Deconstruction of green product innovation drivers for regional export-oriented industrial enterprises in China: the product space perspective

Achieving green economic growth requires enterprises to develop and promote green products that balance environmental protection, intensive resource utilization, and sustainable development. However, under the externality assumption, the green market is often faced with the challenge of insufficient supply. Based on 2004–2018 panel data covering regional industrial enterprises in 30 provinces in China, this study empirically tests the composite driving mechanism of the effect of an increase in the regional green production capacity, organizational factors, and environmental policies on the green product innovation (GPI) of regional export-oriented industrial enterprises (REIEs). This study finds that the increase in regional green production capacity directly drives an improvement in REIEs’ GPI level, that the regional green technology level and degree of human capital accumulation are indirect driving channels between capacity increases and product innovation, and that environmental regulations and green credit have a positive moderating effect on the influence of increasing green production capacity on GPI. Further threshold regression analysis reveals that increasing green production capacity, foreign direct investment, digitization, and trade openness have an inverted U-shaped promoting effect on GPI and that the proportion of local government expenditure shows a diminishing marginal utility effect on GPI.