Economic Complexity, Green Growth, and Ecological Footprint Nexus in a Global Panel

This study examines whether green-growth capacity conditions the ecological association of economic complexity in a global panel of 93 countries from 1995 to 2021, comprising 2,242 country-year observations. The analysis combines Economic Complexity Index data from the Observatory of Economic Complexity, ecological footprint data from the Global Footprint Network, and macroeconomic indicators from the World Development Indicators. Estimation is carried out in Python (linearmodels/statsmodels) using two-way fixed-effects models with country-clustered standard errors. Within a moderation framework, the paper tests whether the relationship between economic complexity and ecological footprint changes with adjusted net savings and whether the result survives alternative specifications. The estimates show that economic complexity is positively associated with ecological footprint across the main models. The interaction between economic complexity and adjusted net savings is also positive and statistically significant, and marginal-effect results indicate that the ecological association of complexity becomes stronger as adjusted net savings rises. However, the same moderation pattern does not hold when carbon intensity of GDP is used as an alternative green-growth proxy. The findings suggest that productive sophistication is not automatically ecologically sustainable and that conclusions about green growth depend on how green-growth capacity is measured. Because sustainability conclusions depend on whether a stock-based (ANS) or flow-based (carbon-intensity) proxy is used, green-growth performance should be assessed against absolute biophysical indicators rather than efficiency metrics alone.