Green logistics and environment, economic growth in the context of the Belt and Road Initiative.

Infrastructure development has been a priority area since the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) was proposed. This paper uses the generalized method of moments (GMM) to analyze the relationship between the green logistics, environment and economic growth based on panel data of countries along the BRI from 2007 to 2018. It is found that fossil fuels are the core of logistics operation activities, and the more fossil fuels are used, the more detrimental to the sustainable development of the environment. "The green logistics is negatively correlated with fossil fuel energy consumption and carbon emissions per capita in countries along the Belt and Road. At the same time, the green logistics can also bring more export opportunities for these countries and increase the national income per capita. The development of the green logistics is of great significance to the countries' environment and sustainable economic development along the Belt and Road.

Introduction

Logistics is the process of maximizing the profitability of goods from origin to consumption to meet customer demand through transportation, storage, and distribution (Saripalle, 2018; Rose et al., 2017). Following the international trade competition and development, logistics management has increasingly become an important way for countries to improve their competitiveness, and improving logistics performance has become a core force and determinant for effective integration into global value chains, maintaining economic growth, and enhancing national competitiveness (Emikonel, 2021; Filova and Hrda, 2020; Soda and Aggarwal, 2020). With global environmental issues on the rise, companies and policymakers are facing increasing pressure to reduce the negative ecological impact of logistics activities and to make it more environmentally sustainable. Without additional environmental measures, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from transportation activities will increase by 60% by 2050, and emissions from global freight alone will increase by 160% (Robaina and Neves, 2021). As per the Paris Climate Agreement, global warming should be kept below 2 °C and preferably be below 1.5 °C, further requiring better environmental policies in the transport sector to address this challenge (Rogelj et al., 2016). Recent research discovers green logistics performance based on the belt and road countries (Li et al., 2021); however, using the generalized method of moments (GMM) to analyze the relationship between the green logistics, environment and economic growth was not discovered in the scholarly articles with a special focus on sustainable economic development along the Belt and Road countries.

Scholarly articles discovered stronger relationship among the constructs of this study (Dhull and Narwal, 2016). The link among green logistics, environment, economic growth, and Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) are discovered as environmental protection and sustainable logistics operations (Agyabeng-Mensah and Tang, 2021). Discovering the nexus between green logistics and sustainable development has recently received global attention from academic researchers, environmental economists, government officials, organizations, policymakers and governments. The study of green logistics includes the complete operation of green supply chains, including green procurement, green transportation, green distribution, and green delivery of environmentally friendly logistics. Studies in this field aim to protect the environment by controlling the external adverse effects of logistics tasks (Agyabeng-Mensah and Tang, 2021; Delmonico and Bezerra, 2020; Omri, 2014; Ozturk 2010; Dekker et al., 2012; Lai and Wong, 2012). Literature indicates that green logistics traditions can be effective in reducing environmental damage and operational costs, improving energy savings and competitiveness of goods and services (Dhull and Narwal, 2016; Lai and Wong, 2012). Furthermore, a number of studies confirm the positive impact of environmental regulations on logistics operations (Dhakar et al., 2021; Mangla et al., 2014; Lai and Wong, 2012). A strict environmental law supports green logistics practices and improves the overall quality of the global ecosystem. Likewise, EU member states have enacted strict green packaging regulations to address waste pollution. Such practices also have spillover effects, as trade modellers must also comply with these legislations (Zhou and Tang, 2021; Hu and Wang, 2020).

In the context of the Belt and Road Initiative, logistics networks as a core construct need to break down barriers, increase openness, and develop towards integration and flexibility to meet the new trends and requirements of economic development (Saeed et al., 2021; Mohsin et al., 2020; Foo et al., 2019; Soong, 2018; Lin and Bega, 2021; Lin et al., 2020). However, the modern logistics industry has also caused a series of economic and environmental problems while promoting economic growth, such as the high cost of logistics, which leads to a higher total social cost of economic development. On the other hand, the ecological damage caused by excessive energy consumption and increased emissions affects the green development of the whole society (Zhang et al., 2020). As a result, the constructs such as green logistics, environment, economic growth, and Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) are well-connected to each other. Therefore, this paper aims to explore the relationship between green logistics, environment, and economic growth in order to provide a reference for the sustainable development of countries.

