Provincial Level In China Research Articles

Analyzing inclusive green growth in China: a perspective of relative efficiency.

Inclusive Green Growth (IGG) has important reference value for China's ecological civilization construction and transformation of economic development. Therefore, this study assesses China's IGG level from the perspective of relative efficiency. The IGG efficiency (IGGE) was measured at the provincial level in China from 2000 to 2020 by using Super-Epsilon-Based Measure (EBM) model that considers undesirable outputs. The spatiotemporal pattern of IGGE was analyzed by kernel density estimation and spatial autocorrelation. The results indicate a fluctuating trend from 2000 to 2020 for the IGGE of China, and significant differences between regional and interprovincial IGGE were observed. On average, the eastern region presented the highest efficiency, while the level in the central regions was lowest. There is a positive spatial autocorrelation in the IGGE distribution, and the agglomeration of spatial distribution fluctuated during the study period. The IGGE has spatial spillover effects at the provincial level according to the spatial Durbin model. Among the influencing factors, the spatial spillover effects of industrial structure, government administrative capability, and industrialization level are significant. The regression results also confirm the Environmental Kuznets Curve effect between IGG and economic growth in China. Finally, some implicit policies can be established based on the empirical analysis.

Downscaling estimates of land carbon opportunity costs for agricultural products to provincial level in China

Agricultural land carbon opportunity cost (COC) characterizes potentials for carbon sequestration through ecosystem restoration, which is a critical component for formulating nature-based solutions to mitigate climate change. Yet existing relevant estimates still stayed at global scale, lacking estimates at national and provincial scale. Here, we integrated multi-source downscaled data to estimate the magnitude of land COC for 20 categories of crops and livestock in 30 provinces of China. Results show that beef got the highest land COC with about 29% of the national total, and COC per unit production of beef was much higher than that of other products. The high beef-induced COC was primarily caused by vast amount of grass feed consumed by beef cattle, resulting in native forest land being cleared into grazing land. Moreover, both land COC and crops yield per unit area of cropland enhanced with latitude decrease, but the increase rate of the former was much higher than that of the latter. Therefore, improving utilization efficiency of existing grazing land and raising yields per unit area of existing croplands in low-latitude provinces, rather than clearing new native forest land into grazing land and cropland, would have great functions on declining national total land COC for agricultural products. The research could also contribute to discussions of local tradeoffs between land carbon storage and agricultural production and then inform climate mitigation strategies.

The impact of FDI quality characteristics on carbon emission intensity: Evidence from China

Using data from 30 provincial-level in China during 2005–2019, this paper investigates the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) quality characteristics on carbon emission intensity. Based on the Copeland-Taylor model, the mechanism of the impact of FDI quality characteristics on carbon emission intensity is also investigated. The key findings demonstrate that FDI quality traits considerably lower regional carbon intensity, and the result is still robust after considering the spatial correlation and using IV-2sls in consideration of endogeneity. The FDI quality characteristics mainly reduce carbon emission intensity through green technology improvement, industrial structure, and factor endowment structure optimization. Moreover, further evidence shows that there are heterogeneous effects with regard to regional and FDI quality characteristics. From the standpoint of FDI quality characteristics, this study adds to the literature on FDI and environmental pollution. Policy recommendations for China are also discussed in this paper, which can serve as a guide for other emerging nations.

Evolution and Driving Factors of the Spatiotemporal Pattern of Tourism Efficiency at the Provincial Level in China Based on SBM-DEA Model.

