Assessing food security and environmental quality under policy stringency and geopolitics using counterfactual and machine learning approaches

The provision of food security promotes sustainable economic growth by fostering healthier and more productive populations. However, achieving food security can impose environmental costs, as production and distribution processes contribute to deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions, and resource depletion. Environmental policy stringency plays a critical role in mitigating these impacts by regulating industrial practices and promoting sustainable technologies. This study examines the relationship between food security and environmental policy stringency in shaping greenhouse gas emissions and ecological footprints, while accounting for energy consumption, geopolitical risks, and technological innovation. Using Canadian annual time series data from 1990 to 2022, the study employs the dynamic autoregressive distributed lag (DARDL) model to analyze long-run dynamics. The empirical results indicate that a 1% increase in food security raises CO₂ emissions by 0.16% and ecological footprint by 0.14%, confirming its environmentally detrimental effect. Energy consumption exerts the largest impact, increasing CO₂ emissions by 0.60% and ecological footprint by 0.67%. Geopolitical risk contributes positively to environmental degradation, increasing CO₂ emissions by 0.01% and ecological footprint by 0.79%. In contrast, environmental policy stringency reduces CO₂ emissions by 0.13% and ecological footprint by 0.16%, while technological innovation decreases emissions by 0.11% and ecological footprint by 0.10% in the long run. All estimated coefficients are statistically significant at conventional levels. Counterfactual analysis further evaluates the effects of ± 1% and ± 5% shocks among variables, revealing asymmetric environmental responses. The robustness of the findings is confirmed using Kernel-based Regularized Least Squares (KRLS). These results suggest that policymakers must balance food security objectives with environmental sustainability by strengthening environmental regulations and promoting green agricultural technologies.