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The association between rural–urban migration flows and urban air quality in China

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Abstract

In light of the rapid urbanization of the world’s population over the past decades, there is a growing concern about the environmental impacts of urban population growth. Rural–urban migration is a particularly important component of the urbanization process in developing countries and is often considered to be detrimental to urban environmental conditions. However, few studies have explicitly examined the presumed negative impacts of in-migration on the natural environment of cities. The continuously increasing volume of rural–urban labor migration in China since the early 1980s has formed the largest population flow in world history. This study links the existing literature on population–environment and urbanization–environment interactions by empirically assessing the relationship between rural–urban migration and urban air conditions in China. A two-period (2004 and 2010) longitudinal dataset for the 113 key environmental protection cities of China was constructed based on multiple data sources. We applied the STIRPAT equation using conventional and spatial panel regression models to examine whether rural–urban migration flows were associated with air pollution in cities. Results show a strong negative association of in-migration with urban air quality even after controlling for the effects of other population, affluence, and technology factors. Findings from this research can contribute to a better understanding of the environmental consequences of rural–urban migration in China, with broader implications for sustainable development research and policies.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Dr. C. Shannon Stokes (Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology and Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University) and Dr. Alex de Sherbinin (Center for International Earth Science Information Network, Columbia University) for their valuable suggestions on the initial development of this research project. This research was supported by the following grants to the first author: the Competitive Public Affairs Research Grants Program of the Center for State Policy and Leadership at the University of Illinois at Springfield (UIS), the Summer Competitive Scholarly Research Grants Program of UIS, and new faculty startup funds from the Division of Applied Social Sciences (DASS) at the University of Missouri-Columbia (MU). Earlier versions of this article were presented at the DASS Lunch and Learn Seminar Series on April 18, 2014 and the 20th International Symposium on Society and Resource Management in Hannover, Germany, June 9–13, 2014. We would like to thank the Department of Sociology and Social Work and the Institute of Population and Ecology Studies at Xiamen University for the support to the data collection work in China. Thoughtful comments from Dr. Mary Barile at the MU Office of Grant Writing and Publications, the journal editors, and two anonymous reviewers are also sincerely appreciated.

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  1. Division of Applied Social Sciences, Department of Rural Sociology, University of Missouri-Columbia, 216 Gentry Hall, Columbia, MO, 65211, USA

    Hua Qin

  2. Department of Sociology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, 61801, USA

    Tim F. Liao

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Qin, H., Liao, T.F. The association between rural–urban migration flows and urban air quality in China. Reg Environ Change 16, 1375–1387 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-015-0865-3

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