The role of economic land use efficiency in promoting green industrial development: evidence from China

Guoxiang Li (), Zhiyang Shen (), Malin Song () and Michael Vardanyan ()
Additional contact information
Guoxiang Li: Nanjing Normal University
Zhiyang Shen: CNRS, UMR 9221 - LEM - Lille Economie Management
Malin Song: Anhui University of Finance and Economics
Michael Vardanyan: CNRS, UMR 9221 - LEM - Lille Economie Management

Annals of Operations Research, 2025, vol. 347, issue 1, No 5, 87-112

Abstract: Abstract We use a slacks-based directional distance function to propose a framework for estimating economic land use efficiency, assess its spatial and temporal trends, and evaluate the role of more rational use of land resources in promoting faster transition to greener manufacturing. Our empirical illustration is based on a sample of 281 Chinese cities during the period 2009–2018. Our results suggest that economic land use efficiency has followed an upward trajectory despite experiencing minor fluctuations during the time period considered. We show that efficiency levels are significantly higher in China’s eastern and central regions than in the western areas, although the latter appear to be gradually catching up with their more economically developed counterparts. Land resources in China’s central and western regions perform significantly better when socially unintended outputs are taken into account during estimation. We also demonstrate that more rational land use plays a significant role in promoting faster transition to greener industrial structure and that this effect is mediated by the degree of competition intensity in manufacturing. Finally, our analysis suggest that the green development-enhancing impact of higher land use efficiency is stronger in regions with good local governance capacity, relatively large shares of secondary industry, and limited innovation capacity. Our findings offer valuable insights into possible strategies policymakers can use to promote faster the green transformation of the manufacturing industry.

Keywords: Land use efficiency; Industrial structure; Green transformation; Mediation effect (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10479-023-05721-8 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:spr:annopr:v:347:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1007_s10479-023-05721-8

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/journal/10479

DOI: 10.1007/s10479-023-05721-8

Access Statistics for this article

Annals of Operations Research is currently edited by Endre Boros

More articles in Annals of Operations Research from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().