Green credit and industrial green total factor productivity: The impact mechanism and threshold effect tests

Green credit is an important financial policy tool to solve environmental pollution problems. Improving industrial green total factor productivity (IGTFP) is the key to promote industrial green development. Our study adopts provincial data from 2005 to 2020 to investigate the influence of green credit (GC) on IGTFP. We find that GC significantly improves IGTFP on the whole, industrial structure upgrading and green innovation are the two key impact paths. Threshold model tests show that with the increase of GC, human capital and R&D intensity, the promoting effects of GC on IGTFP are significantly enhanced. Heterogeneity tests indicate that the promoting effect of GC on IGTFP was further enhanced after 2016, GC significantly promotes IGTFP in eastern China, but it is not obvious in central and western China. Besides, the promoting effect of GC on IGTFP is significantly enhanced with the increase of IGTFP. Our research shows that the government should further optimize the green credit system and play the role of green credit in promoting green innovation and industrial structure upgrading.