Literature review

The green logistics

Logistics and supply chain are closely inter-related. The relation is about the raw materials processing and manufacturing of semi-finished products. Providing services to consumers (Akyelken, 2011) is another aspect of supply chain. McKinnon et al. (2016) established a structure for the green logistics (GL) that replicates the association among logistics actions and environmental influences. It also focuses on the movement of goods as well as shipping of goods. Within the logistics and environmental superiority framework, the green logistics is a crucial component in the organization of the green supply chains. The Green logistics is measured as an indication of the Green Supply Chain Management (GSCM) component (Pathak et al., 2020). The literature delivers numerous explanations for Sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) and numerous definitions for GSCM (Ahi and Searcy 2013). These diverse descriptions shield an inclusive range of classes and restrictions of supply chain networks (Joseph, 2012) especially in the BRI countries.

A growing literature on the green logistics is available on different topics. For example, Tachizawa and Wong (2015) presented three themes on the green logistics, including "converse logistics," "discharges assessment". Pathak et al. (2020) highlight two phases of green logistics practices: the tactical phase of assessing "sustainable logistics" phase of green packaging. In addition to this, the deceptive clash among financial advances and ecofriendly shield is a major concern in the green logistics workflow, which the following researchers investigated. For example, Liu et al. (2020) discovered the viewpoints of logistics benefactors and traced few issues for developing environmental green logistics operations. These experiments include customer priorities, complexity supervision, system equilibrium, and technical and regulatory ambiguity.

Over the past few years, research in Green logistics (GL) has proposed several means and methods to estimate the results of GL and global supply chains. Another research has worked on assessing "total supply chain" performance in sustainable networks of Green Supply Chain (GSC) observes (Mohebalizadeh and Hafezalkotob, 2018; Wang, 2013; Bjorklund et al., 2012). Also, GL and GSC presents at the manufacturing level (Thaib, 2020; Lai and Wong 2012; Lin et al., 2011; Hu et al., 2019; Zhu 2019). However, this study mostly reflects green performance in multinational logistics. The Green logistic presentation is a prerequisite for a profounder understanding of global supply chain management (GSCM), as it is a crucial constituent of the supply chain (Kim and Chai, 2017). Aibin Li et al. (2020) analyzed the main factors influencing and restricting the development of green coal logistics from the theoretical system of the green coal logistics. The above studies explored the green logistics through subdivided industries and failed to examine the green logistics from a macro perspective.

Environmental factors and logistics

Logistics and transport actions are a key reason of ecological contamination, universal heating and weather alteration, and have elevated extensive apprehension. In the perspective of logistics and environmental studies, green logistics intent to decrease the ecological issues of logistics actions. The existing literature has assessed the Logistics Performance Index (LPI) importance on financial presentation from a global viewpoint. For example, Riadh (2020) use a sample of emerging economies and find that improvements in the LPI have a beneficial effect on business incorporation in developing countries.

Researchers investigated the association among logistics presentation and ecological degradation in Asian countries through empirical analysis. Park et al. (2016) argue that green logistics enables industrial activities to reduce the hazards of non-green operations and thus achieve environmental sustainability. Buyukozkan and Cifci (2011) found that companies can reduce 80% of their harmful environmental impacts by adopting environmental measures in their operations. Luthra et al. (2016) stress that green applies in logistics management can improve energy efficiency, reduce waste, and increase environmental sustainability by reducing carbon emissions. Researchers also studied the association among logistics presentation and ecological excellence in forty two Asian countries. They used the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) for their empirical analysis, and the results showed that improved logistics performance reduced carbon emissions. Therefore, the investigation mentioned above articles mentioned in the past concludes that LPI is a significant pointer to discover the vibrant association between GL and the atmosphere from an global perspective. Most of these studies emphasize green logistics and environmental issues at the enterprise level, but they fail to analyze empirically from an international perspective.

