Search

It is important to explore the intrinsic mechanism of green finance's role in widening the green development space for China, in order to optimize the structure of green financial development and accelerate the construction of a modernized economic system. Taking ecological environment improvement as a new research perspective, this paper presents the impacts and mechanisms of green finance on the green development space of the economy and society through the fixed-effect model and moderating-effect model, based on panel data from 30 provinces and municipalities in China from 2011 to 2020. The findings show that green finance development in China significantly expands the green development space of the economy and society, and this conclusion did not change after robustness tests such as replacing the main variables, adjusting the study interval, and considering endogeneity. In terms of its mechanism of action, ecological environment improvement plays an important mediating and regulating role in the process of green finance, essentially magnifying the green development space of the economy and society. In terms of a heterogeneity analysis, the effect of green finance on the expansion of the green development space is the largest in the eastern region, followed by the northeastern region, and the smallest in the central and western regions. In addition, the positive effect of green finance is relatively larger in regions with a higher urbanization level, government fiscal expenditure level, foreign investment level, and advanced industrial structure. The main contribution of this paper is to the field of green development, revealing the important role of the ecological benefits of green finance, which can help to achieve high-quality sustainable development in the economy and society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The protection and management of important agricultural heritage systems (IAHS) are essential to the sustainable economic and social development of heritage sites. Using the time-varying difference-in-differences (DID) model, this paper analyzes the influence of the identification of IAHS on economic growth and compares the difference between Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS) and China's Nationally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (China-NIAHS). The results show that the identification of IAHS can significantly promote the economic growth of heritage sites, and the identification of GIAHS has a stronger role. Heterogeneity analysis shows that the economic driving effect of IAHS identification on heritage sites is affected by geographical location and poverty. The economic driving effect is stronger in Western China and in relatively poor areas. In addition, the influencing mechanism of regional economic growth after IAHS identification is discussed. The results show that IAHS identification can promote the development of the grain processing industry and the improvement of infrastructure construction, so as to increase the added value of secondary industries at heritage sites. Moreover, the level of heritage recognition leads to different policy tendencies. Among these, GIAHS identification significantly promotes investment growth, while China-NIAHS identification significantly promotes the population agglomeration of heritage sites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a new concept for systematically evaluating ecosystem services, Gross Ecosystem Product (GEP) provides an effective means to comprehensively reveal the overall status of the ecosystem, the impact of economic activities on the ecological environment, and the effectiveness of ecological protection efforts. GEP accounting has been conducted in various regions; however, GEP's application in natural reserves still requires further exploration. Taking the Qinling Mountains as the research area, this paper aims to assess the relationship between GEP and economic development on the basis of the GEP accounting system. The results indicated that: (1) From 2010 to 2020, GEP tended to increase continuously and exhibited a distribution pattern with high value regions in the east and west, and low value regions in the north and south. (2) Over the years, the coupling coordination degree between GEP and GDP was in a consistent upward trend. In 2020, a good coupling coordination state between GEP and GDP was achieved in most districts and counties. (3) With the relative development between GEP and GDP, the social economy of most districts and counties lagged behind GEP in 2010. The number of districts and counties lagging in GEP in 2020 increased, while the number of regions with a balanced development of GEP and GDP was still relatively discouraging. (4) In general, elevation, contagion, temperature, population density, and precipitation were the main drivers of coupling coordination degree between GEP and GDP. If the relationship between economic development and ecological environmental protection can be reasonably balanced, it will further promote the sustainable development of nature reserves, and provide a scientific basis for sustainable policy-making in other similar areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2017, the 19th CPC National Congress proposed to "establish a sound economic system of green, low-carbon and circular development", which indicates the direction of high-quality economic development in the new era of China. Clean power investment is a powerful way to promote high-quality economic development by adopting non-fossil-energy utilization and low-emission technologies, as well as creating new jobs. Meanwhile, large-scale investment and a long investment return period result in negative effects on local economies. To better understand the effect of clean power investment, this paper selects panel data of thirty provinces in China from 2010 to 2019 to establish a spatial Durbin model to explore the impact of clean power investment on regional high-quality economic development. The results show that inter-regional high-quality economic development shows significant spatial auto-correlation characteristics. Clean power investment has not only a positive direct effect on high-quality economic development but also generates positive spatial spillover effects. Human capital, degree of government intervention, and urbanization rate have positive effects on regional high-quality economic development, while they play a suppressed role on neighboring regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is directly linked to a broad array of changes because of disorganized activities within the economic system and human intervention. Climate change affects the well-being status of both non-living and living things. Relevant policies to mitigate and adapt to climate change conditions concentrate on solutions that intend to use renewable energy instead of fossil fuels or other conventional energy sources. This study aims to process a review focused on how renewables advance environmental quality and create relevant benefits within severe economic activities. This study elaborates on the case of China for two main reasons. First, China has a pivotal role in the economic system worldwide. Second, China is making serious attempts to transition into a low-carbon economy. An integrative review was processed to receive selected publications. The advantage of this process is that it considers empirical and non-empirical studies, policy papers, and conceptual frameworks. