Policy Effect Research Of Accountability Audit Of Natural Resource

As China’s economic development faces the dual challenges of high energy demand and low carbon transition,the agricultural sector has been tasked with improving its ability to mitigate energy consumption and adapt to climate change.However,in the process of agricultural modernization characterized by mechanization,scale,the problem of non-standardized placement of production factors such as mechanical power,oil consumption and fertilizer application is serious,accompanied by the formation of a high-energy-consuming,high-pollution production model,bringing huge waste of resources and carbon emissions and other environmental problems.In response to the severe reality of environmental problems,the Chinese government has deployed a low-carbon development path for agriculture in several strategic plans to achieve.In 2014,the Chinese government officially opened the pilot work and system construction of the leading cadres’ accountability audit of natural resource system.Given the absence of an agricultural environmental trading market,government audit reform is an important tool for the central government to ensure that officials’ economic and environmental performance go in parallel and to promote a green transformation in agriculture,but the rebound effect may offset the effort in practice.Therefore,whether accountability audit of natural resource have been effective in the agricultural sector as a policy to reduce carbon emissions and whether the policy has triggered an energy rebound effect is of great relevance to low carbon policy pathways in the agriculture.Based on the essence of data availability,this study uses 2007-2020 and 2011-2019 as the sample periods,respectively.Firstly,at the provincial level,supported by behavioral economics theory,the impact effect of accountability audit of natural resource on agricultural carbon intensity was analyzed in detail and hypotheses were formulated,followed by a difference in difference model to empirically test the policy effect and driving mechanism.Secondly,from the city level,the direct impact effect,spatial spillover and mechanism paths of accountability audit of natural resource on agricultural energy rebound were clarified through theoretical derivation,and an empirical study was conducted by constructing a spatial difference in difference model on the basis of the research hypothesis,and the following conclusions were drawn:First,research on the policy-driven effects of carbon emission reduction in agriculture shows that:(1)The implementation of accountability audit of natural resource can significantly reduce the carbon intensity of agriculture compared with non-pilot areas.(2)The policy can effectively stimulate both patent-based and mechanical technological progress,with different types of technological progress exhibiting different levels of mediating effects.(3)The policy effect shows obvious regional heterogeneity,which is manifested as western >central > central.The policy effects in non-main grain producing areas show obvious,while the policy implementation does not have a suppressive effect on agricultural carbon emissions in main grain producing areas.Compared with low-intensity market-based environmental regulation regions,high-intensity market-based environmental regulation regions have stronger emission reduction effectiveness of accountability audit of natural resource.Second,research on the policy impact effect of the agricultural energy rebound effect found that:(1)The accountability audit of natural resource not only caused agricultural energy rebound in the pilot cities,but also produced positive spillover to agricultural energy rebound in neighboring cities through demonstration,imitation and training effects.(2)The policy effects are strongest in developed cities and agricultural non-focus cities,with insignificant heterogeneity in main grain producing areas.(3)The mechanism of effect test found that accountability audit of natural resource positively promote agricultural energy rebound in pilot cities through agricultural energy efficiency and inversely obscure agricultural energy rebound in neighboring cities.Based on the above conclusions,this paper summarized and refined the suggestions of adhering to and improving the audit reform,formulating a reasonable assessment list for sub-regions,efficiently releasing the innovative compensation effect in the agricultural sector,and strengthening the ability to cope with pollution rebound,so as to provide an empirical basis and policy reference for improving the audit list of accountability audit of natural resource and promoting the green transformation of agriculture.