This study examines the effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on deforestation in non-OECD countries, in consideration of the potential trade-offs between economic objectives and environmental concerns and the pollution haven hypothesis. The study applies a multilevel fixed effects estimator to an original panel dataset of more than 4500 locations that received FDI across 120 countries between 2003 and 2019 and considers the sectors and sub-sectors of investment projects to examine heterogeneous land intensity in agricultural and food activities. Three main conclusions emerge. First, the food sector is primarily responsible for FDI-driven forest loss, while FDI projects in other sectors do not seem to significantly contribute to deforestation. Second, forest loss induced by food FDI is driven by specific sub-sectors; in particular, FDI projects in the food trade and services sub-sector seem to be significant, which is likely attributable to increased demand for local agricultural production. Third, animal industry FDI has the most significant impact on forest loss where the forest land cover is dominant.

中文翻译：

---

食物与森林：外国直接投资与森林砍伐之间关系的空间分析


本研究考察了外国直接投资 （FDI） 对非经合组织国家森林砍伐的影响，同时考虑了经济目标和环境问题与污染天堂假说之间的潜在权衡。该研究将多级固定效应估计器应用于 2003 年至 2019 年间在 120 个国家/地区接受外国直接投资的 4500 多个地点的原始面板数据集，并考虑了投资项目的部门和子部门，以检查农业和食品活动中的异质土地强度。出现了三个主要结论。首先，食品部门是 FDI 驱动的森林损失的主要原因，而其他部门的 FDI 项目似乎对森林砍伐没有重大贡献。其次，食品 FDI 引起的森林损失是由特定的子部门驱动的;特别是，食品贸易和服务子行业的 FDI 项目似乎很重要，这可能是由于对当地农业生产的需求增加。第三，畜牧业 FDI 对森林损失的影响最为显著，其中林地覆盖占主导地位。