Sustainable environmental strategy, firm competitiveness, and financial performance: Evidence from the mining industry

Although our understanding of how mining firms' sustainable environmental strategy drives financial performance is well-established, there is still limited research that examines the mechanism that proves this correlation. Consequently, this paper investigates how firm competitiveness plays into the aforementioned narrative. In addition, we examine the moderating role of market orientation the relationship sustainable environmental strategy and firm competitiveness. Using time-lagged data from 194 mining companies, we found support for our hypotheses. Specifically, our findings revealed that (1) sustainable environmental strategy positively relates to firm competitiveness, (2) the impact of sustainable environmental strategy on firm competitiveness is moderated by market orientation, especially when it is high, and (3) firm competitiveness mediates the relationship between sustainable environmental strategy and financial performance. This study contributes to the literature on environmental management, especially on mining firms’ sustainability. It is also expected that these outcomes would guide managers and policymakers on the importance of establishing meaningful sustainable strategies to drive the bottom line.