ABSTRACT This study revisits Bangladesh's competitive edge by examining patterns of global apparel trade during the post‐Multi‐Fibre Arrangement (MFA) era using a large bilateral panel of 27 leading apparel exporters trading with 163 destinations with coverage of 90% of the world apparel exports. Utilising a theory‐consistent structural gravity framework estimated with the Poisson Pseudo Maximum Likelihood (PPML) estimator, this study finds that long geographical distance from major markets such as the US and the EU has not placed Bangladesh in a specific disadvantageous position in this industry. While standard gravity expectations suggest that remoteness should penalise distant Asian suppliers, the results reveal a more nuanced pattern. Bangladesh's exports are less affected by distance at the aggregate level, and for core basic apparel items such as T‐shirts and denim trousers, the Bangladesh‐distance interaction is positive and statistically significant, with contiguity turning negative. This reflects product specialisation, whereby global buyers source standardised, time‐insensitive apparel from distant but low‐cost, scale‐efficient suppliers. Wage competitiveness and bilateral real exchange rate (RER) conditions are also associated with performance, although interpreted as correlated rather than strictly causal. Overall, the findings suggest that Bangladesh successfully leveraged specialisation, scale and cost advantage to overcome the ‘tyranny of distance’ in the post‐MFA global apparel market.

ABSTRACT Improving government‐business relations is critical to fostering entrepreneurship. Using panel data from 282 Chinese cities over 2017–2022, this study empirically examines the impact of government‐business relations on entrepreneurship. The findings are as follows: (1) Government‐business relations stimulate both innovation entrepreneurship and business entrepreneurship, particularly when the relations are close. (2) For innovation entrepreneurship, this positive effect is stronger in non‐resource‐based cities, central cities, and transportation hub cities. For business entrepreneurship, the effect is more pronounced in port cities, cities with flat terrain, and cities with a better commercial credit environment. (3) Mechanism tests indicate that government‐business relations foster both types of entrepreneurship by enhancing market potential, reducing institutional costs and improving environmental governance performance. These findings not only enrich the theoretical understanding of the relationship between government‐business relations and entrepreneurship but also deepen insights into how institutional environments influence innovation and business, providing policy implications for local governments to optimise government‐business relations, improve the business environment, and promote innovation and business.

ABSTRACT Since joining the WTO, China has seen rapid growth in agricultural imports, accompanied by the signing of an increasing number of regional trade agreements (RTAs). This study aims to investigate how RTAs influence China's agricultural imports using HS 6‐digit level data on agricultural trade and tariffs between China and its 121 partner countries from 2002 to 2021, with a focus on disentangling the respective roles of tariffs and non‐tariff changes. The research finds that both tariffs and non‐tariff changes of China's RTAs significantly boost agricultural imports, with non‐tariff changes exerting a stronger effect, and the effects are larger for imports from developing countries. By product, tariff cuts broadly raise imports but are weak or even negative for sensitive cereals and animal products, whereas non‐tariff changes mainly facilitate imports in land, capital, and technology‐intensive and processed sectors, including horticultural and animal‐based products, where China lacks comparative advantages.

ABSTRACT The coordinated development of informal environmental regulation (IER) and the efficiency of government environmental protection expenditure (EGEPE) is key to enhancing the effectiveness of environmental governance. This study focuses on 30 provinces in China over the period from 2008 to 2020, developing a multi‐indicator assessment framework that encompasses both IER and EGEPE. We employ a suite of analytical methods, including the SBM (slack‐based measure) model with undesirable outputs, the entropy technique, a coupling coordination model and a two‐way fixed‐effects model, to dissect the regional disparities, spatiotemporal dynamics and determinant factors influencing the coupling coordination between IER and EGEPE. The results show: ① The coupling coordination degree of IER and EGEPE in the three major regions of China has been on an upward trend, but presents pronounced regional disparities, characterised by East > West > Central regions; ② The number of areas with high‐level coordination has gradually increased, mainly concentrated in the eastern region, while the central and western regions show a trend of ‘low‐level equilibrium trap’ and the trend surface analysis presents a spatial pattern of ‘low in north and high in south—high in east and low in central and western’; ③ Technological innovation plays an important role in promoting the coupling coordination of IER and EGEPE, reflecting the key position of technological development and efficiency improvement in environmental governance.

