Understanding the roles of economic production structure in improving the balance between societal advance and environmental conservation

An effective production structure of economic sectors may play an important role in balancing societal advances and environmental conservation, which are two competing sustainable development objectives. We tested the notion in the context of Tibet region. The region is considered to be a critical barrier for ecological security in China, whereas its environment is largely impacted by economic development that is dominated by major regional cities like Lhasa. To understand what the overall role of economic structures prevailed by major cities may play in the balancing act, we integrate a complex network with an input-output (IO) table from regional perspectives, to delineate the sector-based production and unravel more about the core sectors that drove the overall economic production from 2012 to 2107 in Tibet. We found that there was a significant influence of public administration and social security sector on production, but economy was largely contributed by primary and construction sectors, which highly depended on natural resource consumption. However, the production structure was undergoing a shift, largely reflected by the changes of the core sectors, which started leaning to service sectors with relatively higher productivity and lower environmental impacts. Meanwhile, it highlighted the challenges to sustain the economy without more withdrawal of natural resources, consequently towards more balanced development. Therefore, based on key production path assessment, we further put forward pathways towards more sustainable development by improving supply chain that is centered in agriculture, while transforming sectors around green manufacturing and shifting to more robust and productive service sectors.