In order to give guidance to improve tourism competitiveness and sustainable development, it is particularly important to identify and analyze the factors and mechanisms that affect efficiency. The SBM–DEA model including undesirable outputs was used to measure the tourism efficiency of 30 provinces in China from 2006 to 2019. Combined with the compound DEA model, the sensitivity of each province to the fluctuation of the input–output index was mined. The exploratory spatial analysis method and fixed effect model were used to analyze the spatial change and driving factors of tourism efficiency. The results show that: (1) the tourism efficiency of each province in China fluctuated from 2006 to 2019, and the average value was raised from 0.12 to 0.71, generally reaching the grade of medium and high efficiency; (2) the spatial difference of tourism efficiency is significant, but there is no obvious spatial correlation; (3) the most important input factors to tourism efficiency are environmental resources, tourism resource inputs and tourism infrastructure construction, and tourism fixed asset investment is redundant. (4) Optimizing the industrial structure, strengthening the introduction of core technology, and continuously promoting the process of urbanization and marketization are important ways to improve the efficiency of tourism.

Arranged Marriage: Social Ties between Political Stakeholders and Interfirm Alliance Formation

This study investigates whether socially connected political stakeholders internalize alliance strategies of firms under their respective jurisdictions into their own social exchanges and thus push for nonspontaneous interfirm alliances. To test my hypotheses, I take advantage of the rotation of top two officials (i.e., the governor and the secretary) at the province level in China. I structure a longitudinal dataset of firm-province pairs supplemented with officials’ résumé information and the records of all new cross-province joint ventures established by each listed firm from 2009 to 2019. I found that a listed firm established more alliances with firms in a host province if its home province was socially connected with the host province via more ties between top officials. In addition, this positive effect was stronger: 1) if governors were involved in the interprovincial social ties; 2) if officials were in their last term in their position; or 3) if a focal firm had no political stakeholders from other governments. Notably, I ruled out the competing mechanism that such ties enabled, rather than coerced into, interfirm alliance formation.

Causes and Evolution Characteristics of Green Innovation Efficiency Loss: The Perspective of Factor Mismatch under Local Government Competition

The objective of this paper is to measure the efficiency loss of green innovation caused by local government competition and explore its causes and evolution characteristics. Based on the equimarginal principles such as the deviation of the allocation of green innovation output factors, this paper uses the panel data of China’s provinces (excluding Tibet, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan) from 2000 to 2020 and employs the spatial panel measurement model and the Kernel density estimation. The study finds that first, local government competition causes the mismatch of local innovation factors not only locally but also in neighboring regions. Second, the mismatch of innovative talents and capital caused by local government competition lowers the green innovation efficiency. Third, the shortage of innovative talents caused by local government competition is the main reason for the loss of green innovation efficiency in Beijing, Tianjin, and Shanghai. Fourth, the degree of efficiency loss of green innovation at the provincial level in China is heterogeneous in government competition strategies, and the loss due to tax competition is the most significant. Fifth, although the loss of green innovation efficiency generally decreases yearly, in the future, the institutional competition will still hinder the improvement of green innovation efficiency in the eastern, central and western regions of China. Our policy suggestions include promoting regional cooperation and cultivating innovative talents to further improve the efficiency of green innovation.

Research on Spatial-Temporal Variations of Cultivated Land in China Based on GlobeLand30

The period from 2010 to 2020 is a period of rapid economic development in China, with the increasing population and the urbanization level reaching 63.89%. Cultivated land plays an extremely important role in China’s food security. In order to grasp the spatial and temporal distribution and change of cultivated land use in China in time, based on GlobeLand30 data in 2010 and 2020, this study studied the spatial and temporal change characteristics of total cultivated land resources, cultivated land development and utilization degree, dynamic change degree of cultivated land utilization rate, and cultivated land use center and direction by using GIS technology, reclamation index, cultivated land utilization rate dynamic change degree model, cultivated land center shift model and standard deviation ellipse model. The results show that: ①The cultivated land area in China has changed greatly during 2010–2020, with the largest increase in cultivated land area in Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang, while the largest decrease in cultivated land area in Shandong, Jiangsu, Hebei, Guangdong, Henan and Zhejiang; ②The areas with the highest degree of cultivated land development and utilization are mainly concentrated in Shandong, Jiangsu, Henan, Anhui and other provinces in the east, while Qinghai, Tibet and Xinjiang have the lowest degree of cultivated land development and utilization; ③The regions with the highest dynamic change degree index of cultivated land utilization rate are mainly concentrated in Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Tibet and Qinghai, while the dynamic change degree index of cultivated land utilization rate in Liaoning, Hebei, Shandong, Jiangsu, Shanghai, Zhejiang and Guangdong shows obvious negative changes; ④The spatial and temporal migration of the center of gravity of cultivated land use in China shows the trend of “moving westward to northward”, and the spatial distribution direction of cultivated land use roughly presents the overall characteristics of northeast-southwest direction. This study can effectively reveal the temporal and spatial variation characteristics of cultivated land use at provincial level in China based on GlobeLand30, and provide a scientific reference for further rational development, utilization and protection of cultivated land resources in China.