ABSTRACT This article examines the influence of the restricted export trade policy on technological innovation in Chinese high‐tech companies. The data of A‐share listed firms from 2006 to 2020 are selected as the sample from a micro‐enterprise level. The PSM‐DID method is used to research the innovation input and innovation output. The research findings conclude that the restricted export trade policy will promote high‐tech companies to enlarge their investment in R&D manpower and funds at the cost of the innovation output and quality. For the action mechanism, human capital flow effect and competitive effect play a significant positive intermediary role in innovation input, while learning effect and external cost effect play a negative intermediary role in innovation output. From the perspective of enterprise heterogeneity, enterprises with different sizes, equity structures and life cycles present differently in technological innovation in high‐tech industries when they are impacted by the restricted export trade policy.

ABSTRACT With the widespread adoption of short videos on social media platforms, airlines have increasingly leveraged them as key tools for digital marketing. However, systematic research on their impact on consumers' actual travel behaviour remains limited. This study investigates the effect of short video marketing on civil aviation passenger volume based on monthly panel data from 10 major Chinese airlines between January 2023 and December 2024. The empirical results show that short video marketing significantly increases economy class passenger volume, with improvements in video quality and posting frequency both exerting positive effects. Moreover, stronger marginal effects are observed in the international market and among low‐cost carriers (LCCs). In contrast, business class passengers and full‐service carriers (FSCs) passengers exhibit weaker responsiveness to short video marketing, suggesting that short videos are more effective for leisure and price‐sensitive consumer groups. This study enriches the empirical research on digital marketing in the air travel sector and provides practical insights for airlines to develop differentiated short video strategies.

ABSTRACT Active promotion of biopesticides represents a critical pathway towards achieving sustainable agricultural development in China. In the context of ongoing agricultural digitization, digital extension has emerged as a transformative approach for disseminating agricultural technologies. Based on survey data collected from 793 farmers in China, this study employed a propensity score matching (PSM) method to analyse the impact of digital extension on farmers' biopesticide adoption behaviour. Furthermore, we examined the heterogeneous effects of different digital extension modes. The findings reveal that digital extension increased the likelihood of biopesticide use by farmers by approximately 2.6%–4.3%. Among the various digital modes—graphic‐based extension, live broadcasting and short videos—the short video format proved most effective in promoting biopesticide application. Additionally, digital extension and traditional technical training were found to exhibit a complementary effect, enhancing each other's influence. The positive impact of digital extension was more pronounced among young and middle‐aged farmers, while an observable digital divide limited its effectiveness among older farmers. These results underscore the significance of designing targeted, mode‐aware digital promotion strategies to encourage environmentally sustainable farming practices. They also highlight the need for complementary integration of online and offline agricultural extension services to maximise outreach and efficacy.

ABSTRACT This study investigates the impact of tax administrative penalties on corporate tax compliance using data from the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System of China. The findings show that tax administrative penalties significantly deter corporate tax evasion. Specifically, penalties help regulate corporate behaviour by reducing agency costs, limiting collusion between taxpayers and tax officials, and increasing the costs of capital thinning and accrual‐based earnings management. The deterrent effect is stronger in regions with higher local fiscal pressure, greater enforcement attention, and more advanced information technologies. Moreover, tax administrative penalties produce spillover effects, improving tax compliance among firms in the same industry or region as penalised companies. These results highlight the critical role of tax enforcement in managing tax risks and strengthening compliance. This study recommends improving the uniformity of tax discretion benchmarks across regions to optimise the penalty system and provide institutional support for building a unified national market.