Decomposed Sources of Green Productivity Growth for Three Major Urban Agglomerations in China

This study introduces the global Malmquist-Luenberger productivity index to measure and decompose green productivity growth for the three major urban agglomerations across China over the period 2003-2013. As the first study focusing on green productivity of emerging cities in developing countries, its results show that the major source of green productivity growth is technical progress rather than efficiency improvement. Efficiency deterioration damages green productivity growth in Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta. Finally, this study finds determinants of green productivity growth are very different across these three urban agglomerations.