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ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Can Environmental Regulations Promote Firms’
Proenvironmental Behavior?
Micro Evidence on Environmental
Product Imports
1
School of Economics, Shandong Technology and Business University, Yantai 264005, China
2
School of Economics, Ocean University of China, Qingdao 266101, China
3
School of Economics and Management, Qinghai Minzu University, Xining 810007, China
Submission date: 2024-04-23
Final revision date: 2024-07-11
Acceptance date: 2024-07-24
Online publication date: 2024-11-22
Publication date: 2025-07-22
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2025;34(5):5527-5538
KEYWORDS
environmental regulationproenvironmental behaviorenvironmental product importscost effecttechnology effect
TOPICS
ABSTRACT
How firms respond to environmental regulations is the key to measuring the effect of these
regulations, and firms taking the initiative to assume environmental responsibility and adopt more
proenvironmental behaviors in the production decision-making process is crucial for green development.
Based on the databases of merged Chinese industrial enterprises, firm pollution discharge, and customs,
this paper examines the influence and mechanism of environmental regulation on the proenvironmental
behavior of enterprises from the perspective of environmental products. Benchmark analysis revealed
that environmental regulations improve the extension and intensive margins of firms’ environmental
products. That is, environmental regulations effectively promote firms’ proenvironmental behavior.
The mechanism analysis reveals that the cost effect and technology effect are important factors
influencing the impact of environmental regulations on the proenvironmental behavior of firms.
Furthermore, the expansion analysis shows that the influence of market incentives and command-andcontrol
environmental regulations on firms’ proenvironmental behavior is more significant and that
the effect of public voluntary environmental regulation is relatively weak. This paper provides useful
policy implications for improving the policy effect of environmental regulations from a microperspective.
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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