The high-quality development of resource-based cities is of great importance. In order to clearly understand the problems existing in the transformation of resource-based cities and clarify the high-quality development path, experts from different fields are invited to discuss the current research frontiers of the main dilemmas and breakthrough paths of high-quality development of resource-based cities. The interview results show that the transformation of resource-based cities in China has made great achievements, but there is still a great distance from the requirements of high-quality development, highlighted by the fact that economic development still fails to get rid of the development path of resource dependence, the gathering of new factors to promote high-quality development is weak and resource-based cities are facing great pressure both internally and externally under the carbon emission reduction target. In the New Era, it is necessary to reconceptualize the role and status of resource-based cities and improve the ability of resource-based cities to ensure national resource and energy security; to realize the re-cognition of the new resource system based on a profound grasp of the connotation of the traditional concept of resource endowment, pay attention to the excavation of new resources and enrich the new knowledge system of resource-based city research. According to the development conditions of different types of resource-based cities, it is necessary to implement measures by categories and promote the innovative development of resource-based cities according to local conditions, and continue to improve the employment elasticity of economic growth, enhance the ability of economic development to pull employment, and pay full attention to the creation and cultivation of employment opportunities; accelerate the exploration of a green and efficient transformation and development path, and simultaneously realize the greening of "stock" and the greening of "increment"; to comprehensively consider the development basis and factor resource conditions of resource-based cities, and change from the traditional "growth and expansion type" to the development mode of "combination of efficient growth and smart shrinkage". It is necessary to integrate new data and new technological methods to scientifically/intelligently support the spatial governance of resource (exhausted) cities; to establish the guiding ideology of giving priority to people's livelihood, make up for the historical debts in the past construction process of resource-based cities through urban renewal, comprehensively improve the livability level and economic vitality of resource-based cities, and reshape the urban socio-spatial network; The "chain system" schemes and models such as "strengthen the chain, complement the chain and extend the chain" should be fully referenced for the industrial transformation of resource-based cities. The above viewpoints provide scientific and feasible theoretical and decision support for the high-quality development of resource-based cities.
This paper summarizes the policy evolution of sustainable development of resource-based cities (RBCs) in China over the past 20 years and analyzes the results of promoting sustainable development of RBCs. The main points of this paper are as follows: (1) The evolution path of sustainable development policy of RBCs in China in the study period basically follows the development logic of combining problem orientation and goal orientation, experiencing from "administrative intervention", "administrative guidance" to "comprehensive governance" changes. Generally speaking, the policy evolution can be roughly divided into three stages, namely, the stage of resolving difficulties, the stage of comprehensive promotion and the stage of high-quality development. (2) At present, China has formed a "four-in-one" policy framework for sustainable development of RBCs, which includes the transformation of resource-exhausted cities, innovative development of resource-rich cities, transformation and upgrading of independent industrial and mining areas, and comprehensive treatment of coal mining subsidence areas. (3) RBCs make full use of local advantages, and initially form some characteristic transformation development models. (4) In the New Era, RBCs are faced with severe challenges such as large carbon emission reduction tasks, weak economic growth, and bottlenecks hindering balanced and high-quality development in special areas. It is urgent to make all-out efforts to solve key problems and promote sustaibable development.
