Green intellectual capital and sustainable competitive advantage: unraveling role of environmental management accounting and green entrepreneurship orientation

Purpose This present study investigates how green intellectual capital (GIC) impacts sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) in Spanish wineries, further exploring the mediating roles of environmental management accounting (EMA) and green entrepreneurship orientation (GEO) in the primary GIC-SCA linkage. Moreover, the wineries’ age, size and membership in a protected designation of origin (PDO) are introduced as control variables to enhance the accuracy of the examined cause-effect associations. Design/methodology/approach This research, based on a theoretical framework developed by previous academic studies, utilizes partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to analyze data collected from 207 Spanish wineries between September 2023 and February 2024. Findings The findings indicate that GIC positively impacts the SCA of Spanish wineries, with EMA and GEO partially mediating this relationship. Originality/value This study stands out for its pioneering incursion into the joint analysis of EMA and GEO as mediating factors in the GIC-SCA relationship, a perspective not previously examined in the academic literature as well as for its contextualization in the wine business setting, thus tracing a novel path in the understanding of environmental management and wineries’ intellectual capital.