Carbon emissions generated by foreign firms accounted for about a quarter of the total from all companies in China in the two decades from 1997, according to a new study.
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It also found that foreign companies produced more than half of their total carbon emissions in China’s less-developed inland areas in the 15 years up to 2012. Yet these regions were not seeing as much economic benefit from foreign investment as the coastal areas.
“The eastern coastal region gained more economic benefits, while the central and western inland regions bore heavier environmental pressures,” the lead institute of the study, the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Academy of Mathematics and Systems Science, said in a statement.
“This raises new issues for scientific assessments of carbon emission responsibilities for foreign-owned enterprises,” it added.
The study was conducted by researchers from the academy, as well as Nanjing University, University College London and the University of Birmingham. They published their findings in the peer-reviewed journal Nature Communications last month.
“MNEs [multinational enterprises] represent a non-negligible yet frequently overlooked factor in shaping carbon inequality,” the researchers said.