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PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore the matching relationship between factor endowment and industrial structure, and its impact on economic growth.Design/methodology/approachThe assortative matching method is developed to quantitatively measure the matching between factor endowment and industrial structure. A series of empirical tests are then carried out to evaluate the impact on the economic development of the matching.Findings1) The matching between factor endowment and industrial structure has a significantly positive impact on economic growth. (2) Economic growth reaches its maximum when the gap between the two sectors narrows to zero. (3) This effect is particularly significant for countries with higher GDP per capita and GNI per capita. (4) The results remain robust after employing a series of tests.Practical implicationsAggressive industrial policies are not desirable. The optimal industrial structure is the one that complied with the comparative advantage of the given factor endowment in the economy.Originality/valueSo far, there has been a significant lack of an applicable quantitative indicator for measuring the matching between factor endowment and industrial structure, which is essential for conducting empirical tests and providing evidence for related economic theories.

High export capacity is a key element for sustained long-term economic growth. To achieve this goal, the technological sophistication of exports plays a key role. To enhance exports with a high level of technological sophistication, it is critical to target key drivers of high-tech exports. Hence, this article studies the determinants of international trade flows of manufactures according to their technological content in the case of OECD countries. Given a panel of 35 countries and 15 years (2004 to 2018), panel data estimation techniques are used in the analysis. In addition, two alternative measures have been considered to measure the importance of high-technology content manufacturing exports: High-tech manufacturing exports and high-tech manufacturing exports as a share of total employment. Results obtained show strong evidence of the relevance of variables such as gross fixed capital formation on total employment, the land area per capita, the percentage of university graduates relative to the population group, R&D expenditure in terms of GDP, the stock of inward foreign direct investment in terms of GDP, imports of high-tech manufactures as a share of GDP, the quality of national governance and regulation, the country population and EU membership as determinants of technology-intensive exports. Moreover, the findings have significant implications for trade and industrial policies in OECD countries, to ensure the effectiveness of policies targeting the technological upgrading of exports.

Poverty is a significant global ongoing issue that influences a substantial amount of people despite all efforts to eliminate or lessen it. Although poverty is an eminent problem because of its negative consequences, many people are unaware of the concept of poverty. Poverty not only degrades the human capacity but also undermines economic growth in developing regions. This research aims at exploring the impact and heterogeneity of agricultural factor endowment investment on rural relative poverty. By using the data obtained from China household tracking survey (CFPS-2018), probit model approach was applied to analyze the relationship between agricultural factor endowment investment and rural relative poverty. Finally, the intermediary effect of the selected model was validated through the robustness test. The study findings showed that the input of agricultural factor endowment can alleviate the relative poverty in rural areas of China. Our study findings also revealed that there is a significant heterogeneity in family size, endowment type of agricultural technology elements and the agricultural type. A positive association between the investment in agricultural technology and land factor endowment with relative poverty alleviation by increasing the total value of cash and deposits was revealed from the results. The overall findings of this study provide useful insights to facilitate government institutions to stabilize the agricultural labor force, accelerate the process of agricultural modernization and provide careful consideration to land property rights.

Facing enormous differences in factor endowments across European agriculture the aim of the study was to identify the significance of differences in land, capital and labour endowments on the efficiency of different agricultural production types in the EU. The Ward Cluster Analysis was used to distinguish groups of EU regions, significantly differing in factor endowment, DEA model to determine the relative differences in technical efficiency of different types of agricultural production in EU regions and ANOVA analysis to assess the significance of differences in the efficiency of agricultural production types between these EU regions. It was found that generally the agriculture of the EU-12 regions was characterised in 2015 by higher efficiency of transforming inputs into effects than households in the EU-15 regions. Therefore, factor endowments play a significant role in transformation of production factors into effects. The article shows that there is a diversity of factor endowments in agriculture between EU region groups, which translates into differences in the technical efficiency of agricultural holdings of various types of production.

China’s economy has shifted from high-speed development to high-quality development as the marginal benefits of the traditional growth model decline. This study explores how new quality productive forces (NQPFs) drive industrial structure upgrading via factor endowment upgrading and factor synergy, with the goal of addressing development bottlenecks. Using 2013–2024 provincial panel data, NQPFs are measured through the entropy weight-TOPSIS method (factor endowment upgrading) and a coupled coordination model (factor synergy), integrated into a comprehensive index, and analyzed via two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression. The empirical results show that China’s NQPFs are in their initial stage, with factors still in the process of accumulation and adaptation. NQPFs significantly promote industrial structure advancement and rationalization, with factor synergy outperforming factor endowment upgrading. Its promotion of advancement is universal, but its impact on rationalization is regionally heterogeneous, with inadequate transmission in underdeveloped and high-environmental-regulation provinces and ineffective dual mechanisms in manufacturing-led provinces. Notably, the driving effect of NQPFs on manufacturing upgrading is stronger than that on services. This study provides guidance for NQPF cultivation and contributes to the theory and Chinese practice of industrial structure upgrading from a dual-factor perspective.

