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Rethinking public and private policies in Europe with the support of a industrial sustainability index

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Abstract

The aim of this paper is to design a new index for obtaining a measure of sustainable performance in the industrial sector (SIPI). This approach allows to evaluate the green policy implemented by both government and enterprises and to underline the differences between their actions concerning the environmental, economic, political and social issues. The SIPI main structure has been created by using multi-criteria method in accordance with OECD procedure (2008). The methodology has been built for application to EU-28 countries. The findings produce both the acknowledgement of the success and the identification of the weaknesses of the subjects involved in the policymaking process, providing a support for future planning. Nevertheless, the methodology was formulated in such a way that it could be readapted in other countries or regions.

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Notes

  1. The country-specific table will be available upon request to the authors.

  2. The formula of this normalization technique is the following one for each variable \(\mathop z\nolimits_{i} = \frac{{x_{i} - \bar{x}}}{s}\).

  3. By using the followed formula \(s_{ij} = \frac{(Ij - Min\;I)}{Max\;I - Min\;I} * 100\) where Sij represents the standardized composite indicator for each jth case, Min I and Max I are the minimum and maximum values among ij indicators, respectively.

  4. Cypro is not considered because of unavailability of data.

  5. Each factor is characterized from the followed indicators:

    Factor 1: Emas, Patent applications to the EPO, Ecolabel, Eco-Industrial Parks, R&D Expenditure by Government, % GDP,

    Environmental incentives, Environmentally related ODA, % total ODA

    Factor 2 R&D Expenditure by Government, % GDP, Patent applications to the EPO, Actions in environmental audit, environmental certifications, % of companies, Product innovators, % of total firms, Environmental incentives, Innovations to increase recycling of waste, water or materials, % of total enterprises, Innovations in replacement of materials, % of total enterprises, Innovations to reduce CO2% of total enterprises, Innovations to reduce energy use, % of total enterprises Renewable energy public R&D budget, % total energy public RD&D

    Factor 3 R&D Expenditure by Government, % GDP, Product innovators, % of total firms, Environmentally related taxes, % GDP

    Factor 4 Emas, Ecolabel, Actions in environmental audit, environmental certifications, % of companies, Development of environment-related technologies, % all technologies, Environmentally related government R&D budget, % total government R&D

    Factor 5 Environmenal incentives, Product innovators, % of total firms, Development of environment-related technologies, % all technologies, Renewable energy public R&D budget, % total energy public R&D

    Factor 6 Ecolabel, R&D Expenditure by Government, % GDP.

  6. The final cluster centres show the average of each variable within the cluster, and help us to understand the features of variables belonging to each group.

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  1. Department of Human and Social Science, University of Naples “L’Orientale”, Largo S. Giovanni Maggiore, 30 80134, Naples, Italy

    Roberta Arbolino & Luisa De Simone

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Table 9 Correlation matrix of indicators
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Arbolino, R., De Simone, L. Rethinking public and private policies in Europe with the support of a industrial sustainability index. Int Environ Agreements 19, 315–339 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10784-019-09438-7

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