Paper Title (use style: paper title)


 

http://www.ojs.unito.it/index.php/EJIF          ISSN 2421-2172            DOI: 10.13135/2421-2172/5765 1 

Islamic finance and Sustainable Development Goals. 

A bibliometric analysis from 2000 to 2021 
 

 

Federica Lanzara, University of Turin 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  
Abstract— The aim of this research is to provide, through a 

bibliometric analysis of the last 21 years of thematic literature, an 

overview on the contribution of sustainable development goals 

(SDGs) to the discussion in the field of Islamic finance.  

A bibliometric method has been used to analyze the 

characteristics, citation patterns and content of 15 documents 

published in international academic journals, books review and 

chapters, editorial material and proceedings papers. 

Considering the findings, the analysis has shown that there is an 

enormous gap on that field, with a few works on the topic with an 

impact on research. Through the analysis of the papers, it 

emerges that qualitative method is the most used method to 

demonstrate the link between Islamic finance and its relationship 

in the achievement of sustainable development goals. The 

research also shows that there is an increase on the academic 

interest on the topic only in the last four years. 

Research limitations/implications – The study highlights a 

limitation, related to the adoption of the bibliometric method. 

This is due to the fact that databases include only part of the 

scientific papers and not all world’s sources. However, WOS 

database, the one adopted for the research, is the world’s most 

complete index even if it is not complete at all. On the other hand, 

to have a wider landscape of knowledge on the field of research, 

they have been considered all kind of sources: books review, 

chapters, papers published in international and academic 

journals, editorial materials, reviews and proceedings papers.  

Originality/value – This research shows the initial attention of the 

academic world toward the relation between Islamic finance and 

Sustainable Development Goals, however underlying that this 

contribution is not systematically interpreted by the different 

stakeholders and in the different countries. The bibliometric 

analysis of the literature puts Islamic finance and Sustainable 

Development Goals in relation but contemporarily indicates that 

more efforts need to be done in order to enhance this bond both 

from an academical and a practical point of view. Therefore, with 

the intention of mapping all the studies that have been done in 

this regard, the study analyzes how research on the relationship 

between Islamic finance and social development goals has been 

addressed, confirm with its qualitative approach the link between 

Islamic finance and social impact. 

Keywords: Islamic finance, SDGs, bibliometric analysis, social 

impact 

I.  INTRODUCTION  

Islamic finance in the last 30 years has been growing 

continuously and has provided a niche market with solutions 

and financial inclusion through a well-defined Islamic ethos 

(Mahomed 2017). Its conformation to Islamic principles 

however has not limited its attractiveness to non-Muslim 

countries, customers and actors and poses this alternative 

finance as one of the most interesting vehicles of a financial 

transformation with hypothetical unlimited outputs in the real 

economy (Ferro 2005; Belouafi e Chachi 2014; Masiukiewicz 

2017; Hajjar 2019; Nawaz et al. 2019). Starting from that 

preliminary observation, in the field of the relationship 

between Islamic finance and sustainable development goals, it 

has been observed that there are still gaps in our knowledge 

(Zarrouk Jamel 2015) they are principally related to a lack of 

academic debate and to the lack of coordination between 

financial actors as it will be demonstrated in the research. In 

fact, there is not much literature that faces the relationship 

between Islamic finance and SDGs that, however, seems of a 

certain relevance for global growth. To enhance the 

knowledge on that topic, this paper analyzes the literature 

evolution from 2000 until 2021 in order to fill a gap of 

knowledge in the specific field. Islamic finance, in fact, had 

been addressed as one of the key ―actors‖ for the reach of a 

sustainable development since it can move a huge amount of 

money that actually is not deployed for that purposes (OECD 

2020).  

 

Due to present social and economic challenges, 

particularly after 2008 and COVID-19 crisis, it has been 

enhanced the knowledge of all the possible instruments which 

can be a real alternative for sustainable development and 

global growth (M. Kabir Hassan, Aishath Muneeza, Adel M. 

Sarea 2021; Aam Slamet Rusydiana 2020; Alam 2020; Abbas 

e Frihatni 2020).  

 

In this work, the research focuses on the relationship 

between Islamic finance and sustainable development goals 

from 2000 to 2021. It has been systematically analyzed every 

article published on that field in international and academic 

journals, editorial materials, reviews and proceedings papers.  

 

Submitted April 2021, Revised May 2021, 

Accepted May 2021 



EJIF – European Journal of Islamic Finance                                                                     No 18, August (2021) 
 

 

http://www.ojs.unito.it/index.php/EJIF          ISSN 2421-2172            DOI: 10.13135/2421-2172/5765 2 

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate (a) if Islamic 

finance and sustainable development goals have a relation in 

literature, (b) if so, to crystallize the academic studies on this 

field and (c) furthermore to demonstrate the evolution of the 

perception of the SDGs in Islamic finance in literature. This 

research will show how, among 21 years, the literature has 

underlined the relation between Islamic finance and the 

achievement of sustainable development. Therefore, with the 

intention of mapping the studies that have been done in this 

regard, the paper aims to explore how research on this field 

has been addressed. The originality of this paper is represented 

by the fact that no bibliometric studies have been published in 

this specific field. 

 

In order to explore the contents of the relationship 

between Islamic finance and sustainable development goals in 

literature and as well to identify the main flows of the 

academic sector, this work is organized as follows:  

(i) analysis of the literature; 

(ii) identification of the most influential articles; 

(iii) analysis of the main themes. 

The next section presents the methodology, including a review 

of the literature regarding the results on the eventual relation 

between Islamic finance and social finance. The third section 

explains the categorization of these findings and after 

describing the results of the method used, the fourth section 

outlines implications and conclusions. 

 

Background 

According to previous studies which explained the 

existing relation between Islamic finance and social 

finance(Olanrewaju, Shahbudin, e Zakariyah 2020; The World 

Bank 2017; Cattelan 2018), it seemed interesting to deepen the 

research in order to find out the state of art of the academical 

research on Islamic finance in relation to sustainable 

development goals which are, as an instance, related to the 

―social aspects‖ of finance. Islamic finance, as a matter of fact, 

could be seen as a tool for institutional and economic actors to 

achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) developed by 

the UN(OECD 2020). 

