Impact Analysis of Transport Policies in China

The relationship between infrastructures and development is an issue widely discussed in the economic literature. In this respect, China is an emblematic case, due to the fact that is often investigated by considering the Country as a whole, as if it was a 'homogeneous entity’. In this work, the relationship between the transport infrastructure policy and the Chinese growth rate - starting from the “Open Door policy” up to the next “Go West policy” - is tackled after a preventive articulation of the Country in homogeneous areas, which are built on the basis of several variables combination, obtained through statistical techniques for multivariate analysis. The knowledge of the production functions for different homogeneous classes, allows for obtaining the first indications on the investment policy effectiveness in various transport infrastructures; it also allows for having a global view of the development determinants in different areas. In particular, concerning the effectiveness of the rebalancing strategy of the Go West Policy, the available data show that there was not a decisive change in favour of the inland areas; that was the reason why the growth differential did not go through the expected inversion.