Achieving Sustainable Development Goal‐7: The Role of ICT Development in Alleviating Rural‐Urban and Regional Energy Poverty in BRI Countries

ABSTRACT

Energy poverty poses a significant challenge to sustainable development across BRI countries, where disparities in energy access continue to hinder inclusive growth. The development of information and communication technologies (ICT) has emerged as a critical tool for improving energy access, efficiency, and innovation. This study offers novel evidence on the role of ICT in mitigating energy poverty across 112 BRI countries from 2000 to 2022. It further explores how ICT contributes to narrowing regional and rural–urban disparities. Employing several advanced econometric techniques, the findings indicate that: (i) ICT development significantly alleviates energy poverty, with multiple robustness checks confirming the validity of the baseline results; (ii) recognizing the presence of heterogeneity, we divided the whole sample based on regions, as energy poverty manifests more prominently at the regional level than at the national level. For this, results reveal that ICT development is particularly effective in reducing energy poverty in Africa and Asia compared to Europe and the America; (iii) when considering rural and urban populations, ICT development has a stronger impact on alleviating energy poverty in rural areas; and (iv) financial development and government effectiveness contribute to reducing energy poverty, whereas domestic energy deficiency and income poverty exacerbate energy deprivation. These findings underscore that governments should prioritize ICT development, particularly in Africa and Asia, and focus on rural areas to enhance access to modern energy services, while simultaneously strengthening financial systems and governance to reduce domestic energy deficits and mitigate income‐related energy poverty.