 

Starting from the "Independent Group of Scientists 

appointed by the Secretary-General, Global Sustainable 

Development Report 2019: The Future is Now – Science for 

Achieving Sustainable Development, (United Nations, New 

York, 2019)", this study aims analyze how Islamic finance 

acts in promoting the effective functioning of the SDGs. 

 

In the motivating principles of the SDGs, the Secretary-

General stated (United Nations, 2017, p. 2): ―In adopting the 

2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, world leaders 

resolved to free humanity from poverty, secure a healthy 

planet for future generations, and build peaceful, inclusive 

societies as a foundation for ensuring lives of dignity for all 

[...] Our challenge now is to mobilize action that will bring 

these agendas meaningfully and tangibly to life. I call on 

Governments and stakeholders to recognize the gaps that have 

been identified in this report – in implementation, financing 

and political will – and to now join hands to fulfil this vision 

and keep this promise‖. 

 

The 17 SDGs developed by the UN recognize and 

ratify the essential social, economic and environmental issues 

facing our society.  

 

Fig. 1 Sustainable development goals 

 
Source: United Nations Development Program web site 

 

 

Governments and the public sector as well as the 

stakeholders and the enterprises (P. P. Biancone e Radwan 

2019)too as a whole must use the SDGs as a basis for 

developing the public implementation (Farneti et al. 2019). 

Literature in the field is really limited (Georgeson e 

Maslin 2018; Kharas e McArthur 2019; Attridge, te Velde, e 

Peter Andreasen 2019; Ziolo, Bak, e Cheba 2021) so an 

academic contribution with a deepening on that topic appears 

to be highly recommended in order to reach substantial 

progress in achieving global goals and meet the criteria of 

2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (Littlewood e Holt 

2018).  

 

Bibliometric analysis help on the field of Islamic 

finance do not pertain the relationship between Islamic finance 

and SDGs. These analysis are focused on general topics such 

as ―Islamic finance‖ and ―Islamic banking and finance‖ (P. P. 

Biancone et al. 2020; Bollani e Chmet 2020).  

 

II. METHODOLOGY 

2.1 Method 

The study was conducted in the form of bibliometric 

analysis which is often used  in order to extract and 

manipulate data, based on content or citation analysis  (Wallin 

2005) to determine necessary information about the literature 

about a specific research topic (Zupic e Čater 2015). 

Bibliometric method, furthermore, had already been used in 

the field of Islamic finance (Tijjani et al. 2020; Alshater et al. 

2020; P. P. Biancone et al. 2020) and in the field of 



EJIF – European Journal of Islamic Finance                                                                     No 18, August (2021) 
 

 

http://www.ojs.unito.it/index.php/EJIF          ISSN 2421-2172            DOI: 10.13135/2421-2172/5765 3 

sustainable development (Secinaro et al. 2021). This method 

benefited greatly from computerized data treatment and in the 

recent years there has been a huge increase in the number of 

that kind of publications (Ellegaard e Wallin 2015). 

 

According to Verbeek, Debackere, Luwel, & 

Zimmermann (2002), bibliometric analysis can be defined as 

follows: ―Bibliometrics is the statistical analysis of scholarly 

communication through publications‖. All sources are used to 

perform rigorous bibliometric and network analysis (e.g., 

citation and citation analysis) with the function of tracing the 

knowledge structure of this topic. In particular, according to 

Moral-Munoz et al., ―bibliometrics has quickly evolved and 

technically perfected alongside with the exponential growth of 

science. Presently, the massive amount of data published on 

academic journals, books, patents, proceedings, etc. required 

to be stored and organized into bibliographic databases. The 

information contained on these platforms (i.e. citations, 

keywords, titles, journals, authors, institutions, etc.) provides 

a valuable sample to perform science evaluation research 

using bibliometric techniques (GUTIÉRREZ-SALCEDO et al. 

2020). As a result, bibliometrics has become in contemporary 

context an essential tool for assessing and analyzing 

researcher’s production (Ellegaard e Wallin 2015), 

collaboration between institutions (Skute et al. 2019), impact 

of state scientific investment in national R&D productivity 

(Fabregat-Aibar et al. 2019) and academic quality (van Raan 

2004), among other possibilities (Glänzel 2012)‖. 

 

The analysis of the network through bibliometric tools 

has proved useful in identifying consolidated and emerging 

topical areas(Aria e Cuccurullo 2017; Moral-Munoz et al. 

2020) and also to give contribution towards integrating these 

elements in literature (Secinaro et al. 2020).  

 

The keywords used to perform the bibliometric study 

were: 

- ―Islamic finance and sustainable development goals‖; 
- ―Islamic finance * sustainable development goals‖; 
- ―Islamic finance and SDG‖; 
- ―Islamic finance * SDG‖. 

 

A meta-search engine (Web of Science-WOS) was 

used in the research, which accessed the most well-known 

academic databases (Archambault et al. 2009). This 

multidisciplinary database allows researchers to identify key 

articles for scientific analysis (Okoli e Schabram 2010; 

Webster e Watson 2002). 

 

The research’s results were then aggregated into a 

single list for comparative purposes through the creation of a 

.bib file for the Data Analysis which has been performed with 

R-Studio. Biblioshiny tool was used for the creation of 

conceptual maps of the Data Analysis. 

 

The statistical analyses were done with the 

statistical software R-studio (Derviş 2020)(Rodríguez-Soler, 

Uribe-Toril, e De Pablo Valenciano 2020) and the statistical 

software provided by Web of Science (WOS).  

 

The above-mentioned process can be summarised and 

represented in Fig. 2 below. 

Fig. 2: Methodology framework 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Source: personal elaboration 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2.2 Identification of papers 

Fifteen (15) documents have been identified in the 

WOS database based on the assumptions made. Despite the 

limited number of documents selected for the topic analysis, 

this research maintains its originality because it aims to start a 

fruitful discussion on this topic. Bibliometrix quantitative 

variables have been helpful to analyze, mainly, keywords and 

main topics. 

