Research On The Environmental Governance Effect Of Leading Officials’ Accountability Audit Of Natural Resources

The third plenary session of the 18 th CPC Central Committee proposed for the first time to explore the implementation of " leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources " in 2013.From 2014 to 2017,the leading officials’ accountability audit pilot work was carried out in succession throughout the country,and was fully implemented in 2018.As an important part of the national governance system,whether the implementation of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources has effectively played the role of environmental governance,and what environmental governance effect will it have?This paper firstly reviews the domestic and foreign literature related to the effect of environmental governance and the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources,and defines the concepts of the two;Secondly,based on the public accountability theory,sustainable development theory,and national governance theory,the environmental governance effect of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources was studied in the context of the 2014 leaving audit pilot,and the period of 2010-2017 was selected as the research interval to collect the provincial level data of 30 provinces and the data of A-share listed companies,through the empirical test,the direct environmental governance effect and indirect environmental governance effect of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources are discussed in depth,and the results are tested for robustness.Further,the data from2018 to 2020 are used to test whether the direct and indirect environmental governance effects of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources have long-term effects.The research results of this paper are as follows,firstly,the implementation of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources will have direct environmental governance effects,including: 1)It can promote local governments to increase investment in environmental protection.2)It can promote the economical and intensive use of natural resources in areas under the jurisdiction of local governments.This is reflected in the obvious increase in the green coverage rate of the built-up areas in the pilot areas.3)It can promote the improvement of the ecological environment quality in the areas under the jurisdiction of the local government.This is reflected in the obvious reduction of industrial wastewater discharge and industrial sulfur dioxide discharge in the pilot area.Secondly,the implementation of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources will have indirect environmental governance effects,including: 1)It can promote enterprises in the areas under the jurisdiction of the local government to increase investment in environmental protection.2)Compared with non-heavy pollution enterprises,the implementation of leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources can promote the increase of environmental protection investment of heavy pollution enterprises.3)Compared to enterprises in the western region,the implementation of leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources can promote enterprises in the eastern and central regions to increase investment in environmental protection.Thirdly,further research found that the direct environmental governance effect of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources has a long-term effect,while the indirect environmental governance effect of the leading officials’ accountability audit of natural resources does not have a longterm effect.