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In the domain of global socio-economic dynamics, the pivotal role of food production (FP) cannot be overstated. It constitutes the bedrock of fundamental human necessities while being inexorably linked with critical aspects such as economic expansion, societal equilibrium, and geopolitical interplays. The multifaceted nature of FP appears through its direct impact on macroeconomic indicators and its latent influence on international relations and policy-making. This critical nexus underscores the imperative for a comprehensive understanding and strategic management of food production processes to sustain and enhance global socio-economic stability and growth. Investigating the nexus between green finance (GF) and FP is pivotal for ensuring national security and promoting sustainable economic development. This research thus paper examines GF's impact on FP in China as outlined in the 2017 green finance policies. It employs the difference-in-differences (DID) method and analyzes a balanced panel dataset comprising 282 cities in China from 2009 to 2020. The results show that GF has an inhibitory effect on FP, and this remains valid after a range of reliability checks, including parallel trend assessments and placebo tests. Further findings of transmission mechanism analysis indicate that non-agricultural factors and financial exclusion are critical for GF's inhibitory effect on FP. Heterogeneity analyses show that GF's inhibitory effect on FP is more pronounced in the main food-producing areas, the main food-marketing areas, and cities with better infrastructure. The empirical results of this paper comprehensively illustrate GF's impact on FP and how it contributes to the achievement of food security objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental protection and sustainable development are now profoundly ingrained in the public consciousness in the modern era of the global green revolution. First, this paper uses an evolutionary game model to theoretically analyse the impact of environmental regulation and green finance on enterprises by dissecting the game behaviour between local governments, banks and enterprises. Then, we incorporate entrepreneurial spirit into the model to determine whether entrepreneurial spirit accelerates the achievement of green sustainability objectives. Environmental regulation and green finance are found to contribute substantially to the innovation of green technologies by local enterprises, while entrepreneurial spirit accelerates this process. Finally, we empirically test the findings based on a prefecture-level panel dataset from 2007 to 2020. We find that green finance has a positive impact in Central and Western cities of China, while Eastern cities are in greater need for government environmental regulation controls. For entrepreneurial spirit, the incentive effect of entrepreneurial spirit on the level of green technology innovation is more significant in Central and Western regions of China. This paper enriches the field of research on entrepreneurial spirit and regional green sustainable development by providing empirical evidence for the evaluation of environmental regulatory and green financing policy impacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to explore the direct and indirect impacts of the Carbon Emission Trading System (CETS) on the green transition development (GTD) of Chinese cities. This paper constructs a GTD evaluation system from the perspective of prevention and governance at the source, in terms of carbon reduction, pollution reduction, green expansion and growth, and measures the GTD performance of 281 cities based on the EW-TOPSIS model. It is found that the average increase in GTD of the sample cities from 2006 to 2020 is 3.40 %, the GTD progress of the 281 cities has a considerable positive spatial autocorrelation, with the GTD progress of the CETS pilot cities being significantly bigger than that of the non-pilot cities. Further this paper adopts the spatial difference model (S-DID) to scientifically identify the influence mechanism and heterogeneity of the direct and spatial effects of CETS on city GTD, and the results show that CETS has a positive effect on the GTD of both local and neighboring cities. Propensity score matching (PSM) is used to further corroborate these findings. The study also shows that CETS improves local GTD by promoting green innovation, rationalizing industrial structures, and enhancing energy efficiency in cities. Nevertheless, the ensuing siphon effect hinders nearby cities' levels of energy efficiency, industrial structure rationalization, and green innovation. The policy effects of CETS are more significant in large cities, eastern cities, old industrial areas, and non-resource-based cities. CETS can work in synergy with smart city construction, low-carbon city pilot policies, and emission trading policies to accelerate the process of GTD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study delves into the nexus between the efficiency of carbon emission allocation and the efficiency of green development within the context of innovative city construction. Leveraging data from 283 prefecture-level cities and corresponding provincial-level panel data spanning the period from 2005 to 2019 in mainland China, the research employs the zero-sum gain DEA model to compute provincial carbon emission allocation efficiency