 

All the results were then aggregated into a single list 

for comparative purposes. After the comparison of the four 

lists, it emerged that the first list, ―Islamic finance and 

sustainable development goals‖ was the only one that included 

all the results generated by the researches with other 

keywords. Articles dealing within all areas of knowledge have 

been included in the list. For a wider search, not only peer 

review journals have been selected.  

 

In order to answer the research question, documents published 

from 2000 to 2021 (February 2021) have been selected. This 

period includes the years in which Millennium Development 

Goals and Sustainable Development Goals have been 

operative (MDGs 2000-2015 and SDGs 2015-still on 

operations) due to the fact that Millennium Development 

Goals principles had been substituted and absorbed by 

Sustainable Development Goals
1
. In the research had been 

included documents published in international academic 

journals, books review and chapters, editorial material and 

proceedings papers.  

 

                                                           
1
 https://www.sdgfund.org/mdgs-sdgs 

DATABASE 

Web of Science 

BIBLIOMETRICS ANALYSIS 

 Source main information 

 Authors 

 Countries 

 Network analysis 

 Keyword analysis 



EJIF – European Journal of Islamic Finance                                                                     No 18, August (2021) 
 

 

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The language of publication selected is English in order 

to have a wider and more homogeneous overview since it is 

the most dominant language in social sciences articles (Hamel 

2007). 

III. RESULTS  

3.1 Publication pattern 

Main information, source growth, annual scientific 

production, most relevant sources, top 20 authors and top 20 

Universities cited had been analyzed to identify the 

publication pattern. 

In Tab. I we can find the main information regarding 

the 788 articles included in the research. 

 

Tab. I – Main information 

Description Results 

MAIN INFORMATION ABOUT DATA 

 Timespan 2000:2021 

Sources (Journals, Books, etc) 11 

Documents 15 

Average years from publication 2 

Average citations per documents 1,667 

Average citations per year per doc 0,5856 

References 500 

DOCUMENT TYPES 

 article 11 

proceedings paper 3 

review 1 

DOCUMENT CONTENTS 

 Keywords Plus (ID) 15 

Author’s Keywords (DE) 60 

AUTHORS 

 Authors 31 

Author Appearances 35 

Authors of single-authored documents 3 

Authors of multi-authored documents 28 

AUTHORS COLLABORATION 

 Single-authored documents 4 

Documents per Author 0,484 

Authors per Document 2,07 

Co-Authors per Documents 2,33 

Collaboration Index 2,55 

Source: personal elaboration 

 

As it could be observed, articles (11) and proceeding 

papers (3) are the most relevant type of documents followed 

by reviews (1). On average, most articles were the result of the 

work of multiple authors considering that only 4 documents, 

out of 15, were single-authored.  Finally, the Collaboration 

Index which implies the total number of authors of multi-

authored articles/total number of multi-authored articles, has a 

value of 2,55. 

 

During the period under review (2000-2021), the 

number of publications on the analyzed theme increased in the 

last four years.  

 

Fig. 3: Source growth 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Biblioshiny 

 

The most relevant scientific production refers to one 

journal: Al-Shajarah that is the Journal of the International 

Institute of Islamic Thought and Civilization (ISTAC) (Fig. 4). 

It can be noted (from the figure below) that the majority of 

journals are related to Social studies rather than to Islamic 

finance. 

 

Fig. 4: Most relevant sources 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Web of Science 

 

Annual scientific production has increased particularly 

in the last two years (2021 has just started) (Fig. 4). The data 

confirm what has already been said above. This field of 

research is evolving and the horizons are increasingly broad. 

 

 

 

 

 

 



EJIF – European Journal of Islamic Finance                                                                     No 18, August (2021) 
 

 

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Fig. 5: Annual scientific production 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Web of Science 

 

Considering the research areas of the articles, it can be 

noted (from the Fig. 5 below) that the articles mostly deal with 

Management (3) and only 1 article has been published in the 

field of Development Studies. 

 

Fig. 6: Research areas 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Web of Science 

 

The sample is composed of 31 authors (Tab. II). The 

authors with most impact so far have been: ALI ERAE (2), 

GUNDOGDU AS (2), MAHADI NF (2), ZAIN NRM (2). 

Checking their affiliation at the time of publication emerged 

that the most represented Universities are those represented on 

Tab. III.  

Most of the studies are the result of a group-work while 

only 4 had been the result of the work of a single author.  

 

Tab. II: top 20 authors 

Authors Articles 

Ali Erae 2 

Gundogdu As 2 

Mahadi Nf 2 

Zain Nrm 2 

Abduh M 1 

Afandi Ma 1 

Ali Km 1 

Azman Smms 1 

Balqiah Te 1 

Bazyar M 1 

Doshmangir L 1 

Ghoniyah N 1 

Hananto A 1 

Hartono S 1 

Hassan R 1 

Hati Srh 1 

Hudaefi Fa 1 

Kamal R 1 

Kassim S 1 

Majdzadeh R 1 

Source: personal elaboration 

 

Tab. III: top 20 University for Scientific Production 

Affiliations Articles 

Iium Inst Islamic Banking 

And Finance Iiibf 8 

Univ Tehran Med Sci 8 

Int Islamic Univ Malaysia 4 

Univ Indonesia 4 

Assoc Shariah Advisors 

Islamic Finance Asas 3 

Peace Res Inst 3 

Yarmouk Univ 3 

Baznas Ctr Strateg 

Studies 2 

Boston Univ 2 

Disciplinary Comm 2 

Hamad Bin Khalifa Univ 2 

Inst Agama Islam 

Darussalam Iaid Ciamis 2 

Ipb Univ 2 

Istanbul Sabahattin Zaim 

Univ 2 

Labuan Financial Serv 

Author Labuan Fsa 2 

Malaysian Inst Islamic 

Understanding 2 

Nrm (Corresponding 

Author) 2 

Sch Business And Econ 

Ubdsbe 2 

Shariah Advisory Council 2 

Tabriz Univ Med Sci 2 

Source: personal elaboration 

 



EJIF – European Journal of Islamic Finance                                                                     No 18, August (2021) 
 

 

http://www.ojs.unito.it/index.php/EJIF          ISSN 2421-2172            DOI: 10.13135/2421-2172/5765 6 

 

3.2 Citation analysis 

Fig. 5 and Tab. V display the Country Production with 

Malaysia which tops the list (36), followed by Indonesia (12) 

and Iran (11) which are the only three countries with a 

production of more than 10 documents. This is due to the 

presence on that countries of a lot of scholars interested on the 

themes and with a Muslim majority. In these countries Islamic 

finance is becoming day by day a fundamental tool for growth 

and academic discussion on the field is continuously growing. 

