The Changing Pattern of Manufacturing Specialization in Yangtze Delta Region

There are so different points of view on the real effects of similarity of industrial structures on regional development. This paper presents a couple of views on the changing pattern of manufacturing specializations in Yangtze Delta region. First, it reveals, using data of industries across 16 cities and 55 counties within this region, that the manufacturing specialization has been increased under the initiative of national industrialization during 1994—2003. Second, this study shows that the deepening of industrial specialization has been strengthened instead of existing so-called “synchronization of industrial structure”, after decomposing specialization coefficients among different cities. And third, the author also finds, that Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai has already specialized the different technological fields through the regional comparison on labor productivities and wages among 25 manufacturing sectors. This empirical evidence tends to be significant for the following observations: Yangtze Delta has been forming a very reasonable specialization model of industries with the improvement of regional transportation networks and the increasing mobility of product factors.