and allocate allowances. Furthermore, it utilizes the all-factor non-radial directional distance function and the SBM-DEA model to gauge the green development efficiency of prefecture-level cities. The double-difference method is applied to evaluate the impact of innovative city construction on regional green development efficiency. The results indicate that an imbalance between carbon emission allocation efficiency and emission quotas detrimentally affects urban green development. However, technological progress, factor accumulation, and the institutional environment associated with innovative city building mitigate this negative impact. Heterogeneity analysis reveals a differentiated effect of innovative city building on regional green development efficiency. This paper not only explores the concept of achieving an equitable distribution of carbon emission allowances but also examines how innovative city building influences regional green development. By establishing connections between urban policies, the equitable distribution of carbon emission allowances, and regional green development, it introduces a new perspective for promoting high-quality development at the regional level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rational assessment of the regional sustainable development level is an important prerequisite for formulating development strategies and achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Currently, little literature provides nuanced understanding for national sustainable development from the perspective of county sustainability. Such studies can provide more accurate regional heterogeneity characteristics and policy decision support. Thus, this paper applies the entropy weight method and Chinese county data from 2000 to 2017 to reassess the sustainability of Chinese counties. The results show that China's county sustainability (Sustainable Development Index, SDI) is slowly improving. County sustainability performance is poorer in ethnic minority agglomerations, poor counties, old revolutionary counties, and central and western regions, better in county-level cities and eastern regions. The decomposition results show that economic sustainability and environmental sustainability are the main supporters of SDI growth, and livelihood sustainability is in urgent need of improvement. The regional inequality of SDI in Chinese counties gradually decreases, and inter-group differences are the main contributors to regional inequality in SDI. This paper provides support for China to develop county-level sustainable development measures and practice the SDGs. The findings could be useful for policymakers. [Display omitted] • Based on the entropy weight method and the Chinese county data, the sustainable development levels of 1533 counties in China from 2000 to 2017 are estimated. • Analyses of spatial-temporal dynamic heterogeneity, Linear decomposition, and Dagum decomposition are conducted to study the features of sustainable development in Chinese counties. •The influence of natural features and national concern preferences on county sustainable development are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the digital era, digitalization brings great opportunities and challenges for cities' environmental governance and economic growth. However, it is worth noting that the impact of digitalization on cities' green transition has not been studied from the perspective of Metcalfe's Law. This paper uses the principal component method and non-radial directional distance function (NDDF) to calculate the digital development level and the green economic performance of 269 Chinese cities from 2003 to 2019. (1) The empirical findings demonstrate that digitalization has become a strong driver for cities' green economic transformation. (2) Digitalization indirectly promotes green transition through industrial structure optimization and green technological innovation. (3) The heterogeneity results show that the positive effect of digitalization on green development is more obvious in eastern and economically developed cities. (4) Using the partially linear functional-coefficient model (PLFC), this paper studies the non-linear nexus between digitalization and green economic transition from the perspective of Metcalfe's Law. Thus, Metcalfe's law is confirmed in the green transition of Chinese cities. Some policy recommendations are offered for realizing the coordinated development of digitalization and greening of the urban economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The coordination of economic development and ecological conservation has emerged as a global trend for sustainable development. This paper utilizes the "Broadband China" policy as a quasi-natural experiment, employing panel data from 279 prefecture-level cities spanning from 2006 to 2019. By constructing a spatial difference-in-differences (SDID) model, it examines the impact of digital infrastructure (DI) on industrial ecology (IE). The study finds that DI enhances both local and neighboring IE, with a spatial attenuation boundary of 600 km for IE impacts on neighboring cities. DI primarily facilitates the transformation of IE by promoting green technology innovation and expediting factor mobility. Heterogeneity analysis conducted using a spatial difference-in-difference-in-differences (SDDD) model reveals that DI has a greater impact on IE in resource-based cities, highly marketized