(Rammal e Zurbruegg 2016; Belouafi e Chachi 2014). Finally, 

Fig. 5 shows a generalized worldwide interest on the topic of 

research.   

 

 

 

 

Fig. 5 - Country production 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Biblioshiny 

 

 

Tab. IV - Top 20 Country production 

Region Freq 

Malaysia 36 

Indonesia 12 

Iran 11 

Jordan 3 

Norway 3 

Usa 3 

Brunei 2 

Qatar 2 

Saudi Arabia 2 

Turkey 2 

Bangladesh 1 

Canada 1 

Source: personal elaboration 

 

The most cited country is Iran (17), the only one with 

more than 10 citations, followed by Indonesia (3), Malaysia 

(1), Qatar (1), Saudi Arabia (1), Turkey (1) and USA (1) (Tab. 

IV).  

 

Tab. V: Most cited countries 

Country Total Citations 

Iran 17 

Indonesia 3 

Malaysia 1 

Qatar 1 

Saudi Arabia 1 

Turkey 1 

Usa 1 

Source: personal elaboration 

 

Table IV represents the ranking of the top 20 articles 

per number of citations from other articles. This shows that the 

article with the most total citations and total citation per year 

is a paper edited in Archives of Iranian Medicine (Doshmangir 

et al. 2019). At first sight it could seem strange that an article 

of a Medical journal could be of any interest for the topic of 

this research, however that particular paper is really interesting 

in facing the problem of healthcare systems in achieving 

sustainable development.  

 

On the other hand, regarding the other articles it could 

be said that they came from a variety of journals.  Articles 

with a significant number of total citations per year are related 

to the role of fintech in achieving SDGs in Indonesia (Hudaefi 

2020), the use of waqf in forest preservation and in achieving 

SDGs (Ali e Kassim 2020), the role of Islamic PPPs in the 

context of SDGs (Gundogdu 2019), the different approaches 

of Development Bank of Latin America and the Islamic 

Development Bank in realizing sustainable development (Ray 

e Kamal 2019) and the role of Islamic finance in the 

perspective of Sustainable Development Goals (Gundogdu 

2018). According to the results, it is not possible to identify a 

leading journal with a higher number of published articles 

inserted in the Top-cited documents list.  

 

Tab. V: Top-cited documents 

# Authors, Title and Sources Total 

Citations 

TC per 

Year 

1 (Doshmangir et al. 2019) So 

Near, So Far: Four Decades of 

Health Policy Reforms in Iran, 

Achievements and Challenges  

Archives of Iranian Medicine 

22(10):592-605 – October 

2019 

17 5,667 

2 (Hudaefi 2020) How does 

Islamic fintech promote the 

SDGs? Qualitative evidence 

from Indonesia  

Qualitative Research in 

Financial Markets - Vol. 12 

No. 4, pp. 353-366. 14 March 

3 1,5 



EJIF – European Journal of Islamic Finance                                                                     No 18, August (2021) 
 

 

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2020 

3 (Ali e Kassim 2020) Waqf 

Forest: How Waqf Can Play a 

Role In Forest Preservation 

and SDGs Achievement? 

Etikonomi: Jurnal Ekonomi, 

19(2), 2020 

1 0,5 

4 (Gundogdu 2019) 

Determinants of Success in 

Islamic Public-Private 

Partnership Projects (PPPs) in 

the Context of SDGs  

Journal Turkish Journal of 

Islamic Economy 

Volume 6; Pages 

25-43; 2019 

1 0,333 

5 (Ray e Kamal 2019) Can 

South–South Cooperation 

Compete? The Development 

Bank of Latin America and the 

Islamic Development Bank 

Development and Change - 

Volume50, Issue1- January 

2019 - Special Issue: Beyond 

Bretton Woods: 

Complementarity and 

Competition in the 

International Economic Order 

1 0,333 

6 (Gundogdu 2018) An Inquiry 

into Islamic Finance from the 

Perspective of Sustainable 

Development Goals 

European Journal of 

Sustainable Development, 

7(4), 381. - 2018 

1 0,25 

7 (Tok e O’Bright 2017) 

Reproducing spaces of 

embeddedness through Islamic 

NGOs in Sub-Saharan Africa: 

reflections on the post-2015 

development agenda 

African Geographical Review 

Volume 36, 2017 - Issue 1: 

From the Millennium 

Development Goals (MDGs) 

to the Sustainable 

Development Goals (SDGs): 

Africa in the Post-2015 

Development Agenda. A 

Geographical Perspective, Part 

1 

1 0,2 

8 (Ghoniyah e Hartono 2020) 

How Islamic and conventional 

bank in Indonesia contributing 

sustainable development goals 

achievement  

0 0 

Cogent Economics & Finance 

Volume 8, 2020 - Issue 1 

9 (Azman e Ali 2019) Islamic 

social finance and the 

imperative for social impact 

measurement 

Al-Shajarah - 2019: Special 

Issue: Islamic Banking and 

Finance 2019 

0 0 

10 (Mahadi, Zain, e Ali 2019) 

Leading towards impactful 

islamic social finance: 

malaysian experience with the 

value-based intermediation 

approach  

Al-Shajarah - 2019: Special 

Issue: Islamic Banking and 

Finance 2019 

0 0 

Source: personal elaboration 

 

