Leveraging Bottom Line of Trade Through Environmental Proactivenes

Abstract

It is frequently hypothesized that incorporation of environmental issues in trade practices may leverage the bottom line of trade and improve its environmental performance. Whether or not this hypothesis is true is as important from the perspective of environmental proactiveness as questions relating to the relevant issues- ( 1) What are the relevant environment petformance indicators for a facility's environmental proactiveness and (2) How environmental proactiveness of any trade practice is measured. Based on ample empirical evidence for Indian grossly polluting units, this paper addresses that there are six primary environmental performance indicators (EPls) viz., environmental policy, environment department, regulatory compliance, environmental audit, EMS certification and environmental cost management that may reflect the level of incorporation of environmental issues in trade practice. We have tried to measure this level of integration by applying quantitative scores. We have termed this as 'environmental proactiveness score (EPS)'. Furthermore, we have shown the variation in the nature of film's environmental proactiveness on the basis of EPS.