The Role of Foreign Technology Transfer in Improving Environmental Efficiency: Empirical Evidence From China’s High-Tech Industry

In recent years, China’s high-tech industry has made remarkable technological progress, but it has also brought serious environmental pollution, which has aroused great concern about its environmental efficiency. Although foreign technology transfer is considered as important ways for technological progress of the high-tech industry, the existing research on what role foreign technology transfer plays in improving the environmental efficiency of the high-tech industry is still lacking. Based on China’s interprovincial panel data from 2008 to 2017, we evaluated the environmental efficiency of the high-tech industry using the super-efficiency slacks-based measure (SBM) model with undesirable outputs. We then used the Tobit model to analyze the impact of technology introduction (TI) and foreign direct investment (FDI)—two major types of foreign technology transfer—on the environmental efficiency of the high-tech industry. The results of the super-efficiency SBM model show that the average environmental efficiency of China’s high-tech industry is only 0.4375. Except for Guangdong, Shanghai, and Beijing, most of the provinces in China have low environmental efficiency. The provinces with high environmental efficiency are in the eastern region, whereas the provinces with low environmental efficiency are concentrated in the central and western regions. Tobit regression results confirm the difference in the role of technology import and foreign direct investment in the improvement of environmental efficiency in China’s high-tech industry. Technology introduction has a significant positive impact on environmental efficiency. FDI also promotes environmental efficiency, but it is not statistically significant. These findings were confirmed by a series of robust tests. This study not only deepens our understanding of the environmental efficiency of China’s high-tech industry but also expands the theoretical research on the relationship between technology transfer and environmental efficiency.