Green logistics and economic growth

Importance on waste reduction is the emphasis of green logistics operations and is frequently related with ecological sustainability and improves the monetary act of companies. Jayaraman et al. (2012) found that green logistics operations increase market share and increase buyer faithfulness and advance corporate financial growth. Cosimato et al. (2015) studied the impact of green logistics on economic performance and corporate profits and found that the use of renewable assets in green logistics operations may decrease environmental footprints, meaningfully advance economic situations. According to Fang (2016), green logistics can enable the economic factors in the "Belt and Road" region to gather rapidly, realize the effect of scale economy, and promote the regional economic volume and quality to enter a double-up track.

Using a dynamic panel framework, Chu (2011) finds that logistics (transportation, warehousing, mailing, and telecommunications) positively impacted economic growth in 30 Chinese provinces during the period 1998–2007. In addition, the positive impact of logistics was more pronounced in relatively underdeveloped provinces. Yong Jing and Ab-Rahim (2020) also found that telecommunications infrastructure positively impacted economic growth in both developed and developing countries. The above studies emphasize the necessity of green logistics and promote the operation of green logistics through continuous economic policies to obtain competitive returns, but fail to analyze the promotion of economic development in the process of green logistics operation.

Model construction

According to data from the Belt and Road Portal, China has signed cooperation agreements with 64 BRI countries by December 2018. This paper examines the relationship between green logistics, environment, and economic growth by selecting panel data of 23 countries in the context of the "Belt and Road" initiative. This article adopts the classification method of Xu and Lu (2020), and selects the countries as China, South Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Jordan, the relevant data for Russia, Ukraine, Egypt, Romania, Poland, Greece, Italy, New Zealand, and Sudan are all from the World Bank. Since the Logistics Performance Index is only available for five years, 2007, 2010, 2012, 2014, and 2016, this paper uses similar years as a proxy. There is no doubt that logistics and supply chain management play an important role in national economic development, but environmental policies and green practices are not yet well developed and pose several ecological and social problems. Accordingly, the formula is:where, L is logistics performance, including logistics service quality (LPIQLS), cargo tracking and tracing capability (LPITTC), ease of arranging international transportation (LPICPS), customs clearance efficiency (LPICCP), cargo transportation timeliness (LPIST), and logistics infrastructure quality (LPITTI): represents environmental indicators, including the carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and fossil fuel energy consumption FFUEL; denotes economic indicators, including gross domestic product per capita (GDPPC) and health expenditure per capita (HEPC); Cont denotes control variables, including industrial value added (IVD), manufacturing value added (MVD), imports of goods and services (Import), and exports of goods and services (Export); denotes country number; is a constant term; and is a random error term.

This paper uses panel data of 23 ″Belt and Road" countries to test the hypothesis. Given that heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation problems often occur in panel data, they may mislead the correct results of the statistical model. The problem of heteroskedasticity in panel data can be expressed as heteroskedasticity occurs when the variance of the error term varies with the observed value (Simpson, 2012). Therefore, referring to Blundell and Bond (1998), this article used the generalized method of moments (GMM) to obtain more reliable results, and the first-order lags of the explanatory variables are introduced. Hence, the Eq. (1) is deformed to obtain Eqs. (2), (3), (4), (5), (6), and (7):

In Eqs. (2), (3), (4), (5), (6), and (7), LPIQLS, LPITTC, LPICPS, LPICCP, LPIST, and LPITTI are dependent variables, and is the country time effect; is the country fixed effect; and t is the year (t = 2007–2018). The description of each variable and data sources are shown in Table 1.

Table 1

Variable description and data source.

Variables	Indicators	Description and calculation method
Logistics Performance	LPIQLS	Logistics service quality (value is 1～5)
	LPITTC	Ability to track and query shipments (value is 1～5)
	LPICPS	Arrangement of international transport convenience (value is 1～5)
	LPICCP	Customs clearance efficiency (value is 1～5)
	LPIST	Timeliness of cargo transportation (value is 1～5)
	LPITTI	Quality of logistics infrastructure (value is 1～5)
Environment Variables	CO2	Carbon dioxide emissions (metric tons per capita)
	FFUEL	Fossil fuel energy consumption (% of total)
Economic variables	GDPPC	GDP per capita (constant 2010 dollars)
	HEPC	Per capita health expenditure (% of GDP)
Control variables	IVD	Industrial value added (% of GDP)
	MVD	Manufacturing value added (% of GDP)
	Import	Import value of goods and services (% of GDP)
	Export	Export value of goods and services (% of GDP)

Data source: World bank.

