Green Information Technology Practices and Environmental Management Performance in the Banking Industry in Kenya

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to establish how green information technology practices affect environmental management performance among commercial banks in Kenya. The study sought to achieve two specific objectives: establish the extent of adoption of green information technology practices by commercial banks in Kenya and determine the impact of green information technology on environmental management performance in Kenya. The study took a descriptive research design where all the 43 commercial banks were involved in the study. The study findings reveal that most commercial banks in Kenya have adopted the following green information technology practices: implementation of paperless banking systems; purchasing of energy efficient computers, putting in place energy efficient networks; adoption of greed data centers; embracing virtualization, server consolidation technology; use of cloud computing; adoption of ERP systems and use of real-time processing of transactions. The commercial banks have started to embrace recycling of electronic waste. The study found a strong positive correlations between improved environmental management and adoption of paperless banking system, purchase of energy efficient computers and recycling of electronic waste. The regression results showed that the adoption of green IT accounts for 76.7 percent of the environmental management performance of commercial banks in Kenya.