Firms' eco-innovativeness and its determinants: an empirical cross-country analysis

The paper studies the determinants of different types of eco-innovation in German, Romanian and Portuguese manufacturing sectors over 2012–2014, through an empirical analysis of the Community Innovation Survey. To this end, we consider a measure of eco-innovativeness that counts different types of innovations with environmental benefits that enterprises have undertaken. Due to the count nature of our focal variable and to the large presence of zeros, we estimate a zero-inflated negative binomial model. Drawing upon a consolidated framework of drivers, including ‘technology push’, ‘regulatory push-pull’ and ‘firm-specific’ factors, this work gives an overview of the main eco-innovation drivers and contributes to enlarge the geographical scope of the debate on eco-innovation drivers. Findings highlight how the different regulatory contexts and different levels of competitiveness of the market affect the firms’ eco-innovation behaviour in the three countries and suggest important implications for the design of a smart policy mix supporting eco-innovation.