The Impact of Electronic Commerce on China’s Energy Consumption

The rapid development of e-commerce in China in recent years has transformed China’s economic and social production landscape as well as people’s lifestyles. In addition, it has an increasing impact on China’s energy consumption. Based on Melitz [Econometrica, 2003, 71 (6), 1695–1725], this paper introduces the energy efficiency parameters to propose a theoretical analysis model, and performs theoretical and empirical analysis of the impact of e-commerce on China’s energy consumption using panel data at the provincial level in China. This paper suggests that the development of e-commerce can significantly enhance China’s energy output efficiency, reduce energy consumption per unit of GDP, and curb the excessive growth of total energy consumption. Meanwhile, increased investment in energy conservation, technological progress, and optimized energy consumption structure can also help decrease China’s energy consumption per unit of GDP, thus decreasing environmental pollution. Finally, this paper proposes policy suggestions to lower energy consumption per unit of GDP and control the excessive growth of China’s total energy consumption. Compared with existing studies, the main contributions of this paper are as follows. First, because there are only a few studies on e-commerce and energy consumption, this paper further supplements and enriches relevant literature. Second, this paper proposes a theoretical model regarding the impact of e-commerce development on energy consumption, adding a new perspective to research. Third, there is a lack of adequate studies on the development of China’s e-commerce landscape. While using China’s e-commerce development index data at the provincial level, this paper sets up a panel data regression model and performs in-depth analysis of the impact of e-commerce development on China’s energy consumption.

Uptake of hepatitis B antiviral treatment: A panel data analysis of 31 provinces in China (2013-2020).

China has made substantial efforts aimed to promote the uptake of antiviral treatment of hepatitis B (HB). It is unclear whether these policies achieved the desired impact. This study adopted medicines procurement data from 31 provinces to generate the first evidence about the number of standard antiviral treatment of HB overtime at both national and provincial levels in China. We performed the panel data analyses and quasi-experimental design with the time-varying difference-in-difference method combined with the event study approach to estimate the uptake of HB antiviral treatment before and after national policy changes. The overall trends in HB antiviral treatment at the national level increased incrementally during 2013-2020. There was 2.8862 million 12-month (person-year) antiviral standard treatment in 2020, which was only 8.93% of the eligible people estimated to need treatment. The number of monthly antiviral standard treatment increased by 42.4% (p=.001) overall following the nationwide adoption of the '4 + 7' pilot-pooled procurement prices in 2019, which brought substantial price reduction of core antivirals. A low treatment rate is a critical issue in reaching the elimination of viral hepatitis as a public health threat in China. Affordability is an important but not the only factor that determines the uptake of hepatitis treatment. Further scaling up and acceleration of treatment uptake will need strategies improving public awareness of HB, strengthening diagnosis, linking people who are infected to chronic care, reducing loss to follow-up, and ensuring people who are eligible get timely treatment.

Attention Should Be Paid to Adolescent Girl Anemia in China: Based on China Nutrition and Health Surveillance (2015-2017).

