Wong, Kwok Tung Thomas (2006) Strategies for environmental sustainability in Hong Kong's construction industry. PhD thesis, University of South Australia, Australia.
Abstract
Since the Rio de Janiero Conference held in 1992, there has been greater pressure worldwide to vigorously pursue the conception of sustainable construction for the purpose of creating a healthy built environment using resource-efficient, ecologically-based principles. This dissertation aims to examine the impact of environmental issues on a construction firm's strategy and action and to provide a theoretical and practical framework for the construction industry to move towards sustainability. After reviewing the literature on sustainable construction, corporate environmentalism, stakeholder theory and environmental management systems, a theoretical framework was proposed. Relationships among stakeholder pressures, a top management commitment, the pro-activeness of an environmental strategy, a perceived environmental performance and competitive advantages were hypothesised. A two-stage methodology was employed. The first stage involved exploratory interviews with managers of six local contractors. These interviews have provided a list of items for measuring the domain of constructs. In the second stage, the hypothesised model was empirically tested based on the findings of the questionnaire survey. Evidently, small contractors in Hong Kong are different from large contractors in their culture and some of their practices of sustainability. Most small contractors adopt the reactor approach inasmuch as they take action only when confronted by an internal or external crisis. However, the large contractors usually adopt "beyond compliance" environmental policies. Their more proactive strategies are associated with a deeper and broader coverage of their stakeholders. The data from this research further suggests that top management commitment emerges as a key variable of pro-activeness of an environmental strategy. A proactive environmental strategy influenced environmental performance and competitive advantage To encourage contractors to continuously improve their suitability performance, there must be close co-operation among the government, clients, educational and professional institutions, contractors, subcontractors, and industry practitioners at all levels. To give contractors the opportunity of implementing sustainability, clients should give consideration to sustainability performance in tender evaluation and a sustainable certification scheme should be implemented by the government to recognise the outstanding performance of organisations. The government should rely on direct regulatory controls only if the industry becomes hazardously environmentally inefficient.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | built environment; competitive advantage; sustainability; certification; compliance; co-operation; environmental management system; sustainable construction; stakeholder; Hong Kong; environmental performance; interview; questionnaire survey |
| Index terms: | environmental sustainability, Hong Kong, certification, methodology, interview, construction firm, practitioner, survey, environmental policy, commitment, compliance, construction industry, top management, built environment, manager, environmental performance, conference, dissertation, environmental management system, sustainability performance, tender evaluation, suitability, strategy, subcontractor, environmental issue, local contractor, sustainable construction, questionnaire, competitive advantage |
| Subjects: | sustainable construction, tendering, control systems, psychology, environmental issues, management, health safety and environment, data collection methods, infrastructure and transport systems, organization, sustainability assessment, design criteria, market analysis, research dissemination and communication, research methods, industry analysis, Geography, practitioner, public policy, administrative processes |
| Topics: | Roles and Professions, Contract Administration, Business Strategy, Organizational Design, Geographical Context, Governance, Procurement, Urban Studies, Sustainability, Research Practice, Health and Safety, Design Practice |
| Descriptive scope: | 5 PCTEA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here