Rural residents’ pro-environmental behavior plays a critical role in rural environmental governance. This paper examines how the perception of government environmental information disclosure (EID) can promote rural residents’ pro-environmental behavior (PEB) using a questionnaire survey. Using Zhejiang province of China as a case study, we designed a four-stage mixed sampling method, which yielded 783 valid responses. We used ordinary least squares (OLS), an ordinal logit model and a mediation effect model to draw our conclusions. The results indicated that the EID had a positive impact on the PEB of rural residents. It is also evident that personal environmental concerns (PECs) play a partially mediating role between EID and PEB. Moreover, the impact of EID on PEB is heterogeneous in terms of residents’ age and workplace. This research contributes to insights into the promotion of guiding rural residents’ PEB and improving ecological environment management.

Using a sample of 2822 Chinese A-listed firms over the 2002–2015 period and the propensity score matching with difference-in-differences (PSM-DID) approach, we estimate the causality of environmental information disclosure (EID)’s impact on investment efficiency based on a quasi-experiment in 2007. This paper finds strong and robust evidence that there is a significant positive connection between EID and company investment efficiency in China. We further determine that heterogeneity of EID’s performance appears in the different settings of industry and subdivision industries. The significance of several sub-industries disappeared while the others retained larger significant coefficients than the whole industry case. The probability that an enterprise issues an environmental annual report has a significant positive link with investment efficiency in heavy industry, while this relationship is weakened or even not obvious in non-heavy polluting industries. Finally, we find that employee compensation serves as a mediator from which EID has an indirect effect on investment efficiency. Our results confirm that EID plays a vital role in firm-level capital allocation efficiency.

In global trade, the manufacture and consumption of cotton textile products are intervening in the hydrological cycle. To address the relationship between the product system and the unsustainable use of local water resources, a spatial water footprint assessment is needed. This study presents a spatial water footprint method that was demonstrated in the case of domestically produced cotton T-shirts in three recycle scenarios. The results showed that the water scarcity footprint of conventional T-shirt, eco T-shirt, recycled T-shirt is 2.45 H₂O eq, 1.74 H₂O eq, 8 × 10⁻² H₂O eq, respectively, and the water-eutrophication footprint of conventional T-shirt, eco T-shirt, recycled T-shirt is 1.18 × 10⁻² PDF·m²·yr⁻¹, 9.47 × 10⁻³ PDF·m²·yr⁻¹, 4.04 × 10⁻³ PDF·m²·yr⁻¹, respectively. Two interesting results have been found. Firstly, the hydrosphere has been affected by manufacture and consumption; thus any choice made by manufacturers and consumers may lead to an impact on the water resource in a region that is far from the location. Secondly, the effect of water footprint reduction will be more apparent in places with severe water stress. The spatial water footprint offers a transparent result of each phase’s potential contribution to the local environment and could make a quantitative comparison between product stages, products, and local impacts. Thus, spatial water footprint will be a critical component in the sustainability management improvement of the supply chain.

To present great environmental pressure from energy consumption during textile production, this paper calculates the energy footprint (EFP) of Shaoxing’s textile industry, from 2005 to 2018. Moreover, this study analyzes the relationship between Shaoxing’s textile industry energy consumption and economic development by using decoupling theory. Furthermore, the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index decomposition method was employed to investigate the main factors that affect the EFP of Shaoxing’s textile industry. Research results show the following: (1) The growth rate of the total output value of Shaoxing’s textile industry was greater than the growth rate of the EFP, from 2005 to 2007. Thus, the decoupling state showed a weak decoupling, and EFP intensity decreased. (2) The EFP and economic growth were mainly based on the strong decoupling of Shaoxing’s textile industry from 2008 to 2015 (except for 2011), and EFP intensity declined further. (3) Economic recession in the textile industry was severe in Shaoxing, from 2016 to 2018, and the EFP also showed a downward trend. The state of decoupling appeared as a recessive decoupling (2016) and a weak negative decoupling (2017 and 2018), and EFP intensity first increased and then decreased. (4) The total effect of the factors affecting the EFP of the textile industry in Shaoxing demonstrated a pulling trend, and industrial scale played a significant role in driving the EFP. The energy consumption intensity effect contributed the largest restraint. This paper fills in the gaps in the environmental regulation means and methods of pillar industrial clusters in specific regions.

Water footprint is an indicator to quantify the potential environmental impacts related to water. Current methods for the water footprint assessment can only obtain the results which are typically reported as a profile of impact category indicator results. Due to the diverse and incomparable results, the demand for a single indicator for water footprint assessment is highlighted in recent years. In this paper, an improved approach integrating water quantity and quality into a single indicator was proposed for water footprint assessment. Then, a case study for water footprint assessment of Zhejiang’s textile industry was analyzed with this approach. The results revealed that the comprehensive assessment indicator of water footprint (CAIwf) of Zhejiang’s textile industry decreased more than 20% from 2008 to 2018. CAIwf and endpoint indicator of water footprint (WFend) obtained with volumetric water footprint approach depicted similar tendencies to the CAIwf and WFend obtained with impact-oriented water footprint approach. Among the three sub-sectors of Zhejiang’s textile industry, the CAIwf of textile manufacture sector was the largest, followed by chemical fiber manufacture sector and clothing manufacture sector.