Environmental impacts of SMEs and the effects of formal management tools: Evidence from EU's largest survey
Graafland,Johan Smid,Hugo
Graafland,Johan
Smid,Hugo
Abstract
Much literature on corporate social responsibility suggests that formal management tools to manage environmental impacts, such as environmental reporting or ISO14001 certification, are not suitable for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Other studies, however, argue that using some form of formalization helps SMEs to improve environmental management. This paper empirically studies the hypothesis that relatively simple formal management tools in the form of using targets improve the environmental impacts of SMEs. Based on a unique dataset with environmental performance data of 5205 SMEs in 12 European countries, we find ample support for this hypothesis. Since only 25% of SMEs use targets, there is room for substantial improvement in environmental impacts if all SMEs were to implement this relatively simple process step.
Description
Date
2016-09
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Volume Title
Publisher
Research Projects
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Keywords
CSR, environmental impacts, environmental management, formal management tools, SMEs, targets, SDG 12 - Responsible Consumption and Production
Citation
Graafland, J & Smid, H 2016, 'Environmental impacts of SMEs and the effects of formal management tools : Evidence from EU's largest survey', Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, vol. 23, no. 5, pp. 297-307. https://doi.org/10.1002/csr.1376