Green business operations for building eco-cities: Identifying the role of business and critical success factors for sustainability

Abstract

It is anticipated that by 2050, the number of people living in cities will have increased from 3.6 billion in 2011 to nearly 6.5 billion and that 70% of the world’s population will be residents of cities. This rapid increase in people will occur in developing countries (e.g., Saudi Arabia, China, India). Thus, complex issues related to an increasing level of urbanization present huge challenges but also huge opportunities for governments, societies, and businesses. For instance, sustainable cities projects can provide enormous opportunities with which to create better futures for larger numbers of people via the environmental greening of buildings, supply chains, energy, technology, transport, and waste management, as well as providing a wide range of economic and social benefits. Based on the literature review, this paper presents a research model that defines the unique roles that business firms play in building highly sustainable cities that thrive based on the triple bottom lines of economic, environmental, and social dimensions to create win-win situation. First, effective private and public partnerships are discussed in the context of sustainable cities. Second, the paper argues that enhancing and promoting sustainability strategies and practices in a city gives a firm a competitive advantage in both strategy and operations levels, making it a great role for the businesses. Third, the specific roles of businesses that link them between government entities and city residents will be discussed. Additionally, we have developed a measurement tool for measuring the success factors of these sustainable cities projects. This measurement tool aims to examine the changing roles of businesses in making urbanization sustainable in terms of economic sustainability (e.g., financial performance, job creation, and human resources development), social responsibility (e.g., Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) indicators), and sustainable environmental terms (e.g., quality of life, and resources efficiency use (recycling, renewable energy use)). Finally, the case study illustration includes specific sustainable city projects already in progress in Saudi Arabia.