The Effect of Industrial Structure Upgrading and Human Capital Structure Upgrading on Green Development Efficiency—Based on China’s Resource-Based Cities

Abstract

Green development is crucial to global natural resource conservation, environmental improvement and sustainable development. Furthermore, resource-based cities’ green development is more challenging compared with that of other types of cities. On such basis, it is a necessity to understand the green development level of such cities. Therefore, we introduce green development efficiency (GDE), which is a key indicator for measuring green development. This paper takes China’s 112 resource-based cities during 2010–2019 as its research object, and examines their GDE using the Super-SBM-Undesirable model. Moreover, industrial structure upgrading (ISU) and human capital structure upgrading (HCSU) have important implications for green development. To further explore the influence of ISU and HCSU on GDE, this paper employs a fixed effect model, an interaction effect model and a threshold model. Finally, considering the differences between different resource-based cities, the heterogeneity of ISU and HSCU on GDE in four types of China’s resource-based cities is also explored. It is found that (1) although GDE is on the track of steady improvement, the overall GDE was still relatively low during 2010–2019, with an average GDE of about 0.8; (2) ISU, HCSU and their interaction can promote GDE in resource-based cities and with the intensity of industrial structure increasing, the interaction effect of ISU and HSCU on GDE in resource-based cities shifts from positive to negative; (3) there exists heterogeneity in the direct effect and interaction effect of ISU and HCSU among four types of resource-based cities (i.e., mature cities, growing cities, declining cities and regenerating cities). Our findings offer a data reference for the green and sustainable development of China’s resource-based cities, and also a method reference for other countries’ resource-based cities.

Analysis of human capital effects introducing Bayesian quantile regression in the process of industrial structural upgrading

“…Still, such upgrades often face significant challenges, such as human capital mismatches, directly impeding the vision of regional economic sustainability. Shen et al (2023) [ 45 ] proposed that industrial and human capital structure upgrades are crucial for green development. With the increase in industrial structure intensity, the interactive effect of industrial structural upgrading and human capital structure upgrading on the efficiency of green development in resource-based cities shifted from positive to negative.…”

How Does Digital Finance Affect Energy Efficiency?—Characteristics, Mechanisms, and Spatial Effects

“…By altering the industrial structure and encouraging internal productivity growth, energy efficiency can be considerably boosted in places with low levels of growth in the industry [25]. Additionally, the development of modern industrial structures can be encouraged with the help of financial instruments, which could result in an increase in energy efficiency [26]. In terms of technology, digital technologies can indirectly improve green energy efficiency by reducing resource mismatch [27,28].…”