Research On The Impact Of The Establishment Of China Pilot Free Trade Zones On The High-quality Economic Development Of Cities

In recent years,the rise of international trade protectionism and the rise of “deglobalization” have led the world economy into recession,which has also brought serious challenges to China’s economy and hindered the quality development of the economy under the new normal.In such an economic environment,China proposes to vigorously develop the construction of free trade pilot zones,boldly experiment in the pilot zones,form a new high ground for China’s institutional innovation,actively integrate into economic globalization,deepen the opening up of various fields,and force reform by opening up to lead the high-quality development of China’s economy.In today’s new development pattern of China’s major domestic cycle and dual domestic and international cycles promoting each other,the construction of China Pilot Free Trade Zone forms a highland of institutional innovation internally,replicating and promoting its successful experience nationwide,driving the quality of the domestic economy to improve,and forming a new round of open platform externally to deepen economic exchanges and cooperation with other countries.From these two functions of China’s Pilot Free Trade Zone,it is undoubtedly an important player in the new development pattern and a major strategy and powerful grip to realize China’s high-quality economic development.Since the construction of the first batch of China Pilot Free Trade Zones,China has set up Pilot Free Trade Zones in batches in 21provinces(or autonomous regions)in less than a decade.Has it contributed to the improvement of the quality of economic development,and through which paths has it been transmitted? These questions have yet to be analyzed in depth by scholars,and solving them will not only help to assess the policy effects of the FTZs,but also provide targeted policy recommendations for achieving high-quality development in the FTZs.In view of this,on the basis of summarizing the literature related to FTZs and highquality economic development,this paper selects panel data of 278 prefecture-level cities in China from 2005 to 2019,constructs a measurement system for high-quality economic development with the five major development concepts of innovation,coordination,green,openness,and sharing as the connotation of high-quality development,and applies the multiperiod double difference method empirically based on the evaluation of this system The impact of the establishment of the FTZ on the high-quality economic development of the city and the transmission mechanism are studied,and the impact of the establishment of the FTZ on the regional economic quality is further analyzed.Based on the empirical analysis,the following conclusions are drawn:(1)the establishment of FTZs can significantly improve the quality of economic development of the cities in which they are located;(2)parallel trend test,placebo test,PSM-DID method,“One Belt and One Road” exogenous policy test,excluding the sample of newly established FTZs,replacing After a series of robust tests such as core explanatory variables,the results still hold,avoiding the chance of the empirical results;(3)the results of heterogeneity analysis show that the eastern FTZs,coastal FTZs and the second batch of established FTZs have stronger quality enhancement effects,which are conducive to driving the high-quality development of urban economy;(4)Through mechanism analysis,it is found that the establishment of FTZs mainly promotes the improvement of economic development quality of cities in the zones through five aspects:advanced industrial structure effect,optimization of business environment,innovationdriven effect,trade promotion effect,and enhanced infrastructure investment;(5)Further analysis shows that the establishment of FTZs is conducive to enhancing the innovation development level of cities,giving full play to the innovation spillover effect,pulling neighboring cities to enhance their innovation development level,and promoting highquality economic development in the region.Finally,based on the above findings,this paper puts forward the following suggestions:(1)to build a regional cooperation linkage mechanism and promote the optimization of business environment;(2)to give full play to the location advantages and realize the differentiated development of the FTZ;(3)to break the regional barriers,ensure the flow of resource factors and deepen the radiation-driven effect of the FTZ.