Based on the panel data of China's resource-based cities from 2003 to 2018, this paper comprehensively measures the performance of urban transformation, and uses spatial Markov chain, spatial econometric model and spatial double difference model to explore the performance characteristics of resource-based cities' transformation and its impact on carbon emissions. The results show that: (1) The transformation performance of resource-based cities is increasing year by year, which corresponds to the fluctuating upward trend of regional differences, and the regional differences between the four types of resource-based cities mainly come from regional differences, and mature cities contribute the most; There are obvious spatial differences in the transformation performance of resource-based cities, and the development pattern has evolved from the "multi-point" sporadic distribution with the spanning area as the core to the "cluster" aggregation with the leading area as the core. (2) The transformation performance of resource-based cities has the possibility of state transfer in different periods, which has the characteristics of four convergence clubs: lagging area, starting area, spanning area and leading area. Spatial Markov chain shows that the transfer trend has obvious spatial relevance. State transfer usually occurs between adjacent levels, with less "jumping" transfer phenomenon, and has long-term and sustainable characteristics. (3) The transformation of resource-based cities has significant carbon emission reduction effect, and this effect has the heterogeneity characteristics of different resource types, different development stages and different spatial locations. Economic and industrial transformation, social life transformation and ecological environment transformation are important factors to play the role of carbon emission reduction. Further policy impact analysis shows that the establishment of industrial transformation and upgrading demonstration zones and high-tech industrial development zones has a positive policy effect on urban carbon emission reduction.
As a new mode of transportation in modern society, high-speed railway is an important external driving force for the economic transformation of resource-based cities. Based on the panel data of 114 resource-based cities in China from 2004 to 2018, this paper analyzes the impact of the opening of high-speed rail on the economic transformation of resource-based cities in China by adopting the multi-period differential difference method. The results show that: In general, the opening of high-speed railway plays a significant role in promoting the industrial structure transformation and economic growth of resource-based cities. The opening of high-speed rail also has a heterogeneous effect on the economic transformation of resource-based cities in different development periods: The opening of high-speed railway has a significant promotion effect on the optimization of the industrial structure of coastal resource-based cities, but its impact on economic growth is insignificant. In contrast, the optimization of industrial structure of resource-based cities in inland areas is not significantly affected by the opening of high-speed railway, and its economic growth is significantly affected by high-speed railway. The opening of high-speed rail also has heterogeneous impacts on resource-based cities with different development periods: The opening of high-speed railway has a significant promoting effect on the optimization of industrial structure in the growing and regenerating resource-based cities, but its effect on industrial structure optimization of mature and declining resource cities is not obvious. By contrast, the opening of high-speed railway has no obvious influence on the economic growth of the growing and regenerating and mature resource-based cities, but has a significant promotion on the economic growth of the declining resource-based cities.
Industrial transformation is an important development problem faced by resource- exhausted cities, and exploring the evolutionary mechanisms of industrial transformation and its economic resilience in resources-exhausted cities is of great significance to realize high-quality urban development. From the perspective of evolutionary economic resilience, taking Daye city of Hubei province as an example, this paper constructed an evaluation index system of economic resilience in resource-exhausted cities, and the entropy value method and partial least squares (PLS) are adopted to quantitatively reveal the evolutionary characteristics and driving mechanisms of economic resilience during the industrial transformation of Daye city from 2000 to 2019. The results showed that: (1) The economic resilience of the study area had undergone the evolutionary stages of recession adaptation, resistance to recovery, and response improvement, which corresponded to the study area's economic recession transition period (2000-2009), development recovery period (2010-2014), and efficient improvement period (2015-2019), and the level of economic resilience showed a "slow to fast" rising trend. (2) From 2000 to 2019, the driving factors of the evolution of economic resilience in the study area changed from the transformation of industrial structure and the improvement of innovation level to multi-factors. Among them, residents' income, market scale, government regulation ability, industrial technology level are the key factors to promote the evolution of economic resilience in the study area. (3) The transformation of industrial diversification is the direct driving force for the improvement of economic resilience in the study area, and the evolution of the study area to a higher level of urban life stage is driven by multiple factors. When the pressure factor is eliminated, the urban state is adjusted and the response mode is optimized, the economic resilience will promote the "path breakthrough" of the industry by activating the industrial factors and balancing the driving force, and then evolve into a higher-level state, so as to promote the high-quality development of resource-exhausted cities.