Adolescent girls are in the key stages of rapid physical and psychological development and have a great demand for iron. Anemia affects adolescent girls’ health, future development, and even the health of their offspring. There has been limited study of adolescent girl anemia at the national and provincial levels in China. We investigated the anemia status of adolescent girls in China based on data from the China Nutrition and Health Surveillance (CNHS, 2015–2017). The anemia prevalence in Chinese adolescent girls aged 10–17 years is 8.5%, with mild anemia and moderate anemia accounting for 65.9 and 31.8%, respectively, and severe anemia accounting for only 2.3%. Significant urban–rural disparities and regional disparities were found in adolescent girl anemia. The anemia prevalence in adolescent girls varied from 3 to 13.4% in different provinces, and 90% of the provinces had anemia prevalence higher than 5%. Having started menstruating (OR = 2.58, p < 0.01) and living in rural areas (OR = 1.18, p < 0.05) were risk factors for anemia; having a mother with higher education was a protective factor (OR = 0.87, p < 0.05). As for food intake, consuming meat ≥35 g per day was a protective factor (OR = 0.90, p < 0.05). Consuming vegetables ≥3 times per day was also a protective factor (OR = 0.72, p < 0.01), while consuming vegetables ≥400 g per day was a risk factor (OR = 1.24, p < 0.01). Special attention should be paid to adolescent girls, especially to those already having started menstruating, living in rural areas, to those whose mother has a low education level, and to those with a relatively unbalanced diet. Comprehensive measures, including paying special attention to vulnerable areas and vulnerable subgroups of adolescent girls, would reduce the risk of anemia.

The Impact of the Income Gap on Carbon Emissions: Evidence from China

The income gap and global warming have always been topics of common concern to scholars worldwide. Internationally, there is no consensus yet about the impact of the income gap on carbon emissions, and there are few studies about that in China. To explore the effect of the income gap on carbon emissions at the provincial level in China, this paper first theoretically and qualitatively analyzes the non-linear impact of the income gap on carbon emissions. Then, the Gini coefficient of the resident income of different regions in China from 2010 to 2019 is calculated. Finally, a threshold regression model is used to quantitatively test the existence of a threshold effect between the income gap and carbon emission intensity in China. The threshold value is the per capita disposable income of residents. The results show that the income gap is positively related to carbon emission intensity in poor regions. In high-income areas, the widening income gap inhibits the increase in carbon emission intensity. Based on this, this paper proposes policy recommendations to narrow the income gap and reduce the intensity of carbon emissions.

Energy-Saving Effect of Regional Development Strategy in Western China

Improving energy utilisation efficiency is imperative to ensuring economic growth and achieving sustainable development. China’s Western Development Strategy (WDS) is a major driver to accelerate the economic development of Western China. It stresses the rational control of energy consumption through the vigorous development of a circular economy to achieve the goal of energy conservation. Based on the measurement of energy utilisation efficiency at the provincial level in China, this study evaluates the impact of the WDS on energy utilisation efficiency through a synthetic control method. Then, the internal impact mechanism of the WDS on energy utilisation efficiency is investigated. In addition, this paper tests the heterogeneous effects of the WDS on energy utilisation efficiency from the perspective of the regional scale, resource endowment, performance appraisal, and institutional quality. It is found that the WDS improves energy utilisation efficiency not only through direct effects but also indirectly by accelerating the spatial agglomeration of advantage industries in Western China, which enhanced technological innovation capacity, optimised industrial structure, and improved the human capital level to ameliorate energy utilisation efficiency. Further analysis proves that the energy-saving effect of the WDS is significant in provinces with a small regional scale, less abundant resources, higher levels of the performance appraisal index and quality system. Accordingly, some targeted policy suggestions are made for the government herein.

