Abstract
The Belt and Road Initiative has brought new opportunities for countries along the routes to develop their transportation infrastructure. Through large-scale transportation infrastructure construction, these countries enhanced the Belt and Road cooperation with each other, which further facilitates the rapid development of their own economy, but whether this can promote the sustainable development of their own environment, relevant research is still lacking. In this paper, China is taken as the study subject to evaluate the comprehensive effects that the Belt and Road Initiative exerts on the economy and environment through improving transportation infrastructure. In the study, RAM indicators were first established to measure the unified economic and environmental efficiency of transportation infrastructure, a DID model was then built to study the effects of the Initiative on the unified efficiency, and mediation models were finally created to discuss the ways in which the Belt and Road Initiative can improve the unified economic and environmental efficiency of transportation infrastructure through transformation and upgrade of industrial structure. The study result shows that the Belt and Road Initiative can significantly promote the improvement of the unified economic and environmental efficiency of the national transportation infrastructure, but the result is regionally heterogeneous. The Initiative has positive effects in improving the unified efficiency in eastern region but has no effect in the central and western regions. Although the Initiative can significantly enhance the efficiency through transforming and upgrading the industrial structure, the industrial structure rationalization plays a primary positive role. This paper provides the empirical evidences to evaluate the implementation effects of the Initiative in the transportation infrastructure sector and verifies that countries along the routes can achieve sustainable development through large-scale transportation infrastructure construction under the Belt and Road Initiative.
Highlights
Introduction e Belt and RoadInitiative proposed by China is aimed at achieving common development and prosperity by enhancing interconnectivity and intercommunication
According to formulas (1)–(8), the software MAXDEA was used to measure the economic efficiency, environmental efficiency, and unified efficiency of transportation infrastructure in various regions in China. e average values of the three types of efficiency from 2007 to 2017 are shown in Table 3. e results show that the average values of the economic, environmental, and unified efficiency of transportation infrastructure nationwide were, respectively, 0.902, 0.657, and 0.900, indicating that development of transportation infrastructure has benefited more the economy than the environment in China, the economic development and the carbon emission resulting from transportation infrastructure tend to show a benign coupling
Complexity effects that the Belt and Road Initiative has on the economy and environment by promoting the transportation infrastructure construction, this paper takes China as the study subject, evaluates the effects of the Belt and Road Initiative on the unified economic and environmental efficiency of transportation infrastructure, and analyzes the mediating role played by the transformation and upgrade of the industrial structure. e results show that, first, the Belt and Road Initiative has different effects on the unified economic and environmental efficiency of transportation infrastructure
Summary
Initiative proposed by China is aimed at achieving common development and prosperity by enhancing interconnectivity and intercommunication. Erefore, after the Belt and Road Initiative was put forward, transportation infrastructure has been prioritized for enhancing interconnectivity among countries and regions along the routes. Multilateral financial institutions including the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the Silk Road Fund have been established through efforts under the Belt and Road Initiative to mitigate fund shortage for construction of large-scale transportation infrastructure. By December 2019, AIIB had provided USD 12.04 billion for 63 projects in countries and regions along the routes and the Silk Road Fund had signed 34 projects with a committed investment amount of USD 12.3 billion [1, 2]. Since the Belt and Road Initiative was proposed, progress has been observed in the construction of transportation infrastructure.
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