Cross-national knowledge transfer, absorptive capacity, and total factor productivity: the intermediary effect test of international technology spillover

ABSTRACT

Knowledge has become the most important factor of production with the emergence of the knowledge economy. We use the system GMM estimation method to analyze how cross-national knowledge transfer (CNKT) impacts the total factor productivity (TFP) of China’s 31 provinces and evolution of China’s ability to absorb foreign knowledge. We also examine the possible intermediary effects of foreign direct investment (FDI), outward FDI, import trade, export trade, and direct technology spillovers between CNKT and TFP. We find that: (1) CNKT improves China’s TFP and positively impacts FDI, import trade, export trade, and direct technology spillover; It shows that CNKT not only helps to improve China’s TFP, but also provides innovative knowledge reserve for the absorption of international technology spillovers. (2) The improvement in the domestic infrastructure construction level, R&D capacity, human capital, economic development and openness has obvious absorption effect on CNKT, which is conducive to the absorption and utilisation of international advanced knowledge. (3) FDI, import trade, and direct technology spillover play a partial mediating role between CNKT and TFP, and the intermediary effect of import trade technology spillover is the strongest.

KEYWORDS:

• Cross-national knowledge transfer
• absorptive capacity
• total factor productivity
• international technology spillover

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Referring to the research of Li and Liu (2012), and considering the availability of data, this paper selects countries and regions as the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Sweden, the Netherlands, Japan, Canada, Italy, Australia, South Korea and Hong Kong.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China: [Grant Number 42071154]; National Social Science Foundation of China (Grant Number 19BGJ033); Ministry of Education Humanities and Social Sciences Planning Fund (Grant Number 20YJA790010).

Notes on contributors

Haichao Yu

Haichao Yu, Doctor of Economic Development in Regional Study in Wuhan University. Dr. Yu’s research mainly focuses on the regional economic development and regional innovation.

Jianqing Zhang

Jianqing Zhang, Prof. of World Economics in Wuhan University, Supervisor for Doctor Degree Candidates. Prof. Zhang's research focuses on the international trade, applied mircoeconometrics, regional Economics.

Minqi Zhang

Minqi Zhang, Master of Arts which specialized in international political economy in University of Birmingham. Minqi Zhang‘a research mainly focuses on the study of international economy, globalisation and global governnace.

Fei Fan

Fei Fan, Associate Prof. of Economic Development, Supervisor for Doctor Degree Candidates, Post-doctoral Researcher of Economics. Prof. Fan’s research focuses on the science and technology globalisation, the industrial location, the urban and regional innovation. He has presided over 9 research programmes from the Chinese Nature Science Foundation, the Chinese Post-doctoral Science Foundation, the Soft-science Research Project of Hubei Province. He has published over 30 academic papers in some important academic journals, including some top academic journals. He is the visiting scholar of University of Queensland, Australia. He is an active researcher of the Global Innovation and Development Institute of East China Normal University. He is also very active in the Chinese Regional Science Association and the Chinese Regional Economics Academy.