regions, small-scale cities, and eastern regions. This research provides a novel perspective for exploring the transformation of IE theoretically and offers practical insights for leveraging digitization to promote IE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Promoting industrial digitalization and deepening regional collaborative innovation is essential for achieving urban green and sustainable development. This paper constructs a differential game model based on theoretical analysis and reveals the influence mechanism of industrial digitalization and regional collaborative innovation on urban green development efficiency (GDE). After that, this paper uses the entropy method, Super-SBM model, and improved gravity model to measure the level of industrial digitalization, urban GDE, and regional collaborative innovation, respectively. Then, this paper constructs the fixed-effects model, SDM model, moderating-effects model, and threshold model, then uses the panel data of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) urban agglomeration during 2011–2020 for empirical testing. The results show that: (1) industrial digitalization significantly improves urban GDE. (2) Overall, 2011–2015 is the rapid development period of BTH industry digitalization, and 2015–2020 is its stable development period. However, there are apparent spatial differences and imbalances. (3) Industrial digitalization has a significant spatial spillover effect that can enhance local and surrounding cities' GDE. (4) Regional collaborative innovation can directly enhance urban GDE, and has a positive moderating effect on industrial digitalization to enhance urban GDE. (5) The regional collaborative innovation has two thresholds of 3.9851 and 6.6184. With the collaborative innovation level improving, the main effect intensity steadily increases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industrial internet is an effective means to realize the green development of manufacturing industry. Whether the industrial Internet platform can improve the green innovation performance of enterprises is a very significant issue. Based on the Internet platform empowerment theory, this paper takes the industrial internet pilot demonstration project released annually by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in 2018–2021 as a quasi-natural experiment. By selecting the data of listed companies from 2011 to 2021 as research samples, this paper explores the impact of industrial Internet platforms on enterprises' green innovation performance. The findings indicate that the industrial internet platform dramatically improves enterprises' green innovation performance. And we also find that the impact of industrial internet platforms has greatly boosted the green innovation performance the enterprises with medium-and large-scale and situated in the first tier and new first tier cities. • Chinese industrial Internet pilot demonstration project is taken as a quasi-natural experiment. • The PSM-DID method is used in this paper. • Industrial internet platform can improve green innovation performance in enterprises. • Innovative capability plays an intermediary role between industrial internet platform and green innovation performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper chooses 98 mining cities in China from 2007 to 2021 as research samples. It investigates the policy practice of green development in mining cities according to the point of view of policy combination. We establish a super-efficiency model considering undesirable output to measure the green development level of mining cities and further construct a dynamic panel model based on the Gaussian mixture model (GMM) to test the transmission mechanism and heterogeneous effect of different types of environmental regulation to promote the green development of mining cities. The findings demonstrate that environmental regulations about command control, market incentives, and public participation can all help mining cities develop more sustainably. Additionally, there is a nonlinear relationship of an inverted "U" shape between the degree of green development in mining cities and environmental regulations related to command control. Combining policies can encourage the green development of mining cities, but there are crowding-out and substitution effects when environmental regulations are combined with market forces. Environmental regulation promotes urban green development by improving the energy consumption structure of mining cities. In this process, the level of digital development positively regulates the impact of environmental regulation on urban green development. Therefore, the government should choose environmental regulation tools and combinations according to local needs to achieve a multi-pronged effect of energy structure improvement and urban green development and use digital technology to support the green development of mining cities. • Command-controlled, market-motivated, and public-participating environmental regulations can significantly promote urban green development by promoting the improvement of energy structure. • There is an inverted' U' -shaped nonlinear relationship between the intensity of command and control environmental regulation and the green level of mining cities. • The level of digitization can positively regulate the relationship between environmental regulation and urban green development. • The