Does environmental regulation indirectly induce upstream innovation? New evidence from India

Pavel Chakraborty and Chirantan Chatterjee

Research Policy, 2017, vol. 46, issue 5, 939-955

Abstract: Exploiting a quasi-natural experiment, which involves the imposition of a ban by Germany in 1994 on an input (‘Azo-dyes’) used by the Indian leather and textile industries, we estimate the indirect impact of the environmental regulation on innovation activities of upstream (dye-producing) firms in India and examine how it varies by different firm characteristics: size and ownership. We find robust evidence of a significant increase (11–61%) in innovation expenditure for the dye-makers in response to the ‘Azo-dyes’ ban. Additionally, we find: (i) increase in technology transfer to the tune of 1.2–2.5 times more than that of internal R&D; (ii) increase in innovation expenditure with firm size; (iii) domestic firms investing more in technology transfer as compared to R&D, whereas foreign firms only undertaking the latter and (iv) decrease in investments towards innovation by downstream firms, thereby pointing towards a possible substitution effect in aggregate innovation by upstream firms. Our results are consistent with a variety of estimation methods and robustness checks.

Keywords: ‘Azo-dyes’ ban; Innovation; R&D expenditure; Technology transfer; Dye-producing firms; India (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K32 L25 O3 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (86)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:respol:v:46:y:2017:i:5:p:939-955

DOI: 10.1016/j.respol.2017.03.004

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