references for subSaharan Africa to utilize FDI in promoting its sustainable development.The main findings and conclusions of this study can be summarized as follows:Firstly,based on the relevant theories of FDI’s impact on sustainable development,a research framework on the mechanism of FDI’s impact on sustainable development was constructed,and the impact mechanism of FDI on sustainable development was discussed.The study suggests that FDI inflows directly affect the economic,social,resource,and ecological subsystems of the host country,and collectively,they have a direct impact on the overall system of sustainable development.However,the direct effects of FDI on different subsystems are uncertain,and the impact of FDI on the overall system of sustainable development depends on the positive and negative interactions within and between the subsystems.From an external perspective of FDI,it can influence the host country’s sustainable development through transmission mechanisms such as industrial structure and technological effects.FDI has a positive impact on the host country’s sustainable development through the transmission mechanisms of industrial structure and technological effects only when FDI promotes the transformation of the host country’s industrial structure from low value-added manufacturing,traditional industries,and traditional services to high value-added manufacturing and modern services,and when FDI drives technological progress through technology transfer and spillover.From an internal perspective of the host country,the host country can use regulatory mechanisms such as institutional quality and financial development to reduce transaction costs and costs for transnational corporations,suppress the negative externalities brought by FDI,amplify the positive effects of FDI,and promote the host country’s sustainable development.Secondly,based on the connotation and characteristics of sustainable development and following the principles of systematicity,timeliness,locality and data availability,this thesis constructs an indicator system for the assessment of sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa that includes four dimensions,namely,economic,social,resource and ecological,in accordance with the logical thinking of the initial selection of the indicator system,optimization and establishment of the indicator system and measures the overall level of sustainable development and the level of sustainable development of each sub-system in sub-Saharan Africa in order to reveal the temporal and spatial trajectory and the evolution pattern of sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa.It also measures the overall level of sustainable development of sub-Saharan African countries and the level of sustainable development of various subsystems,in order to reveal the spatial and temporal trajectory and evolutionary pattern of sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa.The study shows that positive progress has been made in the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa,and that the spatial differences in the sustainable development levels of different countries have basically remained stable,with an overall pattern of low levels in Central Africa and relatively high levels in East,Southern and West Africa.Among them,the level of social sustainable development has increased most significantly,showing a relatively high spatial pattern in Southern Africa,and the countries with higher social sustainable development are spreading from Southern Africa to East and West Africa;the level of resource and ecological sustainable development is relatively stable,and the level of resource sustainable development is showing a relatively low spatial pattern in Central Africa,with the countries with higher resource sustainable development spreading from the East and the West to the countries in Southern Africa,while the level of ecologically sustainable development shows a relatively high spatial pattern in East Africa,with countries with higher ecologically sustainable development spreading from East Africa to Southern Africa,Central Africa and West Africa;the situation of economic sustainable development is not optimistic,with the slowest growth rate and a downward trend in 16 countries,and the largest spatial gap,showing a relatively high spatial pattern in Southern Africa.Thirdly,based on the theoretical mechanism analysis in this thesis,the research hypothesis on the impact of FDI on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa is proposed in the context of the regional situation of sub-Saharan Africa,and the research hypothesis on the impact of FDI on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa is verified using a nonlinear fixed effects model in order to assess the direct impacts of FDI on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa,as well as the impacts of FDI on the impacts of FDI on the subsystems of sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa.The study shows that the impact of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa is characterized by a U-shape and has exceeded the inflection point in most of the countries,thus manifesting mainly as a facilitating effect.Among them,the impact of FDI on economic sustainable development is a significant U-shape,and half of the countries have already exceeded the inflection point;the impact of FDI on social sustainable development is a U-shape,and only some of the countries have exceeded the inflection point;the impact of FDI on resources is an inverted U-shape,and most of the samples are on the right side of the inflection point,thus mainly manifesting an inhibitory effect;and the impact of FDI on ecological sustainable development is an inverted U-shape.Fourthly,based on the external perspective of FDI and the internal perspective of the host country,a nonlinear mediation model and a nonlinear moderation model with interaction terms were constructed