经济增长与环境污染——环境库兹涅茨曲线假说的中国检验

Economic Growth and Environmental Pollution: An Empirical Test for the Environmental Kuznets Curve Hypothesis in China

本文运用1996—2002年我国省际面板数据,对我国经济增长与包括水污染、大气污染与固体污染排放在内的6类环境污染指标之间的关系进行了实证检验。实证结果发现,环境库兹涅茨倒U型曲线关系很大程度上取决于污染指标以及估计方法的选取。就本文选取的部分污染指标(工业废水排放、二氧化硫排放)而言,也存在以相对低的人均收入水平越过环境倒U型曲线转折点的可能。并且,包括人口规模、技术进步、环保政策、贸易开放以及产业结构调整等在内的污染控制变量分别对环境库兹涅茨曲线关系起着重要影响。

The Environmental Kuznets Curve （EKC） hypothesis postulates an inverted- U -shaped relationship between different pollutions and per capita income, i. e. , environmental pressure increases up to a certain level as income goes up; after that, it decreases. This paper uses panel data on Chinas 30 provinces during 1996-2002 to examine the EKC relationship between per capita income and six categories measured pollution indicators. We find that the results are highly sensitive to different pollution indicators, functional forms and econometric methods employed. Then we incorporate some dimensions of social changes such as population density, trade openness, environmental policies, technology progress, and industrial structure change, into our model to investigate the impact of various exogenous control variables on the EKC, which can be varied along the development process depending on the income level.