B-CORP & SDGs

TEAM

BACKGROUND AND GENERAL OBJECTIVE

In June 2020, the B Lab of the United States of America (USA), the group of B Academics, and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) awarded the research team of the YSBC in partnership with the Instituto Politecnico Nacional (IPN) of the CIty of Mexico, with funds to conduct a research project on “The Role of Business in Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals in the Global South”

The aim of the project is to map B Corps’ SDGs strategies. It suggests to highlight the extent to which B Corps’ contribute to achieving SDGs, comparing B Corps’ SDGs strategies with the social and environmental threats occurring in the countries in which they are operating. To do this, a comparative analysis is carried out between developed “north” countries’ B Corps, and developing “south” countries’ B Corps, in order to provide dedicated policy implications of social and entrepreneurial relevance.

Through a dataset provided by the B Lab, the YSBC is conducting a quantitative analysis on the extent to which organisations conducting the SDG Action Manager address SDGs.

We are developing two variables:

one that considers the number of SDGs covered by organizations, weighted for the specialisation within macro-categories of SDGs - Breadth; 

and one that considers the effort with respect to each single SDG - Depth.

We preliminary gathered results from Italy and Mexico. We expect to further improve the analysis covering European and South American countries, and through a survey aiming at identifying potential structures of antecedents for different levels of Breadth and Depth.

PUBLICATIONS

Research Report: Breadth and depth strategies of B Corps in pursuing SDGs. Learning from north and south. The report of the project will be delivered by the end of January 2022.