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With the increasing uncertainty of urban security, urban resilience construction with risk awareness and bottom-line thinking has become essential for promoting sustainable urban development. This paper measures China's urban resilience development index (CRDI) based on 284 cities in China (except Tibet) using the entropy method from four dimensions: economic, social, environmental, and infrastructure, and analyzes it by combining coupling coordination degree and barrier factor analysis. We find that: (1) At the national level, CRDI and its sub-dimensions show an increasing trend in time, a decreasing spatial layout from coastal to inland, and a "high-high-low-low" clustering feature in space. (2) At the regional level, the CRDI is from high to low in the east, middle, and west order. The sub-dimensions are from high to low in the order of east, middle, and west for economic, social, and infrastructure resilience and from high to low in the order of east, west, and middle for environmental resilience. (3) To coupling coordination degree, the CRDI index coupling coordination is increasing in time trend but is still on the verge of dissonance. (4) Social resilience is the main obstacle factor. In the indicator layer, human resources, innovation, education, security, living, and environmental protection are the areas where CRDI coordinated development is the key to improvement. Based on the above empirical evidence, this paper proposes countermeasures to optimize urban resilience construction from four perspectives: economic, social, environmental, and infrastructure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The coupling coordination of digital economy and green high-quality development of industries is an important way for sustainable and high-quality economic development. This paper constructs an evaluation index system for the digital economy and industrial green high-quality development, and conducts empirical analysis using the coupling coordination model, the spatial autocorrelation model, and the Tobit model. The data from provinces and cities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt spanning from 2008 to 2021 has been analyzed. Results show that both subsystems exhibit a good and rising coupling coordination, and the regional coupling coordination demonstrates a trend of higher values in the east and lower in the west. Moreover, there is interaction between provinces and cities, albeit with a weakening correlation after 2011. Additionally, spatial clustering is evident between regions with high and low coupling coordination. The coupling coordination degree of each region is impacted by important factors, such as economic development level, financial level, opening up, fiscal expenditure, and urbanization. Therefore, the study recommends policies aimed at boosting the coupling coordination level in the Yangtze River Economic Belt. Key policy proposals contain promoting the integration and innovation of digital technology and green low-carbon technology, strengthening regional cooperation through the transfer of industries, and adopting differentiated development strategies tailored to regional advantages and the varied impact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Resource-based regions support national economic development and are essential sources of basic energy and raw materials. In the post-pandemic era, however, there are practical situations to deal with, such as a fractured industrial chain, a weaker industrial structure, and a sharp reduction in economic benefits. Based on data collected from 68 cities in China, from 2010 to 2021, with 816 observations, this paper explores the industrial development process of resource-based regions in China and the change in the toughness of the industrial structure under the impact of COVID-19. The paper studies and analyzes industrial development trends, industrial structure toughness, and spatial spillover effects. The methods used are the Markov chain model and the Industrial Structure Advancement Index. By building the spatial Dubin model, the paper analyzes the spatial spillover effect of regional industrial development. It decomposes the spillover effect using the partial differential model based on regression. The results show that, during the study period, the comprehensive development level of industries in resource-based regions in China was slowly improving and tended to stabilize after entering the post-pandemic era. The evolution of an advanced industrial structure is significantly heterogeneous among regions, and each region has different toughness. The impact of COVID-19 has reduced the toughness of China's resource-based regions' industrial structure. The spatial spillover effect of regional industrial development is significant. Labor force, technology input, and industrial-structure optimization have different impacts on the industrial development of neighboring regions. In the post-pandemic era, China has used new management methods for more innovation. In order to achieve low-carbon, environmental protection, and sustainable development of resources, realize the rapid recovery of the toughness of industrial structure in China's resource-based cities, and reduce the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, China proposes to expand the supply of resources, improve the allocation of resources, optimize the direction, promote the rational flow and efficient aggregation of various factors, and enhance the impetus for innovation and development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chinese industrial heritage is the materialized carrier and historical witness of the evolution of urban spatial structure and industrial development. As an inseparable part of cultural heritage, it has rich historical, social, economic, scientific, technological, and aesthetic value. However, industrial heritage as a value is not suffi ciently acknowledged in the Chinese society. The factories, their activity, and their historical evolution are often disconnected and isolated from the daily life of the cities, being quite an unknown aspect for most citizens. In addition, due to the acceleration of urbanization, many industrial heritages in cities have disappeared. China has spent two decades promoting sustainable development of its industrial heritage, but there is still a lack of knowledge on how to promote sustainable development of industrial heritage through digital education. Based on these findings the paper discusses our research that promotes sustainable development aspects of industrial heritage, and our subsequent work has particularly focussed on associated landscape recovery. It does so by focussing on the particular highly valued heritage case of the Anshan Steel production site in China, and the environmental consequences of the Dagushan Open mine on the landscape. The paper ends with a critical reflection on how a digital tool can help to shape industrial heritage education, appreciation and involvement, and hence foster sustainable development processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the process of global urban development, there are urgent ecological security and environmental pollution problems, green development is the fundamental way for urban sustainable development, economic transformation and mitigation of ecological and environmental problems. Based on the panel data of 283 cities at prefecture level and above in China from 2003 to 2017, this paper analyzes spatial–temporal evolution characteristics of urban green development efficiency (UGDE) and the peer effects of UGDE between cities of different grades. It is found that during the study period, in terms of temporal evolution, the average UGDE in China increased from 0.47 in 2003 to 0.61 in 2017, with a cumulative growth rate of 29.79%, showing a rising trend in general. In terms of spatial evolution, the number of low-efficiency cities and medium-efficiency cities continued to decrease. The eastern region has always been the main distribution area of higher-efficiency cities and high-efficiency cities; in the central region, UGDE in most cities improved significantly; in the western region, UGDE has always lagged behind that in the eastern and central regions. In addition, the center of gravity of UGDE presented a trend of northwest migration in general, with a total displacement of 100.07 km, and UGDE showed a spatial dispersion trend. The empirical results indicate that the improvement of UGDE in large cities has a driving effect on that in neighboring medium cities and small cities through the positive peer effect, and the growth of UGDE in medium cities has a promoting effect on that in neighboring small cities through the positive peer effect; the increase of UGDE in medium cities has a positive peer effect on that in neighboring