Systematic Review - Network for Business Sustainability

DESIGN OF STUDIES
Sectoral distribution
Figure 7 illustrates the sectoral focus of scientific papers
included in the review. Of the 100 scientific papers, 33
represent mixed-sample studies. The mixed-industrial
category consists of a range of industry types, whereas
the mixed-various category includes studies that
consider a diversity of sectors such as manufacturing,
services and charities.
The service and consumer goods sectors are
underrepresented, and manufacturing and process
industries are overrepresented, which reflects a focus
in the literature on environmental considerations. Until
recently, the literature on SOI has focused on technical
processes, with work largely done by scholars in
science and engineering. As recently as 2010,
Figure 7
DISTRIBUTION OF PAPERS BY SECTOR
(NUMBER OF PAPERS)
Bos-Brouwers (2010b) showed that many sustainable
innovations are incremental and focused on improving
technological processes (i.e. eco-efficiency) and
lowering production costs.
On the basis of this distribution, it is difficult to draw
conclusions relating to SOI in different sectors.
Country distribution
Figure 8 illustrates the geographical distribution of the
scientific studies. This distribution shows global interest
in the topic, though the greater proportion of singlecountry
studies focus on the developed economies.
Just less than one-third of the studies reviewed adopted
a multi-country focus, ranging from cross-country
case studies (e.g. Clark et al., 2009) to surveys across
Europe (e.g. Wagner, 2008).
Figure 8
COUNTRY FOCUS OF SCIENTIFIC STUDIES
(NUMBER OF PAPERS)
Innovating for Sustainability 79