combination of environmental regulations have a significant positive impact on urban green development. • The combination of environmental regulations has heterogeneity in urban green development due to factors such as regional resource endowment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accurate assessment of the sustainable development level is crucial to providing reasonable and effective management recommendations. However, analysis with a single scale can only reflect the sustainable status at a specific level. In this study, a multi-scale analysis of sustainability was conducted via the three-dimensional Ecological Footprint (EF) model in the Yangtze River Delta (YRD). Moreover, driving factors of sustainability were analyzed using the Multi-scale Geographically Weighted Regression model (MGWR). The conclusions include: (1) the development of YRD showed an unsustainable trend from 2014 to 2021, with per capita EF decreasing from 5.769 ha/cap to 5.283 ha/cap. The provincial sustainability is ranked as follows, from being the most sustainable to the least: Anhui Province > Jiangsu Province > Zhejiang Province > Shanghai City. (2) Based on dual indicators of EF depth and size, 41 cities were categorized into nine groups. The dominant type is always Medium size-Low depth (ML) and High size-Low depth (HL) type cities from 2014 to 2021. From the perspective of city scale, the sustainability of five cities weakened, while seven cities showed improvements. (3) Output value of primary industry (OVPI) and population (POP) were always the dominant factors affecting EF, but showed positive and negative correlations respectively. OVPI changes from north-south symmetric type to central symmetric type, while POP changes from central symmetric type to north-south symmetric type. This paper aims to comprehensively assess the sustainable development status from agglomeration-province-city perspectives, and its findings can provide a reference for similar regions with unbalanced development status between ecology and production. • The sustainability of the world-class urban agglomeration was assessed via the three-dimensional ecological footprint model. • More comprehensive and accurate analysis results based on multi-scale analysis. • The four patterns of influencing mechanism are revealed based on the MGWR model. • The combination analysis of dual indicators was adopted to classify the sustainability of 41 cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The comprehensive cohesion of the digital economy, structural deviation adjustment, and green development is a crucial step towards promoting high-quality economic growth and realizing carbon peak and carbon neutrality. This paper probes the impact of intra- and inter-regional digital economy on carbon emissions, considering the mediating effect of structural deviation, utilizing panel data from 267 prefecture-level cities in China spanning the years 2011–2019. The findings reveal the following key insights. First, the connection between the digital economy and carbon emissions within cities follows an inverted "U" shape. In the early stages, the digital economy leads to an average increase in carbon emissions of 0.069%. However, in the later stages, the digitized economy markedly decrease emissions. Second, both the digital economy and carbon emissions exhibit spatial spillover effects. Within the region, DE has a significant nonlinear spillover effect on CO 2 emissions in the neighboring regions, with the spatial decay boundary of this effect extending up to 380 km. Third, analysis of the impact mechanism reveals that the digital economy mitigates local and neighboring carbon dioxide emissions by adjusting structural deviation. Heterogeneity analysis indicates that the digital economy is more likely to have a carbon emission reduction effect in cities that are not involved in the industrial transfer and those that do not belong to the old industrial base. These findings provide a rationale and policy reference for China to harness the opportunities presented by digital economy development and to achieve the "dual-carbon" goal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the top carbon emitter in the world, a key step taken by China to encourage energy conservation, pollution reduction, and environmentally friendly development is the low-carbon city pilot (LCCP) policy, which has made important contributions to reducing global emissions. The LCCP policy aims to conserve energy and reduce emissions, inexorably influence many facets of the economic system because it is a well-rounded environmental management strategy. So, has this policy impacted the entrepreneurial activity of the region while achieving green development? Using panel data from China's 279 cities from 2002 to 2019, this article employs the difference-in-differences (DID) model to assess the influence of the LCCP policy on urban entrepreneurial activity. Through the results, the LCCP policy generally inhibits entrepreneurial activity. But the level of green innovation can alleviate this inhibitory effect. Based on the heterogeneity analysis, the LCCP policy exerts a more pronounced inhibitory effect on entrepreneurial activity in central and western regions, resource-based cities, and non-central cities. Further, the LCCP policy inhibits entrepreneurial activity in high-carbon industries while encouraging entrepreneurial activity in emerging