large cities, and the growth of UGDE in small cities has a positive peer effect on that in neighboring medium cities; UGDE promotes each other between large cities through the positive peer effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the rapid development of the global digital economy, it is of great significance to explore the greening transformation of the manufacturing industry from the micro-perspective of enterprise digital development. This paper empirically examines the impact and mechanism of enterprise digital development on the greening transformation of the manufacturing industry using the 2010–2020 data of Chinese A-share listed companies in the manufacturing industry as a sample. The study shows that enterprise digital development can significantly promote the greening transformation of China's manufacturing industry, and this conclusion still holds after a series of robustness tests. Technological innovation and financing constraints are important mediating mechanisms. Further research found that the impact of enterprise digital development on the greening transformation of China's manufacturing industry has a positive nonlinear effect, and its marginal effect shows a weakening trend. Heterogeneity analysis shows that, from the perspective of micro characteristics, digital development is more able to promote the green transformation of state-owned and large enterprises. From a macro-regional perspective, digital development can better promote the green transformation of the manufacturing industry in eastern cities, key city clusters, and high-level cities. The findings of this paper can provide corresponding insights for "revitalizing the manufacturing industry", and also provide decision-making references for countries aiming to make the manufacturing industry bigger and stronger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The core of low-carbon development lies in reducing carbon sources and increasing carbon sinks, and the construction of free trade zones (FTZs), as an experimental field for China' s comprehensively deepening reforms, is of great significance to urban lowcarbon development. Based on the panel data from 288 cities in China from 2007 to 2020, this paper first comprehensively evaluated the carbon neutrality levels of cities from two aspects: carbon emission and sequestration. Then, it used the multi-period difference-indifferences method and the spatial Durbin model to explore the 'low carbon effect' of the establishment of FTZs. The results showed that: the establishment of FTZs had a significant impact on the low-carbon development of the cities where they were located. Specifically, the establishment of FTZs could drive urban low-carbon development from within the cities by improving their digitization and resource allocation efficiency. At the same time, increased government attention to green development enhanced the carbon emission disincentive and boosted carbon uptake facilitation, fostering a more robust urban low-carbon development. Moreover, the carbon emission suppression effect, carbon absorption promotion effect, and carbon neutral effect of establishing the FTZs varied according to the batches of the establishment, city location, and city characteristics. The 'low-carbon effect' of the first two batches of FTZs, the region south of the Qinling-Huaihe River, and the cities with a higher degree of openness were more pronounced overall. Furthermore, the establishment of the FTZs also had a certain spatial spillover effect on urban low-carbon development. Based on these findings, the paper suggests prioritizing top-level design, exerting comparative advantages, and promoting the low-carbon development benchmark area in a gradient manner. Acceleration of trade facilitation and digital financial reform, promotion of the digital transformation of traditional industries with advantages, and encouragement of digital and low-carbon deep integration are also recommended. The introduction of highquality foreign investment should be combined with the improvement of the effectiveness of supervision and services to improve the efficiency of resource allocation. The study proposes leveraging digital platforms and free trade alliances to maximize the FTZs' catalytic effects. Overall, this study offers significant theoretical and practical insights for enhancing the construction of the FTZs, promoting urban low-carbon development, and advancing towards the goal of carbon neutrality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper selected the data of 284 prefectural-level cities in China in the time range of 2011 to 2020 as the research sample, and established an index system of sustainable development consisting of 22 indicators including economic development, social progress, ecological environment and public institutions and so on, to comprehensive evaluate the sustainability of the cities. Total annual investment in pollution control is selected as the proxy variable of reform, and annual actual amount of foreign investment used is selected as the proxy variable of openingup, to empirically explore the impact of the two on sustainable development. The results of empirical analysis show that reform and opening-up has a significant positive impact on sustainable development. After fixing time and individual effect, it is found that the effect of reform is more prominent. Regional heterogeneity analysis shows that, the impact strength of reform and opening-up in the east is larger than that in the middle and west of China. To study the spatial auto-correlation and spillover effect, Moran's I was calculated and spatial Durbin model was constructed based on the weight matrix of geographical distance, which produced the results that spatial agglomeration is evident for sustainability, and that reform has a significant positive spillover effect. Further, considering the time auto-correlation of sustainability, a dynamic panel model is established, and dynamic threshold regression is carried out. Results show that lag effect of sustainability is significant, and a certain threshold must reform reach can sustainable development be promoted. This paper puts forward several policy suggestions in terms of formulating effective sustainable development strategy, to provide insights for new-pattern urbanization in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the digital economy to empower urban economic green growth provides essential opportunities for China to achieve high-quality growth. This paper assesses the level of digital economy and green growth in Chinese cities, seeking to explore the mechanisms and effects of the digital economy on urban green growth in a unified framework. The results indicate that the digital economy can drive cities' green growth. This conclusion still holds after a set of robustness tests. Meanwhile, the green value of the digital economy is fully released among the eastern cities, major urban agglomerations, and high-level cities. Further research shows that the digital economy can indirectly enhance urban green growth in the neighboring regions through spatial spillover effects. Moreover, labor resource mismatch, capital resource mismatch and green technology innovation are significant mediating mechanisms. The findings could guide policymakers on green growth in emerging economies from a digital economy perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the goal of " carbon peaking and carbon neutrality," how to create a low-carbon and green development path for cities is an urgent problem in China. One of the effective ways to solve this problem is through industrial collaborative agglomeration. In this paper, panel data of 276 prefecture-level cities in China from 2010 to 2020 was selected to investigate the relationship between the collaborative agglomeration of manufacturing and producer service and carbon emission intensity by using a fixed-effects model, intermediary model, and SDM in multiple dimensions. The study found that the collaborative agglomeration of manufacturing and producer service industries significantly influences carbon emission intensity with an inverted U-shaped curve, and the agglomeration of manufacturing and producer service industries can influence carbon emission intensity through technological progress. In addition, the inverted U-shaped impact of collaborative agglomeration of manufacturing and producer services on carbon emission intensity has a spatial spillover effect, and the spatial spillover effect generated is stronger than the impact on the local area. Moreover, from the perspective of industry heterogeneity, compared with low-end producer services, the agglomeration of manufacturing and high-end producer services can play a better role in carbon emission reduction. Regarding regional heterogeneity, compared with the central and western regions, the impact of