Title: Environmental Regulation, Emissions and Productivity: Evidence from Chinese COD-emitting Manufactures

Author: Chunhua Wang and Bing Zhang  

Speaker: Chunhua Wang
Abstract: This paper examines the impacts of limiting COD emissions on output for the desired goods of firms from eight major emitting industries. Specifically, we estimate two equations: 1) a production function which treats emission as an input for producing the desired goods; 2) an emission function which relates materials consumption and a regulation measure to COD emissions. We construct data sample from three major sources. The first is the Annual Surveys of Industrial Production (ASIP) from 1998 through 2007.  The second dataset, environmental survey and reporting (ESR) dataset, contains information about emissions of major pollutants such as COD in major emitting firms or plants. By primarily using legal code of the firms in the ASIP and the ERS, we merge the firm-level data from the two sources. They are then linked to information from the third source about COD regulation in China.Econometric results suggest that limiting COD emission decreases output value, but it is quite small in magnitude. Our empirical results indicate that a 1% reduction in COD emission causes only about 0.01% reduction in output value of the COD-emitting industries. China’s regional strategy of choosing key regulation and targeted industries has no significant impact on the firm’s COD emission. The results are robust across several specifications of our econometric models. As for heterogeneities, we find that the impact is relatively smaller in firms from eastern than those from the western part of the country.  

About Chunhua Wang: He is an associate professor at University of International Business and Economics

Date: March,17th,2016

Time: 15:40-17:00 PM  

Location: Room 608, Academic Hall, CUFE