Provincial Economic Growth And Regional Harmonious Development In Transition Period Of China

Since the reform and opening-up, gap of the economic growth of different provinces of China becomes wider and wider as a result of carrying out the gradient-development stratagy. The gap is also remarkable in different provinces of the same region. Provincial economic growth model is built based on the new classical and Harrod-Domar's growth model. Some conclusions about provincial economic growth are given through positive analysis of the model. The divergence of balanced growth path results in the divergence of provincial regional economy. Educational input, economy institutional reform and economy structure adjustment are the main approach to the convergence of provincial economy. The scale-up of the gap between urban area and rural area is also a representation of the divergence that mentioned above. The growth of provincial economy has a relatively high conditional convergent speed.The main factors that influence the discrepancy of provincial economy include element discrepancy, institutional and policy discrepancy. Since our country has a large territory, there are distinctions in capital, population, technology, resource endowment and geographic position in different provinces. Especially, the technology advancement contributes a lot to littoral provinces in east of China. The level of marketization, industrialization, urbanization, opening up and industrial structure are also greatly diverse. The difference of political support is also an important factor that causes the discrepancy of the growth rate of provinces. The influence of different factor differs a lot in the developing area and developed area. To have a higher growth speed, the developing area ought to quicken the course of marketization, industrialization, opening up and urbanization. The harmonious development among provinces must be based on the adjustment of industrial structure, taking market mechanism as dominant and making enterprises the main body of this course.Capital is the main impetus to regional economic growth. Change in the capital stock is one of the key factors which cause the regional growth and discrepancy. Capital stock, capital structure and capital flow have a remarkable influence to regional discrepancy. Population is another key factor, which influences the economic growth in two aspects. One aspect is consumption and the other is production. The growth of population, population quality, employment and population immigration also influence the provincial discrepancy. The distribution of science and technology resource in our country is greatly unbalanced. East provinces have obvious much more advantages in synthetical science &technology development index than central and west provinces. The discrepancy of resource endowment restricts the style and efficiency in different region and influences the division and interest distribution among them.Under the situation of transition economy, provincial growth discrepancy, which is determined by the difference on endogenous factor composing among provinces, is getting bigger under the influence of exogenous institutional variable. So, it is necessary and also important for us to study the key factor that determines the discrepancy of provincial growth.Some conclusions can be given after positive analysis. From late 1970s to late 1980s, the absolute discrepancy and relative discrepancy of China's regional economy change in opposite direction. The absolute discrepancy increased while the relative discrepancy has a contrary tendency. There are two remarkable degressive courses in relative discrepancy in early and late 1980s. In early 1980s, there existed a slight degressive course in absolute discrepancy. In late 1980s, the expanding speed of discrepancy was sharply decreased. Since 90s, both absolute and relative discrepancy had an accelerated expanding trend, moreover, absolute discrepancy expanded faster than relative discrepancy.Absolute discrepancy of China's regional economy expanded continuously during the period from 1978 to 1990. After 1990s, some developed province such as Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, Liaoning and Heilongjiang, along with some fast developing provinces like Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong and Fujian got a wider gap with other provinces, especially with some central and west province, such as Guizhou, Yunnan, Sichuan, Gansu, Ningxia, Shanxi, Anhui, Jiangxi and Hunan. The absolute discrepancy among Zhejiang, Guangdong, Shandong, Fujian and Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, Liaoning, Heilongjiang, Jiangsu is shrinking. However, this kind of discrepancy has the opposite tendency among other provinces. In 1980s, five provinces including Shanxi, Hubei, Jilin, Xizang, and Xinjiang were getting less discrepancy with the 10 provinces mentioned above. However, this tendency got reversed after 1980s.To reduce the provincial discrepancy, the harmonization of provincial economy development is of great significance. We need to make good use of governmental force, optimize the provincial industrial structure and promote the development of provincial industries; strengthen the collaboration between central government and local government. That building a uniform national market is also necessary for harmonious development. More importantly, accelerating the stratagem of west exploration, revitalizing the old industrial base of the northeast, quickening the prosperity of the Central Region are three key ways to reduce provincial discrepancy.