The Impact of Digital Transformation on Reducing the Embodied Carbon Emission Intensity of Enterprises’ Exports

In an increasingly complex and severe international environment, accurate measurement of enterprises’ embodied carbon emissions in export and their influencing factors can help China to achieve sustainable development of exports. Based on the data of China’s A-share listed companies, matched data from the customs database, OECD multinational enterprises activity database and China carbon emission accounting database, the multi-regional input-output model with differentiation between domestic and foreign capital is applied to calculate embodied carbon emission intensity in export at the enterprise level, and the impact of digital transformation on embodied carbon emission intensity of enterprises in export is examined. The paper shows that digital transformation can significantly reduce embodied carbon emission intensity of enterprises; digital transformation inhibits the increase of embodied carbon emission intensity of enterprises by reducing the intensity of enterprise energy consumption, promoting enterprise green technological innovation, and optimising the export structure of enterprises. Heterogeneity analysis shows that digital transformation has a more significant inhibiting effect on the embodied carbon emission intensity of domestically-funded and capital-intensive enterprises in China; relative to the eastern region, the digital transformation of enterprises in the central and western regions has a stronger inhibiting effect of the embodied carbon emission intensity, and the enhancement of the degree of environmental regulation in the region effectively promotes enterprises in the region to achieve the reduction of the embodied carbon emission intensity by means of digital transformation.