Connective Financing: Chinese infrastructure projects and the diffusion of economic activity in developing countries

Arbeitspapier

This paper studies the causal effect of transport infrastructure on the spatial concentration of economic activity. Leveraging a new global dataset of geo-located Chinese government-financed projects over the period from 2000 to 2014 together with measures of spatial inequality based on remotely-sensed data, we analyze the effects of transport projects on the spatial distribution of economic activity within and between regions in a large number of developing countries. We find that Chinese-financed transportation projects reduce spatial concentration within but not between regions. In line with land use theory, we document a range of results which are consistent with a relocation of activity from city centers to their immediate periphery. Transport projects decentralize activity particularly strongly in regions that are more urbanized, located closer to the coast, and less developed.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Discussion Papers ; No. 274

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Economic Integration ; Foreign Aid ; Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes ; Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity ; Socialist Institutions and Their Transitions: International Trade, Finance, Investment, Relations, and Aid ; Economic Development: Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure ; International Linkages to Development; Role of International Organizations
• Subject: transport costs ; infrastructure ; development finance ; foreign aid ; spatial concentration ; China

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Bluhm, Richard ; Drehery, Axel ; Fuchs, Andreas ; Parks, Bradley ; Strange, Austin M. ; Tierneyk, Michael J.
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Courant Research Centre - Poverty, Equity and Growth (CRC-PEG)
• (where): Göttingen
• (when): 2020

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/219387
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:41 AM CET