Abstract
The strong demand from the public to find new ways to both improve economy and protect nature has been evoked by “pollute first and control later”, which is the previous Chinese mode of development. With the new round of central environmental inspection approaching, should the Chinese government continue to intensify its supervision? The policy effect of the first round of central environmental inspection in 2015 can be a good reference. Based on the data from 1498 listed companies during the period between 2014 and 2018, the Levinsohn-Petrin (LP) method was used to measure enterprises’ total factor productivity. Also, a propensity score matching-difference in difference (PSM-DID) method was established to explore the impact of central environmental inspection on enterprises’ total factor productivity and its impact mechanism. The results indicate that first, central environmental inspection improved the total factor productivity of enterprises by promoting management efficiency and technological innovation. Second, the mediating effect of management efficiency accounts for approximately 16.6% of the total effect, while the mediating effect of technological innovation accounts for only 7.7% of the total effect.
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The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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We would like to thank the editor and the anonymous referees for their valuable comments on this paper.
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This work was supported by the National Social Science Foundation of China (grant number 18ZDA040).
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HW designed the study, performed the experiments and analyzed the data and was a major contributor in writing the manuscript. GY put forward the idea, designed the study, and reviewed the manuscript. YO reviewed the manuscript and edited the manuscript. JQ collected data. XO edited the manuscript. All authors read and approved to the final manuscript. All authors contributed to the study conception and design.
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Wang, H., Yang, G., Ouyang, X. et al. Does central environmental inspection improves enterprise total factor productivity? The mediating effect of management efficiency and technological innovation. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 21950–21963 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-12241-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-020-12241-6