Effects Of Congestion Effect And Factor Market Distortion On Water Resources Utilization Efficiency In China

Water resource is an important material basis for human production and life,an important natural resource for realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,and an important strategic resource for realizing the millennium plan of the sustainable development of the Chinese nation.With the advancement of China's industrialization and urbanization and the acceleration of the pace of building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way,the social and economic development is becoming more and more dependent on water resources,and the demand is expanding day by day,and the contradiction between supply and demand is becoming more and more serious.The coexistence of water shortage and low utilization rate has become an obvious problem of water resources utilization and sustainable development in China.Therefore,the study of water resource utilization efficiency provides theoretical guidance and practical reference for the solution of China's water resource problems.At present,a large number of studies have been conducted on water use efficiency,but most of them focus on production activities in economic regions.It is assumed in advance that increasing water resources input will not reduce economic output,or that decreasing water resources input will not increase economic output.The limitation of this hypothesis is that it excludes the phenomenon that further increase in water resource input will lead to the decline of economic output in the "non-economic" area,namely the "congestion effect".In view of this,based on the panel data of 31 provinces,municipalities and autonomous regions(except Taiwan,Hong Kong and Macao)in 19 years from 2000 to 2018,this paper introduces the "congestion effect" occurring in non-economic areas into the study of water use efficiency in China.From the perspective of "congestion effect",this paper discusses whether water resource input congestion exists in China.The spatio-temporal evolution characteristics of water resource input congestion effect were analyzed,and the inefficiency caused by congestion was decomposed from the global inefficiency,and the sources of water resource inefficiency were identified.At the same time,the spatial and temporal evolution characteristics of water resource utilization efficiency and the driving factors of congestion are analyzed.Finally,the factor market distortion is considered as the influencing factor of water resource utilization efficiency,and the empirical research is conducted.The main conclusions are as follows:(1)The congestion effect of water resource input is widespread in China,and there are significant differences in the congestion degree among 31 provinces and cities.From the perspective of time series evolution,the national average congestion degree showed a trend of first increasing and then decreasing from 2000 to 2018.The water resource input congestion experienced an evolutionary process from agglomeration to dispersion.In terms of spatial pattern,the central and western regions with unbalanced input structure are more prone to congestion than the eastern regions with higher economic development level.(2)From the relative length of LISA time path,the overall spatial pattern of water resource input congestion during the study period has strong stability.According to the curvature of LISA time path,the moving path of all provinces and cities in China is not straight line,and the water resource input congestion experienced a local spatial dependent direction and growth process from relatively stable to relatively fluctuating.From the perspective of moving direction,the spatial integration of water resource input congestion pattern is weakening,and the coexistence pattern of synergy and competition is increasingly prominent.According to the temporal and spatial transition of LISA,the characteristics of transfer inertia,path dependence and locking of water resource input congestion in China are obvious.(3)The global water resource inefficiency in China was serious and showed different changing trends.The water resource inefficiency in most provinces and cities was driven by both congestion inefficiency and pure technical inefficiency.However,from the provincial and regional perspectives,pure technical inefficiency contributes greatly to the global inefficiency,and congestion inefficiency is also an important source of water resource inefficiency.In the dominant type of pure technical inefficiency,the global inefficiency of Zhejiang and Guangdong was all caused by the pure technical inefficiency during the survey period,while the global inefficiency of Inner Mongolia was dominated by congestion inefficiency for a long time during the survey period.(4)The overall level of water resource use efficiency in China is relatively low,and there is great room for improvement of water resource use efficiency.From the perspective of time dimension,the differences of water use efficiency in the eastern,central and western regions were small in the early stage of the study,while the differences increased in the middle and late stage.In terms of space,the provinces and cities with higher efficiency are mostly concentrated in the eastern region.Liaoning,Heilongjiang and Inner Mongolia saw the most obvious improvement in water resource utilization efficiency after eliminating congestion.In terms of the three regions,the elimination of congestion has the greatest impact on the improvement of water resource utilization efficiency in the central region.(5)The driving factors of water resource input congestion effect show that: in the total sample analysis,water resources per capita,industrial water use proportion and agricultural water use proportion have a significant positive effect on water resources input congestion,while the total COD emission also has a positive effect but is not significant.Foreign direct investment and total investment of R&D funds have a negative impact.In the samples of different regions,the proportion of industrial water use and the proportion of agricultural water use in the central and western regions have a positive correlation with the congestion effect of water resources input,while the total amount of foreign direct investment and R&D investment has a negative effect.In the west of China,only the proportion of industrial water use and agricultural water use passed the significance test among the factors with positive correlation to water resource input congestion(6)The influence of factor market distortions on water resource utilization efficiency shows that in the analysis of the national total sample.Total factor market distortions and labor factor market distortions have a significant negative effect on water resource utilization efficiency,while capital factor market distortions have a positive effect.In the regional analysis,the total factor market distortion and labor factor market distortion in the eastern and central regions have a significant negative impact on water resource utilization efficiency,while the capital factor market distortion is the opposite.For the west,the total factor market distortion is negative effect,while the factor market distortion of capital and labor is positive effect.