The role of digital technologies to unleash a green recovery: pathways and pitfalls to achieve the European Green Deal

Abstract

PurposeThe article aims to concern identification and development of pathways for a green recovery process post pandemic taking into account the role of digital technologies for unleashing the policies planned within the European Green Deal (EGD).Design/methodology/approachThe study is based on a systematic literature review (SLR). The electronic databases Scopus and Web of Science (WoS) were surveyed. The authors followed the SLR guidelines laid down by Tranfield et al. (2003) and the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-analysis (PRISMA) framework and 65 articles were found eligible after thorough reading and inclusion in the analysis.FindingsThe article presents an innovative framework containing the digital technologies and their roles in enabling the achievement of the EGD policies and the barriers to their adoption.Originality/valueThe proposed framework would guide organizations and policymakers' decisions to pursue a pathway in which a green recovery is possible, mainly after the consequences of the current pandemic, considering the pitfalls of the journey. The article is original as it provides an up-to-date guidance toward an emerging theme, which is a green recovery economy including a net-zero carbon worldwide target.

The changing role of innovation for crisis management in times of COVID-19: An integrative literature review

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“…As a result, a sizable demand gap has developed, as appropriate coverage is not reflected in connections and consumption. Other issues, such as the development of fake news and cyber-attacks, the growing threat to privacy and personal data protection, and the large-scale generation of electronic waste, have also gotten worse (R. Sharma et al, 2022 ).…”

“…In the past two years, various studies have focused on innovation as a state-of-the-art strategy for surviving situations like the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting innovation's crucial importance (e.g., Sharma et al, 2022 ). By synthesizing the knowledge generated by this scholarship, one can accomplish two critical goals: draw policy lessons for enhancing innovation in response to situations like the COVID-19 pandemic, and set the stage for future scholarship that will advance knowledge in various domains of innovation.…”

How does the digital economy promote green technology innovation by manufacturing enterprises? Evidence from China

“…Dai et al (2022) also argued that with the development of a digital economy in China, its ability to promote green innovation would be stronger. In addition, some researchers worldwide examined digital technologies (Morello et al, 2016;Lu et al, 2021;Sharma et al, 2021;Firoiu et al, 2022;Khan et al, 2022; and digitization (Martin et al, 2018;Umar et al, 2021;Abdulai, 2022;Ma and Zhu, 2022) to indirectly prove a positive link between the digital economy and green innovation (Table 1).…”

Moving towards Environmental Sustainability: Can Digital Economy Reduce Environmental Degradation in China?

“…From the perspective of digital technologies, digital economy is more conducive to reducing carbon emissions than any other technology [ 70 , 77 ]. On the demand side, digital technologies are substituting physical goods with environmentally friendly products, such as emails, eBooks, online teleconferencing, e-commerce, and so on.…”