manufacturing and production services agglomeration on carbon intensity is far more obvious in the more economically developed eastern regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are urgent ecological and environmental problems in the process of the utilization of urban construction land, promoting green utilization of construction land is conducive to urban sustainable development and high-quality economic development. Based on the panel data of 108 prefecture-level and above cities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, China from 2003 to 2017, this paper uses the super-efficiency SBM model to measure the green efficiency of urban construction land (GEUCL), analyzes its spatial–temporal evolution characteristics, and constructs the spatial autoregressive model to study its spatial spillover effects from the perspective of urban hierarchy. It is found that, in terms of temporal variation, the average efficiency value shows a fluctuating upward trend during the study period, rising from 0.27 in 2003 to 0.39 in 2017, the cumulative growth rate is 44.44%, with an average annual growth rate of 3.14%. In terms of spatial distribution characteristics, during the study period, the number of medium-efficiency and high-efficiency cities increases significantly, while the number of low-efficiency cities decreases sharply; high-efficiency cities always present scattered distribution, while medium-efficiency cities change from scattered distribution to agglomeration distribution. In addition, GEUCL has significantly positive spatial spillover effects between neighboring cities of different grades and between neighboring cities of the same grade, among them, the increase of GEUCL in higher-grade cities has significantly positive spatial spillover effects on that in adjacent lower-grade cities; the increase of GEUCL in lower-grade cities has significantly positive spatial spillover effects on that in neighboring higher-grade cities; GEUCL has significantly positive spatial spillover effects between neighboring cities of the same grade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studying the effects of expected economic growth targets and environmental constraint targets set by Chinese local governments at the beginning of the year on high-quality development can provide empirical evidence for optimizing expected target management, improving macro-control, and fulfilling governance efficiency in the new development stage to some extent. Therefore, based on the theory of economic growth accounting and the stochastic frontier model, this paper calculated the level of high-quality development at the urban level, extracted the economic growth targets and environmental constraint targets from the Report on the Work of the Government with text analysis, constructed instrumental variables based on the spatial weight matrix, and then discussed the effects of the expected development targets formulated by local governments on high-quality development, conditional heterogeneity, and mechanisms. The results showed that: ① Excessive economic growth targets were not conducive to high-quality development, while environmental constraints targets had a significant role in promoting it and could slow down the erosion effect of excessive economic growth targets on high-quality development. This conclusion still held after solving a series of robustness tests, such as the endogenous bias. ② Heterogeneity analysis found that, with the implementation of the ecological civilization concept, China' s economy could achieve a win-win situation of quantity increase and quality improvement. To better promote high-quality development, the target positioning of cities with good economic foundations should weaken economic increment and strengthen environmental constraints, and the growth targets and environmental constraints set by local governments should be endogenous to their own regional resource endowments and leave appropriate elastic spaces. ③ The mechanism test showed that improving the economic growth targets reduced the level of innovation and raised the amount of new investment in the region, which was not conducive to high-quality development. Environmental constraints could promote technological innovation and limit the blind expansion of new investment, thus promoting high-quality development. Based on the above research conclusions, this paper summarizes policy implications from the aspects of political performance evaluation, formulation of expected development targets, technological innovation, and green development to promote the synergy between economic growth and green development in China and the synchronization of expected target management and high-quality development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an essential factor of production in economic development, land is an important tool for local governments to boost economic growth. The goals of reaching peak carbon emissions and achieving carbon neutrality will push local governments to change the extensive mode of attracting high energy-consuming and high-pollution enterprises by transferring industrial land at low prices. The lowcarbon city pilot policy is important for China to achieve green and low-carbon economic transformation and sustainable development. This policy will inevitably influence the land transfer behavior of local governments in heavily polluting industries. Based on the panel data of 286 cities from 2007 to 2019, this paper took the low-carbon city pilot policy as a quasi-natural experiment and used the time-varying difference-in-differences method to empirically study the relationship between the pilot policy and the land transfer behavior of local governments. The results showed that: ① The implementation of the low-carbon city pilot policy significantly reduced the area and number of land transfers in heavily polluting industries. The above conclusions still held after a series of robustness tests. ② The impact of the low-carbon city pilot policy on land transfer in heavily polluting industries was affected by the intensity of environmental regulation of local governments and the tenure of officials. The stronger the intensity of environmental regulation in the pilot city became, the more the area and number of land transfers in heavily polluting industries were reduced. When the tenure of the secretary of the municipal CPC committee in the pilot city was less than or equal to 3 years, the area and number of land transfers in heavily polluting industries were significantly reduced. However, the age of the secretary of the municipal CPC committee had no significant impact on the land transfer in heavily polluting industries. ③ Heterogeneity analysis showed that non-resource-based cities, cities with high levels of economic development, and large cities displayed a higher reduction in the area and number of land transfers in heavily polluting industries. Based on these, this paper puts forward suggestions from three aspects: we should further promote the low-carbon city pilot policy, add environmental objectives to the assessment system of officials to increase the constraints of environmental objectives, and formulate and implement environmental policies in accordance with local conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses the global Malmquist-Luenberger index to measure the effect of Internet development on the green total factor productivity (GTFP) of China's 283 prefectural cities. We find that by promoting highquality development, the effect of Internet is significantly positive. Firstly, we explore the two mechanisms through which the use of the Internet promotes GTFP: improvements in the quantity and quality of urban innovation and the advancement and rationalization of urban industrial structures. Secondly, we compare the pre- and post-impacts of the Internet + initiative from which it draws critical policy implications. Finally, threshold regression shows that when urban Internet penetration and employee wages rise to their respective threshold levels, the promotion effect of the Internet on GTFP can be further augmented. Meanwhile, from the perspective of Intensive Growth Theory, the Internet's contribution to green labor productivity is more pronounced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agricultural green development is an essential direction for global sustainable agriculture. The academic literature, however, needs to place greater emphasis on studying the factors influencing agricultural green development performance and how such performance can be improved. A theoretical framework for agricultural green development performance was constructed in this paper using the Super-SBM model, which considers undesirable outputs, to measure the agricultural green development performance of 330 cities at or above the prefecture level in China (excluding Tibet Autonomous Region, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan of China) from 2007 to 2018. Furthermore, the influencing mechanism of agricultural green development performance was then analyzed using a spatial econometric model. The results show that: 1) from 2007 to 2018, China's agricultural green development performance experienced three stages of evolution: 'rise, decline and rise'. 