The Impact of Local Government Green Attention on Firms’ New Quality Productive Forces: Evidence from China’s A-Share Listed Companies

Drawing on a panel of 31,025 firm-year observations from Chinese A-share listed companies over 2010–2024, this study examines the relationship between local government green attention (GreenAtt) and corporate new quality productive forces (NQPF). GreenAtt is derived from prefecture-level government work reports, while corporate NQPF is measured using a multidimensional composite index. In the fully specified fixed-effects model, the estimated coefficient on GreenAtt is 0.000150 and is statistically significant at the 5% level. A one-standard-deviation increase in GreenAtt is associated with an estimated increase of approximately 0.004 in NQPF, equivalent to about 3.5% of the dependent variable’s sample standard deviation. This finding remains robust across multiple robustness checks and alternative model specifications. Further mechanism-related regressions show a negative association between GreenAtt and financing constraints and a positive association between GreenAtt and green innovation, consistent with the proposed mechanisms. Environmental regulation also moderates this relationship, with the interaction between GreenAtt and environmental regulation exhibiting a positive and statistically significant coefficient. When environmental regulation is one standard deviation above its sample mean, the estimated marginal effect of GreenAtt is approximately 31.2% greater than its value at the mean level of regulation. Heterogeneity analyses indicate that the positive relationship is stronger among non-state-owned enterprises, firms outside heavily polluting industries, and firms located in resource-based cities. Overall, these findings provide firm-level evidence linking local governments’ green policy priorities to corporate productive upgrading and highlight differences across institutional and industrial contexts.