Despite populist backlash against globalization in advanced industrialized countries, developing countries have recently sought to liberalize trade. To shed light on this phenomenon, we investigate mass attitudes toward free trade in thirty-six African countries. Using two rounds of Afrobarometer data and original survey data from Ghana and Uganda, we find that individuals hold views that are consistent with their economic self-interest. As factor endowment models predict for a sample of skill-scarce countries, low-skilled individuals are more likely than high-skilled individuals to support free trade. Moreover, the strongest negative effects of skill occur for the most skill-scarce countries in the sample and are driven by individuals in the labor force. Our results are robust to measuring variables more precisely in original surveys and controlling for other factors thought to shape attitudes. The findings indicate that previous evidence against factor endowment models may have partially resulted from inadequate data from the developing world.

Analyzing the influence mechanism of the transformation of demandwillingness and behavior of forestry social services (FSS) of farmers with differentoperation scales in the production process is crucial for promoting the modernizationof the collective FSS system. Based on the survey data of 800 farmers in 3 provincesof China, this study uses the multivariate (Mv-) probit model to quantitativelyanalyze the mechanism of factor endowments' influence on farmers' deviation ofdemand willingness and choice behavior on three FSSs in the different scales: fineseed and cultivation technology service (SCTS), forest insect pest prevention andtreatment service (IPTS), and timber collection and sale service (TCSS). Our resultsshow that the demand rates of IPTS, SCTS, and TCSS are 80.25%, 68.00%, and68.38%, respectively. Large-scale farmers are more willing to demand FSS thansmall and medium-scale farmers. However, their actual adoption behavior is low,and there are significant deviations in farmers' demand willingness and adoptionbehavior for different types of FSS, i.e., 30.37%,12.62%, and 44.88% for SCTS,IPTS, and TCSS, respectively. Farmers' transformation from demand willingnessto adoption behavior is significantly affected by farmers' characteristics. Comparedwith the farmers' demand willingness model, the inhibitory factors for thetransformation behavior for FSS increased significantly, including common factorssuch as the scale of the managed forest land, the difficulty in applying for loggingpermits, getting afforestation subsidies, and the proportion of forestry income. Incontrast, these factors had the opposite influence on the demand willingness model.The number and degree of positive significant influencing factors decreased, withonly the family labor force positively influencing farmers' transformation behaviorfor SCTS. Based on the results, it is suggested to scientifically guide the orderlyflow of rural labor, promoting the moderate scale concentration of forest land flow,accelerating the speed and benefits of inclusiveness in rural finance, and resolvingissues related to farmers' loans to improve the adoption behavior of FSS by farmers.

China’s agricultural modernization hinges on integrating smallholder farmers into modern production systems, yet incomplete rural factor markets and endowment constraints hinder this transition. This study examines how capital, labor, and land constraints limit smallholders’ adoption of modern agricultural production (MAP) and whether technological progress biases exacerbate these barriers. Using panel data from Shandong and Henan (2012–2022), we find that endowment constraints reduce MAP adoption by 0.028% per 1% increase in constraints, with capital constraints being the most binding. These findings remain robust after endogeneity concerns and robustness checks. Regarding the mechanism, capital-based technological progress bias mitigates the negative impact, whereas labor-based technological progress bias exacerbates it. Smallholder farmers are generally biased towards increased use of labor-based technologies and reduced use of capital-based technologies, but the trend is gradually reversing. Policy priorities include targeted subsidies to alleviate capital constraints, land tenure reforms to facilitate scale operations, and technology extension programs tailored to smallholders’ resource endowments. These findings offer a roadmap for China’s rural revitalization strategy and broader agricultural modernization efforts in developing economies.

Based on the factor endowment theory and the agriculture-induced technological innovation theory, this study examines the impact of high-standard farmland construction (HFC) on agricultural ecological efficiency (AEE) and sustainable agricultural development. Using empirical data from 30 provinces in China between 2005 and 2022, it explores how high-standard farmland construction techniques can enhance AEE, considering factor endowment preferences and geographical characteristics. Empirical research indicates that high-standard farmland significantly enhances AEE, particularly in the eastern region, the main grain-producing areas, and the regions with less geographical fluctuation. Additionally, agricultural innovations, capital accumulation, and land circulation reinforce the benefits of such construction, whereas labor mobility has a moderating effect. Quantile regression analyses show that the impact of HFC on AEE initially increases and then diminishes, potentially due to inadequate post-management and maintenance. Consequently, the study recommends that the government enhance policy support and supervision for high-standard farmland projects, integrate agricultural technology with capital accumulation, optimize human resource allocation, guide labor mobility, and reform land transfer systems to boost AEE and sustainability.

While comparative advantage factors expand agricultural trade, trade and domestic policies and gravity factors can either promote or hinder commodity trade. We use a theoretical multicountry trade model to analyze how various factors impact agricultural trade. Following previous literature, we model cross-country productivity differences using a probabilistic distribution. We then empirically implement the theoretical model to quantify the effects of various determinants of agricultural trade. Production-inhibiting policies and tariffs hinder bilateral trade, while domestic institutional quality, support programs, and land endowments expand bilateral trade.