2) The regions with high performance agricultural green development are mainly distributed in eastern China, northeastern China, and southern Qinghai Province. 3) The agricultural economic level, industrialization process, and labor quality play significant roles in promoting local agricultural green development performance, while such performance is obviously inhibited by the openness level and the government's environmental regulations. Local agricultural green development performance is significant inhibited by the agricultural economic level and accelerated industrialization process in neighboring cities, while significantly promoted by the agricultural industrial structure in neighboring cities. Some suggestions for improving agricultural green development performance are proposed based on these research results, which can provide scientific references for promoting sustainable agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are urgent ecological and environmental problems in the process of the utilization of urban construction land, promoting green utilization of construction land is conducive to urban sustainable development and high-quality economic development. Based on the panel data of 108 prefecture-level and above cities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt, China from 2003 to 2017, this paper uses the super-efficiency SBM model to measure the green efficiency of urban construction land (GEUCL), analyzes its spatial–temporal evolution characteristics, and constructs the spatial autoregressive model to study its spatial spillover effects from the perspective of urban hierarchy. It is found that, in terms of temporal variation, the average efficiency value shows a fluctuating upward trend during the study period, rising from 0.27 in 2003 to 0.39 in 2017, the cumulative growth rate is 44.44%, with an average annual growth rate of 3.14%. In terms of spatial distribution characteristics, during the study period, the number of medium-efficiency and high-efficiency cities increases significantly, while the number of low-efficiency cities decreases sharply; high-efficiency cities always present scattered distribution, while medium-efficiency cities change from scattered distribution to agglomeration distribution. In addition, GEUCL has significantly positive spatial spillover effects between neighboring cities of different grades and between neighboring cities of the same grade, among them, the increase of GEUCL in higher-grade cities has significantly positive spatial spillover effects on that in adjacent lower-grade cities; the increase of GEUCL in lower-grade cities has significantly positive spatial spillover effects on that in neighboring higher-grade cities; GEUCL has significantly positive spatial spillover effects between neighboring cities of the same grade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green credit is an important financial tool to promote the transformation of the low-carbon economy. On the basis of clarifying the theoretical mechanism of the impact of green credit on carbon emission reduction, this paper used the fixed effect stochastic frontier model containing unexpected output to measure the total factor carbon productivity of 156 cities in China from 2000 to 2019 and empirically tested the carbon emission reduction effect of green credit and its mechanism from the three dimensions of productivity, intensity, and total amount. The research found that: ① Green credit development significantly improved total factor carbon productivity and reduced carbon emission intensity, but the average impact on total carbon emissions was not significant. The above conclusions were still valid after a series of robustness tests and treatments of endogeneity problems. ② The carbon emission reduction effect of green credit was heterogeneous due to differences in regional location, resource endowment, and financial efficiency. In the central region, non-resource-based cities, and cities with higher financial efficiency, green credit had significant carbon reduction effects in both carbon productivity and carbon intensity dimensions, while green credit in the eastern region, resource-based cities, and cities with lower financial efficiency only reduced carbon intensity. ③ The stimulation of green innovation and the reduction of energy intensity were the most effective channels for green credit to reduce carbon emissions, whereas the mediating effect of the structural transformation channel was not yet significant. Green credit was more effective in promoting green innovation and generating positive spillovers in the green innovation channel. However, green credits were more effective in improving carbon emission efficiency in the energy intensity channel, but the role of supporting low-carbon technologies must be enhanced. ④ Environmental regulations had two moderating mechanisms, 'positive compensation' and 'negative offset,' for the carbon reduction effect of green credit. When the demand and supply of financial resources were low, strengthening environmental regulations would weaken the incentive effect of green credit on low-carbon economic transformation. The above conclusion not only provides a new research perspective and supplementary empirical evidence for understanding the environmental effects of green credit, but also provides a useful reference for further improving green credit policies and promoting the development of a low-carbon economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural revitalization has multiple strategic significance, including improving the capacity of circular development of villages and towns, meeting the basic material needs of the rural population accounting for more than 50% of China's total population, feeding the urban demand back, and building the rural ecological environment to make it green and livable, worthy of attention both inside and outside the society. This paper summarized the low-interference cycle strategy of green livable villages and towns by analyzing the spatial composition of villages and towns and the mechanism of circulation among various elements, forming a set of design strategies, which reduces adverse human interference on the ecology and improves the self-sustaining ability of villages and towns. This paper provides relevant reference suggestions for the construction of green livable villages and towns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Challenges to social, economic, and environmental sustainability are global in scale, yet sustainable development policies must be implemented locally. There has been a tendency for sustainable urbanism projects to engage in the conspicuous sustainability of spatially bounded and highly visible sustainability achievements, rather than spatially expansive, long-term achievements. China's complex system of multilevel governance encourages policy experimentation, but it is also frequently productive of entrepreneurial urbanism and intercity competition. This paper analyses spatial planning documents concerning Hengqin (Zhuhai Municipality, Guangdong Province), an island adjacent to Macao SAR, to show how the ambitions for a new-build district's contributions to sustainable development have become more spatially expansive and ambitious over time. This has occurred alongside changes in project leadership (from city, to provincial, to central government leadership) as well as a deepening awareness of the Greater Bay Area as a region for crossborder policymaking. The paper argues that crossborder perspectives are vital for genuine sustainable development but face certain obstacles in relation to the sites at which policy decisions are made. • Policymakers often prefer conspicuous sustainability to long-term achievements. • Innovative urban entrepreneurialism is common in China's multilevel governance. • Hengqin's spatial planning initially prioritised immediate, localised results. • Centralised leadership and regional awareness can raise sustainability ambitions. • Crossborder perspectives better reflect sustainable development needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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]

