Can Functional Industrial Policy Promote Digital–Green Synergy Development?

Xiekui Zhang, Zhusheng Wu and Zefeng Zhang ()
Additional contact information
Xiekui Zhang: China-ASEAN School of Economics & School of Economics & China-ASEAN Institute of Financial Cooperation, Guangxi University, Nanning 530004, China
Zhusheng Wu: China-ASEAN School of Economics & School of Economics & China-ASEAN Institute of Financial Cooperation, Guangxi University, Nanning 530004, China
Zefeng Zhang: School of Humanities and Public Administration, Baise University, Baise 533000, China

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 16, 1-36

Abstract: Against the backdrop of China’s high-quality development strategy, promoting the synergistic transformation of digitalization and greening in enterprises has become a critical pathway toward achieving sustainable economic and environmental development. This paper takes the MIC2025 as a quasi-natural experiment and constructs a multi-period difference-in-differences (DID) model to evaluate the policy’s impact on the digital–green synergy development (DGSD) of firms, using data from A-share listed companies in China from 2011 to 2022. The empirical results indicate that the implementation of MIC2025 significantly improves DGSD. This conclusion remains robust under a series of tests, including heterogeneous DID specifications, placebo tests, machine learning approaches, and instrumental variable estimation. Further heterogeneity analysis reveals substantial differences in policy effects across regions, city and firm characteristics. A mechanism analysis revealed that the MIC2025 policy effectively enhances corporate DGSD by alleviating financing constraints and incentivizing innovation in digital and green technologies. Additionally, companies in strategic industries exhibit a stronger DGSD growth momentum. This study provides both theoretical support and empirical analysis for understanding how functional industrial policy can promote digital–green synergy, offering valuable insights for policy implications and future research optimization.

Keywords: functional industrial policy; MIC2025; digital–green synergy development; multi-period DID (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/2071-1050/17/16/7233/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/17/16/7233/ (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:16:p:7233-:d:1721572

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 ().