Measurement results and analysis

Descriptive statistical analysis was performed for each indicator, and the results are shown in Table 2. Indicator 5 represents high logistics performance, and 1 illustrates low logistics performance. It can be seen that most of the variables have positive means and standard deviations and have a significant peak distribution. This indicates that the 23 selected Belt and Road countries have good logistics performance, including logistics service quality, ability to track and trace cargo, ease of arranging international transportation, customs clearance efficiency, timeliness of cargo transportation, and quality of logistics infrastructure. The countries selected above also have good GDP per capita, industrial value added, manufacturing value added, and import/export trade. The high average and standard deviation of fossil fuel energy consumption have a severe impact on the environment, per capita CO2 emissions, health expenditure and environmental sustainability.

Table 2

Descriptive statistics results.

Variables	Average value	Standard deviation	Minimum value	Maximum value
LPICCP	2.795	0.487	1.867	3.921
LPITTI	2.335	0.557	1.78	4.069
LPICPS	3.059	0.38	1.93	3.894
LPIQLS	3.022	0.441	2.05	3.822
LPITTC	3.113	0.453	1.89	3.909
LPIST	3.534	0.41	2.31	4.52
GDPPC	8.97	1.2	6.533	11.15
HEPC	5.926	1.362	2.631	8.33
FFUEL	2.197	0.423	0.976	3.125
CO2	1.469	1.254	-1.308	3.95
IVD	3.89	0.534	0.729	4.342
MVD	2.64	0.625	-0.532	3.478
Import	3.48	0.423	2.39	4.519
Export	3.457	0.544	2.098	4.665

Table 3 shows the results of the correlation matrix, which indicates that environmental factors have different effects on logistics performance, with logistics performance increasing CO2 emissions. At the same time, sustainable logistics activities reduce fossil fuel use. GDP and health expenditure per capita are positively correlated with logistics performance, import and export trade and negatively correlated with manufacturing value added. This suggests that manufacturing activities are seriously damaging people's health and increasing health expenditures.

Table 3

Correlation matrix results.

Variables	LPICCP	LPICPS	LPIQLS	LPITTC	LPIST	GDPPC	FFUEL
LPICCP	1
LPITTI	0.9202
LPICPS	0.8631	1
LPIQLS	0.932	0.8463	1
LPITTC	0.9000	0.8445	0.9271	1
LPIST	0.795	0.7967	0.8204	0.8757	1
GDPPC	0.6236	0.5223	0.6582	0.6959	0.6655	1
FFUEL	0.1043	0.0395	0.6423	0.0024	-0.0424	-0.1689	1
CO2	0.4638	0.4718	0.5435	0.5851	0.5692	-0.8566	0.5315
HEPC	0.6076	0.4902	0.6423	0.6684	0.6361	0.9510	-0.1633
IVD	0.2572	0.3715	0.3278	0.3153	0.3650	0.2936	-0.2238
MVD	0.2601	0.4395	0.3102	0.2958	0.3052	-0.0233	-0.0116
Import	0.3375	0.4157	0.2976	0.3093	0.3526	0.2929	-0.1520
Export	0.4116	0.4477	0.4149	0.4490	0.5016	0.5924	-0.3726
Variables	CO2	HEPC	IVD	MVD	Import	Export
HEPC	0.7656	1
IVD	-0.5343	0.1138	1
MVD	-0.1496	0.0775	0.6611	1
Import	0.3974	0.2752	0.3864	0.3416	1
Export	0.7155	0.4941	0.5927	0.2591	0.8239	1

Table 4 shows the results of least squares and fixed effects. The results show that per capita CO2 emissions are negatively correlated with logistics service quality, customs clearance efficiency, and cargo transportation timeliness, i.e., poor quality of logistics services, inefficient customs clearance, and untimely cargo transportation, will significantly increase carbon emissions and lead to air pollution and global warming, which directly affects environmental sustainability. On the other hand, the export volume of goods and services is positively correlated with the quality of logistics infrastructure, logistics service quality and customs clearance efficiency, i.e., improving transportation infrastructure, improving logistics service level, and freight transportation level can promote commodity exports and increase national income.