Economic transformation is the key to achieving high-quality development in resource-based cities. As a new engine of economic growth, the cultural entertainment industry plays an important role in the economic transformation of resource-based cities. Using panel data of resource-based cities on the Loess Plateau from 2010 to 2019, the relationship between the development of the cultural entertainment industry and economic transformation is examined empirically using the spatial Durbin model on the basis of a comprehensive index to measure the effectiveness of economic transformation in resource-based cities. The results show that the relationship between the development of the cultural entertainment industry and economic transformation is "U" shaped, in which the development of the cultural entertainment industry is first inhibited and then promoted, and at the early stage of the development of the cultural entertainment industry, the vigorous development of the cultural entertainment industry is not conducive to economic transformation and upgrading. When the density of cultural entertainment industries crosses the inflection point (5104 units per 10000 people), the effectiveness of economic transformation will increase with the development of cultural entertainment industries. The cultural entertainment industry has a significant spatial spillover effect and can effectively contribute to the economic transformation of neighbouring cities, and the increased economic transformation of neighbouring cities will lead to the economic transformation of the city. The research results are expected to provide a scientific basis and decision-making support for the high-quality development of resource-based cities on the Loess Plateau.
In the new high-quality development stage, the growth and shrinkage of resource-based cities face a systematic reconfiguration of internal and external conditions. There is a lack of empirical evidence on how resource-based cities can escape from the historical fate of "exhaustion of mines and decline of cities" and achieve positive urban population growth in the process of transformation and development. This paper uses cross-sectional and panel data of 116 resource-based cities from 2010 to 2020 to quantitatively characterize their trajectory of growth and shrinkage, and empirically investigate the influence mechanism of industrial structure transformation on population growth and decline. The study finds that more than 60% of resource-based cities in China were shrinking during the study period, showing a geographical distribution pattern of "one belt and two areas". The rationalization and upgrading of industrial structure both show crowding-out effects on the population growth of resource-based cities in the short term, and in the long term, the effect of industrial structure rationalization turns positive, while the compensating effect of industrial structure upgrading is not yet apparent. In the long run, the impact of industrial structure rationalization turns positive, while the compensating effect of industrial structure upgrading has not yet appeared. The diversity of industrial structure can promote the population growth of resource-based cities in the short term, but this effect is not significant in the long term. Based on those findings, the transformation and development of resource-based cities need to improve the level of industrial structure rationalization as an important breakthrough, take industrial structure upgrading as a long-term main line, implement parallel strategies of industrial extension and industrial renewal based on local comparative advantages, and build a diversified industrial system. The industrial structure transformation of resource-based cities of different types and development stages should emphasize strategic differentiation.
After considering resource-based cities as the research object, this paper theoretically analyzes the impact of land finance on housing prices and economic growth, considers the mediating role of housing prices, and constructs a random effect model of panel data. A total of 111 resource-based cities with well-developed land and real estate markets were chosen by categorization based on panel data from 2011 to 2019 to investigate the mediating influence of housing prices on land finance and economic growth in resource-based cities. This study presents some findings as follows. Firstly, land finance has a significant positive impact on economic growth and housing prices in resource-based cities, but there are some differences in the degree of impact. In addition, land financing has the greatest influence on economic growth and housing prices in regenerating cities but on the other hand, land financing in mature cities has the least impact on economic growth and housing price. This difference is related to the resource guarantee ability of the city. Secondly, housing prices in resource-based cities and mature cities have significant partial mediating effects on land finance and economic growth. Most importantly, our analysis found that housing prices had no substantial mediating influence on land finance and economic growth in regenerating, growing, and declining cities. These findings add to the literature by enlightening guidance to policymakers and regulatory organizations for the advancement of land financing and economic growth.
