Research On The Impact Of Digital Economy On The Development Of Urban-Rural Integration In China

Integrated urban-rural development is an important part of the implementation of the rural revitalization strategy and a necessary path to achieve Chinese modernization.Since the reform and opening up,remarkable strides have been made in China’s economic development.However,while urbanization is advancing rapidly,problems such as poor circulation of factors,unreasonable allocation of resources and imbalance in industrial structure between urban and rural areas have also emerged.The structural problems of uncoordinated urban-rural development and inadequate rural development are becoming increasingly prominent,which seriously restrict the sustainable development of China’s economy and society.Faced with the real dilemma of urban-rural development,the report of the 20 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China once again emphasized the need to make efforts to promote urban-rural integration.With the advent of big data,the rapid development of the digital economy has provided new momentum for China to achieve high-quality development,while also demonstrating the huge potential for narrowing the urban-rural gap and providing new opportunities for the realization of urban-rural integration.Therefore,how to put the digital economy to good use to achieve urban-rural integration has become an important issue to be explored.Based on the above background,this paper empirically investigates the impact effectiveness of the digital economy on the development of urban-rural integration in China and its mechanism of action,so as to provide theoretical support for the contributive role of digital economy in the development of urban-rural integration.This paper takes thirty provinces(municipalities and autonomous regions)in China as research subjects.Firstly,the mechanism has been analyzed from three aspects: direct effect,spatial spillover effect and intermediary effect of digital economy on the development of urban-rural integration.Secondly,the evaluation index systems of digital economy and urban-rural integration development have been constructed respectively.The entropy weight method has been used to measure the development level of digital economy and urban-rural integration in thirty provinces(municipalities and autonomous regions)in China from 2012 to 2021,and the spatial non-equilibrium characteristics and evolutionary trends of the development levels of digital economy and urban-rural integration have been analyzed based on the Dagum Gini coefficient and Kernel density estimation.Finally,the fixed-effects model,spatial Durbin model have been employed to empirically investigate the direct impact,spatial spillover effect of digital economy on the development of urban-rural integration.From the perspective of industrial structure upgrading,the mediating effect model have been used to test the transmission mechanism of digital economy affecting urban-rural integration development.The research results show that:(1)China’s digital economy development level is in a steady growth trend in general.However,the development level of the eastern region is better than that of the central and western regions,regional development imbalance is more prominent,and this trend is gradually increasing.(2)At the current stage,the development level of urban-rural integration in China is relatively low and the growth rate is slow.The economic integration and public service integration of urban and rural areas have a greater impact on the development level of urban-rural integration.The spatial distribution is characterized by regional differences of "high in the east and low in the west",but the regional differences are gradually decreasing.(3)The level of urban-rural integration development shows significant positive spatial autocorrelation and spatial agglomeration effect.The digital economy has a negative spatial spillover effect on the development of urban-rural integration.It can improve the development level of urban-rural integration in the region but inhibit the process of urban-rural integration in the surrounding areas.(4)In terms of the influence mechanism,the digital economy plays a significant role in promoting the development of urban-rural integration,and the upgrading of industrial structure plays a partly intermediary role in influencing the development of urban-rural integration by acting as an intermediary for the digital economy.