Coupling Characteristics between Ecological Security and High-Quality Economic Development in the Yangtze River Delta, China

The coordinated development of ecological security (ES) and high-quality economic development (HQED) is of great significance to the integrated sustainable development of the Yangtze River Delta (YRD) urban agglomeration. In this study, the entropy weight-TOPSIS model and the improved coupling coordination degree (CCD) model were used to analyze the coupling coordination mechanism of ES and HQED. The results indicate that the level of ES in the YRD showed a fluctuating upward trend from 0.475 in 2000 to 0.481 in 2020, while HQED continued to rise from 0.097 in 2000 to 0.232 in 2020, and the coordinated development index of ES and HQED increased from 0.293 in 2000 to 0.795 in 2020, highlighting an obvious trend of balanced development. Notably, the eastern coastal cities exhibited superior HQED and ES levels, with a better CCD, compared to the inland cities. The multi-scale geographically weighted regression model (MGWR) analysis shows that industrial structure, production efficiency and urbanization rate were key factors in the imbalanced development of the YRD. Finally, policy suggestions are proposed from the aspects of strengthening technological and industrial innovation and comprehensively promoting new urbanization.