Huddling for Stability: Climate Policy Uncertainty and Corporate Supply Chain Configuration

Amid increasing climate-related policy interventions, the resultant uncertainty has become a major factor influencing corporate decision-making. Using panel data of Chinese A-share listed firms from 2014 to 2024, this study employs fixed-effects models to examine the impact of climate policy uncertainty on corporate supply chain concentration. The results indicate that climate policy uncertainty significantly increases the degree of supply chain concentration, and this finding remains robust after a series of endogeneity treatments and robustness checks, including instrumental variable and propensity score matching approaches. Mechanism analyses show that this effect operates through cost escalation and efficiency deterioration, leading firms to rely more on core trading partners under uncertain environments. Further heterogeneity analyses reveal that this effect is more pronounced among firms with lower levels of supply chain digitalization, weaker information disclosure quality, higher carbon emissions, and in regions with stronger environmental regulation intensity. From the perspective of firms’ micro-level decision-making, this study uncovers the underlying mechanisms through which climate policy uncertainty affects supply chain configuration and provides new empirical evidence for understanding how firms respond to uncertainty shocks.