The Digital Transformation of the Manufacturing Industry, the Double-Factor Allocation Efficiency of the Manufacturing Industry, and Carbon Emissions: Evidence from China

Bochao Zhang, Wanhao Dong () and Jin Yao
Additional contact information
Bochao Zhang: Institute of Economics, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, Shanghai 200020, China
Wanhao Dong: School of Public Finance and Administration, Shanghai Lixin University of Accounting and Finance, Shanghai 201620, China
Jin Yao: Institute of Economics, Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, Shanghai 200020, China

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 14, 1-26

Abstract: Digitization and green low-carbon are the main directions of China’s economic development in the future. This paper aims to explore the relationship between improvements in the digital level of manufacturing industry segments and carbon emissions. It is found that the digitization level of China’s manufacturing industry segments is still at a low level, which needs to be further improved, and the digitization level of technology-intensive industries is higher than that of capital-intensive and labor-intensive industries. There is a serious misallocation of production factors and R&D factors among manufacturing industries, which is mainly caused by capital factors. Improvement in the digital level of manufacturing industry segmentation can significantly improve the double-layer factor allocation efficiency of the manufacturing industry, and can synchronously realize carbon emissions reduction through improvements in the double-layer factor allocation efficiency of the manufacturing industry; in other words, the improvement in the digital level of China’s manufacturing industry has the dual effects of improving factor allocation efficiency and carbon emissions reduction. Further analysis shows that this effect has significant heterogeneity of ownership. Therefore, China should focus on accelerating the digital transformation of the manufacturing industry, improve the allocation efficiency of traditional and R&D factors in the manufacturing industry through this digital transformation, and accelerate the realization of green and low-carbon development.

Keywords: digital economy; digitalization of the manufacturing industry; R&D factors; factor allocation efficiency; carbon emissions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/14/6564/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/14/6564/ (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:jsusta:v:17:y:2025:i:14:p:6564-:d:1704587

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

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