High-quality marine economic development in China from the perspective of green total factor productivity growth: dynamic changes and improvement strategies

High-quality marine economic development (HMED) is regarded as a new development pattern of the marine economy in China. This paper aims to examine the dynamic changes and improvement strategies of HMED from the perspective of the green total factor productivity (GTFP) growth. First, the GTFP growth of the marine economy in China’s coastal regions for the period 2007–2020 is calculated using the bootstrapped Malmquist index. Second, the dynamic changes and spatial impacts of the GTFP growth are characterized using kernel density estimation (KDE). Moreover, a novel analytical framework to study the improvement strategies of the GTFP is developed. Within this framework, the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) method is used to explore the paths to achieve HMED. The findings show that: (i) the GTFP growth for coastal regions shows significant fluctuations, suggesting that a stable pattern of marine economic development has yet to be established; (ii) the regional distribution of GTFP growth varies significantly, with provinces with fast GTFP growth gathering resources from neighboring provinces, resulting in a siphon effect; (iii) for coastal provinces that lack certain development conditions, the combined effect of other advantageous factors can be used to achieve HMED. Finally, this study presents policy recommendations for achieving HMED, which can provide insights into the design of China’s future marine economic policies.