The Pollution Abatement Effect of Environmental Information Disclosure: Based on Quasi-Natural Experiments

Abstract

Environmental information disclosure is an important exploration to promote corporate pollution abatement and the development of China's green economy. Based on China's environmental information disclosure policy implemented in 2007 as a quasi-natural experiment, this paper empirically tests whether it has a pollution abatement effect using Chinese industrial pollution emission data and industrial enterprise data from 2004-2014. It is found that environmental information disclosure has a significant pollution emission reduction effect, and the conclusion still holds after a series of robustness tests, including parallel trend tests, placebo tests, and instrumental variables tests. Meanwhile, environmental information disclosure reduces firms' pollution emissions by promoting industrial structure upgrading, emission reduction technology progress, reducing FDI, and improving firms' total factor productivity. Further analysis shows that the pollution emission reduction effect is more pronounced in non-resourcebased cities, coastal areas, areas with stronger environmental regulations, non-state enterprises, and exporting enterprises.