Friend or Foe: How Do Consumers and Producers Affect the ESG Rating Index? Evidence from China’s Market of Organic Milk

This study attempts to investigate how product attributes and consumer socio-economic status affect organic milk (OM) product ESG performance. There are not many pertinent studies on the interaction between the EGS evaluation system and organic milk products. Thus, this paper develops a targeted hedonic-regression model based on the EPB and ECB theories to investigate the ESG and sub-ESG impact of the above attributes based on the consumption dataset from Kantar Worldpanel. We also introduce the moderating variable of marketing resource intensity (MRI) to check the influencing mechanism of the sub-ESG rating index. This study demonstrates that the intensity of marketing resources has a moderating effect on the ESG performance of organic milk producers. Moreover, we also found evidence that the household’s family size and internal product attributes have a more significant impact on the ESG rating index. In addition, compared to social and governance information, the environmental information disclosure index has a more significant influence on consumers’ socio-economic status and product attributes compared with the social and governance rating index. This study not only contributes to deepening the understanding of the ESG evaluation system but also provides scientific guidance for the producers’ ESG strategy. Therefore, to increase the competitive advantage of OM enterprises, they should endeavor to construct a comprehensive evaluation system of entertainment social governance rating indexes and engage in environmental investment activities.