The Impact of Urbanization on the Delivery of Public Service–Related SDGs in China

China's rapid urbanization has driven economic development and social progress. As the populations of cities and towns have increased during urbanization, demand for public services has risen. Based on the Sustainable Development Goals system of the United Nations 2030 Agenda (UN-SDGs), this study establishes an index system for evaluating progress toward the SDGs related to the supply of public services in the context of China's rapid urbanization. In total, 24 indicators closely related to SDG3, SDG4, SDG6, SDG7, SDG8, SDG9, and SDG11 were selected to represent the four dimensions of education, employment, public health, and infrastructure in public services and calculate a public service–related SDGs index (SDPS). Urbanization was also quantified for land use, population, and the economy. The spatiotemporal changes in urbanization and public service–related SDGs at the provincial level in China from 2000 to 2015 were analyzed. The impact of urbanization on the SDPS was also analyzed by combining geographically weighted regression and multi-scale geographically weighted regression. We found the following results. (1) From 2000 to 2015, the eastern region of China had a high level of urbanization but its speed was relatively slow; the central and western regions underwent faster urbanization but had lower levels of urbanization by 2015. (2) The average SDPS increased from 0.580 to 0.649 over 2000–2015, and the level of public service provision in the eastern and central regions was higher than in the western regions. (3) Land urbanization significantly and positively affected progress toward provincial public service–related SDGs in China, more than did population or economic urbanization. The results provide direction for the government in progressing public service–related SDGs through planning and financial means.

Assessing climate risk related to precipitation on cultural heritage at the provincial level in China

Variation in the physical and chemical environment driven by climate change poses severe threats to the world cultural heritage. Assessing climate risk of cultural heritage is significant to their protection, especially for countries such as China which has a long history and a large amount of cultural heritage. In the study, we employ the risk assessment framework proposed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to assess quantitatively the long-term precipitation-related climate risk of cultural heritage at the provincial level in China. The cultural heritage is divided into 5 categories based on material and cultural characteristics: ancient culture sites, ancient tombs, ancient architectural structures, cave temples and stone carvings, and the modern and contemporary historic sites; and the future climate is projected to 2099 under the RCP-4.5 scenario. The results show that the risk of 5 categories of heritage varies considerably. The overall risk of the ancient culture sites and ancient tombs is significantly higher than that of the other 3 categories of heritage due to the vulnerable materials and old age. Spatially, the central regions of China face the highest overall climate risk due to the high hazard and exposure, followed by the eastern regions and the western regions. There are small regional differences in the risk of the ancient tombs while significant regional differences in the risk of the ancient architectural structures. To mitigate the climate risk of cultural heritage, the study highlights the key regions and the corresponding categories of heritage as well as strategies for prioritizing cultural heritage protection.

How Does Public Health Investment Affect Subjective Well-Being? Empirical Evidence from China.

Maximizing or improving residents’ subjective well-being is one of the basic purposes of public expenditure. As an important component of public expenditure, the impact of public health investment on residents’ subjective well-being receives considerable attention. Regarding the empirical evidence, this paper measures residents’ subjective well-being from the perspectives of overall cognitive happiness, life satisfaction, positive emotions and negative emotions, on the basis of a multi-level structural model of subjective well-being. Factor analysis is used to estimate the subjective well-being of residents at the province level in China, based on the China Family Panel Studies of 2018. In addition, structural equation modeling is employed to explore the impact of public health investment and its regional disparity on the subjective well-being of residents. The empirical results show that public health investment has a significant positive effect on residents’ subjective well-being. Moreover, there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between the regional disparity of public health investment and residents’ subjective well-being. Further study illustrates that the effects of public health investment and its regional disparity on residents’ subjective well-being are heterogeneous by group. Public health investment has a greater impact on the well-being of low- and middle-income, eastern and urban residents than high-income, midwest and rural residents.

