Policy-Driven Rural E-Commerce and Carbon Emission Reduction in China: Mechanisms of Income Gap, Industrial Structure, and Digital Infrastructure Toward Village 5.0 in 2,132 Counties

While the “Comprehensive Demonstration Policy for E-commerce in Rural Areas” has been widely acknowledged for stimulating rural economic vitality, its implications for carbon emissions remain underexplored and lack sufficient empirical evidence. Leveraging this policy as a quasi-natural experiment, this article employs a multi-period Difference-in-Differences strategy on a panel dataset of 2,132 Chinese counties to assess the carbon emission impacts of rural e-commerce expansion. Notably, the results show that: (1) The advancement of rural e-commerce has a significant carbon emission reduction effect. (2) Rural e-commerce has significantly narrowed the income gap between urban and rural areas, effectively promoted industrial structure optimization, and enhanced the level of digital infrastructure to facilitate carbon emission reduction. (3) The carbon reduction effect of rural e-commerce is particularly significant in areas with high industrial development level and high disposable income of rural residents. This article has broader implications for the digital-green transition paradigm, while offering actionable insights and evidence-based strategies to help developing economies to foster integrated rural development and environmental stewardship.