From pollution to preservation: a dynamic examination of tourism, globalization, and environmental resilience in top-tier economies

Tourism is an important growth driver for global economies in today's globalization era. The increase in tourism activities has caused policymakers to worry about carbon emissions from related tourist transportation movements and how it might affect environmental quality. Several scholars have investigated the nexus of tourism-related CO₂ pollution to solve this puzzle; however, the issue persists. In this vein, this study contributes to evaluating the nexus among tourism, globalization, and environmental quality in the top ten most polluted economies from 1995–2020. We employ the dynamic common correlated effect (DCCE) methodology. Additionally, the DCCE technique estimates econometrics tools to resolve the concerns of cross-sectional dependence and slope heterogeneity. Study results demonstrate that tourism has positive environmental effects over the long term. Globalization, gross capital formation, and economic growth all positively affect CO₂ emissions. Interestingly, interaction terms results show the real effect of all variables on the environment. The government of the top ten most polluted countries can play an important role in ensuring sustainability by encouraging sustainable tourism, environmental-friendly globalization, and favorable gross capital formation for the environment and economic growth.