Obtiene el mismo resultado sin los ceros a la izquierda.
Use el tipo de datos entero para comparar valores enteros.
También puede convertir los valores sobre la marcha usando cast:
Tu ejemplo con Cast:
select if( cast('00160001' as unsigned) between cast('0013001' as unsigned)
and cast('0023000' as unsigned),1,0) as test_a,
if( cast('00200000' as unsigned) between cast('0013001' as unsigned)
and cast('0023000' as unsigned),1,0) as test_b;