 

Topics analyzed from the considered articles are quite 

various, so for the purpose of this research, we will have a 

deepen look at the five most cited papers in the field of 

interest. In the most cited articles, the most relevant scientific 

contributions are: 

 (Doshmangir et al. 2019) which observes the necessity of 
a sustainable development of healthcare system in Iran, 

providing an interesting reconstruction of the last 30 years 

achievements on that field. Regarding the target of this 

research, it appears relevant to underline the lines of the 

paper in which the authors of the paper state that ―To 

achieve sustainable health development, bold policy 

reforms are essential in core components of the health 

system, i.e. governance, delivery of healthcare and 

financing‖(Roberts et al. s.d.)(World Health Organization 

2010), attributing a determinant role to a joint action at all 

levels to achieve sustainable goals. Even if in the paper 

there is no direct mention of SDGs, it is possible to insert 

that contribution in SDG number 3 ―good health and 

wellbeing‖; 

 (Hudaefi 2020) examines the relationship between Islamic 
fintech and the achievements in endorsing SDGs, finding 

that ―Islamic P2P fintech lending in Indonesia has been 

financing SMEs, agriculture sector, and conducting 

charity programmes for disadvantaged groups. In some 

degree, these findings may be synonymous of the Islamic 

fintech efforts in endorsing the SDGs implementation in 

Indonesia. This study is among the pioneers which 

substantively confirm the role of fintech firms in 

promoting SDGs‖; 

 (Ali e Kassim 2020) analyzes the role that a productive 
waqf forest will generate in tangible and intangible 

benefits. An important implication of the research is that 

―Waqf research for Muslim society is essential and 

potential for elaborating the potentials of waqf in 



EJIF – European Journal of Islamic Finance                                                                     No 18, August (2021) 
 

 

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strengthening the ummah’s economy (Rusydiana & Al 

Farisi, 2016). Previous research stated that waqf could be 

used to support environmental and forest sustainability.‖ 

and also that ―Waqf could be introduced into forest 

protection and regeneration program in terms of funding 

(Hasanah & Hakim, 2017; Yaakob et al., 2017). Waqf is 

―holding the assets and donating the yields.‖ Waqf has 

several unique characteristics that suitable for developing 

forest preservation, namely: waqf cannot be sold (laa 

yubaa’), cannot be granted (laa yuuhab), and inherited 

(laa yurats) as well As-Sa’di, 2002). In terms of waqf for 

forest conservation, a forest that became a waqf land will 

be sustainable, because waqf rule forbids to change the 

land use to another use until the end of the world.‖. 

Finally, that kind of sustainable investment will have a 

dramatic impact on the achievement of a sustainable 

development since it complies with SDGs number 1 ―no 

poverty,‖ 2 ―zero hunger,‖ 3 ―good health and wellbeing,‖ 

6 ―clean water and sanitation,‖ 13 ―climate action,‖ and 

15 ―live on land‖; 

 (Gundogdu 2019) examines the role of Islamic public-
private partnership (PPPs) projects in bridging the huge 

infrastructure investment gap related to sustainable 

development goals (SDGs); in this paper ―Islamic PPPs 

are presented as an instrument to address SDG #7: 

Affordable Energy, SDG #9: Industrial Innovation and 

Infrastructure Development and SDG #8: Decent Work 

and Economic Growth‖. SDGs are seen as an 

opportunity for the growing of Islamic finance industry 

since ―Islamic financial institutions would find leeway to 

invest in tangible assets produced by PPP projects‖; 

 (Ray e Kamal 2019) analyse the role of Southern-led 
multilateral development banks (MDBs) in harnessing 

global capital to finance specific sector such as 

infrastructure. They analyse MBDs’ performances 

comparing them to those of their Northern-based 

counterparts and focuses on ―bank operations to 

determine whether their governance structure impacts 

their internal performance, as reflected on balance 

sheets, and external performance — gaining relevance in 

development finance and particularly in infrastructure 

lending, including the burgeoning sector of sustainable 

(climate-resilient) infrastructure‖. Finally, it resulted 

MBDs’prominence as major players in the field of 

development finance. 

 

3.3 Keyword co-occurrences network 

Every article published must contain keywords. These 

keywords are the research fields that have been involved in the 

respective articles. It establishes the co-occurrences of the 

network keywords. The purpose of the co-occurrence analysis 

is to design the conceptual structure of a frame of reference 

using a network of co-occurrence words to map and group the 

terms extracted from the keywords into a bibliographic 

collection.  

 

The following Fig. 6 provides information to find out 

which are the most relevant keywords analyzing papers’ 

abstracts. The figure shows that researchers combine their 

scientific production with a significant number of keywords. 

The most involved keywords are ISLAM, DEVELOPMENT, 

SOCIAL, SDGS, FINANCE, SUSTAINABLE, GOALS, 

HEALTH, BANKS and FINANCIAL. Analyzing these 

keywords, it is clear that there is a general attention to 

sustainable development but there is a lack of specificity, with 

the exception of the keyword health that could be reconducted 

to a specific SDG. Central appears the role of BANKS in 

Islamic finance path toward sustainable development. 

 

 

 

Fig. 6 - Most relevant words 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Biblioshiny 

 

 

Fig. 7 - Annual occurrences of most cited words 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Biblioshiny 

 

The figure above helps to understand the spread of the 

annual occurrences of the most cited words in the last years 

(production starts effectively in 2017 and does not register 

articles in 2021, so the picture contains the period 2017-2020).  



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At the same time in Tab. VI and Fig. 8 below clarify the 

trending topics between 2017 and 2020, the years with 

production.   

