| The promotion of reform and opening-up development strategy has created the"miracle of China’s economic growth" that shocked the world,and the history of world economic development has also repeatedly proved that "opening-up" is the road to a country’s prosperity.The report of the 18th Party Congress emphasizes the need to "comprehensively improve the level of open economy" and "we must implement a more proactive open strategy and improve an open economic system that is mutually beneficial,diversified and balanced,safe and efficient".It can be seen that openness has become an important thrust for China’s economic development at this stage.However,the unbalanced development strategy implemented at the early stage of reform and opening up has led to the uneven degree of openness among regions,which to a certain extent has aggravated the phenomenon of unbalanced regional development.At the same time,the transformation of the world economic and political landscape and the changes in China’s economic situation have gradually"blunted" the advantages of this open mode,and problems such as weak economic growth momentum have gradually emerged.In order to break the economic development dilemma,the central government proposed the development strategy of Yangtze River Economic Belt,deploying the Yangtze River Economic Belt to become a coordinated development belt with interaction and cooperation between East and West,and an open belt for internal and external development along the coast and rivers.With the deepening of the all-round opening pattern of Yangtze River Economic Belt,the scale of foreign direct investment introduced into Yangtze River Economic Belt is also gradually increasing,and the connection between it and the economy is getting closer.Then,under the new opening pattern,how to unify the introduction of foreign investment with regional economic growth as well as regional coordinated development and give full play to the economic growth effect of foreign direct investment is of great significance to promote the transformation of China’s open economy and promote regional coordinated development.In this paper,we study the economic growth effects of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta Economic Belt,which includes:firstly,a theoretical analysis framework of the spatial effects of FDI on regional economic growth is built based on inductive and deductive analysis;secondly,a mathematical model of the spatial effects of FDI on regional economic growth is built based on the extension of Hoyt’s model;and thirdly,a mathematical model of the spatial effects of FDI on regional economic growth is built based on the extension of Hoyt’s model.Secondly,the development patterns and regional differences between FDI and economic growth in the Yangtze River Economic Belt are investigated;thirdly,a spatial panel data model of the economic growth effect of FDI in the Yangtze River Economic Belt is established,and the overall and temporal heterogeneity of the model is investigated.Fourthly,an intermediary effect model and a spatial panel joint cubic equation model are established to empirically test the influence of FDI on the urbanization and industrial structure upgrading of the economic growth of the Yangtze River Economic Belt,and to conduct a comparative analysis based on the heterogeneity of the three major city clusters of the Yangtze River Economic Belt.The main findings of this paper are as follows.(1)The total foreign direct investment in Yangtze River Economic Zone shows a stable growth trend during the period under examination,but the growth rate is slowing down,and there are differences in the distribution characteristics.With China’s increasing openness to the outside world,the business environment continues to be optimized,and the attractiveness of foreign investment increases,the total foreign direct investment in the Yangtze River Economic Zone still shows a growing trend against the background of a significant decline in global direct investment.However,the regional distribution,industry distribution and source distribution of foreign direct investment in Yangtze River Economic Zone are uneven.First,the distribution in provincial cities is higher than that in general prefecture-level cities,the distribution in coastal provinces and downstream areas is higher than that in inland provinces and upstream and middle areas,and the distribution in Yangtze River Delta city cluster is higher than that in Yangtze River midstream city cluster and Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster,but the phenomenon of uneven utilization of foreign investment is gradually improving.Secondly,the distribution of sources and industries of foreign direct investment in Yangtze River Economic Zone also has uneven distribution,mainly from Asian regions and concentrated in manufacturing industries.(2)The direct effect of FDI on regional economic growth is significantly positive,while the spatial spillover effect of FDI on regional economic growth is significantly negative,and the proposed strategy of Yangtze River Economic Belt is conducive to promoting regional economic growth.The competition of local governments in attracting investment will amplify the competitiveness of spatial interaction among cities,which directly leads to the "siphoning" effect of cities with better operating environment on neighboring cities and restricts the economic growth of neighboring cities.However,over time,this spatial spillover effect gradually changes from negative to positive spillover,i.e.,FDI forms a positive spatial interaction between cities and gradually plays a role in promoting the coordinated development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt region.From the heterogeneity of the three major city clusters in the Yangtze River Economic Belt,the direct effect of FDI on economic growth in the three major city clusters is significantly positive,but the strength of the effect shows a decreasing trend of the Yangtze River Delta city cluster,the middle reaches of Yangtze River city cluster,and the Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster in that order.The results of spatial effect show that the spatial spillover effect of foreign direct investment on economic growth in Yangtze River Delta city cluster is significantly negative,the spatial spillover effect of foreign direct investment on economic growth in middle reaches of Yangtze River city cluster is not significant,and the spatial effect of foreign direct investment on economic growth in Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster is significantly positive.