Chinese companies have made significant breakthroughs in corporate social responsibility.

A report released this month by the Golden Bee Corporate Social Responsibility Index showed that the CSR philosophy is rooted in more than 300 businesses polled in the survey.

"Last year, the index of CSR performances of Chinese enterprises reached a record level," Golden Bee stated in its report. "There were major improvements made in information disclosure and fulfilling social responsibilities for stakeholders."

The level of CSR performance by companies increased last year by 6.9 percent compared to 2015, according to Golden Bee.

The index was set up in 2007 by the China WTO Tribune, a monthly journal on China's World Trade Organization-related work and launched by the Ministry of Commerce.

Yin Gefei, vice-president of China WTO Tribune, as well as chief CSR expert at Golden Bee, believes CSR "practices" should be enshrined in law.

"The trend of CSR practices globally is that some countries transformed the common understanding of CSR into laws through a legal framework," Yin said. "China has similar plans to enact laws related to CSR practice."

In the Gold Bee report, company performance levels varied considerably in different industries.

Manufacturing, storage and transportation industries performed generally better than other sectors.

The power industry came out on top of "fulfilling responsibilities to stakeholders".

The engineering sector fell, while finance, wholesale and retail industries performed poorly in "fulfilling responsibilities to consumers".

State-owned enterprises maintained their leading role for the third consecutive year for "fulfilling responsibilities to communities," the report stated.

Foreign companies and those from Hong Kong and Macao tended to pay more attention to the integration of social responsibilities into corporate strategies.

Private enterprises also performed well in terms of "fulfilling responsibilities to communities".

Leading enterprises such as Sinopec, the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China Ltd, China Shipbuilding Industry Corp and State Grid received Gold Bee awards for CSR.

zhuwenqian@chinadaily.com.cn