Ecological Welfare Performance Evaluation and Spatial–Temporal Difference Evolution of Blue Economic Zones: A Case Study of the Blue Economic Zone of Shandong Peninsula

Xuhui Cong, Zhipeng Qi, Sai Wang, Peikun Su, Liang Wang (), Jonas Šaparauskas, Jarosław Górecki and Miroslaw J. Skibniewski
Additional contact information
Xuhui Cong: Business School, Shandong University of Technology, Zibo 255049, China
Zhipeng Qi: Business School, Shandong University of Technology, Zibo 255049, China
Sai Wang: Business School, Shandong University of Technology, Zibo 255049, China
Peikun Su: Business School, Shandong University of Technology, Zibo 255049, China
Liang Wang: International Business School, Hainan University, Haikou 570228, China
Jonas Šaparauskas: Department of Construction Management and Real Estate, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, Saulėtekio Al. 11, LT-10223 Vilnius, Lithuania
Jarosław Górecki: Faculty of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Architecture, Bydgoszcz University of Science and Technology, 85-796 Bydgoszcz, Poland
Miroslaw J. Skibniewski: Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA

Land, 2023, vol. 12, issue 10, 1-15

Abstract: The construction and development of the Blue Economic Zone on the Shandong Peninsula in China was elevated to a national strategy in 2011, and it has achieved year-on-year economic growth, driving the economic development of Shandong Province. However, it has also generated problems, such as a fragile ecological environment, unbalanced regional development, and prominent human–land conflicts. Therefore, on the basis of the idea of green sustainable development, this paper measures the ecological welfare performance of seven prefecture-level cities in the Blue Economic Zone of Shandong Peninsula from 2011 to 2020 using an entropy-weighted model together with the TOPSIS method. It then analyzes their spatial distribution characteristics using the natural breaks method. Our findings show that the overall ecological welfare performance level in the Shandong Peninsula BEZ shows a stable upward trend, and that the ecological welfare performance of each city is similar to that of the divided region. The ecological welfare performance levels of Weifang, Rizhao, and Binzhou are relatively low. Dongying, Weihai, Qingdao, and Yantai form a cluster of cities with high ecological welfare performance. Therefore, for the advancement of the Shandong Peninsula BEZ, the government should the government should reasonably deploy the industrial structure; actively implement industrial transformation; strengthen the synergistic development among cities to achieve complementary advantages, coordinating the growth of rural and urban areas; and improve the social security system to achieve high-quality sustainable development in the Shandong Peninsula BEZ.

Keywords: Blue Economic Zone; ecological welfare performance; TOPSIS model; natural breaks method; spatial and temporal variation; entropy-weighted model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/12/10/1886/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2073-445X/12/10/1886/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jlands:v:12:y:2023:i:10:p:1886-:d:1255242

Access Statistics for this article

Land is currently edited by Ms. Carol Ma

More articles in Land from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().