Albert Duodu

About

I am a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Economics, Aalto University, and at the Helsinki Graduate School of Economics. I received my PhD in Economics from Lund University in 2024.

My research lies at the intersection of international trade, environmental economics, and development economics. I study how global trade and climate policies shape firm behaviour, supply chains, and long-run sustainability — including the effects of offshoring, import competition, carbon taxes, border adjustments, and energy price shocks on production, labour demand, and emissions. A second strand of my work examines development questions in sub-Saharan Africa, with a focus on electricity access, blackouts, household adaptation, and institutional trust.

Fields: International Trade · Environmental Economics · Development Economics · Climate Policy · Firm Behaviour

Department of Economics, Aalto University · Ekonominaukio 1, 02150 Espoo, Finland · Curriculum Vitae (PDF)

Research

Working Papers — Trade & Environment

Carbon Offshoring and Manufacturing Cleanup

Job Market Paper Under Review

Production in manufacturing firms in high-income countries is generally becoming cleaner. Some of this trend has been shown to be due to the adoption of new technologies, but carbon offshoring — when dirty production at home is replaced with imports of carbon-intensive products from abroad — may be an additional factor. Leveraging Swedish firm-product level data between 2005–2014 and combining shift-share instrumental variables with a difference-in-differences design, I find that a 10% increase in the import of emission-intensive goods makes firms' production processes about 5% cleaner but increases transport emissions by 2%. The type of offshoring matters: foreign direct investment has a much larger emissions-reducing effect than offshoring through arm's-length imports.

Greener Under Pressure: The Local Geography of Import Competition and Emissions in Swedish Manufacturing

Under Review with Zoheir El-Sahli

We examine how local import competition — measured across different spatial dimensions within Sweden — affects the CO₂ emission intensity of manufacturing firms. Using detailed geographic data on Swedish manufacturers, we show that increased local import competition leads to lower firm-level emissions, with the effect diminishing as the distance between producers and importers grows. We identify two mechanisms: (i) a pro-competitive efficiency effect, with gains in TFP, higher value added, lower marginal costs, and higher markups; and (ii) a product-mix effect, with reallocation away from emission-intensive goods. We also document evidence of carbon offshoring and investment in pollution abatement as additional firm responses.

Environment and the Economy: Firm-Level Responses to Energy Price Shocks

Working Paper

Carbon pricing is a cornerstone of climate policy, yet its firm-level incidence remains poorly understood. Combining matched employer–employee and firm-level data from Sweden (2006–2014) with a shift-share IV and a dynamic difference-in-differences design that exploits variation in exposure to energy tax reforms, I show that higher energy prices generate substantial reductions in energy use and CO₂ emissions. These environmental gains come with economically meaningful adjustments: declines in productivity and employment, and incomplete cost pass-through. The incidence is highly heterogeneous — low-productivity firms and high-skilled workers bear disproportionate costs, while more productive firms absorb shocks more easily.

Who Bears the Carbon Border? Optimal Differentiation and Spatial Reallocation under the EU CBAM

In Progress with Matti Liski

Working Papers — Development

Lights Out, Tax Gone: The Fiscal and Institutional Consequences of Electricity Shortages

In Progress

From Side Hustles to Structural Change: Gig Platforms and Labour Market Dynamics in Africa

In Progress with Emmanuel Quarshie, Kingsley Laar, Emmanuel Ansah Otabil & James Baduor

Illegal Mining, Weather, and Firm Adaptation: Evidence from Ghana's Galamsey Zones

In Progress with Michael Danquah & Emmanuel Quarshie

Blackouts, Consumption Smoothing, and Adaptation Mechanisms in African Households

In Progress

About

Research

Working Papers — Trade & Environment

Working Papers — Development

Teaching