Female Directors and Carbon Information Disclosure: Evidence from China

Abstract

In recent years, natural disasters and public health events caused by global warming have occurred frequently around the world. It has become a global consensus to actively respond to climate change. Firms are the main source of greenhouse gas emissions. The disclosure of carbon information is one of the most important ways for firms to respond to climate change. The effect of female directors on carbon information disclosure is still unclear. Considering that China is the largest country in greenhouse gas emissions and the social status of females in China is different from western countries, this paper explores the effect of female directors on carbon information disclosure by firms in China. Based on the sample of listed Chinese firms in high carbon industries during the period of 2012–2017, our empirical results show that female directors have a positive association with carbon information disclosure. In addition, we find that the power, educational level, and financial background of female directors have positive impacts on firms’ carbon information disclosure. Our findings make a significant contribution to the ongoing debate on the role of female directors and provide new insights and policy implications for firms, regulators, and other stakeholders.

Impact of Carbon Information on Enterprise Value: Analysis Model Design Based on Big Data

“…e high-quality carbon information disclosure of these foreign enterprises has been actively promoted by investors and local laws and regulations [6,7]. e US government promulgated the mandatory greenhouse gas reporting system in 2009, which stipulates that certain special industries and companies that emit more than 25000 tons of greenhouse gas per year must report to the EPA.…”

How do Independent Directors View Carbon Information Disclosure? Evidence From China

“…Among the other corporate governance mechanism researchers have identified institutional ownership (Akbaş and Canikli, 2018), family ownership (Terlaak et al, 2018) and board effectiveness (Ben-Amar and McIlkenny, 2015). In addition to the firm specific factors and corporate governance factors, some studies have linked GHG emissions with some other factors such as industry regulations (Peng et al, 2015), stakeholders pressure (Liesen et al, 2015), legal system (Luo and Tang, 2016) and culture (Freedman and Jaggi, 2005;He et al, 2021a). However, how the independent director plays a role in…”

“…The data collected in this study is taken from multiple sources. Firstly, based on the study conducted by (He et al, 2021a), we collect data for CID from the Ministry of Environmental Protection of China, which has identified the 16 industries involved in polluting the environment. These industries are, thermal power generation, steel, cement, electrolytic aluminum, coal, metallurgy, chemicals, petrochemicals, building material, paper, brewing, pharmaceuticals, fermentation, textile, leather, and mining.…”

“…In this study we used some controlled variable pertaining to corporate governance as well. Studies have shown that ownership concentration effects the CID (He et al, 2021a). In countries where corporate governance is weak, ownership concentration acts as a substitute (Shleifer and Vishny, 1986).…”

Audit partners’ gender and time variances of key audit matters

“…Due to the excessive self-esteem and the need for recognitions, narcissists tend to develop excessive recognition and dominance in their professional domain (Maccoby, 2003). Because audit failure can tarnish audit partners' reputations (He et al, 2021), narcissistic audit partners will have strong motivation to conduct high-quality audits (Nevicka et al, 2016) and will withstand against the possible compromise of independence. Alternatively, narcissistic audit partners may have less regards for public backlash arising from audit failure.…”