The Long-term Anthropogenic Processes’ Effects on Ecological Footprints in Morocco: A STIRPAT Analysis Based on Four Co-integration Approaches

Morocco provides a stark example of how a developing country in the southern hemisphere of Africa is struggling with the diverse and devastating impacts of climate change, which are exacerbated by development issues and a lack of studies that allow for understanding the causal effects of environmental degradation, a crucial factor in informing adequate policy responses. An exhaustive STIRPAT analysis, conducted in Morocco from 1970 to 2023, uses four pieces of empirical evidence and four cointegration methods: ARDL, FMOLS, DOLS, and CCR. The increase in ecological footprints of production, consumption, import, and export in Morocco is due to urbanization, technical progress, trade openness, and economic growth, respectively. Anthropogenic processes, attributed to urbanization, economic growth, technological progress, and trade openness, have a positive contribution to environmental alteration and have been found unsustainable in the Moroccan context. Thus, relevant policies are being proposed at the individual, organizational, and governmental levels to reduce their environmental burden, increase bio-capacity regeneration potential, and promote environmental sustainability both in Morocco and beyond.