(3)Urbanization is an important transmission path of FDI to regional economic growth.The intermediate effect model regression results show that the intermediate effect of urbanization is 0.0178,and the proportion of urbanization intermediate effect to the total effect of FDI on economic growth is 28.30%.The results of the spatial panel joint cubic equation model regression show that FDI in the Yangtze River Economic Belt can contribute to regional economic growth by increasing the level of urbanization.The spatial effect shows that the economic growth and urbanization in the region will be significantly and positively influenced by the economic growth and urbanization in other regions.The heterogeneity analysis of the three major city clusters of the Yangtze River Economic Belt shows that the urbanization mediating effect of the Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster and the city cluster in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River is 0.0130 and 0.0104,respectively,while the urbanization mechanism of the Yangtze River Delta city cluster is insignificant when the spatial factor is not taken into account.After incorporating spatial factors,the urbanization mechanism of FDI in Chengdu-Chongqing city clusteris the most prominent,but the urbanization mechanism of Yangtze River Delta city clusteris and middle Yangtze River city clusteris is not obvious;in terms of spatial effect,the urbanization of Yangtze River Delta city cluster,city cluster in the middle reaches of Yangtze River Delta and Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster all show significant positive spatial spillover effect.(4)The upgrading of industrial structure is also an important channel for FDI to act on regional economic growth.The results of the intermediate effect model regression show that the intermediate effect of industrial structure upgrading of FDI in the Yangtze River Economic Belt on economic growth is 0.0238,and the intermediate effect of industrial structure upgrading accounts for 35.22%of the total effect of FDI on economic growth.The results of the spatial panel joint cubic equation model regression indicate that FDI in the Yangtze River Economic Belt can act on regional economic growth by promoting the upgrading of industrial structure.The spatial effect shows that the economic growth and industrial structure upgrading in the region will be significantly and positively influenced by the economic growth and industrial structure upgrading in other regions.The heterogeneity analysis of the three major city clusters in the Yangtze River Delta Economic Belt shows that,when the spatial factors are not considered,the mediating effects of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta city cluster and Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster on economic growth and industrial structure upgrading are 0.0475 and 0.0185 respectively,while the mediating effects of industrial structure upgrading in the city cluster in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River are insignificant.After incorporating spatial factors,the most prominent effect of FDI in the Yangtze River Delta city clusterr on the industrial structure upgrading mechanism of economic growth is 0.0475,0.0185,followed by Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster,while the effect of industrial structure upgrading in the city cluster in the middle reaches of Yangtze River is not significant.In terms of spatial effects,the industrial structure upgrading of the Yangtze River Delta city cluster,the city cluster in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and the Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster all show significant positive spatial spillover effects.This paper examines the economic growth effect of FDI in the Yangtze River Economic Belt and tests the two transmission mechanisms of urbanization and industrial structure upgrading,which are the effects of FDI on regional economic growth,through a combination of theory and empirical evidence.Compared to the results of the existing literature,the following possible innovations exist in this paper.Firstly,the paper constructs a Hoyt expansion model of the spatial effects of FDI on regional economic growth,and explains the spatial effects of FDI on the economic growth of the Yangtze River Economic Belt in terms of spatial competition effect,spatial correlation effect,institutional spillover effect and polarization diffusion effect.Most of the existing literature focuses on the theoretical analysis of the direct impact of FDI on economic growth,but seldom considers the spatial effect of FDI on economic growth from the theoretical level.Therefore,the theoretical analysis framework of the spatial effects of FDI on economic growth in this paper expands the theoretical analysis system of FDI research to a certain extent.Secondly,the paper establishes a spatial panel Durbin model to empirically examine the direct and spatial effects of FDI on economic growth in the Yangtze River Economic Belt,and also to examine the time heterogeneity before and after the formulation of the Yangtze River Economic Belt strategy.Most of the existing studies investigating the economic growth effect of FDI are based on the general panel data model,and the spatial panel Durbin model is a useful supplement to the few current studies.The empirical results of the paper find that the spatial effect of FDI on economic growth in the Yangtze River economic belt is significantly negative,and the proposed strategy of the Yangtze River economic belt will help alleviate the competition among cities for attracting investment and guide the spatial effect of FDI on regional economic growth from negative to positive spillovers.This paper further enriches the existing research findings and validates the effectiveness of the proposed Yangtze River economic belt strategy.Thirdly,the paper explores the transmission paths of FDI to regional economic growth in terms of urbanization and industrial structure upgrading.This paper analyzes the urbanization and industrial structure upgrading influence mechanisms of FDI on regional economic growth from both theoretical and empirical perspectives based on the unique geographical units of the Yangtze River Economic Belt,and finds that urbanization and industrial structure upgrading are the most important factors for the impact of FDI on the economic growth of the Yangtze River Economic Belt.It is also an important path for FDI in the Yangtze River Economic Belt.This study expands the influence mechanism of FDI on regional economic growth and provides a basis for the formulation of relevant policies in the Yangtze River Delta Economic Belt.Fourthly,the paper examines the heterogeneity of the impact of FDI on economic growth and its influence mechanism based on the Yangtze River Delta city cluster,city cluster in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster.It is found that the differences between the three major city clusters are relatively obvious.The spatial effect of FDI on regional economic growth is significantly negative in the Yangtze River Delta city cluster,positive in the Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster,and insignificant in the city cluster in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River.The influence mechanism of industrial structure upgrading is most obvious in the Yangtze River Delta city cluster,while the influence mechanism of urbanization is most obvious in the Chengdu-Chongqing city cluster.The research in this paper provides more direct and clear evidence to support the exploration of feasible paths for the Yangtze River Economic Belt to take city clusters as the main body,enhance the spatial connection between cities through the implementation of differentiated investment attraction strategies,and promote regional collaborative development. |
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