 

Tab. VI Trend topics per year 

item freq year 

Islamic Social Finance 5 2019 

Sdgs 4 2019 

Sustainable Development Goals 3 2019 

Financial Intermediary 2 2019 

Sustainable Development 2 2019 

Sustainable Development Goals (Sdgs) 2 2019 

Waqf 2 2020 

Affordable Housing 1 2018 

Agriculture 1 2019 

Blended Finance 1 2019 

Cash Waqf 1 2018 

Complementary Currency 1 2018 

Credit Distribution 1 2020 

Crowd Funding 1 2018 

Crowdfunding 1 2019 

Development 1 2017 

Economic Empowerment Fund 1 2018 

Embeddedness
2
 1 2017 

Faith Based Ngos 1 2017 

Food Security 1 2019 

Goal And Function Of Bank 1 2020 

Goals 1 2019 

Green Sukuk 1 2019 

Hdi
3
 1 2019 

Health Policy 1 2019 

Health System 1 2019 

Health System Framework 1 2019 

Ihya' Al-Mawat 1 2019 

Ijara 1 2019 

Indonesia 1 2020 

Infrastructure Development 1 2018 

Intermediation 1 2019 

International Trade 1 2018 

Iran 1 2019 

                                                           
2
 According to the concept of social embeddedness, economic 

decisions are affected by the social networks in which economic 

actors operate (Czernek-Marszałek 2020) 
3
 Human Development Index 

Islamic Bank Financing 1 2019 

Islamic Banks 1 2019 

Islamic Fintech 1 2020 

Istisna 1 2019 

Maqasid Al-Shari'ah 1 2019 

Maqasid Al-Sharrah 1 2019 

Micro Finance 1 2018 

Ppps 1 2019 

Project Finance 1 2019 

Qatar 1 2017 

Reform 1 2019 

Rem 1 2019 

Review 1 2020 

Sme Financing 1 2018 

Social Impact Measurement 1 2019 

Social Living Standards Improvement 1 2020 

Source: personal elaboration 

 

 

 

 

Fig. 8 Trend topics per year 

 
Source: personal elaboration from Biblioshiny 

 

The figure and the table above show that researchers 

combine their scientific production with a significant number 

of keywords. Instead, the figure below helps to understand the 

spread of the annual occurrences of the most cited words in 

the last four years which implies an increased awareness on 

the field.   

 

To examine the content of the articles, a list of the trend 

topics per year had been developed. The target of the coding 

process is to determine whether there is a match between 

SDGs and the keywords in the article collection.  

According to UNDP 4, ―The Sustainable Development Goals 

(SDGs), also known as the Global Goals, were adopted by all 

                                                           
4
 https://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/sustainable-

development-goals.html 



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United Nations Member States in 2015 as a universal call to 

action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all 

people enjoy peace and prosperity by 2030. 

The 17 SDGs are integrated—that is, they recognize 

that action in one area will affect outcomes in others, and that 

development must balance social, economic and 

environmental sustainability.‖ 

 

Tab. VI Sustainable Development Goals and trend topics 

# SDGs Expected 

achievements 

Most cited words 

1 No poverty End poverty in 

all its forms 

everywhere 

Agriculture and Food 

security 

2 Zero 

hunger 

End hunger, 

achieve food 

security and 

improved 

nutrition and 

promote 

sustainable 

agriculture 

Agriculture and Food 

security 

3 Good 

health and 

well-being 

Ensure healthy 

lives and 

promote well-

being for all at 

all ages 

Health policy, Health 

system and Health 

system framework 

4 Quality 

education 

Ensure 

inclusive and 

equitable 

quality 

education and 

promote 

lifelong 

learning 

opportunities 

for all 

 

5 Gender 

equality 

Achieve 

gender 

equality and 

empower all 

women and 

girls 

 

6 Clean water 

and 

sanitation 

Ensure 

availability 

and 

sustainable 

management 

of water and 

sanitation for 

all 

 

7 Affordable 

and clean 

energy 

Ensure access 

to affordable, 

reliable, 

sustainable 

and modern 

Green sukuk 

energy for all 

8 Decent 

work and 

economic 

growth 

Promote 

sustained, 

inclusive and 

sustainable 

economic 

growth, full 

and productive 

employment 

and decent 

work for all 

Blended finance, 

Complementary 

currency, Credit 

distribution, 

Crowdfunding, 

Economic 

empowerment fund, 

Embeddedness, Faith 

based NGOs, Goal and 

function of bank, 

Intermediation, 

International trade, 

Islamic fintech, Micro 

finance, PPPs, Project 

finance, SME 

financing, Social 

impact measurement 

9 Industry, 

innovation 

and 

infrastructu

re 

Build resilient 

infrastructure, 

promote 

inclusive and 

sustainable 

industrializatio

n and foster 

innovation 

Green sukuk; 

Blended finance, 

Complementary 

currency, Credit 

distribution, 

Crowdfunding, 

Economic 

empowerment fund, 

Embeddedness, Faith 

based NGOs, Goal and 

function of bank, 

Intermediation, 

International trade, 

Islamic fintech, Micro 

finance, PPPs, Project 

finance, SME 

financing, Social 

impact measurement 

10 Reduced 

inequalities 

Reduce 

inequality 

between and 

among 

countries 

Affordable Housing, 

HDI, Social living 

standards 

improvement, 

Infrastructure 

development; Blended 

finance, 

Complementary 

currency, Credit 

distribution, 

Crowdfunding, 

Economic 

empowerment fund, 

Embeddedness, Faith 

based NGOs, Goal and 

function of bank, 

Intermediation, 

International trade, 

Islamic fintech, Micro 

finance, PPPs, Project 



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finance, SME 

financing, Social 

impact measurement 

11 Sustainable 

cities and 

communitie

s 

Make cities 

and human 

settlements 

inclusive, safe, 

resilient and 

sustainable 

Affordable Housing, 

HDI, Social living 

standards 

improvement, 

Infrastructure 

development 

12 Responsibl

e 

consumptio

n and 

production 

Ensure 

sustainable 

consumption 

and 

production 

patterns 

 

13 Climate 

action 

Take urgent 

action to 

combat 

climate 

change and its 

impacts 

Agriculture and Food 

security; 

Green sukuk 

14 Life below 

water 

Conserve and 

sustainably 

use the ocean, 

seas and 

marine 

resources for 

sustainable 

development 

 

