Abstract Improving the status of import trade network will help to promote the construction of trade power, and improving environmental performance is an inevitable requirement to achieve “carbon neutrality” and “carbon peak”.Taking trade network as an entry point and on the basis of constructing a theoretical model, this paper uses the data of Chinese manufacturing enterprises from 2000 to 2013 to measure the import trade network status of enterprises through a directed weighted trade matrix, and systematically examines how the import trade network status affects the environmental performance of enterprises in combination with two representative indicators of pollution emission intensity and carbon emission intensity.The study shows that the improvement of import trade network status significantly improves the environmental performance of enterprises, and the technology upgrading effect and cost optimization effect are important channels for import trade network status to affect the environmental performance of enterprises. This conclusion is still true after the endogenous treatment and robustness test of a series of methods such as tool variables.In addition, heterogeneity analysis indicates that the impact of import trade network status on enterprise environmental performance will vary with the location of production chain, business dynamics and export participation.
2022, Vol. 39 