As more attention is given to green and sustainable industries, an analysis of the industrial impacts on all aspects of life, including inclusive affluence, is gradually developing. Idle rural residential land is a valuable resource and an important factor in promoting sustainable development. Balanced urban and rural development contributes to inclusive prosperity, so understanding the relationship between industry and the balanced development of urban and rural can significantly impact social development. In China, achieving the balanced development requires narrowing the urban-rural income gap. This paper analyzed the impact of reallocating idle rural residential land on promoting the balanced development. The study found that industry development has a positive impact on the balanced development, with a regression coefficient of 1.478. Regions with higher industry indices in counties had better outcomes regarding the balanced development. When the development of rural industry derived from idle residential land was in good condition, the effect increased by 3.326 percentage. The results showed heterogeneity, with the regression coefficient of industry development on the balanced development in county-level cities being 0.498 larger than in urban areas. In summary, the reallocation of idle residential land can promote sustainable development, increase residents' income, and improve overall regional economic development. The results are applicable to the comprehensive reallocation of rural land resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The trend of market-oriented land transaction scheme and the optimal allocation of land resources have become two important components of ecological sustainable development. However, the relevance of analyzing effects of land marketization on ecological and environmental development cannot be overemphasized. The ecological and environmental effects of land marketization are the focus of this paper. We begin by developing a theoretical framework to investigate how land marketization affects eco-efficiency. Moreover, we develop a data envelopment analysis model to measure eco-efficiency. We empirically investigate the effect of land marketization on eco-efficiency using a data set of 251 cities in China over the period of 2003 to 2018. Both theoretical and empirical results show that the land marketization exerts positive effects on eco-efficiency. Specifically, a 100% increase in land marketization level leads to a 2.4 percent increase in eco-efficiency. The heterogeneous effects and spatial effects of the land marketization on eco-efficiency are also examined. Besides, the endogeneity issues are also discussed using instrumental variable approach. Finally, the mechanism analysis shows that land marketization improves eco-efficiency primarily through improving efficiency change, best practice change and technology gap change, respectively. The main conclusions are confirmed by several robustness checks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carbon lock-in has become a major obstacle to green development in all countries, and carbon unlocking (CUL) is of great significance in accelerating the process of carbon neutrality worldwide. Based on the panel data of 292 prefecture-level cities in China from 2006 to 2020, this paper constructs a PSM-DID model based on machine learning to empirically test the impact of LCCP policy on urban CUL. The regression result shows that the low carbon city pilot (LCCP) policy significantly increases the level of CUL by 1.25 % in the pilot cities, which is still valid after range of robustness tests, and the mechanism analysis shows that green innovation and green habits are important ways for the policy to affect CUL. Based on the generalized random forest (GRF) algorithm, we further find that the policy can increase the CUL level by 0.6 %, and the average treatment effect (ATE) of the sample is concentrated between 0.004 and 0.006, which exhibits obvious heterogeneity. This paper chooses population quality, openness level and industrial structure as heterogeneous factors, which are finally found to have a U-shaped or inverted U-shaped relationship with ATE. This study provides useful insights for China and other countries to break the carbon lock-in and realize green development. • Low-carbon city pilot policy can effectively promote urban carbon unlocking. • Causal forest model is used for causal inference based on generalized random forests algorithm. • The propensity score is calculated by machine learning. • Generalized random forest is used for heterogeneity analysis. • Low-carbon city pilot policy transmits policy effects through green innovation and green habits. [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]

High carbon emissions and population aging are two obstacles to China's development as an emerging economy. It is urgent to scientifically examine the impacts of population aging on carbon emissions to discover new pathways for urban carbon emission reduction. However, existing studies face challenges in terms of focusing on and methodology for accurately capturing the role of industrial production and energy consumption in the environmental effects of population aging. This paper constructs a chain mediation analytical framework and systematically examines the intrinsic linkages between population aging and carbon emissions in Chinese cities from 2000 to 2020 using a two-way fixed effects model. This paper has three main findings. (1) The positive correlation between urban population aging and carbon emissions development is generally low, with coupling coordination degree values of 0.4233, 0.4458, 0.4220, 0.4715, and 0.4665 for each yearly cross-section. (2) For every 1% increase in the population aging rate, carbon emissions decrease by 0.3478% on average. The carbon reduction effect of population aging is significantly greater in low-emissions cities and high-income cities than in other cities. (3) The industrial upgrading (IU) path, energy conservation (EC) path and chain mediation (CM) path account for 72.43%, 7.23% and 20.34%, respectively, of the indirect effects. If the causal link between IU and EC is not considered, the EC effect will be overestimated by 281.16%. The results of the study suggest that properly coping with population aging and reducing carbon emissions are not completely opposed to each other, a conclusion that passes both endogeneity exclusion and robustness check. This paper advocates replacing the one-size-fits-all approach in carbon emissions management and investing more in policy preferences to support carbon emission reduction in both high-emissions and low-income cities. [Display omitted] •The synergistic trends of carbon emissions and population aging are not apparent. •Population aging significantly reduces carbon emissions at the city scale. •Linkage effect of industrial upgrading and energy conservation on carbon emission reduction. •Energy conservation effect of population aging amplified by industrial upgrading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Enhancing the green economy efficiency (GEE) is crucial for building a sustainable economy. How can the rapidly advancing digital transformation contribute to this process? The paper empirically examines the direct and spatial spillover effects of digital transformation on cities' GEE in China. This study utilizes the National E-commerce Pilot City (NEPC) policy as a quasi-natural experiment of regional digital transformation and employs the staggered difference-in-differences (DID) method with heterogeneous effects. The findings reveal that (i) implementing the NEPC policy significantly increases urban GEE by 2.6%, corresponding to a 16% increase in the mean of GEE. This effect is particularly pronounced in non-resource-based cities and cities with high Internet penetration. (ii) The mechanism test shows that the pilot policy positively affects GEE by promoting green structural transformation, enhancing green innovation, and strengthening public environmental concerns. (iii) The study highlights a positive spatial spillover effect of the NEPC policy on the GEE of nonpilot cities. (iv) The adoption of the NEPC plays a pivotal role in advancing energy use and carbon emission efficiency. This paper expands the existing knowledge on the green development effects of the digital economy while offering valuable policy insights for building an "Inclusive Green Economy". [Display omitted] • The staggered differences-in-differences method is employed to examine the direct and spatial spillover effects of NEPC on cities' GEE in China. • This paper uses NEPC as a quasi-experiment for digital transformation. • NEPC significantly improves green economic efficiency by 2.6%. • Green structural transformation, innovation, and environmental concerns are main channels. • Positive spillover effect of NEPC on green economy efficiency in non-pilot cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tests China's three-dimensional intergovernmental competition in terms of land leasing. Using the land-leasing data of China's prefecture-level cities from 2003 to 2019 collected from China Land Market, and with the help of the dynamic spatial Durbin model, we show that in the land-leasing behavior of prefecture-level cities in China, three-dimensional government competition does exist and that the influence coefficient from high to low is the government competition of different periods in the same region, shown as horizontal government competition and vertical government competition, respectively. In particular, China's government competition and regional economic development show a clear correlation. We find obvious heterogeneity: in the eastern region, the government competition for land leasing started earlier and has now begun to transform. However, the three-dimensional government competition in the western region lags behind the national level. Therefore, urban development should emerge from the mindset of blindly focusing on the expansion of urban areas, paying more attention to the guiding role of urban planning in urban development and promoting cities on the path of sustainable development by improving the efficiency of land use. [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]

