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This paper aims to examine the impact of six possible foreign direct investment (FDI) spillover channels on the total factor productivity (TFP) of Chinese agricultural enterprises and investigate the moderating role of absorptive capacity (technological acumen) on TFP spillover effects.

Based on data from 118 agricultural and related Chinese industries, the authors employ a multithreshold regression model to empirically analyze the impact of FDI on the TFP of agricultural enterprises and the threshold effect of absorptive capacity. To overcome potential endogeneity problems, the authors select the FDI stock of corresponding USA industries and the industrial access policy index as instrumental variables and re-estimate the model.

The results suggest foreign-invested agricultural enterprises are more likely to benefit from FDI, while the “aggregate” FDI spillover effect is negative for domestic agricultural enterprises. However, once threshold effects are introduced, the authors find firms “close to” (“far from”) the technological frontier experience statistically significant positive (negative) spillover effects. Similar results are obtained for virtually all FDI spillover channels for firms in both upstream and downstream industries. FDI spillovers, when they occur, can be a two-edged sword – benefiting some firms at the expense of others.

The authors introduce six FDI spillover channels to examine the impact of FDI on the productivity of foreign-invested and domestic agricultural enterprises. Moreover, the authors analyze the threshold effect of firms' absorptive capacity. These findings can help formulate foreign investment introduction policies based on the characteristics of agricultural enterprises with different ownership structures. These results are also beneficial for agricultural enterprises to better exploit FDI spillover effects and improve their productivity.

The objective of this study is to explore the impact of a government-supported initiative for operational security, specifically the establishment of the national security emergency industry demonstration base, on the profitability of local publicly traded companies. Additionally, the study investigates the significance of firms' blockchain strategies and technologies within this framework.

Using the differences-in-differences (DID) approach, this study evaluates the impact of China's national security emergency industry demonstration bases (2015–2022) on the profitability of local firms. Data from the China Research Data Service (CNRDS) platform and investor Q&As informed our analysis of firms' blockchain strategy and technology, underpinned by detailed data collection and a robust DID model.

Emergency industry demonstration bases have notably boosted enterprise profitability in both return on assets (ROA) and return on equity (ROE). Companies adopting blockchain strategies and operational technology see a clear rise in profitability over non-blockchain peers. Additionally, the technical operation of blockchain presents a more pronounced advantage than at the strategic level.

We introduced a new perspective, emphasizing the enhancement of corporate operational safety and financial performance through the pathway of emergency industry policies, driven by the collaboration between government and businesses. Furthermore, we delved into the potential application value of blockchain strategies and technologies in enhancing operational security and the emergency industry.

The purpose of this study is to analyze the effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on pollution emissions and how environmental regulation affects this relationship.

In the empirical research, the authors selected panel data for 30 provinces in China from 2005 to 2019 as samples. First, the authors used the instrumental variable method to verify the existence of the above hypotheses in China. Then, the authors analyzed the moderating effect of different types of environmental regulations on the environmental effects of FDI. Next, in further discussion, the authors analyzed the difference between the environmental effect and the moderating effect in different time periods and regions, respectively. Finally, the authors discussed whether the different intensities of environmental regulations lead to the transfer effect of FDI in choosing investment destinations.

The result shows that FDI can help reduce pollution emissions and create a “pollution halo” effect, which is enhanced by command-and-control regulation but suppressed by market-based incentives. The heterogeneity analysis reveals that the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party has weakened the pollution halo effect of FDI, while the environmental effect of FDI in the eastern region is not significant, but in the middle and western regions, there is a significant pollution halo effect and a positive moderating effect of environmental regulations. Finally, further analysis reveals that FDI has a transfer effect under command-and-control environmental regulations.

First, the main purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between FDI and pollution emissions from the perspective of heterogeneous environmental regulation. Therefore, there is no detailed discussion on their effect mechanism of them. Second, limited by data, the authors adopt the single index to measure the stringency index of command-and-control and market-based incentive environmental regulations in China. The single index may not be able to fully reflect the intensity of regional environmental regulation, so the construction of a composite indicator is necessary. These shortcomings are the focus of the authors' future research.

Under the guidance of high-quality development, the conclusions above can provide reference for adjusting FDI policies and improving environmental regulation policies.

The innovations in this paper can be summarized as the following four dimensions: First, the authors use the instrumental variable (IV) method to address endogeneity in the relationship between FDI and pollution emission, which can further ensure the robustness of the research results and increases the credibility of the paper. Second, the authors distinguish between two types of environmental regulations to investigate their moderating effect on the environmental impact of FDI. Third, the authors consider the temporal and spatial heterogeneity of both the environmental effects of FDI and the moderating effect of regulation. Last, the authors analyze the spatial spillover of environmental regulation through the study of the transfer effect.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the social responsibility performance’s current situation, influencing factors and mechanisms of multinational companies (MNCs) in China. The paper is based on the MNC’s social responsibility performance factors to find some relevant reasons for unsatisfied performance and on the multiple perspectives such as institutional distance and stakeholders, to provide feasible solutions for MNCs to assume civic responsibility and the high-quality development of the host country.

