Grey Relational Analysis of Industrial Structure and Economic Growth in Guangdong Province from an Incremental Perspective

Abstract

The optimization and upgrading of the industrial structure are key drivers of high-quality economic development. As the largest provincial economy in China, Guangdong’s industrial evolution serves as a bellwether for the nation. Based on an incremental perspective, this paper measures the correlation between industrial fluctuations and GDP in Guangdong Province from 2014 to 2023.The research results indicate that the Tertiary Industry shows the highest degree of correlation, with other service industries and Transportation, Storage & Postal services performing particularly prominently; In the Secondary Industry, the synchronization of the Construction Industry is significantly higher than that of the industrial sector, indicating that the investment side within the secondary industry is more sensitive to incremental fluctuations. The Primary Industry has the lowest synchronization, which is consistent with the characteristics of Guangdong’s agricultural structure. Based on these findings, this paper proposes policy recommendations to provide references for the sustained and healthy development of Guangdong Province’s economy.