ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Environmental Economics and Management
The Role of Industry–Finance Cooperation Pilot Policy in Green Innovation: Evidence from Chinese Firms
Provisionally accepted
- 1Shandong Jianzhu University, Jinan, China
- 2Dongbei University of Finance and Economics, Dalian, China
- 3School of Economics, Yunnan University of Economics and Finance, Kunming, China
- 4Yunnan University of Finance and Economics, Kunming, China
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Under China's dual carbon goals, whether the Industry-Finance Cooperation Pilot Policy (IFCPP) improves both quantity and quality of corporate green innovation remains unresolved. Taking the IFCPP as a quasi-natural experiment, we use panel data of Chinese A-share listed firms (2012–2023) and the staggered DID method, measuring quantity by green invention patent applications and quality by citations. Results show the IFCPP significantly boosts both, with a stronger quality effect. It operates via a dual pathway including external dimensions of signal transmission and expectation stabilization as well as internal dimensions of resource allocation and innovation accumulation, and internal channels are more prominent. The interactions between them show that R&D investment hedges external uncertainty, financing constraint alleviation depends on external stability, and ESG strengthens internal factors. Heterogeneity analysis finds more significant quality improvement for non-SOEs, manufacturing firms, and heavily polluting industries. From economic effects, policy-induced green innovation enhances firm market value and drives regional growth via spillovers. This study shows the model of industry-finance cooperation promotes innovation transformation from "quantity-pursuing" to "quality-valuing," supporting green low-carbon transition.
Keywords: Corporate financing constraints, Corporate green innovation, Environmental social and governance performance, Industry finance cooperation pilot policy, the staggered DID
Received: 02 Dec 2025; Accepted: 09 Feb 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Jiang, Lv, Zhou and Dai. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Yu Zhou
Hui Dai
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