Deciphering the Manufacturing Production Space in Global City-Regions of Developing Countries—a Case of Pearl River Delta, China

In the context of economic globalization, the manufacturing production space in the global city-regions of developing countries have presented significant spatial characteristics, attracting attention to the problems of intensive and sustainable development of production space. Taking global city-region in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) as an example, manufacturing production space based on remote sensing (RS) technology and point of interest (POI) data extraction was more precise and continuous, which had more advantages for further analysis of spatial characteristics and influencing factors in multi-scale, and precise policy recommendations. The results show that: (1) under different scales, the distribution characteristics of manufacturing production space and the agglomeration characteristics of spatial form are different. It is not simply extensive agglomeration or diffusion that can accurately explain its diversified spatial characteristics. Meanwhile, for the local manufacturing production space optimization control, the local government should apply advanced experience according to local conditions instead of simply and roughly promotion or containment. (2) Influencing factors show a strong positive correlation with the urbanization rate, the number of foreign direct investment (FDI) enterprises and gross industrial production, and which shows a weak negative correlation with fixed asset investment and the employment population. In conclusion, the spatial characteristics of manufacturing production space in global city-regions in developing countries is significantly different from that in Western countries, and its influencing factors have similarities and differences. Therefore, when conducting multi-scale space optimization and sustainable regulation, the government should consider more about the actual multi-scale spatial characteristics of manufacturing production space and its influencing factors instead of copy the Western experience.

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Green development of China’s Pan-Pearl River Delta mega-urban agglomeration

Scientific Reports ◽

10.1038/s41598-021-95312-z ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Tao Liu ◽

Yue Li

Keyword(s):

Developing Countries ◽

Influencing Factors ◽

Pearl River Delta ◽

Technological Progress ◽

River Delta ◽

Urban Agglomeration ◽

Pearl River ◽

Efficiency Change ◽

Urban Agglomerations ◽

Green Development

AbstractMega-urban agglomerations in developing countries have been main parts of economic development. But at the same time, they have become the most prominent and sensitive areas of resource and environment problems. It is important to clarify the mechanism and driving factors of green growth in mega-urban agglomerations. Based on the panel data of 28 major cities in China's Pan-Pearl River Delta urban agglomeration from 2006 to 2015, this paper evaluates the level of green development of urban agglomeration by green total factor productivity index (GTFP) based on Global Malmquist DEA model, and decomposes GTFP into technological progress, pure technical efficiency change, scale efficiency change and technological scale change. On this basis, this paper constructs a panel econometric model to analyze the influencing factors of GTFP and its decomposition factors. The results show that GTFP of Pan-Pearl River Delta urban agglomeration is growing, and the scale effect caused by technological progress is the main driving factor. Green development in the Pearl River Delta urban agglomeration takes into account efficiency and regional fairness, which causes differences in GTFP growth patterns of sub-urban agglomerations within mega-urban agglomerations. The technological progress and technical efficiency improvement are becoming the main driving force of GTFP growth in relatively backward areas. Furthermore, according to the influencing factors of GTFP and its decomposition factors, mega-urban agglomeration should eliminate internal administrative barriers to build an integrated market. It should also increase the proportion of technology industries in core cities, and give full play to the role of technology spillover effect on surrounding cities. In addition, improving the efficiency of resource and energy utilization is also helpful to promote the transformation of urban agglomeration development from factor-driven to efficiency-driven and innovation-driven. Our research results have implications for the coordinated development of economy and environment in developing countries.

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