ABSTRACT
Attempts to define SE like its counterpart green entrepreneurship have established that it is crucial to understand what comprises a sustainable business in order to scope SE. ‘Green’ can be used in both absolute and relative sense as well as from a product and process perspective. Most scholarship in this context, press on the essentiality of a green belief system or intentionality to undertake SE (Isaak, 2016; Schaltegger, 2002) However, the notion that ‘entrepreneurial activity that benefits the environment’ irrespective of portraying ecological motives seems as a more holistic approach to SE (Walley et al., 2016). Although green entrepreneurship emphasis is more towards compliance with environmental standards while generating profits, it is difficult to see how environmental value addition does not benefit societies. Hence, it is quite improbable to separate and prioritise ecological, social, and economic motives in sustainable businesses. As sustainable businesses are driven by a mix of social, economic, and environmental orientation, charitable, voluntary, and public sector foundings are excluded from this conception. It is in this backdrop that ‘an individual who starts -up and/ or runs a for-profit, and significantly green, business by virtue of the nature of its end product’ will hereafter be referred to as a sustainability-oriented entrepreneur. A departure from eco-social motivations or intentionality (unlike social and green entrepreneurship) also justifies this work’s adoption of an outcome or end-product oriented approach to SE. By virtue of their end products, sectors or industries hence comprising of businesses including recycling and reuse, waste disposal and collection, research and education, consultancy and monitoring, energy conservation, eco-capital equipment, heritage and ecotourism, in-firm green production, forestry and organic farming, and alternative green product production (Eastwood et al., 2001) can be considered a breeding ground for SE.
