Evaluation and Factor Analysis of the Intensive Use of Urban Land Based on Technical Efficiency Measurement—A Case Study of 38 Districts and Counties in Chongqing, China

Reasonable evaluation of the intensive urban land use has emerged as an important issue and hot topic for urban development. This paper aims to construct a unified framework for evaluating the intensive use of urban land and analyzing its influence channels. It combines the advantages of the approach of the indicator system and that of efficiency measurement, and provides an empirical test to apply this analytical framework using the panel data of 38 districts and counties in Chongqing, China, ranging from 2009 to 2018. To achieve our goals, we used the panel data model and stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) model with decomposed technical inefficiency. Our results show that: (1) the level of intensive use of urban land in all districts and counties of Chongqing is steadily increasing, and the gap among regions is narrowing, (2) all districts and counties of Chongqing face severe and increasing difficulty in improving their intensive urban land use, and, (3) currently, the degree of external dependence is not a stable influential factor for land-use efficiency and intensive potential in these districts and counties, and improving the land use structure, increasing population density, strengthening fiscal expenditure on education, and promoting transportation convenience can markedly reduce land use inefficiency and simultaneously increase intensive land use. In conclusion, the framework for evaluating intensive use of urban land based on the SFA model with decomposed technical inefficiency can better integrate intensive land-use evaluation and the factor analysis process, and retain the scalability of factor analysis. For all districts and counties in Chongqing, we clarify several effective channels to promote the intensive use of urban land, which provides reference and technical support for formulating land policies.