The impact of sustainable political economy and climate change on cereal yields: empirical evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa

Climate change and political instability are among the greatest challenges to agricultural output in most of Sub-Saharan Africa, yet agriculture is still a key driver of economic growth within the region. Drawing on World Bank and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) data, this paper investigates the effect of climate change and political economy variables on cereal yields employing a dynamic panel Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) model on 15 Sub-Saharan African countries' panel data from 2010 to 2023.The empirical findings reveal that GMM estimation successfully explains both short-run and long-run determinants of grain yield performance. Political stability, trade openness, foreign direct investment (FDI), and arable land have statistically significant and positive effects on productivity, of which FDI has impacts in the range of 0.23–0.35, while arable land had strong influence with coefficients of 0.45–0.52.Based on the above findings, the conclusion of the study is that while political stability, trade openness, FDI, and arable land availability positively impact cereal yields in the short run, long-run policy measures are justified to address cereal yield issues occasioned by climate change specifically rising temperature and emissions. Therefore, the present paper recommends that Sub-Saharan countries emphasize political and economic stability, improve trade infrastructure, and institute overall climate adaptation policies to enhance agricultural resilience and food security.