At present, realizing steady and healthy economic growth is one of the major aims of resource-depleted cities in urban transformation. The service-driven development mode is of great significance for improving economic growth levels and promoting employment in resource-depleted cities during the process of urban transformation. Based on panel data of 23 prefecture-level resource-depleted cities in China from 2001 to 2018. This paper aims to analyze the economic growth effect of the service industry on the transformation of resource-depleted cities by utilizing the fixed-effect model and threshold model. The results indicate that: (1) Generally, there are differences in the economic growth effects of service industry development on urban transformation in different stages of transformation, and the economic growth effects of service industry on urban transformation show a trend of "promotion-inhibition-promotion" with the improvement of service industry development level. (2) Producer service industry placed an effect of "negative-positive-negative" trend on the economic growth of urban transformation at different stages of transformation, and the consumer service industry exerts an effect of "suppression-promotion-inhibition" on the economic growth of urban transformation with the improvement of consumer service industry development level. (3) Traditional service sectors such as transportation, wholesale and retail have a negative effect on the economic growth of urban transformation, while high-end service sectors such as information transmission and finance place a positive effect on economic growth. (4) The overall economic growth effect of the service industry on the transformation of coal cities and forest cities is significantly positive.
In this paper, resource-based cities (RCs) with shrinking population in China are taken as cases to analyze the spatio-temporal evolution characteristics of urban population and housing price since 2005, and compare the different response characteristics of urban housing prices during the period of population shrinkage in terms of the amount and speed of housing price appreciation. In addition, the grey correlation model is adopted to identify factors influencing different responses of housing prices. The results show that: (1) The population shrinkage of RCs in China is getting worse, but the housing prices of 90% RCs are increasing during the period of population shrinkage. Only a few RCs, mainly in Eastern Heilongjiang, Northwestern Gansu and Central Shanxi, have seen a slight decline in house prices. (2) There are obvious differences in housing price response intensity in RCs under the background of population shrinkage. Cities of high response intensity grades mainly include the moderate population shrinkage cities, the declining and mature coal resource cities, the border RCs, and the RCs in the border area of provinces. (3) For most RCs, population shrinkage is not closely correlated with housing price response. Other factors are more closely correlated with the response to housing prices, and there are significant differences among cities with different housing price response intensity.
Most resource-depleted cities face the problems of environmental degradation, landscape fragmentation, and blocked ecological mobility, in which their broken ecosystems are in urgent need for restoration. Meanwhile, resource-depleted cities are also typically shrinking cities. Under the impacts of population outflow, economic recession, and physical decay, there appeared a large quantity of abandoned lands and vacant houses, with inefficient sites in urgent need for restructuring. At the same time, these fragmented patches and corridors in the ecological system also provide opportunities for the restoration of ecological security patterns. This paper explores a GeoDesign method that combines the processes of ecological restoration and spatial governance in a shrinking city, using the case of Xikuangshan district in Lengshuijiang city. First of all, following the standard process of ecological restoration, i.e. "identifying ecological sources, constructing resistance surfaces, extracting corridors, acquiring key nodes, and constructing ecological networks", the research constructs conductance surfaces based on the InVEST model, and uses the circuit theory modeling to simulate natural ecological landscape patches. The key ecological flow paths are identified according to the strength of the current. Secondly, based on the spatial distribution of important ecological corridors and patches identified, the key obstacle points in the ecological network that need restoration are selected. Finally, a zonal phased plan is developed with reference to the existing land use, the effect of ecological restoration is tested using the afore-mentioned model, and eventually, the urban design strategy is considered for the regeneration and reuse of the abandoned lands and vacant houses on the key obstacle nodes. This research aims to bridge the analytical method of ecological restoration with the demands for spatial shrinkage of the resource-depleted city, in order to formulate a step-by-step GeoDesign method by integrating 'ecological analysis-policy study-planning design', from which the shrinking resource-depleted city is able to achieve smart shrinkage and ecological restoration.
