Governmental Ownership, Board Gender Diversity, and ESG Performance: Evidence from an Emerging Market

Consistent with Sustainable Development Goal 5 (SGG 5) concerned with gender equality, this study examines the relationship between Board Gender Diversity (BGD) and environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) performance. In addition, it investigates the moderating role of governmental ownership concerning this relation by focusing on an emerging market. A sample of 71 Egyptian-listed companies on EGX100 during 2014–2019 has been examined. Both univariate and multivariate analyses are conducted to examine the relationship between BGD and ESG performance and the effect of governmental ownership on this relationship using OLS, 2SLS, and Logistic regressions. The results revealed a positive relation between BGD and ESG performance. In addition, we found that governmental ownership has a moderating effect on the relationship between BGD and ESG performance. This finding indicates that the effect of BGD on ESG performance in emerging markets is conditional on the governmental ownership, which provides a fertile environment for BGD to support ESG issues. The results add to the growing interest regarding the implications of BGD and governmental ownership for ESG performance in emerging economies. This study has significant implications for regulatory bodies, firms, and investors in emerging markets such as Egypt. It ensures that board gender diversity can enhance ESG performance in the case of governmental ownership. In addition, it highlighted the value of enforceable regulations on overseeing private firms’ ESG performance.