By Tian Hui, Research Institute of Finance, DRC

Research Report, No.116, 2018 (Total 5391) 2018-7-26

Abstract: Environmental information disclosure of enterprises is a basic system supporting the green financial development. However, the current enterprise environmental information disclosure in China is not perfect. The analysis findings on listed companies show that viewing from the perspective of accessibility, the number of listed companies which are making relevant disclosures is quite limited; viewing from the perspective of availability, key environmental information is inadequate; viewing from the perspective of reliability, the accuracy and completeness of disclosure are not verified by the third party. The above-mentioned facts are due to the loose requirements of relevant regulatory rules, including: disclosure rules have low legal effect and systematic coordination mechanism is not in place and rules are not matched with the importance of green development; the disclosure is made on a voluntary basis for enterprises and the government does not send a clear signal to the market for imperative disclosure; clear guidance for specific disclosure requirements is not made in light of China’s national conditions. Policy options are raised as follows: relevant government departments need to jointly issue normative documents on information disclosure; the government needs to set out the general target for enterprise environmental information disclosure and implement it in different stages; the supporting mechanism needs to be improved further.

Key words: environmental information disclosure, green finance, listed companies