How does e-commerce city pilot improve green total factor productivity?Evidence from 230 cities in China

This paper presents a feasible road to achieving green development through the e-commerce model. We employ the data of 230 cities data in China from 2003 to 2017 as a research sample and use the Multi-period DID method to test the policy shock of National E-commerce Demonstration Cities (NEDC) pilots on the green total factor productivity (GTFP). The basic results show that urban GTFP increases by about 1.24% on average after becoming pilot cities, and NEDC policy has promoted the improvement of urban GTFP. We adopt different methods to test the robustness of the basic results, and all tests show that basic results are extremely robust. Moreover, NEDC policy plays a more effective role in the growth of urban GTFP in the mid-western cities and resource-based cities. The industrial structure upgrading effect, unproductive costs reduction effect, and green innovation motivating effect are the key mechanisms for NEDC policy to affect urban GTFP. Under the context of the information technology era, this study provides new evidence for the relationship between e-commerce and green development, and also gives policy guidance for other countries who are seeking the energy-saving and emission-reduction measures. •We study the impact of National E-commerce Demonstration Cities (NEDC) policy on green total factor productivity (GTFP).•The NEDC policy has significantly and robustly promoted the improvement of urban GTFP.•Some historical variables are used as instrument variables to solve endogenous problems.•There are three mechanisms: industrial structure upgrading, unproductive costs reduction, and green innovation motivating.•The NEDC policy plays a more effective role in the growth of urban GTFP in the mid-western cities and resource-based cities.