’Greening Chinese business’

Archiv – Ulrich Steger of the International Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland, along with Fang Zhaoben and Lu Wei of the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), have jointly compiled a book entitled: ’Greening Chinese business – barriers, trends and opportunities for environmental management’. According to the authors, environmental regulation in China is not very different from that in the rest of the world, except that environmental authorities are less well established.Ulrich Steger of the International Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland, along with Fang Zhaoben and Lu Wei of the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), have jointly compiled a book entitled: ’Greening Chinese business – barriers, trends and opportunities for environmental management’. According to the authors, environmental regulation in China is not very different from that in the rest of the world, except that environmental authorities are less well established. In order to understand why corporate environmental performance has hardly improved despite the existing regulatory framework, empirical research on high-level executives’ perceptions of environmental protection is therefore deemed essential.
The book analyses and interprets Chinese managers’ perceptions of environmental management and regulatory enforcement practices. Most importantly, it identifies the bottlenecks to environmental protection among Chinese firms. It also presents two case studies that illustrate how Chinese corporations currently react to a wide range of different environmental challenges, including hardening regulatory pressure, competition and lack of capital. Over 300 companies – both state-owned enterprises and SMEs – took part in the research.
Key findings include the following:
* Around 70% of managers admitted to moderate or even substantial environmental impact;
* Managers hesitate to take necessary action to upgrade technical equipment because, while this would decrease pollution, it would also lead to lay-offs that in turn would diminish social stability. Since the latter is the top priority in China, managers fear loss of company image;
* Regulatory enforcement has been sufficiently strong to put environmental management on Chinese managers’ ’to-do’ list, but managers criticise existing enforcement practices as too lax and opaque due to local protectionism, bribery and lack of expertise within enforcement institutions;
* Similarities exist between the current Chinese approach and that of ’state-of-the-art’ industrial centres in OECD countries such as Germany in the 1960s. Apart from a lack of capital, managers cite a lack of expertise – managerial more than technical – as the main obstacle to ’greening’ their organisations.
The 191-page hardback book is available from Greenleaf Publishing in the U.K. for US$ 75. The book can be ordered with a 10% discount from the Greenleaf website at: www.greenleaf-publishing.com/catalogue/china.htm