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Arid Land Geography ›› 2026, Vol. 49 ›› Issue (4): 769-777.doi: 10.12118/j.issn.1000-6060.2025.588

• “Dual Carbon”Research • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Where is the big gap of the coordinated development of carbon reduction, pollution reduction, green expansion, and growth in China? The east and the west or the north and the south

LIU Honghong(), ZHANG Wenbin()   

  1. School of Management, Xi’an University of Finance and Economics, Xi’an 710100,Shaanxi, China
  • Received:2025-10-02 Revised:2025-11-10 Online:2026-04-25 Published:2026-04-28
  • Contact: ZHANG Wenbin E-mail:hhdmn@xaufe.edu.cn;zhangwbufe@xaufe.edu.cn

Abstract:

Regional development imbalances constrain the synergistic advancement of carbon reduction, pollution reduction, green expansion, and growth, thereby hindering the symbiotic relationship between the economy and the environment in the process of Chinese modernization. From the dual perspectives of eastern-western and northern-southern regional divisions, this study measures and decomposes disparities in the synergistic development of carbon reduction, pollution reduction, green expansion, and growth across 30 Chinese provinces from 2015 to 2023 using the Dagum Gini coefficient. The QAP method is employed to examine the factors driving these regional disparities. The results indicate that (1) The overall disparity in regional synergistic development exhibits a slight but fluctuating decline. Inter-regional and intra-regional differences are the primary contributors to the development gaps between the eastern-western and northern-southern regions. (2) In terms of disparity magnitude, regions rank from highest to lowest as follows: North, east, south, west, and central. (3) The disparity between the eastern and western regions exceeds that between the northern and southern regions; however, the eastern-western gap is narrowing more rapidly, while the northern-southern gap is gradually approaching the scale of the eastern-western gap. (4) The effectiveness of synergistic advancement is shaped by multiple factors, whose marginal effects vary across spatiotemporal contexts. The levels of digital economy development, green innovation capability, and science and technology investment are the primary drivers of regional disparities. The impacts of digital economy development and green innovation capability exhibit a fluctuating upward trend, whereas the effect of science and technology investment remains relatively stable.

Key words: collaborative development of carbon reduction, pollution reduction, green expansion, and growth, QAP analysis, Dagum Gini coefficient, regional disparities