中国中西部发展中城市的增长极作用

Effects of urban growth poles on economic development in central and western China

为了分析增长极在中部崛起和西部开发中可能发挥的作用,对我国中西部地域相连、经济水平接近的山西、河南、安徽、湖北、湖南、江西、广西、四川、重庆、陕西10个省（直辖市、自治区）的942个市县2000～2007年非农业GDP和就业增长的空间溢出效应进行了检验。模型估计表明,中西部地区各市县非农业经济增长的主要决定因素是自身的投入,同时,中心城市也存在明显的扩散和回流效应。地级市的非农业GDP增长对县级市有扩散效应,意味着城市间经济有一体化趋势,但是地级市的就业增长对县级市有抑制作用;地级城市对相对更不发达的县镇的GDP和就业增长同时具有带动作用;相邻的县级市相互间有较强的促进作用,但是对邻近县镇却有抑制倾向。

In order to analyze the possible effects of growth poles on Central Rise and Western Development in the central and western China,this paper constructs a spread-backwash effects model based on the theories of growth pole and unbalanced growth,and applies a spatial simultaneous statistical model to a dataset of 942 cities and counties in the ten central and western provinces for the period from 2000 to 2007.The statistical results show that central cities,presented by prefecture or higher level cities,had net spread effects of non-agricultural GDP growth on county-level cities and counties,suggesting that different levels of cities and counties had a tendency to develop economies complementary to each other.However,these larger,central cities showed backwash effects of employment growth on the county-level cities and spread effects on rural counties.Neighboring county-level cities had strong net spread effects on each other in both non-agricultural GDP and employment growths,but the county-level cities exerted negative effects on growth of rural counties,especially in non-agricultural GDP growth.Several important policy lessons are drawn from this study.First,the research findings in general support the growth pole strategy adopted by virtually all of the provinces in the central and western regions.Second,the evidence of backwash effect of large cities on the neighboring cities calls for new policy initiatives to mitigate competition for the same types of workers and professionals.Third,integration and collaboration of economies in neighboring cities should be an important component of the overall growth strategy for each region to fully benefit from a growth pole strategy.Fourth,the research findings also suggest a need for improvement on regional transportation infrastructure and education to close the gaps between the central and western regions and the eastern region.