Research on the Productivity Effect of Inter-Regional Industry Transfer<br/>—Taking Guangdong Province as an Example

Abstract

This paper empirically tests the influence of the inter-regional industrial transfer policy which was promoted by local government in Guangdong Province in 2005 on total factor productivity by using the double-difference and triple-difference models, based on the panel data of 120 counties in 21 prefecture-level cities in Guangdong Province from 2001 to 2016. The study found that the inter-regional industrial transfer policy of Guangdong Province has increased the total factor productivity of the area with industry transferring out, but has a negative impact on the TFP of the land with industry transferring in, and there are differences in the effects of total factor productivity in the four regions: the periphery of the Pearl River Delta, Eastern Guangdong, Western Guangdong, and Northern Guangdong. And the industrial transfer has the greatest negative effect on the eastern Guangdong region, and the least negative effect on the western Guangdong, which has a positive impact on the TFP in northern Guangdong. Through further analysis of single factor productivity, the study found that the decline in total factor productivity of the industry is mainly caused by the decline in capital productivity. The experience of inter-regional industrial transfer in Guangdong Province has implications for China’s ascendant inter-regional industrial transfer. How to encourage the government to play a more active guiding role in promoting industrial transfer, promote the increase of total factor productivity and achieve sustainable and stable economic development, is a question worthy of further discussion.