Role of sustainable management policy and carbon neutral processes in improving sustainable performance: Study of China's aluminium sector

Abstract

Aluminium industry is considered as one of the leading natural resource industries. This industry provides one of the crucial inputs for technological development, including green energy technology which contributes almost 3% to global carbon emissions. This study explores the role of sustainable management policy, one of the significant stressors for carbon neutrality, on sustainable performance of firm in aluminium sector. This study also explores the role of energy related inflation in the association between sustainable management policy and sustainable performance. Further, we argue that sustainable management policy can help improve carbon neutrality of processes, which in turn, improves sustainable performance of firm. The focus of the study is China's aluminium sector. China is the world's leading aluminium producer, with around 59% share in global production in 2022. The data is taken from the aluminium sectors. Data was collected using a close ended questionnaire. We employed component based-SEM in two steps for analysis of modelled relationship. The empirical results highlight an instrumental role of sustainable management in adopting the sustainable performance in aluminium sector. Our results also show that sustainable management policy can reduce the process related carbon emissions, further leading to improve the sustainability of a firm. The empirical results also reveal a negative role of energy related inflation, in the association between sustainable management policy and sustainable development. It hampers the effect of sustainable management policy on sustainable performance.