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied to retrieve the final number of publications. Review results from 39 well-acknowledged Journals provided 180 selected publications categorized into seven study groups: data analyses, model optimization studies, market issues, renewable energy technology publications, nuclear energy publications, ocean energy publications, and policy-related studies. Policy implications concern China's efforts to accelerate the integration of renewables in the energy mix. Hence, the country should increase energy efficiency in consumption and process investment plans based on robust research and development efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital rural development has become an emerging dynamic force for high-quality rural development in China. This paper constructs the "environmental-economic-social" analysis framework for digital rural development, analyzes the spatial variation of the digital rural development level (DRDL) in Chinese counties in 2020, and conducts the factor detection and interaction detection of its influencing factors. It is found that: (1) digital rural development has its own unique spatial differentiation mechanism, which can be analyzed from three dimensions: environmental system, economic system, and social system, which play a fundamental role, decisive role, and a magnifying effect on digital rural development, respectively. (2) The DRDL in China's counties has significant spatial distribution, spatial correlation, and spatial clustering characteristics. The DRDL in general shows a decreasing distribution trend from coastal to inland regions, and the overall differences in DRDL mainly come from intra-regional differences rather than inter-regional differences. The rural infrastructure digitalization dimension has stronger spatial correlation while the spatial correlation of the rural governance digitalization dimension is weaker. There are obvious hotspot and coldspot areas in the DRDL, with large differences between the coldspot and hotspot areas of different sub-dimensions. (3) The spatial divergence of the DRDL is closely related to geographical elements and is the result of the combined effect of several geographical factors. The factor detection results show that the dominant factors within the four regions are significant different. The interaction detection results show that the driving force of the two-factor interaction is stronger than that of the single-factor interaction and that the interaction among the factors further deepens the spatial differentiation of the DRDL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whether China's economy can maintain sustainable growth has been debated both in China and internationally, and the most representative critique has been summarized in the "Krugman Query". Faced with such doubts, how to achieve a "win-win" for economic growth and environmental protection has become one of the central objectives of local government work while striving for the new vision of development. Taking China's carbon trading pilot policy as an example, and based on panel data of 30 provincial administrative regions in China from 2001 to 2018, this paper uses the Data Envelopment Analysis-Malmquist index model and the Propensity Score Matching-Difference in Difference method to measure the level of green economic growth from two aspects: green development mode and economic growth effect, and further explore the impact of China's carbon trading system on green economic growth. The results show that the implementation of the carbon trading system promoted both the green development level and economic growth of pilot cities, and positively affected green total factor productivity, refuting the "Krugman Query". Finally, the study puts forward a series of recommendations in strengthening environmental regulation, improving green technology innovation, and developing low-carbon industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exports are a crucial driving force of China's economic growth; however, researchers have yet to verify whether they can effectively improve the high-quality economic development. Based on interprovincial panel data from 2000 to 2019, in this study, we constructed a high-quality economic development indicator system through the entropy weight method, and we adopted the linear regression model and dynamic panel threshold model to empirically test the export trade effect on the high-quality economic development as well as its mechanism. We also probed the impact of the heterogeneous absorptive capacity on the high-quality economic development. According to our research findings, China's export trade has substantially promoted the high-quality economic development level by, from the viewpoint of the action path, positively influencing the economic, open, and coordination subsystems. The influence of the export trade on the high-quality economic development has a substantial single-threshold effect on the heterogeneous absorptive capacity; that is, when the threshold variables that represent the regional absorptive capacity (the economic level, R&D intensity, and technological gap) are all higher than the threshold value, the export trade has a substantial positive impact on the high-quality economic development level. The research conclusions of this paper provide new ideas for the development of high-quality economic systems as well as a useful reference for China in its formulation of more targeted foreign trade policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At present, the new energy industry