Table 4

Results of least squares, fixed effects, and random effects.

Variables	Ols-a1	Fe-a1	Ols-a2	Fe-a2	Ols-a3	Re-a3	Ols-a4	Re-a4	Ols-a5	Fe-a5	Ols-a6	Fe-a6
GDPPC	0.147	-0.0618	0.130	-0.230	0.120	0.0042	0.0951∗	-0.0321	0.200∗	-0.0621	0.0982	-0.148
	(0.0358)	(0.0746)	(0.0310)	(0.0699)	(0.0307)	(0.0391)	(0.0301)	(0.0400)	(0.0359)	(0.0852)	(0.0275)	(0.0707)
HEPC	0.0001	0.0741∗∗∗	-0.092	0.0310	0.0120	0.0607∗∗∗	-0.0179	0.0533∗∗	-0.0193	0.0936∗∗∗	0.0054	0.0075
	(0.0226)	(0.0251)	(0.0202)	(0.0235)	(0.0188)	(0.0210)	(0.0189)	(0.0210)	(0.0218)	(0.0286)	(0.0164)	(0.0238)
FFUEL	0.0897	0.21	0.0812	0.296	0.0756	-0.157	0.0717	-0.123	0.0607	0.220	0.0205	0.154
	(0.0341)	(0.0522)	(0.0292)	(0.0489)	(0.0270)	(0.0319)	(0.0281)	(0.0323)	(0.0341)	(0.0596)	(0.0227)	(0.0495)
CO2	-0.0186	-0.187∗∗∗	-0.0271	-0.07	-0.0484∗∗	0.0123	-0.0124	0.0433	-0.090∗∗∗	-0.193∗∗∗	-0.0492∗∗	-0.0140
	(0.0226)	(0.0573)	(0.0215)	(0.0537)	(0.0189)	(0.0290)	(0.0199)	(0.0306)	(0.0217)	(0.0654)	(0.0162)	(0.0543)
IVD	0.0084	0.069	-0.0186	0.110	0.0411∗	0.0327	-0.0169	-0.0521∗	0.0200	0.106∗	0.0189	0.103∗∗
	(0.0269)	(0.0440)	(0.0265)	(0.0412)	(0.0213)	(0.0299)	(0.0236)	(0.0307)	(0.0241)	(0.0502)	(0.0173)	(0.0417)
MVD	0.0432	-0.0458	0.0598	-0.19	0.0344	0.0033	0.071	0.0708	0.0470	-0.0857∗	0.0412	-0.0615
	(0.0161)	(0.0453)	(0.0155)	(0.0425)	(0.0124)	(0.0276)	(0.0146)	(0.0291)	(0.0154)	(0.0518)	(0.0122)	(0.0430)
Export	0.272∗∗	0.0938∗∗	0.163	0.0403	0.222∗	0.111∗∗∗	0.186	0.0701∗	0.273∗∗∗	0.160∗∗∗	0.101∗∗	-0.0474
	(0.044)	(0.0395)	(-0.0363)	(0.0371)	(0.0357)	(0.0384)	(0.0378)	(0.0378)	(0.0491)	(0.0452)	(0.0365)	(0.0375)
Import	-0.14	-0.0729∗	-0.0596∗	-0.0314	-0.13	-0.0307	-0.0726	-0.0225	-0.119∗∗∗	-0.0392	-0.0141	0.0068
	(0.041)	(0.0323)	(0.0325)	(0.0303)	(0.0331)	(0.0310)	(0.0339)	(0.0302)	(0.0442)	(0.0369)	(0.0336)	(0.0306)
Intercept	-1.951∗∗∗	-2.320∗∗∗	-1.262∗∗∗	-0.389	-1.557∗∗∗	-0.797∗∗∗	-0.792∗∗∗	0.191	-2.156∗∗∗	-2.831∗∗∗	-0.525∗∗∗	1.287∗
	(0.215)	(0.815)	(0.188)	(0.764)	(0.187)	(0.329)	(0.187)	(0.341)	(0.235)	(0.931)	(0.164)	(0.772)

