No abstract

This study examines the impact of China's green credit policy on the environment. In particular, we consider an initiative that requires all banks to base their loan decisions on corporate environmental performance. This is an important issue since it is globally gaining popularity to leverage bank loans as an avenue to enforce corporate environmental responsibility. Moreover, there are only a handful of empirical investigations in relation to the impacts of credit constraint on corporate environmental behaviors and strategies. This research also provides useful insights on how to enhance environmental regulation enforcement, using the Environmental Protection Bureau in partnership with local banks to exert a creditable threat of financial constraint on unfavorable environmental outcomes. Using the synthetic control method and difference‐in‐differences analysis, we find that this policy has significantly motivated firms, particularly those firms with a higher dependence on external financing, to reduce water pollution. We further discover that the policy compels firms to favor pollution prevention at the source instead of end‐of‐pipe treatments, since the policy imposes a long‐term credit constraint on pollution.

There is increasing concern about another influenza pandemic in China. However, the understanding of the roles of transport modes in the 2009 influenza A(H1N1) pandemic spread across mainland China is limited. Herein, we collected 127,797 laboratory-confirmed cases of influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 in mainland China from May 2009 to April 2010. Arrival days and peak days were calculated for all 340 prefectures to characterize the dissemination patterns of the pandemic. We first evaluated the effects of airports and railway stations on arrival days and peak days, and then we applied quantile regressions to quantify the relationships between arrival days and air, rail, and road travel. Our results showed that early arrival of the virus was not associated with an early incidence peak. Airports and railway stations in prefectures significantly advanced arrival days but had no significant impact on peak days. The pandemic spread across mainland China from the southeast to the northwest in two phases that were split at approximately 1 August 2009. Both air and road travel played a significant role in accelerating the spread during phases I and II, but rail travel was only significant during phase II. In conclusion, in addition to air and road travel, rail travel also played a significant role in accelerating influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 spread between prefectures. Establishing a multiscale mobility network that considers the competitive advantage of rail travel for mid to long distances is essential for understanding the influenza pandemic transmission in China.

Ambient fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) exposure has been linked to decreased semen quality, but the associations between PM 2.5 constituent exposures and semen quality remain unknown. We enrolled 1081 men whose partners underwent assisted reproductive technology procedures in Wuhan, China in 2014−2015, and examined their semen quality. Daily average concentrations of PM 2.5 constituents including 10 metals/metalloid elements and 4 water-soluble ions were continuously determined for 1 week per month at 2 fixed monitoring stations. Linear mixed models were used to examine the associations of exposures to PM 2.5 and its constituents with semen quality. Each interquartile range (36.5 μg/m 3 ) increase in PM 2.5 exposure was significantly associated with 8.5% (95% CI: 2.3%, 14.4%) and 8.1% (95% CI: 0.7%, 15.0%) decrease in sperm concentration and total sperm number, respectively. Antimony, cadmium, lead, manganese, and nickel exposures were significantly associated with decreased sperm concentration, whereas manganese exposure was also significantly associated with decreased total motility. Nonsmokers were more susceptible to PM 2.5 constituent exposures, especially for antimony and cadmium (all P for effect modification <0.05). These findings suggest that PM 2.5 and certain constituents may adversely affect semen quality, especially sperm concentration, and provide new evidence to formulate pollution abatement strategies for male reproductive health.