Corporate Sustainability Practices and Corporate Financial Performance of Selected Breweries in Nigeria

Abstract

Purpose: The nexus between Corporate Sustainability Practices (CSP) and Corporate Financial Performance (CFP) has over the years yielded a mix of positive, negative, and neutral associations across industries and territories. Considering the paradox of economic benefits against negative sustainability implications of manufacturing and consuming alcoholic beverages, the researchers examined the influence of CSP on the CFP of selected breweries in Nigeria. In two hypotheses, the proxies for CSP are Social-Infrastructural-Development Cost, Community-Education-and-Training Cost, and Community-Health-Related Cost, whereas the determinants for CFP are return on equity and prices of shares.

Methods: Adopting a causal-comparative research design, data were obtained from the annual financial reports of the companies and the Nigerian Stock Exchange factbooks. The multivariate regression analysis was deployed for estimating the results.

Results: The general models for testing hypotheses one and two indicated that corporate sustainability practices do not significantly influence either the return on equity or the market prices of the shares of breweries in Nigeria.

Implications: The researchers concluded that changes in the level of CSP were not enough for predicting variations in the CFP of breweries in Nigeria. It was, however, observed that awareness about CSP and the related value is still low among capital market investors and consumers in Nigeria. Hence, breweries are encouraged to be consistent with such practices as the associated benefit may be incremental.