The impact of economic policy uncertainty on corporate social responsibility: A new evidence from food industry in China

Abstract

The ability of the food industry to practice a high degree of corporate social responsibility is related to whether national food safety can be effectively guaranteed. By taking the food enterprises in China’s A-share listed companies from 2009–2018, this paper probes into the influence of China’s macroeconomic policy uncertainty on corporate social responsibility, and depicts the differencent impact of enterprise’s practice of social responsibility under government association and market association, respectively. The results firstly show that, the uncertainty of economic policy has a negative effect on the social responsibility of food enterprises, with a regression coefficient of -0.013. Secondly, nonstate-owned enterprises are more vulnerable to macroeconomic fluctuations in the practice of social responsibility. Thirdly, in the case of greater economic policy uncertainty, enterprises with stronger market connections in the food industry tend to be more conservative in their CSR. The above research results not only verify the path of transmission of economic policy uncertainty to corporate social responsibility, but also provide important ideas and references for improving the level of corporate social responsibility in the food industry and ensuring food safety.