Impact of Carbon Sequestration by Terrestrial Vegetation on Economic Growth: Evidence from Chinese County Satellite Data

Abstract

Land vegetation plays an important role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and stabilizing atmospheric CO2 concentration. However, the impact of carbon sequestration of terrestrial vegetation on economic growth has not yet been reported in the literature, especially in the context of China’s current high-quality economic development strategy, and clarifying carbon sequestration on high-quality economic development has an important research-support role in achieving the goal of “carbon peak” and “carbon neutral”. Therefore, based on the panel data from 2735 countries and cities in China from 2000 to 2017, this statistical analysis adopts a dual-fixed-effect model to identify the heterogeneous impacts of land-based vegetation carbon sequestration on high-quality urban economic development. The results show that carbon sequestration by terrestrial vegetation has a significant positive impact on economic growth in northeast, central, south, and southwest China but not in north, east, or northwest China, and after a series of stability tests, the effect still holds. Terrestrial vegetation carbon sequestration affects economic growth mainly through upgrades of industrial structures, resource allocation effect, and vegetation coverage. This statistical model further clarifies the empirical evidence provided by vegetation carbon sequestration for high-quality economic development and the economic effects on afforestation and ecological conservation.

The Effect of Carbon Sink Afforestation Projects on China’s Forest Product Export Trade: Empirical Evidence from Chinese Microenterprises

“…On the basis of existing research, the main contributions of this study are reflected in the following aspects: Firstly, the economic impact of CSAPs is investigated from the perspective of forest product export trade. Based on the practical background of the implementation of forestry carbon sinks, existing studies mainly study the economic, social, and ecological effects of CSAPs theoretically [14][15][16], while a small number of studies carry out empirical analysis centering on industrial structure upgrading and economic growth, and argue that CSAPs can improve local economic growth and optimize the industrial structure [17,18]. They neglect the fact that an important purpose of CSAPs is to improve the international competitiveness of Chinese forest product enterprises.…”