Human papillomavirus vaccination at the national and provincial levels in China: a cost-effectiveness analysis using the PRIME model

BackgroundHuman papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines have been proven effective against cervical cancer. However, HPV vaccination is not included in the Chinese immunization program. This study aimed to assess the cost-effectiveness of incorporating different HPV vaccines into immunization programs at the Chinese national and provincial levels.MethodsThe Papillomavirus Rapid Interface for Modeling and Economics model was used to estimate the possible cost and social and economic benefits of adopting various HPV vaccination immunization strategies in 31 provinces in Mainland China in 2019. Demographic and regional economic data were obtained from the national and provincial Statistical Yearbook. The cost of vaccines was gathered from the centralized procurement information platform of all Chinese provinces. Treatment costs, epidemiological data, and other model parameters were obtained from published literature. The cost of vaccination, treatment costs saved, net costs, cases and deaths averted, life years saved, disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) prevented, and incremental cost-effectiveness ratios were predicted both provincially and nationally. Deterministic sensitivity analyses were used to explore model uncertainty.ResultsThe net cost of vaccinating with the domestic bivalent HPV vaccine was the lowest. At the national level, after bivalent or quadrivalent HPV vaccination, the number of cases and deaths averted due to cervical cancer were 12,545 and 5109, respectively, whereas the 9-valent HPV vaccine averted 28,140 cases and 11,459 deaths. HPV vaccines were cost-effective at a national level (maximum cost US$ 18,165 per DALY gained.) compared to the 3 times GDP per capita (US$ 30,837). Bivalent HPV vaccines were cost-effective in all 31 provinces. Imported quadrivalent and 9-valent HPV vaccines were cost-effective in 29 provinces, except Heilongjiang and Gansu. The univariate sensitivity analysis showed that the results were robust when the model parameters were changed, and that the discount rate was the main factor affecting the baseline results.ConclusionsThis study provides evidence that the inclusion of HPV vaccination in the immunization program would be cost-effective at a national level and in most provinces. Provinces with a higher population have more prevented cases, deaths, and DALYs. The economics of HPV vaccination at the provincial level differs from that at the national level, and provinces with an inability to pay should seek help from state subsidies.

Spatial variations and social determinants of life expectancy in China, 2005–2020: A population-based spatial panel modelling study

SummaryBackgroundSocial determinants of health (SDOH) produce a broad range of life expectancy (LE) disparities. In China, limited literatures were found to report association between SDOH and LE at ecological level during a consecutive period of time from the spatial perspectives. This study aimed to determine the existence, quantify the magnitude, and interpret the association between SDOH and LE in China.MethodsProvincial-level LE were estimated from mortality records during 2005–2020 from National Mortality Surveillance System in China. A spatial panel Durbin model was used to investigate LE associated SDOH proxies. Spatial spillover effects were introduced to interpret direct and indirect effects caused by SDOH during long-term and short-term period on LE disparities.FindingsNationwide, LE increased from 73.1 (95% confidence interval (CI): 71.3, 74.4) years to 77.7 (95%CI: 76.5, 78.7) years from 2005 to 2020. Unequally spatial distribution of LE with High-High clustering in coastal areas and Low-Low clustering in western regions were observed. Locally, it was estimated that SDOH proxies statistically significant related to an increase of LE, including GDP (coefficient: 0.02, 95%CI: 0.00, 0.03), Gini index (coefficient: 2.35, 95%CI: 1.82, 2.88), number of beds in health care institutions (coefficient: 0.02, 95%CI: 0.00, 0.05) and natural growth rate of resident population (coefficient: 0.02, 95%CI: 0.01, 0.02). Direct and indirect effects decomposition during long-term and short-term of LE associated SDOH proxies demonstrated that GDP, urbanization rate, unemployment rate, education attainment, Gini index, number of beds in health care institutions, sex ratio, gross dependence ratio and natural growth rate of resident population not only affected local LE, but also exerted spatial spillover effects towards geographical neighbors.InterpretationSpatial variations of LE existed at provincial-level in China. SDOH regarding socioeconomic development and equity, healthcare resources, as well as population characteristics not only affected LE disparities at local scale but also among nearby provinces. Externalities of policy of those SDOH proxies should be took into consideration to promote health equity nationally. Comprehensive approaches on the basis of population strategy should be consolidated to optimize supportive socioeconomic environment and narrow the regional gap to reduce health disparities and increase LE.FundingNational Key Research & Development Program of China (Grant No.2018YFC1315301); Ministry of Education of China Humanities and Social Science General Program (Grant No.18YJC790138).

