The dynamic impact of financial, technological, and natural resources on sustainable development in Belt and Road countries

This study attempts to determine the untapped factors that affect sustainable development in 64 Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) countries from 2006 to 2019. The study employed the two-step system Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) validated through Two-stage Least Square (2SLS). The findings of system-GMM revealed a significant dynamic nature of the relationship between sustainable development and its determinants. Findings demonstrate that financial development, financial inclusion, energy efficiency ratio, per capita health expenditure, per capita income growth, governance, and integration of before and after BRI dummy show a significant positive impact by contributing to BRI countries’ sustainable development path. However, e-government, natural resource rent, macroeconomic conditions, and government size have a significant but negative effect by hurting sustainable development. Integration of BRI further enhances and promotes a country and regional sustainable development path. Therefore, better regional policies for financial development, financial inclusion for poverty alleviation, and e-government development are required, boosting per-capita income and sustainable development in the coming years. The study concludes that BRI country’s natural resources rent contributes to national saving but declines the natural resources. Also, it endorses the theory that a nation should adopt the “Hartwick rule” to reinvest rents from the depletion of the natural resources in reproducible capital forms to shift from a weak sustainable path. This study also proposes significant policy implications for balanced and sustainable growth in light of the current research findings.