represented by photovoltaics has become the main force to realize the optimization of China's energy structure and the goal of "double carbon"; with the absence of land resources, the waterborne bifacial photovoltaic has ushered in a new opportunity. Therefore, in order to address the problem that the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) of photovoltaics (PV) could not take into account, the dynamic economic performance in the control process, an economic model predictive control (EMPC), is proposed in this work to realize the MPPT of the waterborne bifacial PV power generation system. Firstly, the model of the bifacial PV module is constructed by combining the ray-tracing irradiance model and considering the effect of water surface albedo on the irradiance absorbed by the module. Secondly, the EMPC controller is designed based on the state-space model of the system to maximize the power generation as the economic performance index, and to solve the optimal input variables time by time to achieve a rolling optimization with the operational requirements of the system itself as the constraints. Thirdly, the MATLAB/Simulink (R2022a) simulation experimental results verify that the EMPC strategy could be utilized to achieve MPPT of the waterborne bifacial PV power generation system, according to the changes of environment. Finally, it is also demonstrated that the bifacial PV power generation system that employed the EMPC strategy outperformed the traditional MPPT algorithm, with respect to both output power tracking velocity and accuracy, and the power generation could be improved by about 6% to 14.5%, which significantly enhances the system's dynamic process economics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, rapid industrialization has driven higher energy demand, depleting fossil-fuel reserves and causing excessive emissions. China's "dual carbon" strategy aims to balance development and sustainability. This study optimizes microgrid efficiency with a tiered carbon-priced economy. A Stackelberg game establishes microgrid-user equilibrium, solved iteratively with a multi-population algorithm (MPGA). Comparative analysis can be obtained without considering demand response scenarios, and the optimization cost of microgrid operation considering price-based demand response scenarios was reduced by 5%; that is 668.95 yuan. In addition, the cost of electricity purchase was decreased by 23.8%, or 778.6 yuan. The model promotes user-driven energy use, elevating economic and system benefits, and therefore, the scheduling expectation of "peak shaving and valley filling" is effectively realized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Like many developed countries in the world, China currently faces many serious demographic challenges that pose a potential risk to the country's socio-economic development and stability. The current demographic development and trend is characterized by a change in the reproductive behavior of the population, characterized by a decline in birth rates, a change in family behavior, and a shift in the value system. This paper is aimed at identifying the impact of population policy and the degree of its influence on both the economic and social system of the country. Based on a deterministic approach, the findings reveal and demonstrate the serious demographic challenges facing China, and we are noting that there is no guarantee that parametric adjustments, such as shifting the retirement age, will de facto ensure the financial health of the pension system by preventing bankruptcy. We point out the risks and prospects for the sustainability of China's socio-economic development based on an analysis of past and current Chinese demographic policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Production efficiency is a critical research topic in the field of construction economics and management. It reflects the developmental potential and competitiveness of the economy or an economic system. An objective and reasonable assessment framework of the production efficiency in the construction industry is essential to promote the industry's high-quality development. This study aims to propose a scientific and holistic framework to examine the production efficiency in the construction industry and to investigate evolution patterns from a macroeconomic perspective. Input and output indicators were identified through the value-added and the fuzzy Delphi methods. In addition, the production efficiency in the construction industry was examined via the bootstrap-DEA and Malmquist exponential decomposition models. A case study in China was conducted at the end of this research. The panel data of 31 provinces from 2010 to 2020 were applied in the case study. The results reveal the following: (1) The bootstrap-DEA model results show that the trends of production efficiency before and after rectification are similar, but the difference is largest at the peak. Moreover, the production efficiency value after correction is evidently lower than that which is obtained by the traditional DEA model. (2) The Malmquist index decomposition results show that the change trend of technical efficiency in the construction industry is contrary to that of the scale efficiency. In addition, the improvement of scale efficiency cannot bring a melioration of management efficiency or the accumulation of production experience. (3) There is no direct correlation between production efficiency and economic development. High-value areas and median areas are contiguous, and they are mainly distributed in the central and eastern provinces. The findings accurately reflect construction industry productivity, providing practical data for developing policy recommendations for bridging regional construction development gaps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The accurate prediction of gross box-office markets is of great benefit for investment and management in the movie industry. In this work, we propose a machine learning-based method for predicting the movie box-office revenue of a country based on the empirical comparisons of eight methods with diverse combinations of economic factors. Specifically, we achieved a prediction performance of the relative root mean squared error of 0.056 in the US and of 0.183 in China for the two case studies of movie markets in time-series forecasting experiments from 2013 to 2016. We concluded that the support-vector-machine-based method using gross domestic product reached the best prediction performance and satisfies the easily