15 Life on 

land 

Protect, 

restore and 

promote 

sustainable 

use of 

terrestrial 

ecosystems, 

sustainably 

manage 

forests, 

combat 

desertification 

and halt and 

reverse land 

degradation 

and halt 

biodiversity 

loss 

Agriculture and Food 

security; 

Green sukuk 

16 Peace, 

justice and 

strong 

institutions 

Promote 

peaceful and 

inclusive 

societies for 

sustainable 

development, 

provide access 

to justice for 

all and build 

 

effective, 

accountable 

and inclusive 

institutions at 

all levels 

17 Partnership 

for the 

goals 

Strengthen the 

means of 

implementatio

n and 

revitalize the 

global 

partnership for 

sustainable 

development 

 

Source: personal elaboration from UNDP website 

 

Keywords emerged on Tab. VI and Fig. 6 had been put into 

Tab. VII in order to clarify their relation with SDGs. It 

emerges that literature on the field of Islamic finance and 

SDGs deals with a number of issues that will be analyzed 

below. 

-  (Affordable Housing, HDI, Social living standards 
improvement, Infrastructure development) SDG 10 – 

Reduced inequalities, SDG 11 - Sustainable cities and 

communities;  

The issue of Affordable housing, according to 

(Gundogdu 2018) can be attained through resource 

mobilization. It is also observed that such mobilization 

requires product development and successful SDG 

programs that will have to provide convincing results.  

HDI has been taken under consideration (Afandi, 

Wahyuningsih, e Muta’ali 2019) to evaluate the role of 

Islamic finance in improving quality of life of Java 

Islands’ population; it has been observed that Islamic 

banking should encourage its financing based on social 

values or impact investments such as education, health, 

rural communities, agriculture, nutrition and renewable 

energies to support the improvement of HDI. Social 

living standards improvement are, according to 

(Ghoniyah e Hartono 2020), part of the banking’s 

objectives in Indonesia in order to improve equity, 

national stability, and economic growth. Infrastructure 

development by Multilateral Development Banks and 

local governments have not succeeded in reducing 

poverty (Gundogdu 2019), however Islamic finance 

could succeed in achieving sustainable development 

goals using PPPs.  

- (Agriculture and Food security) SDG 1 – No poverty, 
SDG 2 – Zero hunger, SDG 13 – Climate action, SDG 15 

Life on land; 

Agriculture and food security are identified as key actors 

in achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), 

particularly goal number two, ―Zero hunger‖.  In this 

sense, it is assumed that sixs Islamic social finance tools 

namely infāq, waqf and zakat and Iḥyā’ al-Mawāt and al-

Iqṭāʽ are really effective and will be very important tools 



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to sustain regionally or internationally the achievement 

of sustainable development, especially for developing 

and least developed countries.  (Abduh 2019). 

- (Green sukuk) SDG 7 Affordable and clean energy, 
SDG 9 - Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure, SDG 13 

– Climate action, SDG 15 Life on land; 

Green sukuk is seen (Hati et al. 2019) in Indonesia as a 

viable solution to environmental problems and as a 

bridge between the Islamic and conventional financial 

markets. It is assumed that, since those who invest in 

Sukuk are mostly socially responsible, there is even more 

potential for countries that have Muslim majorities to 

develop green Sukuk markets because they are in greater 

compliance with Sharia principles and they also are 

aligned with the achievement of sustainable development 

goals (SDGs). 

- (Blended finance, Cash waqf, Complementary 

currency, Credit distribution, Crowdfunding, 

Economic empowerment fund, Embeddedness, Faith 

based NGOs, Goal and function of bank, 

Intermediation, International trade, Islamic bank 

financing, Islamic bank, Islamic fintech, Micro 

finance, PPPs, Project finance, SME financing, Social 

impact measurement) SDG 8 – Decent Work and 

Economic Growth, SDG 9 - Industry, Innovation and 

Infrastructure and SDG 10 – Reduced inequalities; 

Blended finance, PPPs and Project finance, are 

examined to shed a light on the role of Islamic finance in 

order to achieve sustainable development goals through a 

blended form of finance called Islamic public-private 

partnership (PPPs). PPPs’ projects, which will have the 

nature of Project financing, in fact, could also reach a 

resource mobilization from Islamic capital markets and 

are seen as an opportunity for the growing of Islamic 

finance industry which may contribute to the 

achievement of Sustainable Development goals 

(Gundogdu 2019) 

(Ghoniyah e Hartono 2020) assumes that an 

intensification in credit distribution can increase the 

level of banking profitability generating a very 

significant impact of financing or credit on sustainable 

development. It is also considered that, on the one hand, 

Conventional bank has a lower orientation of credit 

distribution in the real sector while, on the other hand, 

Islamic banks, which have more friendly implications 

than conventional banks, can be a reference in setting 

and applying business objectives (social objectives). 

Islamic finance industry has contemporary products to 

address at least the first 11 SDGs that relate directly to 

Islamic economics and finance. Among them  

Crowdfunding is analyzed as a useful tool for resource 

mobilization (Gundogdu 2018). Moreover, in Thailand 

Crowdfunding is seen (Zain, Mahadi, e Noor 2019) as a 

useful platform to make possible the revival of waqf, 

which is one of Islamic social finance's instruments and 

the most preferrable charitable tool due to its features 

that are perpetual, irrevocable, and inalienable. The 

revival of waqf may provide essential assistance in 

alleviating poverty and giving equal opportunity for 

economic participation.  

In (Tok e O’Bright 2017) the nexus of religion, space, 

and development is analyze, shading light on the role of 

Faith based NGOs as partners in sustainable 

development and key actors for achieving the Sustainable 

Development Goals in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). 

Moreover, it is also stressed the concept of 

Embeddedness, according to which economic decisions 

are affected by the social networks in which economic 

actors operate, analyzing the case study of Qatari 

organizations in SSA.  