It remains to be clarified whether environmental regulation has a driving effect on green total factor productivity in resource-based cities, through what path and whether there is heterogeneity of city types. This paper selects panel data of 113 resource-based cities in China from 2004 to 2019, and uses non-radial and non-angular SBM model and GML index to measure green total factor productivity of resource-based cities. Then, this paper empirically tests the intermediary effect of scientific and technological innovation, foreign direct investment and industrial structure optimization and the heterogeneity among different type cities. The results show that: (1) The effect coefficient of environmental regulation on green total factor productivity of resource-based cities is significantly positive. Both industrial structure optimization and foreign direct investment play a significant positive mediating effect, while scientific and technological innovation plays an indirect inhibiting effect. (2) The heterogeneity test of city types shows that technological innovation plays a positive mediating role in growing and mature cities, and an indirect inhibiting role in regenerating cities; the foreign direct investment has a positive mediating effect in the declining cities, and negative in regenerating cities; the industrial structure optimization plays a positive mediating effect in growing and mature cities. (3) The comparative mediation effect results in the whole-sample regression shows that the intermediary effect of industrial structure optimization, foreign direct investment and scientific and technological innovation decrease step by step; the mediating effects of industrial structure optimization account for nearly 80%, and the direct effect of environmental regulation is greater than the overall mediating effect. Growing and mature cities mainly exert intermediary effects through scientific and technological innovation and industrial structure optimization, declining cities mainly exert intermediary effects through foreign direct investment, and regenerating cities mainly exert intermediary effects through scientific and technological innovation and foreign direct investment. The robustness test shows that the results are reliable. Finally, this paper puts forward policy suggestions from the aspects of establishing the externality constraint mechanism of resource development and pollution emissions, and adopting the environmental regulation policy of classified guidance and local conditions, etc.
Based on the panel data of 114 resource-based cities in China from 2011 to 2018, the entropy weight method is used to calculate the high-quality development index of each resource-based city. The influence and its mechanism of market-oriented environmental regulation tool on the high-quality development of resource-based cities are discussed by using systematic GMM model, static panel threshold model and dynamic panel threshold model. The results show that: (1) From 2011 to 2018, while the overall level of high-quality development of resource-based cities in China is improving, there also exists a phenomenon of widening extreme differences, and the spatial differences show a distribution pattern of "high in the east and low in the west". Specifically, the high-quality development index is the highest in the eastern region, followed by the northeastern region, whereas it is lower in the central region and the lowest in the western region. (2) Market incentive environmental regulation tools have a significant positive influence on the high-quality development of resource-based cities, that is, the improvement of the intensity of market incentive environmental regulation tools will significantly improve the high-quality development level of resource-based cities. In addition, a systematic GMM model is adopted to avoid possible endogenous problems in the regression and improve the robustness of the empirical results. Moreover, after we use the robust approach of gradually adding control variables and changing lag terms, the regression results are still consistently significant, which further proves the robustness of the results. (3) The positive effect of market incentive environmental regulation tools on the high-quality development of resource-based cities is regulated and restricted by the level of urban low-carbon living influence structure. There exists a threshold in the relationship between market incentive environmental regulation tools and high-quality development level of resource-based cities, that is, when the urban low-carbon living index exceeds a certain threshold level, the positive effect of market incentive environmental tools on its high-quality development is strengthened. The corresponding political implications are further analyzed based on the above empirical results.
