Purpose

As reporting environmental, social and governance (ESG) information is not yet mandatory in all countries, it is intriguing to understand ESG’s underlying driving mechanisms. This study aims to investigate ESG determinants in the banking sector of the Middle East and North Africa countries.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors gather data for 38 listed banks for the period 2011–2019. The data used is threefold as follows: data related to ESG; firm-level; and country-level data. While ESG and firm’s level data are taken from Refinitiv, country-level data are extracted from the World Bank. Using panel regression, the authors test the effect of firm- and country-specific variables on the overall ESG score and its pillars.

Findings

Results indicate that banks’ ESG scores are negatively affected by performance and positively affected by size. The level of economic development exerts a negative impact on the environmental pillar while the social development exerts a positive impact on ESG and governance pillar. Corruption is the only country-level that gathers a homogenous effect on ESG scores. Finally, the three pillars follow heterogeneous patterns.

Originality/value

This study extends the scope of previous studies by introducing new country-level independent variables to contribute to the understanding of ESG antecedents.

中文翻译：

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中东和北非地区银行业 ESG 的决定因素：趋势还是必要？

目的

由于并非所有国家都强制报告环境、社会和治理 (ESG) 信息，因此了解 ESG 的潜在驱动机制很有趣。本研究旨在调查中东和北非国家银行业的 ESG 决定因素。

设计/方法/途径

作者收集了 2011-2019 年期间 38 家上市银行的数据。使用的数据有以下三方面：与 ESG 相关的数据；公司层面；和国家层面的数据。ESG 和公司层面的数据取自 Refinitiv，而国家层面的数据则取自世界银行。使用面板回归，作者测试了公司和国家特定变量对整体 ESG 评分及其支柱的影响。

发现

结果表明，银行的 ESG 评分受绩效的负面影响，而受规模的正面影响。经济发展水平对环境支柱产生负面影响，而社会发展水平对ESG和治理支柱产生积极影响。腐败是唯一对 ESG 评分产生同质影响的国家层面。最后，三大支柱遵循异质模式。

原创性/价值

本研究通过引入新的国家级独立变量来扩展先前研究的范围，以帮助理解 ESG 前因。