新型基础设施对城乡电子商务融合发展的影响——基于双重机器学习的因果推断

The Impact of New Infrastructure on the Integrated Development of Urban-Rural E-Commerce—Based on Causal Inference with Double Machine Learning

摘要: 本文立足“数字中国”与“乡村振兴”国家战略背景，采用双重机器学习模型实证检验新型基础设施对城乡电子商务融合发展的影响效应与内在传导机制。研究发现，新型基础设施能显著正向促进城乡电子商务融合发展，其通过畅通农产品上行与工业品下行通道、降低城乡流通成本、提升供需精准匹配效率，打破城乡电商发展的数字与空间壁垒；城乡电商协同技术创新在二者之间发挥显著的部分中介作用，新型基础设施可通过提升该创新的数量与质量，实现对城乡电商融合发展的间接赋能，且融合基础设施、创新基础设施的赋能效应更为直接。本文的研究为破解城乡电商发展失衡问题、弥合城乡数字鸿沟、推动城乡经济循环畅通提供了理论依据，也为新型基础设施的城乡差异化布局优化提供了政策参考。

Abstract: Based on the national strategic context of “Digital China” and “Rural Revitalization”, this paper empirically examines the impact and internal transmission mechanism of new infrastructure on the integrated development of urban-rural e-commerce by adopting a double machine learning model. The results show that new infrastructure can significantly and positively promote the integrated development of urban-rural e-commerce. It breaks down the digital and spatial barriers to the development of urban-rural e-commerce by smoothing the upward channels for agricultural products and downward channels for industrial products, reducing urban-rural circulation costs, and improving the efficiency of supply-demand matching. Urban-rural e-commerce collaborative technological innovation plays a significant partial mediating role between the two. New infrastructure can indirectly empower the integrated development of urban-rural e-commerce by increasing the quantity and improving the quality of such innovation, with the enabling effects of integrated infrastructure and innovative infrastructure being more direct. This study provides a theoretical basis for addressing the imbalance in urban-rural e-commerce development, bridging the urban-rural digital divide, and promoting the smooth flow of urban-rural economic cycles. It also offers policy references for optimizing the urban-rural differentiated layout of new infrastructure.