Transport Infrastructure, Spatial Clusters and Regional Economic Growth in China

Nannan Yu, Martin De Jong, Servaas Storm and Jianing Mi

Transport Reviews, 2011, vol. 32, issue 1, 3-28

Abstract: China's transport infrastructure distribution and its economic activities have largely the same pattern of spatial clusters. This paper aims to determine whether causal linkages exist between transport infrastructure investment and economic growth in China at national and regional levels. We examine causality in a panel cointegration and a Granger causality framework using time series data throughout the 1978--2008 period. The empirical findings show that in the long run, at the national level, there is unidirectional Granger causality from economic growth to transport infrastructure; at the regional level, there exists bidirectional causality in the affluent eastern region while the low-income central and western regions exhibit unidirectional Granger causality from economic growth to transport infrastructure. These results imply that an improvement in transport infrastructure alone is not sufficient for stimulating economic growth in the underdeveloped areas of China. To better realize the economic benefits brought by transport infrastructure, the Chinese government should pay serious attention to the development of complementary factors in the central and western provinces.

Date: 2011
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01441647.2011.603104 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:taf:transr:v:32:y:2011:i:1:p:3-28

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/TTRV20

DOI: 10.1080/01441647.2011.603104

Access Statistics for this article

Transport Reviews is currently edited by Professor David Banister and Moshe Givoni

More articles in Transport Reviews from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().