Wan An-Wei, Cui Wei
Business School, Hohai University, Nanjing, R.P. China.
Business School, Nanjing Institute of Technology, Nanjing, R.P. China.
PLoS One. 2025 May 22;20(5):e0322922. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0322922. eCollection 2025.
In the context of global climate change, green development has become the main goal of smart city construction. Most existing research suggests that smart cities will enhance the level of the green total factor productivity (GTFP) in cities. However, this study found that smart cities will reduce the level of green total factor production in the short term and increase it in the long term. Based on this, this article selects three batches of smart cities in China from 2013 to 2019, and uses the Malmquist index model, common frontier function, and panel data method to analyze the GTFP model in the early stage of smart city construction in China. The study found that: (1) the GTFP of the three batches of smart cities in the early stage of construction was less than 1 and showed a downward trend, indicating that smart cities will reduce the GTFP level of cities in the short term. (2) Technical efficiency is the main reason for the decline of GTFP in the early stage of smart city construction and the rise of GTFP in the medium and long term. Specifically, there is a U-shaped relationship between the technological efficiency of smart cities and their GTFP. For every 1% increase in technical efficiency in the later stages of smart cities, GTFP increases by 47.3%. (3) The GTFP in the process of smart city construction shows a trend of decreasing in the early stage and increasing in the middle and later stages. The GTFP level in the later stage of smart cities is greater than 1 and shows a fluctuating upward trend, indicating that smart cities will improve the city's GTFP level in the long run. In view of this, we should attach importance to ecological protection in the early stage of smart city construction and take effective measures to reduce carbon emissions during this period. During this period, policies such as taxation can be implemented to encourage companies to adopt cleaner production technologies, strengthen the exchange of green technologies between cities, accelerate the flow of green knowledge, reduce redundant construction of information infrastructure, and thus minimize the decline in GTFP in the early stages of smart city construction. This study provides policy recommendations and decision-making references for further promoting the construction of new green and smart cities worldwide.
在全球气候变化的背景下，绿色发展已成为智慧城市建设的主要目标。大多数现有研究表明，智慧城市将提高城市的绿色全要素生产率（GTFP）水平。然而，本研究发现，智慧城市在短期内会降低绿色全要素生产率水平，而在长期内会提高该水平。基于此，本文选取了2013年至2019年中国的三批智慧城市，运用Malmquist指数模型、共同前沿函数和面板数据方法，对中国智慧城市建设初期的GTFP模型进行了分析。研究发现：（1）三批智慧城市建设初期的GTFP均小于1且呈下降趋势，表明智慧城市在短期内会降低城市的GTFP水平。（2）技术效率是智慧城市建设初期GTFP下降以及中长期GTFP上升的主要原因。具体而言，智慧城市的技术效率与其GTFP之间存在U型关系。在智慧城市后期，技术效率每提高1%，GTFP就会提高47.3%。（3）智慧城市建设过程中的GTFP呈现出初期下降、中后期上升的趋势。智慧城市后期的GTFP水平大于1且呈波动上升趋势，表明智慧城市从长期来看将提高城市的GTFP水平。鉴于此，我们应在智慧城市建设初期重视生态保护，并采取有效措施在此期间减少碳排放。在此期间，可以实施税收等政策，鼓励企业采用更清洁的生产技术，加强城市间绿色技术的交流，加速绿色知识的流动，减少信息基础设施的重复建设，从而最大限度地减少智慧城市建设初期GTFP的下降。本研究为进一步推动全球新型绿色智慧城市建设提供了政策建议和决策参考。
