The missing links? The indirect impacts of drivers on eco‐innovation

Abstract

The drivers of eco-innovation (EI) have been the focus of much research in the past. Some of these drivers have been external to the firm, such as regulation, whereas others have been internal, including its resources and capabilities and its environmental strategy. However, the analysis of the impact of those drivers on EI has too often been carried out as if they were separated from each other. In reality, the EI drivers are likely to interact. This paper tries to cover this gap in the literature using a holistic and integrated approach. Survey data from 97 chemical firms were analyzed using partial least squares to determine the critical drivers of EI and their interconnections. Our results indicate that, in fact, the impact of some drivers might not be direct but is mediated by their influence on other drivers. This is the case with environmental collaboration, environmental knowledge, green skills, consumer pressure, and export behavior, which have an indirect effect on EI through their impact on environmental strategies. Therefore, our results suggest that environmental strategy is a central mediator and a powerful driver for the entire model.

Is It Necessary to Centralize Power in the CEO to Ensure Environmental Innovation?

“…As to the policy implications of this study, firstly, the results provide confidence to policy makers regarding the positive effect that the policies that promote eco-innovation can have on business competitiveness and, secondly, offer some guidelines that could assist them to establish incentives for developing eco-innovation. Indeed, a better understanding of the drivers of eco-innovation could assist policy makers to develop policies aimed at promoting eco-innovation (Keshminder and Río 2019;Costa 2021), for example, stimulating or, at least, not limiting the accumulation of power in the figure of the CEO. Moreover, considering this paper's results, policy makers could develop policies aimed at raising managerial awareness regarding the environmental and economic benefits that eco-innovation projects can generate.…”

“…According to the resource-based theory (Keshminder and Río 2019), larger and more profitable firms have a greater volume of resources that can be devoted to eco-innovation projects Przychodzen and Przychodzen 2015). Likewise, firm age also favors eco-innovation, as older companies have accumulated knowledge and experience related to the development of other environmental strategies (Rehfeld et al 2007) and often have greater access to external financing (Johnson and Lybecker 2012).…”

“…In parallel, eco-innovation has attracted growing research attention (de Jesus Pacheco et al 2018) with the aim of knowing its characteristics and drivers (Díaz-García et al 2015). However, most studies have focused on examining the institutional and market factors as well as the firm characteristics that lead companies to pursue eco-innovation (Keshminder and Río 2019), whereas researchers have paid relatively little attention to the role played by the chief executive officer (CEO) in this regard (Liao et al 2019), despite being the main actor responsible for corporate strategies, including those related to corporate social responsibility (CSR) (Arena et al 2018;García-Sánchez and Martínez-Ferrero 2019;García-Sánchez et al 2020c). Indeed, only a small number of papers have analyzed how the CEO's characteristics may affect her/his company's propensity to develop eco-innovation.…”

Do independent, female and specialist directors promote eco‐innovation and eco‐design in agri‐food firms?

“…Reduced resources and capacities can lead companies to cooperate to obtain the means to deal with the complexity of proactive environmental strategies (De Marchi, 2012). In a later study, Keshminder and Pablo del Río (2019) highlight the role that institutional factors can play directly and indirectly in business environmental proactivity.…”

Sustainable innovation: Processes, strategies, and outcomes

“…The paper by Keshminder & del Río () provides an initial attempt to cover an important yet neglected topic in the research of drivers of eco‐innovation, that is, whether and how those drivers are interrelated instead of being only separated from each other. A holistic and integrated approach to eco‐innovation drivers is designed by the authors, merging different streams of the literature.…”