The Effect Of Telecommunication Infrastructure On Economic Growth

The development of telecommunication infrastructure can directly affect economic growth through investment in growth factors,and indirectly affect economic growth through other channels such as reducing the cost of economic activities,optimizing industrial structure,promoting trade development,accelerating regional economic integration,increasing employment and reducing poverty.On the basis of Barro's growth regression model,this paper incorporates telecommunication infrastructure as an environmental factor into the economic growth regression model.Based on the panel data of 25 countries along the Maritime Silk Road from 2001 to2016,the effect of telecommunication infrastructure endowment on economic growth is empirically investigated by using Sys-GMM.The results show that:(1)Under the control of basic factors of production,economic structure,policy system and telecommunication infrastructure,the growth rate of per capita GDP has an obvious inverse relationship with the initial scale of per capita GDP,which indicates that the economic growth of countries along the line has conditional convergence false,that is to say,countries with higher per capita GDP tend to have slower growth rate;(2)There is no causal inversion between the endowment of telecommunication infrastructure and the growth of per capita GDP,which is telecommunication infrastructure promotes economic growth.It shows that the endowment of telecommunication infrastructure is one of the reasons for the growth of per capita output or the gap between the rich and the poor in the countries along the line;(3)The endowment of telecommunication infrastructure in the countries along the line conforms to the law of diminishing marginal returns,indicating that the more backward the telecommunication infrastructure development is,the more obvious the promotion effect of the improvement of telecommunication infrastructure on economic growth will be.It means that it is likely to gain greater economic growth effect from telecommunications infrastructure investment in the early stage of developing countries.The countermeasures and suggestions for the countries along the line include:(1)Strengthening the improvement of investment environment of telecommunication infrastructure;(2)Increasing investment in telecommunication infrastructure construction;(3)Broadening financing channels for infrastructure;(4)Optimizing the industrial structure of the countries along the line.The countermeasures andsuggestions for China include:(1)China should increase its investment in telecommunication infrastructure in backward countries along the line;(2)China should strengthen the improvement of investment environment of telecommunication infrastructure with other countries along the line;(3)China should strengthen risk management of investment in national infrastructure along the line;(4)China should encourage domestic enterprises to participate in cooperation of national telecommunication infrastructure along the line.