A Comparative Study Of The Provincial Economic Growth In Western China

In September1999, The Fourth Plenary Session of the Fifteenth Party CentralCommittee put forward “carrying out the western development strategy "to promotethe economic development in the western region. Since then, the Central Committeehas repeatedly stressed that we should give priority to carrying out the westerndevelopment strategy over total strategy of regional coordinative development.In fact, the western region in China is indeed an important area which needs to bedeveloped. It is reflected in: The western region is the difficulty and focus of buildinga well-off society in an all-round way; it is the area which has the largest poverty area,the largest number of poor people and the deepest poverty degree; The western regionis an important continue of strategic resources and the potential of social consumermarket is tremendous; the western region is concentrated distribution area of ethnicminorities; the western region is the main source of China’s major rivers and theconcentrated distribution area of forests, grasslands, wetlands and lakes. Therefore,since the implementation of the s western development strategy, systematic analysis oneconomic growth of western region is essential.As we all know, the western development strategy has a tremendous positiveeffect on economic and social development. But since the implementation of thewestern development strategy, there are obvious differences between economicdevelopment of provinces and cities. For example, in1999synthetical index ofeconomic development in Inner Mongolia is No.7, and in2008it rises to No.1; whileYunnan Province from No.1to No.8. Based on this, the comparative study of theprovincial economic growth in China’s western region is beneficial to determine themain influencing factors, and it is helpful to further improve the policy effects ofwestern development strategy, which has important academic and practical value.On the basis of regional economic growth theory and the review of relatedliteratures, this paper does data description and comparative analysis toward the provincial economic development’s differences in western region, concerningimplementation effect of western development strategy, and analyzes possibleinfluencing factors of provincial economic development’s differences to establish themeasurement model and examine the effect of influencing factors, putting forward thepolicy suggestion. The paper is specifically divided into six parts:Introduction: This part mainly includes the background and significance ofselecting the topic, the related literature review, research content and structurearrangement.The first part is review of related basic theory. This part summarizes the existingregional economic growth theory including the description of regional economicgrowth’s power mechanism, regional economic development’s unbalanced theory,regional economic coordinated development and government intervention theory.The second part is the content of western development strategy and the overallsituation of economic development in the western region. This section firstsummarizes the western development strategy and related policy measures. And thenmake use of the GDP, growth rate and per capita GDP to compare the differencesbetween provinces in western region and eastern, central regions from1993,1999,2005,2010four point. Finally, make use of the main data index about westerneconomic and social changes given by the Eleventh-Five and Twelfth-Five-year planto compare with the national level, evaluating western development’s overall effect onwestern region.The third part is the comparative analysis on the provincial economicdevelopment’s differences in the western region. This chapter first illustrates themethod of measuring provincial economic growth’s differences and data selection.Then does statistical analysis on provincial economic development’s differences,including GDP, per capita GDP, the GDP index, the secondary industry to GDP ratio,net exports, and urban residents’ income levels and indicators which reflect economicdevelopment, industrial structure, foreign trade, income of residents. Finally, evaluateswestern development’s effect on differentiation of each region of the western. Thefourth part is the analysis on the influence factors of provincial economic growth inwestern region. This chapter first analyzes the main factors affecting provincialeconomic development’s differences in western region and its mechanism of action. Then the paper describes analysis on constructing panel data model. Finally, analyzesand interprets the empirical results.Conclusions and policy recommendations: This section is to conclude the mainresearch conclusions we get from this article and put forward corresponding policyrecommendations combining with the actual situation of China’s minority areas.Through the above research, this paper gets the following conclusion:After the implementation of the “western development strategy”, the economy inwestern region achieves rapid growth above the national average; railways, highways,water transport and aviation are developing rapidly; ecological environment has beenmarkedly improved. Contrast to the region’s changes of GDP in12western provincesbefore and after the western development strategy, we can find that except the rapidincrease in Inner Mongolia and Shanxi, the economic position of other westernprovinces remained essentially unchanged, but GDP growth rate gradually turned intohigh-speed from the low speed, which means that the western region’s developmenthas already begun, especially in recent5years,, the pursued characteristics in percapita GDP is more apparent, and western region begin to show a trend to narrow thegap with other regions. The western development is a strategy which has an importanteffect on the western region, and it is a very successful regional coordinateddevelopment strategy.The policy measure of western development strategy is one important reason foreconomic growth differences in the various provinces. Data analysis showed that: thereal GDP growth rate of the provinces in the western region exist differences, the gapwas roughly inverted U-shaped. That is:1993-2000narrow stage, the expansion phasein2000-2005,2005-2010, narrow stage. The influence of Western developmentstrategy in the initial period of implementation is not equal, and some provinces is inthe relatively fast growth and some provinces is relatively slow, with the deepening ofpolicy implementation, after2005, the provincial speed difference shows a narrowingtrend. Among them, small economic scale’s Inner Mongolia and larger shaanxi are theprovinces which get the most benefit, a small economic scale’s Ningxia, Xinjiang,Yunnan and Guizhou have not obtained relatively fast development, larger Sichuanalways stays average development speed. In addition, there are some differencesamong industrial structure adjustment, net exports, the income of residents, andchanges in the gap have its own unique characteristics, according to rank position changes of provinces, we can find changes mentioned above exist certain relevancewith differences of provincial actual economic growth speed.Using panel data model to measure and inspect, we can find that the financialtransfer payment, the level of industrialization, urban residents’ income have asignificant positive effect on actual economic growth rate of provincesSince the implementation of the "Western Development Strategy”, the differencesin the actual economic growth speed of the provinces can be explained by financialtransfer payment, the level of industrialization, the difference of urban residents’income, that is: financial transfer payment, the level of industrialization, the differenceof urban residents’ income are important reason for the differences in the actualeconomic growth speed of the provinces. Increasing financial transfer payments andimproving the level of industrialization and the income of urban residents canaccelerate the pace of economic development of backward areas, and narrow theinternal gap in the western region. Considering the individual differences of provinces,we can see the self-growth of Guangxi, Gansu, Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan, Xinjiang isweak, so the financial transfer payment, the level of industrialization, the income ofurban residents are relatively more important for economic growth in these provinces.