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This paper addresses the optimal path selection problem for economic corridors, which is a significant issue in the field of geo-economics. The paper has utilized the spatiotemporal characteristics of geo-economics and identified the development needs in this field to propose an improved ant colony optimization (ACO) strategy. The proposed strategy focuses on enhancing the heuristic function, functional area setting, and pheromone updating strategy. The heuristic factors and transfer probabilities have been improved to couple the path nature, which were based on an analysis of the factors that influence geo-economics. This improvement enhances the applicability of the ACO to path selection problems in macrospace. Additionally, the paper has differentiated the priority of path nodes by setting functional areas, which adds directionality to path selection. The improved ACO has been applied to analyze the optimal path in macroscopic economic space. The experimental validation was conducted in the Indo-Pacific region and economic corridors in China within this region, and corresponding potential geo-economic hubs were analyzed. The experimental results were validated using the Mann−Whitney U test and an evaluation method based on path effectiveness. The feasibility and objectivity of the proposed method were verified. This research provides a valuable exploration of the problem of path selection in macrospace and time and provides decision aid for the construction and adjustment development of a country’s geo-economic relations in a given region. It is a technical reference for establishing sustainable development strategies and national and regional economic planning. Overall, this work contributes significantly to the field of geo-economics and demonstrates the effectiveness of the proposed method through experimental validation.
Zhao et al. (Tue,) studied this question.