Research On The Impact Of ESG On Total Factor Productivity Of Enterprises

China’s economy has entered a stage of high-quality development,according to the 14 th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People’s Republic of China and the 2035 Vision.Enterprises are micro components of the overall social economy.Whether enterprises can improve the efficiency of resource allocation,enhance the innovation ability and improve the total factor productivity is crucial to promote the high-quality development of the Chinese economy.Because our capital market is still imperfect,the asymmetric information phenomenon between enterprises and investors restricts enterprises from obtaining capital source and does not affect the high quality development of enterprises.The concept of Environment,Social and Governance(ESG)proposed by the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment(UNPRI)in 2006 emphasizes that enterprises should pay attention to protecting the environment and ecology,actively fulfill social responsibilities,and improve their own governance capacity.It is comprehensive.ESG rating enables investors to evaluate enterprises not only from the perspective of economic benefits,but also from the perspective of environmental performance and social performance,so as to assess the quality of enterprises more accurately,thus promoting the positive communication and interaction between enterprises and investors.Therefore,studying the relationship between ESG performance and total factor productivity of enterprises and its influencing mechanism is of great significance for enterprises to actively practice ESG concept,improve their competitiveness and achieve sustainable and high-quality development.First,this paper summarizes and defines ESG performance and total factor productivity of enterprises.Based on sustainable development theory,information asymmetry theory,signal transmission theory and stakeholder theory,the research hypothesis of this paper is proposed.With the data of Chinese listed enterprises from2011 to 2021 as samples,the impact of ESG performance on total factor productivity of enterprises is discussed through empirical test.And the influence process of ESG performance on the total factor productivity of enterprises,including the mediating role of technological innovation level and financing constraints in this process and the moderating role of analysts’ attention.On this basis,it further studies whether there are differences in the impact of ESG performance on total factor productivity of enterprises under different property rights,different industries and different life cycles.The results show that: first,good ESG performance can improve the total factor productivity of enterprises;Second,the level of technological innovation and financing constraints can play an intermediary role in the process of ESG performance affecting the total factor productivity of enterprises.Third,analysts focus on the positive adjustment of the impact of ESG on the total factor productivity of enterprises.Fourth,the heterogeneity analysis shows that the ESG performance of state-owned enterprises and heavily polluting industries has a more significant positive impact on total factor productivity.In different life cycles,the positive effect of ESG performance on total factor productivity of growing and mature enterprises is more obvious than that of declining enterprises.Finally,based on the above conclusions,this paper puts forward some suggestions from the perspectives of government and enterprise.