This paper constructs the system of urban high-quality development index from the six dimensions of economy, innovation, coordination, green, open and sharing. It measures the high-quality development level of cities in 31 provinces (municipalities and autonomous regions) of China from 2004 to 2019 by entropy method, analyzes the spatial distribution and spatial correlation of high-quality development level of Chinese cities by using global spatial auto-correlation and hot-spot analysis and analyzes its driving factors by geographical detector model. The results show that: (1) the overall change of high quality development level of cities during the period of investigation is stable and slightly increased. The regional level is high in the eastern coastal areas and low in the western remote areas. Overall level of development: the eastern part>overall>middle part>the west area. (2) The high-quality development level of the city has significant spatial agglomeration characteristics, and the overall spatial distribution characteristics is "East hot west cold", hot spot range from "striped" gradually evolved into "clump", while the cold point range gradually transferred to the northwest region; hot spots have radiation-driven effect on the surrounding areas, and hot spot district have a "eviction weakening" effect on cold spot areas. (3) Innovation has the strongest effect on the high-quality development of cities, followed by open development, coordinated development and economic development, while the impact of green development and shared development is weaker; and the interaction between driving factors is greater than the independent effect of single factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green development is a significant concept that cannot be ignored in contemporary society. However, in the context of China's transition from high-speed growth to high-quality development, the complex impact of urban development has brought great challenges to the urban green environment. In this paper, the impact of urban development on green development efficiency (GDE) was studied. First and foremost, a Super-SBM model was introduced to measure the GDE of 41 cities in the Yangtze River Delta during 2009–2018. Moreover, a Tobit model was used to analyze the correlation between four urban development factors, including economic development and GDE. According to the results, the mean GDE of the Yangtze River Delta is 0.824, and the GDE in most cities there has shown a fluctuating growth trend in this decade. By comparison, the GDEs of coastal cities and cities in the southeast of the Yangtze River Delta were generally higher than those of cities in the north, indicating that the green development is geographically unbalanced, and there is spatial heterogeneity in the area studied. The study's results also suggest that the urban economic development, innovation level, and government planning play a significant role in stimulating urban green development, and that the expansion of urban construction area hinders the improvement of GDE. [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]

To address global climate change, achieving carbon peak and carbon neutrality has become a global consensus. However, the means to simultaneously achieve carbon reduction and promote green economic development, particularly in developing countries, require further investigation. This study evaluates the impact of e-commerce on CO 2 emissions. Through an examination of the effects of the National E-Commerce Demonstration City (NEDC) policy from 2006 to 2017, this paper reveals that e-commerce growth facilitated by the NEDC policy resulted in a 7.89% reduction in total CO 2 emissions and a per capita reduction of 1.1146 tons in the pilot cities. Mechanism analysis demonstrates that the upgrading of industrial structure, development of digital finance, and the growth of innovation and entrepreneurship serve as primary pathways for this impact. The robustness of the findings is supported by parallel trend tests, placebo tests, and additional sensitivity analyses. Furthermore, the research reveals that the NEDC policy exhibits a more significant reduction in CO 2 emissions in cities with higher levels of economic development and non-resource-based cities. Welfare analyses show that the NEDC policy has significant socio-economic effects. These findings provide new evidence on the environmental effects of the digital economy and offer insights into achieving carbon neutrality. • The National E-commerce Demonstration Cities (NEDC) policy reduced CO 2 emissions. • Optimizing industrial structure, enhancing digital finance, and promoting innovation and entrepreneurship are mechanisms. • The effect is more pronounced in cities with high economic levels and high resource dependence. • The NEDC policy substantially enhanced social welfare by reducing CO 2 emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • Incentive initiatives on energy-efficient renovation of existing buildings in China were analyzed. • The dynamic evolution of incentive initiatives was analyzed from different perspectives. • A critical analysis of representative initiatives in two batches of pilot cities was conducted. • Implementation barriers and limitations on energy-efficient renovation of existing buildings were summarized. • Recommendations and pathways of promoting related incentive initiatives were proposed. Under China's national strategy of carbon neutrality by 2060, it is urgently necessary and challenging for the governments to proactively explore policy tools to facilitate energy-efficient renovation of existing buildings. Currently, a considerable number of studies have been conducted on building energy-efficient renovation and its derivative topics, however, a comprehensive overview on incentive initiatives related to existing renovation practices in China is still scarce, such as a lack of critical correlation analysis between national and local initiatives, a lack of the synthesis and critique towards the latest policies and related achievements, and inadequate generalization of the diverse and multi-layered barriers and challenges in building energy-efficient renovation practices. To address these issues, this paper adopts a diversified policy segmentation approach to deeply analyze the dynamic evolution of the incentive initiatives from both national and local level perspectives, as well as to establish the related network of policy linkages between national to local, and between different localities. In addition, this paper presents a critical analysis on representative initiatives in two batches of pilot cities, and proposes good practices and valuable experiences for building energy-efficient renovation. Finally, this paper further summarizes and discusses the barriers to building energy-efficient renovation from four perspectives: governments, householders, enterprises and research institutions, and proposes a series of targeted and feasible pathways and strategies. This study can provide theoretical guidance and targeted recommendations for the formulation of policies, standards and regulations for building energy-efficient renovation in China. [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]

