Jin, J.; Zhao, R.; Yang, Y., and Chuan, M. 2019. Endogenous study on economic development, environmental investment, and green development based on the panel data analysis of 11 provinces in the Yangtze River Economic Belt. In: Li, L.; Wan, X.; and Huang, X. (eds.), Recent Developments in Practices and Research on Coastal Regions: Transportation, Environment and Economy. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 98, pp. 426–432. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208.
Chinese President Xi pointed out that the green development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt is a national development strategy promoting the coordinated development of the economy and green development in the Yangtze River Economic Belt and the building of the national green development demonstration zone as the only way to break the environmental bottleneck of economic development. This study selects 11 provinces and cities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt between 2006 and 2017 and makes an empirical study on the relationship among green development, environmental investment, and green development by using a panel vector autoregression (PVAR) model. The results of this study found that investment in environmental governance has no significant effect on economic development and green development; that in the past, the provinces and cities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt had an unsustainable behavior of exchanging the environment for economic development; and that economic development can significantly promote green development. According to the empirical results and conclusions, this study puts forward the following suggestions to improve the level of green development and sustainable and healthy economic development: establish and improve the mechanism of environmental protection investment, optimize the structure of environmental protection investment, and gradually increase the intensity of environmental protection; actively introduce social capital into the field of environmental protection; and continue to optimize the industrial structure and increase the proportion of green industries.
