Research on the Impact of Ecological Civilization Construction on Residents'Health
In recent years,there have been many cases of Chinese residents becoming ill,disabled or dying as a result of environmental pollution,and the discussion on whether a green China and a healthy China can be synergized has become more and more heated.In fact,the difficulty in scientifically assessing the relationship between ecological environment protection and residents'health lies in the former being a comprehensive concept involving numerous factors,making it difficult to accurately measure.However,the recent implementation of ecological civilization pilot reforms by the Chinese government provides a good opportunity for a systematic examination of the relationship between ecological environment protection and residents'health.In this study,we matched Chinese General Social Survey data(2010-2017)with regional-level statistical data,and viewed the pilot reforms in ecological civilization demonstration areas and experimental areas as"quasi-natural experiments",using a difference-in-differences approach to estimate the effect of ecological environment protection on residents'health and its underlying mechanisms.The results show that the construction of ecological civilization can significantly improve the health levels of local residents,as the implementation of ecological civilization pilot policies reduces the absolute difference between the actual and ideal BMI values of residents in pilot areas by approximately 5.92 percentage points.Mechanism analysis reveals that optimizing the atmospheric environment in pilot areas is the underlying channel for the improvement,while optimizing the water environment in pilot areas is not an effective channel.Heterogeneity analysis indicates that local female populations,elderly populations,low-educated populations,and low-income populations are the main beneficiaries of ecological civilization construction.Compared to existing literature,this paper's potential marginal contributions are as follows:first,it expands the scope of environmental regulatory policies from the regional and enterprise levels to the residential level.Currently,scholars mainly focus on the driving effect of environmental pollution prevention and control policies on regional and enterprise development.However,the ultimate goal of environmental protection is to serve the sustainable development of humanity and significantly improve people's well-being.Therefore,focusing the research on residents and scientifically evaluating whether the implementation of ecological civilization pilot policies can significantly improve the health levels of local residents becomes crucial.Second,it not only identifies the causal relationship between ecological civilization construction and residents'health conditions but also examines the underlying mechanisms,finding that optimizing the local atmospheric environment,rather than the water environment,is the primary channel for improving the health conditions of local residents through ecological civilization construction.Third,it distinguishes residents'characteristics into innate and acquired traits,with innate traits mainly referring to those determined at birth,such as gender and age,while acquired traits mainly refer to those that can be changed through efforts,such as education level and income level.It separately examines the differentiated effects of the implementation of ecological civilization pilot policies on the health conditions of residents with different characteristics.This study suggests to some extent that the construction of ecological civilization demonstration areas and experimental areas is not only beneficial for the pilot areas to explore the path of green development but also advantageous for these areas to accumulate health capital.Therefore,the central government needs to intensify the promotion of pilot to establish the foundation for the coordinated development of a green China and a healthy China.In addition,ecological civilization pilot reforms can create greater health benefits for"vulnerable groups"in pilot areas,such as female,elderly,low-educated,and low-income population.Thus,the central and local governments can not only use targeted healthcare system reforms to narrow the health gap between different groups,but also rely on ecological civilization pilot reforms to address health inequality issues between different groups.
construction of ecological civilizationecological environment protectionresidents'healthhealth inequalityreduction of air pollutant emissionreduction of wastewater
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