Abstract Cities do play significant roles in tackling global environmental changes. Decoupling economic growth from environmental pressures is critical for global sustainable development, however, few studies pay attention to the decoupling analysis at city level. This paper conducts a comparative study of the decoupling performance of economic output from CO 2 emissions between Beijing and Shanghai, the top two cities in China. In this paper, the decoupling trends and the decoupling effects are explored from a sectoral perspective, by combining the Tapio decoupling elasticity and the logarithmic mean Divisia index (LMDI) model. The results show that Beijing and Shanghai both experienced weak decoupling in construction, expansive negative decoupling in transport, expansive coupling in trade, and weak decoupling in others over the period 2000–2015. Moreover, agriculture appeared strong decoupling in Beijing, and recessive decoupling in Shanghai; industry showed strong decoupling in Beijing, and weak decoupling in Shanghai. The decoupling effects showed different magnitudes and patterns in industrial sectors between Beijing and Shanghai. Overall, per-capita GDP and population growth inhibited the decoupling, while energy intensity, industrial share, energy mix accelerated the decoupling process. Highlights • The decoupling of sectoral economic output from carbon emissions in Beijing and Shanghai are investigated. • Beijing's industry enjoyed better decoupling performance than Shanghai's industry. • Transport should be put more emphasis in further decoupling efforts. • Energy intensity is crucial effect accelerating the decoupling process. [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]

Resource-based cities generally face the dual pressures of ecological damage and high carbon emissions. Taking the National Sustainable Development Plan for Resource-Based Cities (NSDP) issued in China as a quasi-natural experiment, this paper for the first time, uses the difference-in-difference method to test the coordinated effect of green expansion and carbon reduction brought by NSDP at the county level using rich remote sensing data. The results show that NSDP has significantly promoted the ecological quality improvement and CO 2 emission mitigation in resource-based cities, and the above coordinated benefits mainly occur in energy, mature, declining, northeastern, and municipal resource-based cities. Through the mechanism analysis, we find that NSDP mainly works by promoting the transformation of industry sector to agriculture, animal husbandry, accommodation and catering, finance, and environment management sectors, which are reflected in output, employment, product yield, land type and land transaction area. Further discussion on the tertiary industry suggests that developing tourism, easing financing constraint and strengthening environment regulation, are the key channels to borne fruit in green expansion and carbon reduction. • Analysis of placed-based policy on resource at the county-level. • Coordinated effects of green expansion and carbon reduction are tested. • Key areas of policy effects are identified. • Industrial structure transformation and its related mechanisms are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Carbon emissions from energy consumption of 282 prefecture-level cities in China were calculated. • A new method for calculating carbon emission factors for electricity is proposed. • Extending the Atkinson Index to the application of Carbon Fairness. • Measured the inequality and fairness indicators of carbon emissions from energy consumption at the prefecture-level city level in China. This paper focuses on the conceptualization and quantification of carbon emission inequality and fairness from energy consumption. In order to more accurately measure the carbon emissions generated by electricity consumption in each city, we firstly propose a new method for calculating the carbon emission factor for electricity, and calculates the carbon emissions from energy consumption in 282 prefecture-level cities in China from 2003 to 2019. Through the application of the Theil-Kaya decomposition mechanism and the improved Atkinson index, we conducted an in-depth study of the carbon emission inequality and fairness indicators from energy consumption. The results show that (1) Although China's overall inequality has declined, it remains significant in the western region, with its inequality indicator fluctuating from 0.548 in 2003 to 0.683 in 2019.(2) The decomposition of the drivers of inequality indicators shows that the contribution of GDP per capita to inequality is increasingly being replaced by energy intensity and the energy carbon emission factor, with energy intensity emerging as the main driver, contributing more than 40% to inequality in 2019, both overall and in the three regions.(3) The results for the fairness indicator, on the other hand, show a certain degree of divergence. Further Dynamic Time Warping fitting analysis shows that regardless of how the public's sensitivity to carbon emissions varies, the change trends of the fairness and inequality indicators for carbon emissions in the eastern region show a high degree of convergence, even in the two most extreme cases. The fit is poorest in the western region, but improves significantly if public's sensitivity to carbon emissions increases. (4)To sum up, some policies that are consistent with the context of the times, such as the East-West regional counterparts and the construction of a new type of power system, are worthy of priority consideration by the Government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's 'dual carbon' strategy is of strategic importance in leading global climate governance and promoting China's high-quality and green economic development. Cities are the centres of human activities. However, these are also places where high energy consumption and high carbon emissions are concentrated. This study selected data from 192 small and medium-sized cities in mainland China for the period 2000–2020. It classified these into seven categories using the K-means clustering method, calculated the decoupling status of different types of small and medium-sized cities based on the Tapio decoupling index, and analysed the relationship between carbon emissions and economic growth in various types of small and medium-sized cities based on the EKC curve theory. Finally, the backpropagation neural network (BPNN) model was used to classify and predict the time required to achieve carbon peaking for seven types of small and medium-sized cities. The following conclusions were drawn: (1) The development status of small and medium-sized cities shows a 'geese echelon pattern'. New dynamic small and medium-sized urban areas may reach peak carbon emissions first, while resource-based small and medium-sized urban areas may be the last to do so. (2) The decoupling of carbon emissions from industrial development in small and medium-sized cities has not been completed. This manifests mainly through the states of declining decoupling, absolute decoupling, and strong negative decoupling. (3) A significant inverted U-shaped relationship exists between economic development and carbon emissions in these cities. (4) These cities may have the disadvantage of premature or excessive de-industrialisation. Additionally, these generally have an inefficient and expansionary economic development status. Therefore, this study contended for a more robust integration of a radical political economy and ecological economics to support the development of such cities in China. The paper proposes differentiated development paths and fundamental recommendations for small and medium-sized cities in the implementation of the 'double carbon' strategy. The intention is to provide theoretical guidance and implications for promoting green and low-carbon development in urban and rural areas and for the early achievement of the strategy in China. [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]

Based on the unique perspective of local environmental regulations promulgated in Chinese prefecture-level cities from 2000 to 2018, this paper examines the impact of urban environmental legislation on green total factor energy efficiency (GTFEE). The results show that implementing environmental legislation significantly improves local GTFEE , with comprehensive protection regulations contributing to local energy efficiency improvements, while the impact of pollution prevention regulations is insignificant. This conclusion remains robust to multiple scenarios. Potential mechanisms through which environmental legislation can guide urban green transition include the industrial upgrading effect represented by "clean industry development" and "polluting industry exit", as well as the technical innovation effect achieved through "new technology generation" and "old technology upgrading". Furthermore, environmental legislation with a higher degree of regulatory effectiveness has a greater potential for energy saving. Environmental legislation has a more significant impact on improving GTFEE in cities in non-old industrial bases, with less frequent turnover of officials, and in central and western regions in China. This study evaluates the positive impact of urban environmental legislation on GTFEE , aiming to advancing the rule of law in local environmental