An Empirical Study On The Determinants Of Environmental Information Disclosure By Chinese Listed Companies

Since the reform and opening up, with the rapid economic development, the environmental problems of China are more and more prominent. Environmental pollution and ecological damage is increasingly becoming the bottleneck of sustainable development of Chinese economic. Meanwhile, with the environmental legislation and environmental management standards becoming more stringent, the impact of environmental information to decision-making is gradually obvious. Investors want to gain the environmental information of the corporate so that they can judge the enterprises'potential profitability and businesses value and avoid environmental risks。Facing with growing external pressure and nends of the environmental information disclosure, whether listed companies have the motivation to disclose more environmental information? What are the factors restricting Chinese listed companies to disclose environmental information? This article aims to explore these issues through theoretical analysis and empirical research methods.In this paper, after conducting a theoretical analysis to the motivation of listed companies to disclose environmental information, the author empirically examine the relationships between the lever of environmental information disclosure and the factors in two aspects of corporate character and ownership structure. First of all, based on the classification methods of environmental information by Xiao Hua and Zhang Guoqing (2008), combined with the status quo of environmental information disclosure of Chinese listed companies, the author built the system of environmental information disclosure items. Secondly, the author selects 368 manufacturing firms listing on the Shanghai Stock Exchange as the sample. Then the author calculates the environmental information disclosure index according to their 2009 Annual Report and the independent environmental report (social responsibility reports and sustainable development report). Thirdly, multiple linear regression method is explored to examine the relationships between the lever of environmental information disclosure and 7 factors:company size, company profitability, company debt levels, corporate competence, equity concentration, the proportion of state-owned shares and the proportion of the outstanding shares. The results showed that:among the variables about corporate character, company size, company profitability and corporate competence are significantly positive to environmental information disclosure. The companie whose size is larger, profitability is stronger and the efficiency of assets utilization is higher, will disclosure higher level of environmental information. Company debt levels are negative to environmental information disclosure, but not significant, and the symbol is contrary to the author's predictions. Amongn the variables about the ownership structure, the stock concentration and the proportion of outstanding shares are significantly positive to environmental information disclosure, that is, the higher the shareholding concentration, the greater the proportion of outstanding shares, the higher the level of environmental information disclosure. The proportion of state-owned shares is positively related to environmental information disclosure, but not significant. The symbol is the same as expectations.Finally, based on the analysis of determinants of environmental information disclosure by Chinese listed companies, combined with the development status of Chinese capital market, this paper gives some policy recommendations on how to encourage Chinese listed companies to enhance the environmental information disclosure.