The Effect of Green Creativity and Green Innovation on Green Competitive Advantage and Performance of Sustainable SMEs: The Moderation Role of Digital Empowerment

The purpose of this study is to examine and analyze the relationship pattern between green creativity, green innovation, green competitive advantage, and sustainable SME performance moderated by digital empowerment.Digital empowerment is a crucial aspect in the current era because creative SMEs are currently faced with a very varied and innovative digital market.The population of this study is natural-colored batik SMEs in two provinces, namely: Special Region of Yogyakarta and West Java.These two provinces have natural-colored batik SMEs and have been able to survive until now.This quantitative study analyzed questionnaire data from 225 batik SME owners in Indonesia using PLS-SEM to examine how green creativity and innovation influence competitive advantage and performance, with digital empowerment as a moderator.The results showed green creativity and innovation had significant positive effects on green competitive advantage and SME performance.Additionally, digital empowerment strengthened the relationships between green creativity, innovation, competitive advantage, and performance.These findings indicate developing employee green creativity, pursuing green innovation, and leveraging digital technology are important strategies for SMEs to achieve sustainability.