Abstract: The Malmquist productivity index is employed to explore the relationship between the protection strength of regional intellectual property rights and international technology spillovers. Based on the empirical investigation on provincial panel data during the period of 1995-2007, the following conclusions are come to: First, the domestic R&D inputs and human capitals are the major impetus of Chinese economic growth, human capital is the major factor that pushes the fast growth in the eastern part of China, R&D inputs is especially important for the development in the middle and western regions of China. Second, the protection strength of intellectual property rights has significantly promoted the technology spillover of international trade channel in all regions, while it shows a significant regional discrepancy on the technology spillover of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) channel. Specifically, the protection strength of intellectual property rights in the western region of China is of benefit to the technology spillover of FDI channel; while the cases remain uncertain in both middle and eastern regions of China, and negative effects might show in the eastern region of China due to slack law enforcement.

Key words: Malmquist productivity index, FDI, international trade, technology spillover, intellectual property right protection