Mitigation of agricultural NH3 emissions reduces PM2.5 pollution in China: A finer scale analysis

Ammonia (NH3) emissions have been linked to the formation of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in the air, and PM2.5 pollution has been shown to damage environment quality and public health on a global scale. Current management practices can reduce NH3 emissions significantly. However, reduction effects of these measures are only considered for specific source or chain. Potentials of NH3 emissions reduction from the whole agricultural systems by integrating current management measures and how agricultural NH3 emissions affect PM2.5 pollution by these integrated measures at the provincial level in China is poorly quantified. Thus, we calculated the potential to mitigate NH3 emissions under different integrated reduction measures and assessed the mitigation effect on PM2.5 pollution at the provincial level in China. Furthermore, costs for agricultural NH3 emission abatement and health benefits from reducing PM2.5 pollution by agricultural NH3 control were evaluated. We found that total agricultural NH3 emissions in China was 12.5 Tg N in 2017, which can be reduced by 74% if highly effective reduction techniques are integrated applying, with the potential to reduce PM2.5 pollution from 43 to 28 μg m−3. The cost to implement the mitigation scenarios ranged from 57 to 999 billion ¥, while the health benefits from PM2.5 pollution control increased from 1471 to 1768 billion ¥ when NH3 emissions were reduced from 47 to 74%. The benefit-to-cost ratio was much higher in provinces/cities with highly developed economies and a high population density than those with less developed economies.

Bundling regions for promoting Sustainable Development Goals

The needs and capacities to achieve the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) differ across regions and nations, but little research has been done to investigate their similarities and differences. Here, we proposed using SDG bundles (i.e. groups of regions with similar performances on all individual SDGs) to classify regions when assessing SDG progress and applied the method at the provincial level in China from 2000 to 2015. Five SDG bundles with distinct characteristics were identified. The dominant bundles changed from ‘poor performance for all SDGs’ in 2000 to ‘high scores for environmental and some social SDGs and intermediate scores for others’ and ‘low scores for environmental SDGs but high scores for others’ in 2015, indicating the overall improvement of China’s sustainable development level. However, no bundle had relatively high scores in all SDGs, implying that China has much work left to do. Changes in the SDG bundles across space and time were related to regional socioeconomic development, climate, and geographic conditions. This study sheds light on identifying regions’ strengths and weaknesses in achieving all SDGs, which can inform targeted sustainability actions for regions within certain SDG bundles and promote collaborations among regions with different bundles.

How Strategic Interaction of Innovation Policies between China’s Regional Governments Affects Wind Energy Innovation

Prior research has shown the importance of innovation policies that promote innovation in renewable energy, such as wind power. We study the impact of the strategic interaction of innovation policies between regional governments in terms of wind energy innovation in China. Based on panel data from 2007 to 2018 on a provincial level in China, we construct an innovation strength index of each province in the wind power industry and investigate the inductive effect of the technology-push policy and the demand-pull policy, as well as their spatial spillover effect on wind energy innovation. The results show that the technology-push policy of local governments has an obvious inductive effect on wind energy innovation in the region, while also having a negative spillover effect through R&amp;D factor competitions between regions with geography proximity or with proximity in the ranking of R&amp;D funds input. In terms of the demand-pull policy, only changes at the national level can produce positive spillover effects by promoting expectations of market growth. Yet, competition between regions with proximity in the ranking of wind energy resource reserves produce negative spillover effects. The findings should have a far-reaching impact on the sustainable development of global wind power.