Note: (1) a1 indicates the quality of logistics infrastructure, a2 indicates the ability to track and query cargo, a3 indicates the quality of logistics services, a4 indicates the ease of arranging international transportation, a5 indicates the efficiency of customs clearance, and a6 indicates the timeliness of cargo transportation. (2) ∗∗∗, ∗∗, and ∗ indicates meeting the significance levels of 1%, 5%, and 10%, respectively, differently.

Table 5 shows the estimation results of the dynamic panel GMM. Two economic indicators are used in this paper, namely GDP per capita and health expenditure per capita. At the 5% confidence level, GDP per capita is positively correlated with customs clearance efficiency, and for every 1% increase in customs clearance efficiency, GDP per capita increases by 0.081%. At the 10% confidence level, logistics service quality and logistics infrastructure quality are positively correlated with GDP per capita, with a 1% increase in GDP per capita increasing by 0.061% and 0.0481%, respectively. The low efficiency of customs clearance is usually associated with unskilled labor and outdated machinery and equipment (Rehman Khan et al., 2018), and since there are many developing countries in this paper, the level of customs infrastructure and services still needs to be improved. Therefore, improving the efficiency of customs clearance, improving the quality of logistics services, and improving transportation infrastructure is more conducive to economic development and higher national income.

Table 5

GMM regression results.

Variables	LPIQLS	LPITTC	LPICPS	LPICCP	LPIST	LPIQTTI
FFUEL	-0.0179∗∗∗	-0.0152∗∗	-0.0249∗∗∗	-0.0255∗∗∗	-0.0109	-0.0143∗∗∗
	(0.006)	(0.008)	(0.008)	(0.008)	(0.010)	(0.005)
GDPPC	0.0610∗	-0.0573	0.0158	0.0810∗∗	0.0260	0.0481∗
	(0.032)	(0.021)	(0.008)	(0.037)	(0.013)	(0.020)
HEPC	-0.0131∗∗∗	0.0004	-0.0105	-0.0273∗∗∗	0.0368	0.0200∗
	(0.006)	(0.000)	(0.010)	(0.015)	(0.020)	(0.017)
CO2	-0.0110∗∗∗	0.0048	-0.0218∗∗∗	-0.0127	0.0005∗	-0.0051
	(0.004)	(0.003)	(0.008)	(0.007)	(0.022)	(0.006)
IVD	-0.0250	-0.0490∗∗∗	-0.0540	0.0250∗	-0.0015	-0.0028
	(0.0132)	(0.023)	(0.031)	(0.005)	(0.005)	(0.0063)
MVD	0.0331	0.0019	0.0038	0.0453	0.0115∗∗∗	0.0070
	(0.0043)	(0.006)	(0.017)	(0.009)	(0.000)	(0.011)
Import	0.0524	0.0443	0.0496∗∗	0.0435	-0.0016	0.0423∗
	(0.002)	(0.034)	(0.036)	(0.022)	(0.035)	(0.021)
Export	0.0384∗∗	0.0233	0.0540∗∗∗	0.0321∗∗	0.0494	0.0348∗∗∗
	(0.002)	(0.014)	(0.030)	(0.002)	(0.025)	(0.018)
Intercept	1.6458∗∗∗	0.7239∗∗∗	0.8475∗	0.3650∗∗	1.5817∗∗∗	2.5178∗∗
	(3.151)	(2.132)	(1.426)	(1.161)	(3.587)	(1.958)

Table 5 shows that at a confidence level of 1%, the quality of logistics services, customs clearance efficiency and health expenditure are negatively correlated, and for every 1% decrease in both, the health expenditure will increase by 0.0131% and 0.0273%, respectively. At a confidence level of 10%, health expenditure is negatively correlated with the quality of logistics infrastructure, and for every 1% decrease in the quality of logistics infrastructure, health expenditure increases by 0.020%.

