Corporate social responsibility, the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and financial performance, with implications for human resource development

Abstract

Purpose

India is one of the fastest developing economies, but it faces numerous socioeconomic problems, such as hunger, poverty, under- and unemployment, gender inequity and illiteracy. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) funding at the corporate level could tackle these socioeconomic problems, providing support to the nation’s overall development. Mandated CSR expenditures, in alignment with the achievement of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) of the United Nations, would support the nation’s contributions to building a sustainable future. Several questions, however, remain. Thus, this study aims to explore relationships between a company’s gross and net profits and its expenditures for CSR; and mapped the specific CSR activities used to address each of the 17 UN SDGs and then draw implications for human resource development (HRD).

Design/methodology/approach

The data were gathered from published annual reports (2019–23) of 60 Fortune 500 Indian companies. A zero-order correlation was used to find the relationship between CSR expenditure and gross, as well as net, profits. Furthermore, the CSR activities of the sample were mapped with the UN SDGs.

Findings

There was a positive, moderate to strong correlation between CSR expenditures and gross profit (r = 0.82, p < 0.01), but for net profit, the correlation was strong (r = 0.85, p < 0.01). All CSR activities mapped to at least one of the SDGs.

Originality/value

The alignment of CSR activities and SDGs based on Fortune 500 Indian companies has not yet been explored. Also, no study to date discusses the gaps in the CSR expenditures for specific UN SDGs.