Towards a carbon neutral Africa: A review of the linkages between financial inclusion and renewable energy

Abstract

We assessed the linkages between financial inclusion and consumption of renewable energy towards low carbon print in Africa by adopting the Arksey and O’Malley framework. We searched for peer-reviewed articles from JSTOR, Emerald Insight, Taylor and Francis, ScienceDirect, Springer, Elsevier and Sage databases. We used keywords and Boolean logic and our search covered the period from January 2000 to October 2023. We further screened related articles' reference lists. To retrieve other relevant documents on financial inclusion and renewable energy linkages towards neutral carbon in Africa, we searched through Z-library, Google Scholar, and web-based sites. Twelve studies that satisfied the inclusion measures were identified and further discussed. Of these studies, 7 supported the argument that financially included households consume renewable energy in Africa thus establishing a direct linkage. Five studies assessed the combined influence of financial inclusion and consumption of renewable energy on Africa’s low carbon emission and found that consumption of renewable energy serves as a conduit for financially included households to emit low carbon. Our study’s results add to the discourse on financial inclusion and renewable energy consumption at the household level and furnish a reference point for making decisions aimed at addressing measures to mitigate carbon emissions.

Keywords

• Just transition
• Financial inclusion
• Renewable energy
• Africa south of the Sahara
• Systematic literature review