to empirically examine the roles of transmission mechanisms such as industrial structure and technological effects,regulatory mechanisms such as institutional quality and financial development in the impact of FDI on sustainable development in subSaharan Africa.From the external perspective of FDI,transmission mechanisms such as industrial structure and technological effects play a significant mediating role in the impact of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa.This is because FDI promotes the favorable development and transformation of industrial structure and facilitates technology transfer and spillover,thereby driving sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa.From the internal perspective of the host country,the improvement of institutional quality and the level of financial development positively moderate the impact of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa.As institutional quality and financial development improve,the promoting effect of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa gradually strengthens.Fifth,focusing on the impact of heterogeneous FDI and FDI under different conditions on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa,we explore the impact of heterogeneous FDI and FDI under different conditions on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa from the perspectives of the type of FDI,the motivation of FDI investment,and the place of origin of FDI,respectively,and based on the host countries’ different levels of economic development,debt level,geographic location.The study finds that the impacts of greenfield FDI and cross-border M&A FDI on sustainable development are both U-shaped,and the positive effect of cross-border M&A FDI on sustainable development is larger than that of greenfield FDI;the impacts of market-and efficiency-seeking FDI and non-market-and efficiency-seeking FDI on sustainable development are both U-shaped,and the positive effect of market-and efficiency-seeking FDI is larger than that of non-market and efficiency-seeking;the impact of investment from China,the Netherlands and France on sustainable development is also U-shaped,while the impact of investment from the United States is a linear promotion,and the positive effect of FDI from China on sustainable development has the highest marginal contribution;the impact of FDI on the sustainable development of low-income and middleincome countries are also U-shaped,and the impact of middle-income countries is greater than that of low-income countries;For non-HIPCs and HIPCs,the impact of FDI on sustainable development are also U-shaped,and the positive impact on non-HIPCs is greater than that on HIPCs;for West Central and South East Africa,the impact of FDI on sustainable development are also U-shaped,and the positive impact on the South East is greater than that on the West Central region.Sixth,based on the conclusions above,this article proposes corresponding policy recommendations in the following aspects: addressing self-development bottlenecks,creating conditions to attract more high-quality FDI,vigorously promoting the technological transfer and spillover of FDI,actively leveraging the role of FDI in industrial upgrading and transformation,significantly improving institutional quality to gradually reduce the negative impact of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa,innovating financial development mechanisms to provide financial support and security for promoting FDI and sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa,and implementing differentiated policies to attract foreign investment to meet the sustainable development needs of different countries in sub-Saharan Africa.Compared with existing research,this article’s innovations are mainly reflected in the following four aspects: First,it designs a sustainable development indicator system suitable for sub-Saharan Africa,focusing more on the quality of economic development,social equity,sustainable use of resources,and ecological vulnerability issues.The indicators are more specific,precise in regional and problem orientation,and at the same time consider the timeliness and the future.Second,it establishes a nonlinear evaluation model for assessing the impact of FDI on the host country’s sustainable development and empirically tests the nonlinear effects of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa,which has improvements in the methodology,making it better able to reveal the impact of FDI on the host country’s sustainable development.Third,based on the external perspective of FDI and the internal perspective of the host country,it theoretically reveals the mechanisms which FDI affects sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa and empirically tests the impact of FDI on sustainable development through structural effects and technological effects.It also examines the moderating role of institutional quality and financial development in the impact of FDI on sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa,further expanding the research on the mechanisms of FDI’s impact on the host country’s sustainable development.Fourthly,taking into full consideration the heterogeneity of FDI and the vastness of sub-Saharan Africa and its uneven development,FDI is subdivided into greenfield investment and cross-border M&A,market-and efficiency-seeking FDI,and non-market-and efficiency-seeking FDI,and the impacts of FDI from China,the United States,the Netherlands,and France on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa are also examined.On this basis,it is further divided into low-income and middle-income countries,non-HIPCs and HIPCs,and the Central-west and South-east regions,to empirically demonstrate the impact of FDI on the sustainable development of sub-Saharan Africa,and to make up for the shortcomings of the heterogeneity analysis of the existing literature. |
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