Social and Environmental Responsibility Practices in Moroccan Port Companies: Towards Environmental Performance

Abstract

Morocco has shown its interest in sustainable development by launching major projects in both economic and social sectors, particularly in terms of port and airport infrastructures, industry, agriculture, tourism … which leads to protect the environment and rationalize energy consumption.

Thus, Moroccan port companies have launched several projects based on the foundations of Sustainable Development, namely economic growth, social inclusion and environmental protection.

The objective of this work is to emphasize the practices of Corporate Social Responsibility in Moroccan port companies and their commitment to sustainable development and environmental protection.

To achieve this, we adopted a mixed research methodology, consisting of a documentary analysis of procedures and extra-financial information, an exploratory study based on a field survey to establish the current status of CSR within a Moroccan port operator, the projects and resources dedicated to it, mainly in the environment field, and performance indicators that enabled us to highlight the efforts made to manage greenhouse gas emissions, waste, water and the preservation of oceans and marine biodiversity.

The results unveiled the level of CSR maturity and the environmental performance of port activities identifying the challenges that face sustainable development and analyzing the gaps that compromise the CSR strategy and the future of a lower carbon maritime industry.

Keywords: Sustainable development, Corporate Social Responsibility, Environmental protection, Energy efficiency, Environmental performance.

Classification JEL: M14, Q01, G30 

Paper type: Empirical Research