Linking green entrepreneurship to green innovation: the mediating role of green entrepreneurial self-efficacy

William Makumbe and Leon T.B. Jackson

African Journal of Economic and Management Studies, 2026, 1-18

Abstract: PurposeIn line with the United Nations 2030 Agenda, environmental sustainability has become a prominent concept in academic discourse. Due to its vast natural resources, Africa is well-positioned to become a global leader in green business. However, with a growing small and medium-sized enterprise (SME)population in Africa, empirical evidence on SME sustainability efforts remains limited. For this reason, this research examined the mediation effect of green entrepreneurial self-efficacy on the relationship between green entrepreneurship and green innovation in Zimbabwean manufacturing SMEs.Design/methodology/approachThe data were analysed using SmartPLS 4 from a randomly selected sample of 370 managers.FindingsThe results showed that while green entrepreneurship strongly influenced green innovation, green entrepreneurial self-efficacy partially mediated the relationship between the two variables.Originality/valueThe study contributes context-specific evidence from an African economy, addressing the limited representation of developing markets in green innovation research. In environments characterised by institutional constraints and resource scarcity, identifying self-efficacy as an enabling mechanism provides novel insight into how firms can stimulate green innovation despite structural limitations. The findings, therefore, enrich both theory and practice by integrating strategic and psychological perspectives within the African economic context.

Keywords: Environmental sustainability; Green entrepreneurship; Green innovation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/ajems/article/doi/10.1108/ ... -to-green-innovation (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/ajems/article-pdf/doi/10.1 ... s-08-2025-0620en.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:ajemsp:ajems-08-2025-0620

DOI: 10.1108/AJEMS-08-2025-0620

Access Statistics for this article

African Journal of Economic and Management Studies is currently edited by Prof John Kuada

More articles in African Journal of Economic and Management Studies from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().