The Impact of Environmental Regulation on Technological Innovation of Resource-Based Industries

Dang Khoa Tran,Huaping Sun,Farhad Taghizadeh-Hesary,Weiqing Li

doi:10.3390/su12176837

Abstract

The development of the resource-based industry has obvious negative externality, and the government’s environmental regulation on the resource-based industry will force the technological innovation of the resource-based industry. This paper selects the panel data of 12 resource-based industries in China from 2003 to 2019 and tests the impact of environmental regulation on technological innovation of resource-based industries by constructing the econometric model. The results show that environmental regulation can promote the technological innovation of resource-based industries. Specifically, environmental regulation has no significant positive impact on the immediate product innovation of 12 resource-based industries in China, but it has a significant positive impact on the product innovation lagging behind one period and two periods. Environmental regulation has no significant impact on the process innovation of current period, but has a significant positive impact on the process innovation of lagging one period. Industrial scale has a significant positive impact on product innovation of resource-based industries. The input of scientific and technological activity personnel has a significant positive impact on the product innovation of current period, and in the long run, it promotes both product innovation and process innovation. On this basis, this paper puts forward the relevant measures and suggestions for the formulation of environmental regulation policies. The government departments should subdivide the resource-based industries, formulate environmental rules and policies by classification, encourage industrial enterprises to carry out technological innovation, reasonably implement fiscal and taxation policy tools and increase the investment in R&D funds, and improve the training mechanism of scientific and technological personnel.

Highlights

Resources are the main foundation and basic power of a country’s economic development
Due to the lag period of technological innovation to the intensity of environmental regulation, this paper examines the impact of environmental regulation at sight and lags 1, 2, and 3 periods of patent authorization, the proportion of new product sales revenue, and R&D investment
Compared with the existing research, some of them think that environmental regulation has a negative impact on industrial technological innovation, while others think that environmental regulation has a positive impact on industrial technological innovation

Summary

Introduction

Resources are the main foundation and basic power of a country’s economic development. Since the reform and opening up, relying on energy and mineral resources, China has achieved rapid economic growth through large-scale development and expansion of resource-based industries. With the rapid development of industrialization, China’s resource-based industries such as the coal mining industry and oil and gas extraction industry have developed rapidly. The development of resource-based industries has a negative externality of the environment, which needs to consume a lot of resources and pollute the environment. Control environmental pollution has become an important prerequisite for the sustainable development of China’s resource-based industries. Strengthening environmental regulation is an inevitable choice to effectively promote the development of resource-based industries, but the high cost of environmental pollution control brings problems for the development of resource-based industries

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Results

Conclusion