THE IMPACT OF INDUSTRIALIZATION ON AIR POLLUTION: THE CASE OF POLAND

Abstract

In the study, the effects of industrialization on air pollution are analyzed with time series for Poland between 2000-2019. For this purpose, “industry” as a variable indicating industrialization and “PM2.5” representing air pollution were included in the model. According to the ADF unit root results, it is concluded that all variables are stationary at the first difference. Therefore, since the variables used in the analysis are not stationary at the level and at the second difference, it was found appropriate to estimate the cointegration coefficient using the Johansen, FMOLS method. Necessary assumptions must be provided for the Johansen cointegration test. These assumptions are; There is no autocorrelation problem, no changing variance, and the parameters are stable. After providing the necessary assumptions for the Johansen cointegration test, the cointegration relationship between the variables was investigated with the Johansen cointegration test. As a result, the existence of at least one cointegrating vector in the long run was determined between the PM2.5 variable, which represents industrialization and environmental pollution. After determining that there is a cointegrated relationship between the variables in the long run, the effect of the independent variable on the dependent variable was analyzed with the FMOLS estimator. It has been determined that the effect of industrialization on environmental pollution is positive and statistically significant. It has been concluded that a 1% increase in industrialization increases environmental pollution by 2.86%, so there is a long-term positive relationship between industrialization and environmental pollution.