Evaluaiton Of Urban Efficiency And Study On Its Spatiotemporal Evolution Of Cities At Prefecture Level Or Above In China

As a growth pole of national and regional economic development, the city should aim atpursuiting the high efficiency. The effectiveness of urban efficiency will directly determine the city’slong-term development, and even affect the development of whole areas. Improving urban efficiencyis the essential way to realize the sustainable development of cities and regions. Since the reform andopening-up, China has made great achievements on urban development. The process of urbanizationhas accelerated ceaselessly. The urban scale has expanded day by day. The urban economy hasgrowed continuously. However, urban efficiency is generally low. High consumption, high pollutionand low output are apparent. The extensive mode of economic growth not only costs a lot of spaceresources, but also reduces the quality of urban development. Urban efficiency has been an importantindicator to measure the level of urban development with area GDP and urbanization rate, whichcauses the wide attention of all circles.This paper mainly includes the following three aspects: The first is to build the index systemand evaluating method of urban efficiency of cities at prefecture level or above in China. The secondis to reveal the spatiotemporal evolution of urban efficiency. The third is to analyze the influencingfactors of urban efficiency of cities, and seek the practical ways to improve urban efficiency from theregional perspective. The full paper includes five chapters: the first chapter is the introduction, whichputs forward the research background, significance, content, train of thought and method. Thischaper builds the platform of the research theory and demonstration platform. The second, third andforth chapter are the core parts of the paper. The second chapter measures and evaluates urbanefficiency of cities at prefecture level or above in China based on DEA with the CCR and BCCmodel. The third chapter analyzes the spatiotemporal evolution of urban efficiency of cities atprefecture level or above in China from2001to2010, and analyzes the spatial correlation and spatialspillover effect of urban efficiency by ESDA. The fourth chapter analyzes the influencing factors ofurban efficiency from the aspects of resources, human capital, industrial structure and policies, andputs forword proposals from the regional perspective. Finally, the fifth chapter summarizes theconclusions and innovations of the paper, and discusses the deficiencies.The main conclusions of thepaper are as follows:(1) Urban efficiency has been generally low in the recent10years. Urban efficiency shows thefluctuant developing trend, while GDP and urbanazaiton rate showes the increasing trend. Urbandevelopment in China is the extensive growth pattern of “high consumption, high pollution and low output", which only focuses on the rising of areas GDP and urbanization, but ignores urbanefficiency.(2) The spatial difference of urban efficiency in China is significant.Urban efficiency in China ismore advanced in eastern regions than central and western regions, which coincides with the spatialpattern of the economic development in China at present. Urban efficiency of eastern areas is higherthan the national average level, and far higher than central and western regions, while central andwestern regions are below the national average level. Urban development efficiency not only existsthe spatial dependence, there is also a strong spatial spillover effect among cities.(3) From the perspective of administration, urban efficiency coincides with the administrationpattern in China. The higher the administration is, the higher urban efficiency is. Overall, urbanefficiency of municipalities directly under the central government is higher than cities of provincialcapital and deputy provincial and prefecture level. It only changed slightly in2001and2007. Fromthe perspective of urban scale, urban efficiency coincides with the urban scale pattern in China. Thelarger the urban scale is, the higher urban efficiency is. From the perspective of urban function, itshowes the difference between the comprehensive and professional city. Average urban efficiency ofcomprehensive cities is higher than professional cities.(4) Urban efficiency is mainly restricted by technical efficiency and scale efficiency. Scaleefficiency affects more than technical efficiency. Cities in China have not yet breaked through the"scale bottleneck", scale efficiency is still the main restrictd aspect of urban comprehensiveefficiency. Most cities in China are still in the "growth" stage, which shows insufficient investmentand increasing returns to scale. Only a small portion of cities are in the higher development stage.They have reached constant returns to scale or decreasing returns to scale.(5) Resources, human capital, industrial structure and policies are the main influencing factorsto make differences of urban efficiency at prefecture level or above in China. The differencesbetween the three regions of China enlightenes that cities should reform deeply, strengthentechnological innovation and scale adjustment in the developing process. Break regional divisions toform resonable developing pattern. Create economic growth pole to play the cluster effect andradiation effect. Improve urban efficiency to narrow the gap between eastern, central and westerncities by these measures, which finally formates the good regional developent pattern of prospectiveeastern, rising central and developing western areas.