Wang Ningjing, Zhang Xiping, Wang Zhen, Chen Yingjia, Li Shilong
College of Mathematics and Statistics, Chongqing University, Chongqing, 400044, China.
College of Economics and Business Administration, Chongqing University, Chongqing, 400044, China.
Heliyon. 2023 Jul 3;9(7):e17954. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e17954. eCollection 2023 Jul.
China's economy has achieved remarkable success, while it has also paid a high environmental cost. Environmental pollution not only causes great economic losses, but also severely restricts the development of society. Both theory and practice demonstrate that financial development plays a significant role in environmental governance, but the internal mechanism of its impacts has remained to be explored. It is vital to investigate the influence mechanism of financial development on the environmental quality in order to accomplish sustainable economic development through finance and enhance environmental quality concurrently. This paper, using mediating model, spatial Durbin and spatial error model, constructs a theoretical framework financial development on environmental quality from two dimensions, i.e., Financial Interrelations Ratio (FIR) and Financial Efficiency (FE), based on panel data of 234 cities in China from 2010 to 2019. And the results are as follows: (1) the improvement of Financial Interrelations Ratio (FIR) and Financial Efficiency (FE) had not yet reached the level of environmental pollution improvement; (2) in terms of mechanism, the rise of the level of financial development promoted economic growth, but inhibited the optimization of industrial structure, which increased industrial pollution emissions and deteriorates environmental quality; (3) urban environment had significant spatial dependence; (4) the impact of financial development on environmental quality in eastern region has been transformed into an improvement effect, while it still shows a deteriorating effect in central and western regions. Some policy recommendations related to the use of financial development to improve environmental quality are proposed at last, which will help to promote ecological protection and high quality synergistic economic development in China.
中国经济取得了显著成就，但也付出了高昂的环境代价。环境污染不仅造成巨大经济损失，还严重制约社会发展。理论和实践均表明，金融发展在环境治理中发挥着重要作用，但其影响的内在机制仍有待探索。探究金融发展对环境质量的影响机制，对于通过金融实现经济可持续发展并同时提升环境质量至关重要。本文基于2010年至2019年中国234个城市的面板数据，运用中介模型、空间杜宾模型和空间误差模型，从金融相关比率（FIR）和金融效率（FE）两个维度构建了金融发展对环境质量的理论框架。结果如下：（1）金融相关比率（FIR）和金融效率（FE）的提升尚未达到改善环境污染的程度；（2）在机制方面，金融发展水平的提高促进了经济增长，但抑制了产业结构优化，增加了工业污染排放，恶化了环境质量；（3）城市环境存在显著的空间依赖性；（4）金融发展对东部地区环境质量的影响已转变为改善效应，而在中西部地区仍呈现恶化效应。最后提出了一些利用金融发展改善环境质量的政策建议，这将有助于促进中国的生态保护和经济高质量协同发展。
