The ISO 14001 standard's effect on agrifood small- and medium-sized enterprises' performance: Literature review and empirical evidence

A significant part of the literature postulates the importance of economic factors and, in particular, market pressure as the main motivation for the adoption of environmental management systems, such as ISO 14001 (International Organization for Standardization). Most of these studies are based on questionnaire surveys assessing the perceptions or opinions of company managers. Few studies have investigated the relationship between the adoption of the standard and economic and financial performance using objective accounting data. This study aimed to test the link between ISO 14001 adoption and economic and financial performance using accounting data from 374 agrifood small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Spain during the period 2013 to 2015. The results showed that ISO 14001 contributes to improved commercial and marketing performance through a positive effect on turnover in domestic markets and especially in export markets. However, no positive relationship could be found between ISO14001 and company results or profits. Therefore, ISO 14001 can be considered more as a means of entering and developing sales, particularly in export markets, than a tool to enhance financial profits.