Resource curse and green economic growth

Abstract

The implementation period of the “Sustainable Development Plan of Resource-based Cities in China (2013–2020)” is drawing to a close. Objective evaluation of the effect of the policy is of great theoretical and practical significance for China's resource-based cities in their quest to transform their economic development models and realize sustainable development. However, there are few literatures to analyze the resource curse phenomenon from the perspective of policy evaluation. In this paper, the panel data of 285 cities in China from 2003 to 2018 are used to empirically analyze the impact of the plan on the green economic growth of resource-based cities by using the Difference-in-Differences (DID) method. The results show that after a series of robustness tests, the plan can significantly promote green economic growth in resource-based cities and effectively alleviate the “resource curse” phenomenon in these cities. In addition, this paper also explores the transmission mechanism of the plan to promote urban green economic growth. The study shows that the plan significantly improves the green economic efficiency of resource-based cities by increasing investment in scientific and technological innovation, promoting the development of the manufacturing industry, improving system quality and strengthening environmental regulations. Therefore, the development of resource-based cities of the future can better avoid the “resource curse” and achieve sustainable development if their rich resource advantages can be used to focus on scientific and technological innovation, increases in investment in the manufacturing industry and improvements in system quality and environmental regulation.