pollution governance and thereby promote urban green transition. • Use a Difference-in-Differences model to explore the effect of urban environmental legislation. • Environmental legislation guides urban green transition development. • The impact of heterogeneous urban environmental regulations on green transition development. • Industrial upgrading and Technical innovation have positive mediating roles. • Environmental legislation policy has city attributes, official turnover and location heterogeneity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's rapid urbanization growth during the past decades which has highly promoted its affluence has induced various challenges for the countryside. The problem of rural decline of quite many villages which are suffering depopulation in turn challenges the urbanization sustainability in China. By way of in-depth historical and literature review, the paper finds distorted urban-rural relationship and the tendency of village decline owing to China's long time urban biased policy. By further investigating China's new-type urbanization strategy, the paper draws concerns about future rural development which is less mentioned in the plan. It calls for ruralization and actions to revitalize the countryside so as to be adapted to China's new-type urbanization plan. [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]

• Constructed China's sustainable development index based on SDGs. • Evaluated the trend of China's sustainable development level. • Discussed the ladder differentiation of China's sustainable development. • Found the characteristic national conditions index shape. • Ranked the sustainable development degree of typical cities. To evaluate China's sustainable development level, it is necessary to integrate the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG S) into the indicators reflecting the development issues with Chinese characteristics after localization. Based on China's national conditions, the SDG S are specified in the Chinese context, and integrated into the indicators reflecting the development problems with Chinese characteristics to evaluate the degree of sustainable development in China. Results show that: first, the overall trend of China's sustainable development level is positive, but mainly increased by the system development degree and system coordination degree. The system sustainability degree decline sent a danger signal to the future of China's sustainable development. Second, the development pace of China's sustainable development in different regions is quite different, and overall, there is a step-type differentiation between the east regions, central regions, and west regions. Beijing and Shenzhen are with the highest degree of China's sustainable development. Third, the line of the characteristic national conditions index is "U" shaped. As for a series of accompanying problems in the construction of socialism with characteristics, China's attention to them and its ability to solve them have changed qualitatively around 2007. Based on this, the paper puts forward different suggestions for the sustainable development of different regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • A Super-SBM with undesirable output model is applied. • The environmental efficiency of 283 Chinese cities during 2003–2016 is analyzed. • The overall environmental efficiency performance across the Chinese cities is low. • China has achieved significant improvement in environmental efficiency across survey period. Abstract In the past decades, unprecedented dramatic economic development in the Chinese cities has also brought serious environmental problems. In line with this, the Chinese government has been investing great efforts and resources in addressing environmental problems. However, little previous studies have been conducted in examining whether this development is efficient from a win-win perspective balance between economic growth and environmental protection. This paper presents a comprehensive analysis on the environmental efficiency (EE) in the process of dramatic economic development in the Chinese cities. The Super-slack-based measure (Super-SBM) model is adopted to analyze the EE performance. Data used for analysis are collected from 283 sample cities in China. The research results indicate that the overall EE performance across the Chinese cities is relatively low, and the differences in EE performance among the 283 cities are significant. The top three EE performers are Shenzhen, Sanya and Erdos, and Baiyin, Xinzhou and Liupanshui are the bottom three performers. The results also suggest that the EE performance in the Eastern area, where most first-tier cities are located in, is significantly higher than that in the Central and Western areas (aggregated with fourth and fifth tier-cities). From the dynamic perspective, the results show that China has achieved significant improvement in environmental efficiency across the surveyed period of 2003–2016. The research findings provide valuable references not only for the Chinese policy-makers and practitioners to adopt measures for promoting a win-win balance between environmental protection and economic development in the Chinese context, but also for further studies on environmental efficiency in the international context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract This paper develops a new paradigm to analyze the eco-efficiency of Yangtze River Economic Belt (YREB) in China and makes a first empirical attempt at examining whether the eco-efficiency in urban agglomerations (UA-s) outperform Non-urban agglomerations (Non-UA-s), or driving the Non-UA-s in promoting eco-efficiency using a dataset of 108 prefectural-level cities during 2003–2014. The main findings are as follows. First, the eco-efficiency of YREB gradually increases during the study period. Cities in UA-s with higher eco-efficiency experience an increasing spatial agglomeration while those in Non-UA-s show a slight downward shift. Second, in terms of eco-efficiency, both statistical test and econometrical test confirm that cities in UA-s outperform those in Non-UA-s. Third, the global and club convergence of eco-efficiency in YREB is ascertained. Forth, the eco-efficiency of UA-s exerts backwash effects on those in Non-UA-s, along with decreasing the convergence speed of eco-efficiency. Special issues are briefly discussed, lastly. Highlights • A new analysis paradigm is developed to explore the YREB's eco-efficiency. • Temporal-spatial evolution and empirical tests are conducted, indicating a proof that eco-efficiency in urban agglomerations outperform that in Non-urban agglomerations. • Urban agglomerations have backwash effects and slight constraints to Non-urban agglomerations in terms of eco-efficiency. • Some special issues are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industrial structures in China's resource-based cities are unlikely to materially change in the short term, and the large quantities of air pollutants emitted by residents' energy consumption cause serious air pollution. It is therefore urgently required to frame policies that can be adopted to realize the sustainable development of a social economy under the constraint of atmospheric environment in China's resource-based cities. In this paper, we develop a dynamic optimization model by using input–output analysis with gross regional product (GRP) maximization as the objective function. This model contains three submodels: the socioeconomic submodel, atmo-environmental control submodel, and energy submodel. The model is applied to Tangshan City, a typical resource-based industrial city, to conduct a dynamic simulation with 13 terms from 2013 to 2025 and based on the data in 2012. The goal for the model operation is to realize the optimal development of a social economy under the restrain of certain emission levels of air pollutants. This goal is achieved by introducing a comprehensive policy that includes a residential clean energy promotion policy and an industry emission reduction policy, and industrial restructuring also plays a role by industrial subsidies. The simulation results demonstrate that sulfur dioxide ( S O 2 ) and nitrogen oxides ( N O x ) can be reduced by 53% and 45%, respectively, in Tangshan City in 2025 compared with their values in 2012 with an annual GRP growth rate of 6.2%. The total output of the clean energy in the simulation period is 41.4 million tons of standard coal. The goal of improving the atmospheric environment and sustainable development of social economies in resource-based cities can be achieved by coordinating the relationship among economic development, atmospheric environmental protection, and energy consumption through a dynamic optimization model with a comprehensive policy and industrial restructuring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]