A Study On The Influencing Factors Of Environmental Accounting Information Disclosure Of Listed Companies In China's Iron And Steel Industry

Iron and steel industry is on one hand a significant contributor to China's modern economy,however on the other hand,is causing severe pollution to our nation's delicate environmental system.China's rapid economic growth has unquestionably ranked ourselves among the international advanced economic entities which have been long led by western superpowers.Unfortunately,China has not been spared the same environmental collapse that all these superpowers have went through.As the core competence of our national economic growth,iron and steel industry has relentlessly developed itself at the expense of the health of our air condition,soil quality,water system,and many other ecosystems.Numerous pollution-related disasters on China's mainland have led to not only a nation-wide attention,but also a broad range of concerns from societies and science institutions all over the globe.Despite of the enduring public appeal and the heart-broken tragedies,the levels of corporate disclosure have continuously been significantly uneven and in-satisfyingly ambiguous against the government's general notices.The major reason for these massive undocumented pollution,and countless manipulated reports,is that China has no mandatory standards and enforceable regulations on corporate environmental accounting disclosure.This paper will demonstrate that enterprises with long-term stable development and relatively large scale tend to pay more attention on their environmental social responsibilities.In addition,this paper will present that companies with higher level of stock equity concentration statistically provide more transparent and elaborate environmental disclosure documents.Multiple analyses indicate that a separation of ownership and the management rights will also improve the disclosure transparency and depth.This paper will study several public records of distinctive listed companies in China's iron and steel industry.All business data is generated from those companies' corporate environmental accounting disclosure quality statistics.The government-graded scores of above statistics range from a full marks of ten to zero,from which we can establish a quantifiable compare and comparison.All data is analyzed by SPSS software and demonstrated in linear regression models in order to identify the key influencing factors and discuss the potential impacts.Studied factors include: corporate profitability,debt level,the proportion of independent directors,the scale of enterprises,the growth rate of business income,the concentration of ownership,the separation of ownership and the management rights,and the location of enterprises.This paper will prove that factors such as the scale of enterprises,the concentration of ownership,state-owned stock-holding system,and the separation of ownership and the management rights,have prominently influences on the level of environmental accounting information disclosure.Analyzed data will present an evidently linear correlation between above factors and the different levels of disclosure.Other factors,while not showing a direct linear correlation,are as well relevant to the transparency and comprehensiveness of the disclosure.Based on the results of this study,we urge China's government to establish detailed and enforceable policies and standards with specific requirements and comprehensive templates.A targeted screening and inspection method should be designed to supervise those companies with negative factors,and to encourage them to improve their levels of environmental accounting information disclosure and fulfill their social environmental responsibilities.