It has been shown that environmentally unfriendly logistics operations have a severe impact on human health, with high levels of gas emissions having a negative impact on human health (Wu and Dunn, 1995). Pollutant emissions from industrialization and logistics activities can result in significant health costs, which would change with more green practices in supply chain management (Zawaydeh, 2016).

This paper uses two environmental indicators, including CO2 emissions per capita and fossil fuel energy consumption. The results show that at the 1% confidence level, the quality of logistics services and the ease of arranging international transportation are significantly and negatively correlated with CO2 emissions, with each 1% decrease in both being associated with a 0011% and 0.0218% increase in CO2 emissions, respectively. At a confidence level of 10%, cargo transportation time is positively related to CO2 emissions, with each 1% increase in the former being associated with a 0.0005% increase in CO2 emissions. Transportation is the leading cause of CO2 production in logistics operations and is mainly responsible for water and air pollution, which undermines environmental sustainability and causes many health problems (Dekker et al., 2012). Therefore, this study is consistent with the previous studies in the context of higher taxes that should be levied on polluting vehicles to ensure environmental sustainability (Sharma and Gandhi, 2016). Also, renewable energy and biofuels should be promoted as a better option to control global warming and environmental degradation (Leigh and Li, 2015).

The study shows that at the 1% confidence level, the quality of logistics services, the convenience of arranging international transportation, the efficiency of customs clearance, the quality of logistics infrastructure and the energy consumption of fossil fuels are significantly negatively correlated. For each of the first four, a 1% decrease in energy consumption increases by 0.0179 %, 0.0249%, 0.0255%, 0.0143% of energy consumption. At the 5% confidence level, each 1% reduction in tracking and tracing capacity increases fossil fuel energy consumption by 0.0152%, which has a negative impact on environmental sustainability and increases the cost of logistics operations. Logistics operations are heavily dependent on energy, and environmental sustainability needs to use more renewable resources in logistics operations (Changchun, 2017).

Conclusions and recommendations

The study highlights that freight and logistics are not significant contributors to the total carbon footprint. Thus, better regulation can significantly reduce carbon emissions with little or no cost. The exploration of green logistics from a macro perspective bring numerous difference compared to the previous studies that explored green logistics through subdivided industries. The research found significant relationship among the constructs such as green logistics, environment, economic growth, and Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

The authors discovered green logistics and environmental issues from an international perspective using a panel data of 23 countries. From the panel data of 23 countries from 2007-2018; we analyze and concludes that poor logistics infrastructure quality, logistics service quality, and timeliness of cargo transportation consume more fossil fuels and increase carbon emissions, which not only leads to environmental degradation but also has a negative impact on human health. At the same time, improved customs clearance and freight facilitation can lead to more export opportunities and higher national income per capita. This paper examines the relationship between green logistics and the environment and economic growth, and the findings are useful in promoting green practices, which play an important role in addressing environmental and economic issues. However, the results of this study could attract policy makers to adopt a more integrated and sustainable perspective. A sustainable development perspective places more emphasis on economic growth through the use of green logistics.

In the context of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), China has proposed "widespread consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits". It should continue to promote the improvement of the quality of logistics infrastructure in each country, which is vital for the healthy economic development of countries along the route, especially developing countries. In addition, to achieve environmental protection and economic benefits in global logistics operations, countries should develop green logistics policies that limit the use of fossil fuels, reduce pollution, and mitigate environmental degradation. Further research may use micro-data samples of green logistics performance to address the issue of economic growth and environmental sustainability.

Declarations

Author contribution statement

AKM Mohsin: Conceived and designed the experiments; Performed the experiments; Analyzed and interpreted the data; Contributed reagents, materials, analysis tools or data; Wrote the paper.

Hasanuzzaman Tushar, Sayed Far Abid Hossain, Kazi Khaled Shams Chisty, Mohammed Masum Iqbal, Md. Kamruzzaman, Siddiqur Rahman: Conceived and designed the experiments; Contributed reagents, materials, analysis tools or data.

Funding statement

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Data availability statement

Data will be made available on request.

Declaration of interests statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

No additional information is available for this paper.