Based on the dual pressures of economic transformation and energy conservation and emission reduction faced by resource-based cities, this paper empirically measures the carbon emission efficiency of 114 resource-based cities in China from 2004 to 2019 by using a three-stage super-efficiency SBM model, and discusses the efficiency differences, spatio-temporal evolution and sources of differences by using the methods of Dagum Gini coefficient, kernel density estimation and QAP regression analysis. The results show that: (1) After the environmental factors and random interference is removed, the average carbon emission efficiency of resource-based cities decreases to 0.230, but the overall trend is on the rise. (2) The areas with high carbon emission efficiency are concentrated in regenerating and mature cities, and the distribution is relatively scattered. The low value areas are mainly growing and declining cities, and they are clustered in northeast, central and other regions. (3) The carbon emission efficiency of resource-based cities varies greatly, among which the contribution rate of inter-group difference is the highest, but it shows a downward trend; The differences within the groups of regenerating and mature cities are relatively stable, while the differences within the groups of growing and declining cities are gradually expanding. (4) The differences of population density, per capita disposable income and the number of large-scale enterprises will significantly expand the differences of carbon emission efficiency of resource-based cities, and the differences in population density, population structure and disposable income of residents have a significant heterogeneous impact on the differences in carbon emission efficiency of different types of resource-based cities. Considering the characteristics of carbon emission efficiency of resource-based cities, this paper puts forward the following policy implications: Firstly, according to the types of resource-based cities, we should adopt emission reduction schemes that suit local conditions. Secondly, we should increase investment in low-carbon innovation and promote green transformation of industry. Resource-based cities can increase R&D investment by imitating innovation, and make low-carbon innovation more directional and targeted. At the same time, resource-based cities should encourage enterprises to carry out green technological transformation and upgrading. Thirdly, we will promote green consumption mode and strengthen emission reduction of residents. The government should enhance residents' cognitive level of consumption emission reduction ability and encourage consumers to make low-carbon consumption. Moreover, the government should explore green financial innovation, establish individual carbon credit and carbon account system, and encourage residents' participation in green financial market.
Green development is an important manifestation of the high-quality transformation of resource-based cities. The study develops a green development efficiency evaluation system, using MinDs model, Theil index, Geodetector and other methods, to measure green development efficiencies in resource-based cities of Western China from 2001 to 2019, and analyzes the spatiotemporal heterogeneity characteristics and associated driving factors. The main conclusions are as follows: (1) The green development efficiency of resource-based cities in the western region is bounded by 2015, showing a trend of "rising first and then falling", the green development efficiency change trends of different types of cities are quite different, resource-based cities in Northwest China and Guangxi have shown an upward trend as a whole, resource-based cities in Southwest China and Inner Mongolia have shown a downward trend in recent years, growing cities have developed relatively stable, mature and regenerating cities have declined significantly after 2017, and declining cities have shown an upward trend. (2) The green development efficiency of resource-based cities in the western region is characterized by a normal distribution with a small number of extremely low and extremely high intervals, and a large number of intermediate scores. (3) The problem of spatial unevenness of green development efficiency is still serious. Changes in the efficiencies of mature cities in northwest and southwest regions are the dominant factors for expanding gaps in the efficiencies of resource-based cities in Western China. (4) Economic development, urbanization, city size expansion and technological innovation can significantly increase the green development efficiency of resource-based cities in the whole study area. Moreover, the driving factors of green development efficiency of resource-based cities in different spatial ranges and different life cycles have their own characteristics. The research has practical significance for improving the green development efficiency of various resource-based cities in the western region of China.
Coastal resource-based cities are spatial carriers with highly intertwined land resources and sea resources. From the perspective of cross-system impact, the spatial governance will help to break through the limitations of the transformation and development of resource-based cities, and maximize the comprehensive efficiency of resources. Firstly, this paper clarifies the complexity of cross-system impact and the diversity of coastal resources, and takes spatial resources as the core element of the study. Secondly, it emphasizes the ecological-economic-social "integrated efficiency" of the whole land and sea system, and takes "land-sea coordination" as a guide to deepen the connotation of high-quality development of coastal resource-based cities. Thirdly, it explores the spatial governance path of "key resource identification-spatial efficiency evaluation-spatial resource regulation" for high-quality development. Concretely, we select key resources by identifying cross-system impact scope, conducting resource spatial surveys, and determining the resource combination mode. Furthermore, a resource spatial efficiency evaluation framework including "comprehensive efficiency evaluation" and "cross-system impact correction" is established to clarify the differences of various spatial efficiencies, and provide a decision-making basis for spatial governance. Finally, according to the results of spatial efficiency evaluation, combined with the requirements of territorial spatial planning, this paper puts forward beneficial regulation and control methods for the high-quality development of coastal resource-based cities, in the four aspects of resource spatial optimization, regional resource integration, total space allocation and development mode guidance.
