The impact of innovative city policies on land use efficiency

Under the background of realizing the strategy of advanced country and superior development, the innovative cities pilot, as an important institutional exploration path, can effectively stimulate the innovation vitality of cities, enhance the industrial framework, improve the urban environment, and significantly affect the urban land elements. This research integrates the notion of high-quality development into urban land components, creates an index system for evaluation using the input-output model, and uses the Super-SBM model to evaluate the land-use efficiency of 279 cities nationwide. This paper using a multi-period DID model discusses the impact of innovative city pilot policies on land use efficiency. These are the findings of the study: (1) In terms of average land use efficiency, cities in the eastern region are 0.1333 higher than those in the central region in 2021; The western region is 0.0593 higher than the central region. From 2006 to 2021, the land use efficiency range (the gap between the maximum and the minimum) showed a decreasing trend. (2) The efficient use of urban land can be realized through the execution of the innovative cities pilot. Specifically, contrasted with non-innovative cities, innovative city pilots can increase the importance of efficient urban land usage by roughly 3.6%. And the conclusion passes several tests for robustness. (3) The findings of the mechanism analysis indicate that the innovative cities pilot primarily achieves effective utilization of urban land resources through the path of industrial structure optimization effect, policy guidance effect, and innovation talent gathering effect. (4) Extended analysis reveals that the impact of innovative cities on land use efficiency mainly affects eastern cities and large cities. Based on the research results, this paper proposes to optimize the industrial structure; Strengthen the government's pollution control; Build a "Smart Land" management system; Countermeasures and suggestions such as improving land use efficiency in accordance with local conditions.