available information of economic factors. The computational experiments and comparison studies provided evidence for the effectiveness and advantages of our proposed prediction strategy. In the validation process of the predicted total box-office markets in 2017, the error rates were 0.044 in the US and 0.066 in China. In the consecutive predictions of nationwide box-office markets in 2018 and 2019, the mean relative absolute percentage errors achieved were 0.041 and 0.035 in the US and China, respectively. The precise predictions, both in the training and validation data, demonstrate the efficiency and versatility of our proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climatic changes significantly impact the socio-economic system. Compared with research on the impacts of climate change on the agricultural economic system, researches on the impacts on the industrial economic system are still scarce. This is mainly because of the difficulties in matching climate data with socio-economic data in terms of spatiotemporal resolution, which has greatly limited the exposure degree assessment and the risk assessment of industrial economic systems. In view of this, based on remote sensing inversion and multi-source data fusion, we generated kilometer-grid data of China's industrial output in 2010 and built the spatial distribution model of industrial output, based on random forest, to simulate the spatial distribution of China's industrial output under different climate change scenarios. The results showed that (1) our built spatial distribution simulation model of China's industrial output under different climate change scenarios had an accuracy of up to 93.77%; (2) from 2010 to 2050, the total growth of China's industrial output under scenario RCP8.5 is estimated to be 4.797% higher than that under scenario RCP4.5; and (3) the increasing rate of the average annual growth rate of China's industrial output slows down significantly under both scenarios from 2030 to 2050, and the average annual growth rate will decrease by 7.31 and 6.54%, respectively, under scenarios RCP8.5 and RCP4.5 compared with that from 2010 to 2020. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wastewater propagation chains (WPCs) measure inter-sector average propagation lengths (APL) of wastewater discharge. To achieve sustainable wastewater management, one needs to understand the propagation mechanisms by identifying WPCs at a national level over time. However, the traditional model of identifying WPCs is prone to retaining APLs with lower values but larger wastewater discharge intensities, ignoring many linkages whereby intensities are less than a preset threshold. Nevertheless, these overlooked linkages are valuable in understanding wastewater propagation mechanisms. This study proposed a new model coupled input-output analysis with the graphical theory, called the average propagation lengths-hub covariance graph (APL-HCG). This model can investigate WPCs where the closeness of sector linkages exceeds the preset thresholds. Furthermore, it is capable of retaining linkages for identifying hub wastewater propagation chains (HWPCs). Based on APL-HCG, the resultant HWPCs are decomposed as separated sub-chains which are basically composed of linkages among certain significant sectors belonging to the secondary industry or the tertiary industry. Scenario analyses show that HWPCs are effective in reducing wastewater discharge in the national economic system. The total wastewater discharge would decrease by 1.36%, 2.53%, 2.46%, and 2.11% if we reduced 10% of the final demand of all sectors in HWPCs in 2002, 2007, 2012, and 2017. The APL-HCG model outperforms the traditional model on WPCs by 0.14%, 1.61%, 0.47%, and 0.10%, respectively. The APL-HCG model is 0.21%, 0.68%, 0.70%, and 0.35% better than the scenario of random sampling with the number of sectors equal to HWPCs, respectively. Certain policy implications were provided to reduce wastewater effectively at the national level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Simple Summary: There are three main rearing systems for white-feathered broilers in China. They are the net floor system (NFS), the normal cage system (NCS), and the high standard cage system (HCS). This study compared the relationship between economic benefit and animal welfare between these systems. The high economic input, high output, and high profit in these three different rearing systems. The welfare scores were 778.24 ± 29.45, 691.09 ± 32.97, and 669.82 ± 22.79, respectively. As white-feathered broiler production in China has developed, from the conventional system to the latest system, both cost and economic profit have increased while the welfare score has decreased. This study explains why the level of animal welfare in China's white-feathered broiler production is not high at present, and why breeders do not wish to improve the level of animal welfare production. Both proper animal welfare and economic benefit are important to the broiler industry, so it is better to consider these two factors together. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between economic benefit and animal welfare in different production systems of white-feathered broilers in China. Based on the Welfare Quality Assessment (WQA) protocol for poultry, the authors compared and evaluated the results of the Welfare Quality model (WQM) and the deterministic model. The present study conducted welfare evaluations and investigations on 66 broiler chicken flocks on 52 farms in China. These flocks included three types: the net floor system (NFS), the normal cage system (NCS), and the high standard cage system (HCS). In terms of economy, the results were in line with high economic input, high output, and high profit. In terms of animal welfare assessment, the authors calculated the welfare scores per measure and the attributional WQ scores and WQ index scores of each production systems. The results showed that nine welfare measures from four welfare criteria presented different trends in the three production systems. WQ index scores were 778.24 ± 29.45, 691.09 ± 32.97, and 669.82 ± 22.79, respectively. According to Chow test results, significant differences were found between WQ index scores and total cost and profit (all p < 0.01). In conclusion, with the development of white-feathered broiler production in China, from the conventional system to the latest system, both cost and economic profit have been increased, but the welfare score has been decreased. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]