The study uses general literature review and empirical analysis to analyze the way and degree of various factors which are affecting the social responsibility of MNC in China, and supplements the deficiencies of previous studies.

The paper reveals the influencing factors and mechanisms of MNCs’ social responsibility in China through the regression results. In addition, based on Research Report on Corporate Social Responsibility of China (Huang et al., 2013/2019), the paper also summarizes the performance and dynamic changes of MNCs social responsibility in the Chinese market in the past decade.

The paper enriches research on the social responsibility of MNCs in the background of non-western countries, dynamically describes the performance of MNCs’ responsibilities in a 10-year span and solves the problem of inconsistent research conclusions caused by too long time span. The paper also creates the “local enterprise responsibility level” to quantify the development of the host country’s responsibility, and identifies the “responsibility demonstration effect” of state-owned enterprises and private enterprises.

Previous studies have reached inconsistent conclusions on foreign direct investment (FDI) technology spillovers and corporate innovation. The main purpose of this paper is to explore the technological spillover effects of FDI from the microperspective of firm linkages induced by geographic distance. Further analysis is conducted on the impact and mechanism of this spillover on the innovation quality of Chinese enterprises. The conclusions drawn from this paper can guide Chinese enterprises' foreign capital utilization and innovation strategy choices.

Using the data of China's A-share listed companies from 2009 to 2019, this paper explores the role of FDI technology spillover in enterprise innovation quality through a two-way fixed-effect model. The robustness of the results is proven by substituting variables, adding industry fixed effects and excluding high-profit groups, and further using the two-stage least squares (2SLS) method to alleviate the empirical endogeneity problem.

These findings indicate that FDI technology spillover based on geographic proximity has a positive impact on the innovation quality of Chinese enterprises. However, there are different impacts for different types of enterprises. FDI technology spillover has a positive impact on the innovation quality of non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs) and small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), while it has no effect on state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and large enterprises. The authors also find that the degree of financing constraints and R&D investment are important transmission mechanisms between FDI technology spillover and enterprise innovation quality.

This study ignores industry characteristics when considering foreign enterprises around Chinese enterprises. In fact, technology spillover effects differ across industries. When the authors matched microdata to regions, only the provincial level was considered. Therefore, there is still room for further research. In future research, the authors should consider industry characteristics and group foreign enterprises and Chinese enterprises in the same industry and in different industries to explore industry differences in technology spillover. In addition, when matching corporate data to regions, the authors can match to the city level and draw city-level conclusions.

This study is different from previous studies that focus on the quantity of enterprise innovation or innovation output. The authors focus on the role of technological spillovers in the quality of Chinese enterprise innovation, enriching research in the field of enterprise innovation quality. In addition, the current FDI technology spillover indicators are technically difficult to measure at the micro level. The authors draw inspiration from the theory of the geographical structure of financial supply and combine the creation methods of macro and micro indicators in existing articles in other fields. The authors ingeniously construct a new FDI technical spillover indicator. This indicator combines the commonly used regional FDI technology spillover with the geographic proximity of enterprises at the microlevel by constructing an interaction term between the two. This indicator not only alleviates the endogeneity problem to a certain extent but also has implications for future research in the field of FDI technology spillovers at the micro level.

(1) FDI technology spillovers are an effective way to improve the innovation quality of local enterprises, especially for non-SOEs and SMEs. Therefore, The authors suggest that in the context of dual circulation, the Chinese government should continue to open wider to the outside world and encourage foreign enterprises to invest in China. (2) In future development, managers of SOEs and large enterprises should create an innovation incentive mechanism. Moreover, they should change their vertical management structure and make full use of their policy advantages and budget advantages to increase innovation activities. In the process of acquiring technology spillovers, enterprises need to solve their own financing constraints.

First, this study solves a technical problem. It is technically difficult to measure the current FDI technical spillover indicators at the micro level. This study innovatively constructs a new FDI technology spillover indicator that combines regional FDI technology spillovers with the microperspective of the geographical proximity of enterprises. This approach not only alleviates certain endogeneity problems in the empirical evidence but also enriches relevant research in the field of technology spillover. In addition, this study focuses on the impact and mechanism of this spillover, which addresses the current research gap among previous studies that mainly focus on innovation quantity and ignore innovation quality.

This study focuses on the relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and economic growth of the formal sector comprising all foreign and domestic registered enterprises engaged in production of goods and services.

This study uses a balanced longitudinal data set for the period from 2006 to 2014 from secondary sources in 63 provinces/cities of Vietnam. The generalized method of moments (GMM) estimation for a dynamic panel data model is applied.

The greater the share of FDI in capital resource, the more favorable the output growth in the whole formal sector. The FDI enterprises are more productive than domestic formal firms, and the output growth of FDI firms creates a positive spillover effect on the output growth of domestic firms.

The effect of FDI on economic growth is investigated at subnational level for the whole formal economic sector as well as the formal domestic firms. The domestic and foreign industrial agglomerations and the business environment are also examined.

This paper analyses how firm births and deaths are influenced by previous firm births and deaths in related and unrelated sectors. Competition and multiplier effects are used as the theoretical lens for this analysis.

