Faced with an increasingly tight resource supply, serious environmental pollution and degrading ecosystems, human beings are eager to reduce environmental pollution and promote public health. In this context, this paper takes the ecological civilization demonstration area (ECDA) established in China as a quasi-natural experiment to test whether ecological civilization construction (ECC) is an effective solution for the reduction of environmental pollution and improvement of public health. Based on the panel data of 31 provinces in China from 2009 to 2020, the study analyzes the impact of ECC on environmental quality and public health by employing a difference-in-difference model. The results show that ECDA has restrained environmental pollution and reduced the morbidity and mortality, which indicates that ECC effectively promotes environmental quality and public health. The effect of ECC is more pronounced in economically developed regions. In addition, ECC improves environmental quality through scale effects, structural effects, technology effects, and ecological conservation effects, while the positive effects of ECC on public health are driven by scale effects and ecological conservation effects only. Therefore, policymakers should support low-carbon production, promote the upgrade of industrial structures, and encourage enterprises to develop green technologies. Ecological protection projects such as afforestation and greening are necessary. Governments should initiate ecological civilization construction in economically developed regions and then gradually promote the policies in relatively poor areas.
Keywords: difference-in-difference model; ecological civilization construction; ecological civilization demonstration area; environmental quality; public health.