Journal of Geographical Sciences >
Post-earthquake economic resilience and recovery efficiency in the border areas of the Tibetan Plateau: A case study of areas affected by the Wenchuan Ms 8.0 Earthquake in Sichuan, China in 2008
Zhou Kan (1986-), PhD and Associate Professor, specialized in resources and environmental carrying capacity and regional sustainable development. E-mail: zhoukan@igsnrr.ac.cn |
Received date: 2020-01-07
Accepted date: 2020-02-17
Online published: 2020-10-25
Supported by
Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research Program (STEP)(2019QZKK0406)
National Natural Science Foundation of China(41807510)
National Natural Science Foundation of China(41501139)
Copyright
The border areas of the Tibetan Plateau and the neighboring mountainous areas have a high incidence of earthquakes with a magnitude greater than Ms 5.0, as well as having a dense distribution of geological disasters such as collapses, landslides, and debris flows. Revealing the post-disaster economic development and recovery process is very important for enhancing disaster prevention and response capacity in order to formulate control policies and recovery methods for post-disaster economic reconstruction based on economic resilience. Using long-term socioeconomic data and the autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model, this paper calculated the economic resilience index of the areas most severely affected by the Wenchuan Earthquake of 2008 and adopted the improved variable returns to scale (VRS) date envelopment analysis (DEA) model and the Malmquist productivity index to analyze the efficiency and effect of annual post-disaster recovery. The results show that: (1) the economic resilience index of the areas most severely affected by the Wenchuan Earthquake was 0.877. The earthquake resulted in a short-term economic recession in the affected areas, but the economy returned to pre-quake levels within two years. In addition, the industrial economy was less resilient than agriculture and the service industry. (2) The comprehensive economic recovery efficiency of the disaster-stricken area in the year following the disaster was 0.603. The comprehensive efficiency, the pure technical efficiency, and the scale efficiency of the plain and hilly areas were significantly greater than those of the plateau and mountain areas. (3) The annual fluctuation in total factor productivity (TFP) following the disaster was considerable, and the economic recovery efficiency decreased significantly, resulting in a short-term economic recession. The TFP index returned to steady state following decreases of 33.7% and 15.2%, respectively, in the two years following the disaster. (4) The significant decrease in the post-disaster recovery efficiency was caused mainly by technological changes, and the renewal of the production system was the leading factor in determining the economic resilience following the disaster. With the decline in the scale of economic recovery following the earthquake, long-term economic recovery in the disaster-stricken areas depended mainly on pure technical efficiency, and the improvement in the latter was the driving force for maintaining the long-term growth of the post-disaster economy. Therefore, according to the local characteristics of natural environment and economic system, the disaster-stricken areas need to actively change and readjust their economic structures. At the same time, attention should be paid to updating the production system to enhance the level of technological progress and give full play to the scale effects of large-scale capital, new facilities, human resources, and other investment factors following the disaster so as to enhance the impact of economic resilience and recovery efficiency in response to the disaster.
ZHOU Kan , LIU Baoyin , FAN Jie . Post-earthquake economic resilience and recovery efficiency in the border areas of the Tibetan Plateau: A case study of areas affected by the Wenchuan Ms 8.0 Earthquake in Sichuan, China in 2008[J]. Journal of Geographical Sciences, 2020 , 30(8) : 1363 -1381 . DOI: 10.1007/s11442-020-1786-8
Figure 1 Location of the study area in the border areas of the Tibetan Plateau and map of its topography (expanded inset on the right) |
Figure 2 Schematic diagram of the growth trajectory of the post-disaster regional economy |
Figure 3 Comparison of pre-earthquake and post-earthquake GDP |
Figure 4 Changes in GDP and added value of the three strata of industry |
Figure 5 Differences in the recovery cycles between secondary industry and tertiary industry |
Figure 6 Changes in the industrial structure of the three strata of industry |
Figure 7 Changes in per capita GDP and coefficient of variation |
Table 1 Relative efficiency of economic recovery and its decomposition results for 2008 |
Area | Comprehensive efficiency | Pure technical efficiency | Scale efficiency | Returns to scale |
---|---|---|---|---|
Wenchuan | 0.505 | 1.000 | 0.505 | Increase |
Beichuan | 0.293 | 1.000 | 0.293 | Increase |
Mianzhu | 1.000 | 1.000 | 1.000 | Constant |
Shifang | 1.000 | 1.000 | 1.000 | Constant |
Qingchuan | 0.321 | 1.000 | 0.321 | Increase |
Maoxian | 0.269 | 1.000 | 0.269 | Increase |
Dujiangyan | 0.912 | 0.939 | 0.971 | Decrease |
Pingwu | 0.299 | 0.580 | 0.515 | Increase |
Pengzhou | 0.637 | 1.000 | 0.637 | Decrease |
Anxian | 0.798 | 0.981 | 0.813 | Increase |
Average value | 0.603 | 0.950 | 0.632 | — |
Figure 8 Changes in total factor productivity (TFP) and its decomposition results |
Table 2 Malmquist index and its decomposition results since 2007 |
Year | Comprehensive efficiency | Rate of technological change | Pure technical efficiency | Scale efficiency | Total factor growth rate |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
2007 | 0.924 | 1.131 | 0.974 | 0.948 | 1.044 |
2008 | 1.027 | 0.646 | 1.053 | 0.975 | 0.663 |
2009 | 0.957 | 0.886 | 0.854 | 1.121 | 0.848 |
2010 | 1.011 | 1.030 | 0.988 | 1.023 | 1.041 |
2011 | 0.930 | 1.092 | 1.012 | 0.919 | 1.015 |
2012 | 0.993 | 1.039 | 1.060 | 0.937 | 1.032 |
2013 | 1.019 | 1.011 | 1.069 | 0.953 | 1.030 |
2014 | 1.037 | 0.999 | 1.029 | 1.007 | 1.036 |
2015 | 1.037 | 0.977 | 0.991 | 1.047 | 1.014 |
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