industries, resulting in industrial structure change and upgrading. This paper supplies new empirical evidence for the effects of the LCCP policy on entrepreneurial activity and industrial structure change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite ecotourism certification's efficacy as a potential environmental management tool for promoting sustainable development, the applicability of Western ecotourism certification patterns in China and the environmental effects of China's ecotourism certification remain unclear. Based on China's Prototype-zone of National Ecotourism Attractions (PNEA) certification, this paper aims to provide empirical evidence on the causal relationship between ecotourism and low-carbon sustainable development in relation to public environmental concerns. The multiperiod Difference-in-Differences (DID) model is set up to examine the supervision of PNEA certification on regional carbon emissions based on the panel data from 285 Chinese prefecture-level cities in 2011–2017. Results demonstrate that PNEA approval can reduce regional carbon emissions by 1.1% per capita, and this effect would increase over time. Heterogeneity analysis shows that the carbon emission reduction impact is significantly higher on midwestern cities, resource-dependent cities, and cities with net population inflow. Furthermore, the determinants of public environmental concerns, such as PNEA's functions of tourism economic development and environmental education, are crucial for low-carbon sustainable development. The findings quite clearly account for the contributions of ecotourism certification in promoting sustainable development and the benefits of effective policy instruments. • The PNEA certification implemented by China's central government is different from the Western ecotourism certifications. • The approval of China's unique ecotourism certification can reduce regional carbon emissions by 1.1% per capita. • The economic development function and environmental education function are key to promoting public environmental concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Depopulation is a major challenge for many rural inland areas, as is the case in a considerable number of rural municipalities in Galicia (north-western Spain). The pandemic had a considerable impact on internal migration in 2020, but it was far from being anywhere near high enough to reverse the ongoing trend of population decline, highlighting the need for further action. Thus, this paper has a twofold objective: firstly, to propose an index of rural sustainable development for the rural Galician municipalities, and secondly, to identify the factors related to it. In so doing, a composite index stemming from the Benefit of the Doubt methodology has been proposed in the first stage, an index built from four-dimension factors– economic, demographic, social, and environmental. The empirical evidence of this index has been compared with three additional ones (namely, common weights, super-efficiency, and geometric mean and logistic normalization models). In the second stage, the relationship between the composite index and a set of exogenous variables that affect rural development has been analyzed, the data confirming that the rates of female immigration and occupancy in the hospitality sector favors sustainable development, whereas the distance from the provincial capital hinders it. This paper paves the way for an assessment of the potentialities of each territory, and the evidence found allows actions to be supported that generate sustainable progress in rural Galician municipalities and that are useful for tackling this complex problem. • A new rural sustainable development index based on four dimensions is proposed. • Strengths and weaknesses for each Galician rural municipality are identified. • Environmental factors constitute a driver of rural development in Galicia. • Social aspects (i.e., health, education, services) stand out as main weaknesses. • Policies to boost social care and attract childbearing-age inhabitants are paramount. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carbon footprint (CF) and inequality reductions were two of the most important sustainable development goals. However, there was a lack of understanding of the latest equality of carbon footprint across regions. Based on the multi-regional input-output table and the China Family Panel Studies survey data of 17 provinces, this paper examined the evolution of carbon footprint and inequality in China. The results showed a stark disparity between regions and a declined inequality in the last few years. Specifically, the CF per capita in northern provinces (Liaoning, Shanxi, Heilongjiang, Shandong and Shaanxi) exceeded the average level in 2017. From 2015 to 2017, the carbon inequality showed a downward trend, with a national CF-Gini coefficient decrease from 0.31 to 0.28. Meanwhile, the gap between CF per capita in urban areas and rural areas was declining, with a growth rate at 18% and 32% from 2015 to 2017, respectively. In addition, CF per capita from various consumption categories indicated that household equipment and daily necessities, residential, transportation and communication were the three most important sources, with a downward trend from 2015 to 2017. This study would provide policymakers with deep insights into policies to achieve just transition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]