New Quality Productive Forces and High-Quality Economic Development: Evidence from Shaanxi Province

Abstract

China’s regional economies are at a critical stage of transition from factor-driven growth to innovation-driven and green development. New quality productive forces, centered on technological innovation, digitalization, and green development, provide an important driving force for high-quality economic development. Based on panel data from ten prefecture-level cities in Shaanxi Province from 2009 to 2022, this study examines the impact of new quality productive forces on high-quality economic development and its underlying mechanisms. The results show that new quality productive forces significantly promote high-quality economic development, with industrial structure upgrading and energy utilization efficiency serving as important mediating channels. Heterogeneity analysis indicates that this promoting effect is significant in the Guanzhong region but not statistically significant in Northern and Southern Shaanxi. The findings suggest that Shaanxi should strengthen enterprise innovation and industry-university-research collaboration, promote industrial upgrading and energy efficiency improvement, and adopt differentiated policies based on the development conditions of Guanzhong, Northern Shaanxi, and Southern Shaanxi to promote coordinated regional economic development.