ENVIRONMENTAL MARKET OPPORTUNITY ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AMONG THE SMES IN NAIROBI COUNTY.

Abstract

This study examines the environmental market opportunity on sustainable development among SMEs in Nairobi County. The interviews involved three levels of management of all the SMEs and a total of 246 randomly selected
SMEs from Nairobi County. The context description for quantitative data collected using Likert scale closed-ended
questions and analyzed using parametric tests; the open-ended questions were analyzed using descriptive content
analysis. Descriptive statistics namely, the mean, the range, and standard deviation provided information the characteristics of the phenomena (environmental market opportunity and sustainable development). Further, the
influence of environmental market orientation on sustainable development was examined using multiple linear
regression analysis and the results interpreted. The findings of the study are that environmental market opportunity
is a good predictor (R2 = 0.525, p < 0.001) with environmental market opportunity having a positive and significant
effect on sustainable development (β= p<0.01). The implications of these findings for policy and practice are that, the
government to have policies to govern environmental market opportunity concepts in the country and across the
counties in Kenya. Also, systems, that ensures, SMEs are well nurtured as they grow and will not need to pull out of
ecopreneurship growth. A policy that also fosters the interaction between market opportunity and end-users,
facilitating the emergence of products or services based on real market opportunities and customer needs.