Dual Engines Powering Sustainable Tourism: How Can Industrial Collaborative Agglomeration of Culture and Tourism Enhance Tourism Eco‐Efficiency?

ABSTRACT The cultural and tourism industries exhibit a pronounced trend of industrial collaborative agglomeration, which is widely recognized as a potent engine for achieving sustainable tourism. Accordingly, investigating how industrial collaborative agglomeration of culture and tourism (ICACT) influences tourism eco‐efficiency (TEE) offers critical academic insights and actionable guidance for advancing sustainable tourism; yet, this topic remains largely overlooked. This paper proposes a theoretical framework illustrating the impact of ICACT on TEE and empirically validates it drawing upon Chinese provincial data across the years 2011 to 2021, thereby addressing a critical research gap in this field. The results demonstrate that: (1) ICACT notably enhances TEE, a finding that maintains its validity after correcting for endogenous biases and performing robustness checks. This impact is more pronounced during the 2016–2021 period, in eastern and central regions, and in areas with higher TEE. (2) ICACT improves TEE through two key mechanisms: promoting tourism industrial diversified agglomeration and accelerating tourism industrial structure upgrading. (3) ICACT not only elevates local TEE but also exerts significant positive spatial spillover effects, thereby fostering sustainable tourism in neighboring areas. This study expands the application boundaries of agglomeration economies and new economic geography theories in the cultural and tourism sectors, and delivers critical theoretical insights and rigorous empirical grounding that empower regional authorities to leverage ICACT for advancing sustainable tourism.