How could Belgian SMEs adopt the concept of digital sobriety as a new CSR practices?

Digitalization has impacted humankind in a significant way, intruding on various human activities, with huge benefits but also many dangers due the lack of awareness and perception of its environmental impacts. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) equipment has a growing impact on climate change, with a fast increase in Greenhouse Gas Emissions (GHG) and implications for various Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the production, consumption, and elimination phases. This is mostly due to developed/Western societies who overconsume ICT equipment, characterized by a great impact upon the production phase abroad and a quickening technological innovation cycle, itself a great driver of economic growth. In the recent years, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) practices and new business models for circular economy have emerged, allowing a reduction of negative externalities of products and services through the implementation of sustainable practices. Responsible digital consumption is seen as a possible solution to the growing issue of e-waste, resource depletion and overconsumption of both hardware & data. The term of “Digital sobriety” starts to gain interest, as that could represent cost savings at procurement, along with responsible digital behaviour for companies and their employees, resulting in a decrease in the global GHG digital footprint. We thus focus here on the responsible digital consumption of companies, related to SDG n°12: Responsible consumption and production. The idea of this thesis is to observe how SMEs could adopt and benefit from digital sobriety practices in countries where digitalization is at its highest and a source of rapid economic growth. We focus on Belgium’s digitalization status and the solutions to implement digital responsible management for all small businesses who lack relevant CSR tools and practices to address environmental issues. A responsible consumption of hardware, along with a responsible consumption and production of software and data must start to make sense in the corporate world of developed countries, still using ICT equipment on an everyday basis without any awareness of its environmental impact.