This paper uses 2008–2016 Irish business demography data pertaining to 568 NACE 4-digit sectors within 20 NACE 1-digit industries across 34 Irish county and sub-county regions within 8 NUTS3 regions. A three-stage least squares (3SLS) estimation is used to analyse the impact of past firm deaths (births) on future firm births (deaths). The effect of relatedness on firm interrelationships is explicitly modelled and captured.

Findings indicate that the multiplier effect operates mostly through related sectors, while the competition effect operates mostly through unrelated sectors.

This paper's findings show that firm interrelationships are significantly influenced by the degree of relatedness between firms. The raw data used to calculate firm birth and death rates in this analysis are count data. Each new firm is measured the same as another regardless of differing features like size. Some research has shown that smaller firms have a greater propensity to create entrepreneurs (Parker, 2009). Thus, it is possible that the death of differently sized firms may contribute differently to multiplier effects where births induce further births. Future research could seek to examine this.

These findings have implications for policy initiatives concerned with increasing entrepreneurship. Some express concerns that public investment into entrepreneurship can lead to “crowding out” effects (Cumming and Johan, 2019), meaning that public investment into entrepreneurship could displace or reduce private investment into entrepreneurship (Audretsch and Fiedler, 2023; Zikou et al., 2017). This study’s findings indicate that using public investment to increase firm births could increase future firm births in related and unrelated sectors. However, more negative “crowding out” effects may also occur in unrelated sectors, meaning that public investment which stimulates firm births in a certain sector could induce firm deaths and crowd out entrepreneurship in unrelated sectors.

This paper is the first in the literature to explicitly account for the role of relatedness in firm interrelationships.

This paper aims to study the agent learning from expert demonstration data while incorporating reinforcement learning (RL), which enables the agent to break through the limitations of expert demonstration data and reduces the dimensionality of the agent’s exploration space to speed up the training convergence rate.

Firstly, the decay weight function is set in the objective function of the agent’s training to combine both types of methods, and both RL and imitation learning (IL) are considered to guide the agent's behavior when updating the policy. Second, this study designs a coupling utilization method between the demonstration trajectory and the training experience, so that samples from both aspects can be combined during the agent’s learning process, and the utilization rate of the data and the agent’s learning speed can be improved.

The method is superior to other algorithms in terms of convergence speed and decision stability, avoiding training from scratch for reward values, and breaking through the restrictions brought by demonstration data.

The agent can adapt to dynamic scenes through exploration and trial-and-error mechanisms based on the experience of demonstrating trajectories. The demonstration data set used in IL and the experience samples obtained in the process of RL are coupled and used to improve the data utilization efficiency and the generalization ability of the agent.

The purpose of this paper is to study the spillover effects of foreign direct investment (FDI) on skilled–unskilled wage inequality in the Indian manufacturing industries.

The authors show theoretically with a model of spillover that if foreign firms (receiving FDI) have a negative spillover effect on domestic firms (not receiving FDI), then the level of capital and skilled workers in the domestic firms falls down. Consequently, the authors conduct an empirical analysis by using system GMM estimation technique on the firm-level data of the Indian organised manufacturing sector.

The authors show that wage inequality worsens when there is negative spillover effects like competition spillover or skill spillover effect of FDI in India.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt to measure the various spillover effects of FDI on the wage inequality in the Indian manufacturing industries by using firm-level data.

This paper aims to examine spillover effects of heterogenous foreign direct investment (FDI) enterprises (domestic vs. export-oriented) through horizontal and vertical linkages and absorptive capacity effect on domestic firms' total factor productivity (TFP). It clarifies the spillover effect on domestic firms in accordance with industrial zones, business size, technology sector and geographical agglomeration, respectively.

The dataset used is based on Vietnamese manufacturing firms during 2011–2014, input–output (I–O) Table 2012. This paper is conducted in two steps: (1) TFP is estimated by using a semi-parametric approach developed by Levinsohn and Petrin (2003); (2) Regression with panel data for domestic firms, applying the fixed effect method.

In terms of domestic-oriented FDI (DFDI) enterprise group: TFP spillover through horizontal linkages is found negative for domestic firms but positive for those participating in export. Additionally, backward linkages have a negative impact on TFP for most domestic enterprises, except for those operating in the high-tech sector. In terms of export-oriented FDI (EFDI) enterprise group, horizontal linkages have a negative impact on domestic firms' TFP including domestic ones participating in export whereas backward linkage is an important channel with positive effects. Absorptive capacity enables firms to improve productivity through linkages with EFDI and DFDI enterprises. Exporters located in industrial zones or regions with numerous exporters can receive better impacts through backward linkages EFDI.

Comprehensively, this is the first paper to detect FDI heterogeneity in their behavior when entering a developing country like Vietnam. The added value in this study comes from the export ability of local firms which is in line with Melitz (2003) theory that they can excel in absorping the TFP spillover from competing with DFDI competitors or from supplying to EFDI enterprises. Moreover, the role of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), low technology, high technology and learning by regions affecting the impact through both horizontal and vertical linkages are included for analysis.