Goal and function of bank, according to (Ghoniyah e 

Hartono 2020), are strictly related due to the fact that 

banks in Indonesia have as a clear objective and target to 

be aligned with social goals. In fact, for Islamic banks in 

Indonesia the goals are profit-oriented or socially 

oriented, which align them with sustainable development 

goals (SDGs). It is also assumed that there are 

differences between Islamic and conventional banks in 

promoting sustainable development.  

(Azman e Ali 2019) assume that there is a growing 

interest of Islamic social finance towards Social Impact 

Measurement. They also address that Value Based 

Intermediation, in the continuously evolving 

environment of Islamic social finance integration with 

Islamic financial instruments and mainstream social 

finance, could be useful, along with other instruments, 

such as Maqcisid al-Shari'ah, to achieve Sustainable 

Development Goals.  

Islamic bank financing is intended to be encouraged 

(Afandi, Wahyuningsih, e Muta’ali 2019) when it 

supports activities based on social values or impact 

investments such as education, health, rural communities, 

agriculture, nutrition and renewable energies to support 

the improvement of HDI, as it is demonstrated by the 

case study of Java Islands.  

Islamic bank (Razinah, Hassan, e Salman 2019) are 

addressed in order to stress on the one hand their 

relevance to achieve of Sustainable Development Goals 

(SDGs) through their financial intermediary roles and, 

one the other hand to highlight the positive impacts of 

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in expanding the 

financial intermediary roles of Islamic banks. Moreover, 

it has been underlined that Islamic banks may implement 

SDGs in their policies and may realize more transparent 

reporting on their activities. 

(Hudaefi 2020) explores the Indonesian market in order 

to clarify how Islamic fintech firms have been promoting 

the global movement of sustainable development goals 

(SDGs) in the that context.  

Of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 

United Nations, the first 11 have a perfect fit with the 



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purpose and principles of Islamic finance. It is 

highlighted (Gundogdu 2018) that Islamic finance 

industry has contemporary products to address these 

SDGs. In this context, Cash waqf, Complementary 

currency, Economic Empowerment fund, International 

trade, Micro finance and SME financing must be seen 

as useful tools to achieve SDGs also because they are 

employed as resource mobilization tools. 

- (Health policy, Health system and Health system 
framework) SDG 3 Health and well-being; Health 

policy, Health system and Health system framework are 

analyzed (Doshmangir et al. 2019) in order to reach a 

sustainable development of healthcare system in Iran.  

 

SDG 4 - Quality education, SDG 5 - Gender equality, SDG 6 - 

Clean water and sanitation, SDG 12 - Responsible 

consumption and production, SDG 14 - Life below water, 

SDG 16 - Peace, justice and strong institutions e SDG17 - 

Partnership for the goals do not match with the considered 

literature.  

 

Furthermore, there are some keywords, typical of Islamic 

finance framework, which has not been possible to insert in 

the SDGs framework (waqf, cash waqf, ihya' al-mawat, 

ijara, istisna, maqasid al-shari'ah). These keywords, 

however, have a certain relevance in the Islamic finance 

discussion on SDGs since all of them refer to particular 

financial tools that could be deployed to reach them.  

IV. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION 

 

4.1 Contributions to the literature  
The relationship between Islamic finance and 

sustainable development goals has been proven according to 

literature, however the academic debate is still at the 

beginning. In order to develop the contribution of Islamic 

finance to the debate of sustainable international growth, a 

hard work must be done from both an academical and 

practical point of view. That is particularly true also taking on 

account the enormous chances of expansion of Islamic finance 

both in Muslim and non-Muslim countries (Al-Khazali, Lean, 

e Samet 2014; Alharbi̇ 2016; Belouafi e Chachi 2014; Grassa 

e Hassan 2015; Kalimullina 2020; Pepinsky 2013; Uddin e 

Mohiuddin 2020). In fact, according to Nawaz et al. (Nawaz et 

al. 2019), ―Numerous market trends suggest a rising use of 

Islamic financing as a financial sector development. It is an 

increasingly visible substitute for conventional banks in 

Islamic states (Cihak e Hesse 2008) and in a growing number 

of countries with large Muslim populations, such as the UK, 

USA, Italy, France, China, Singapore, Korea, and Japan. In 

some countries, such as Pakistan and Malaysia, Islamic 

banking activity runs in parallel with the conventional 

banking system. Globally, the assets of Islamic institutions 

have grown at two-digit rates for three decades and some 

conventional banks have opened Islamic finance divisions.‖  

 

Due to the need to boost the participation of Islamic 

finance to the world’s growth and sustainable development, it 

has been considered that a bibliometric analysis of the 

relationship between Islamic finance and sustainable 

development goals could have been the right way to contribute 

to the academic debate for further systematic studies on this 

field. Through the coding activity, emerged that only 10 out of 

17 SDGs have connections in literature to Islamic finance.  

 

Some keywords, as emerged by the coding activity, 

cannot be inserted in particular SDGs categories because they 

are specific Islamic finance instruments.  Among them, a 

particular mention must be done regarding zakat, sukuk and 

wakq (awfq) which appear to be the most effective 

instruments for an Islamic financial contribution to sustainable 

development. According to (Ismail, Shaikh, e Mohd Shafiai 

2017) waqf ―can be used to provide a wide range of welfare 

services to Muslims as well as non-Muslims, and the 

beneficiaries could also be other living beings. For instance, 

animal protection programmes and environmental 

preservation expenditures can be provided more flexibly 

through waqf. The institution of waqf can transform social 

capital into social and public infrastructure. It provides a 

permanent social safety net in the case of perpetual waqf to 

the beneficiaries.‖. On the other hand, Zakat, which is a 

―Payment made annually under Islamic law on certain kinds 

of property and used for charitable and religious purposes, 

one of the Five Pillars of Islam‖ 5 , according to (Ismail e 

Shaikh, 2017),  seems to be another important instrument to 

achieve sustainable development, particularly due its attitude 

to ―help in scaling up the benefits in terms of strengthening 

institutions to create synergistic effects‖. Finally, sukuk has a 

high potential to be an innovative financing mechanism for 

Islamic microfinance also because well-developed Sukuk 

markets would enhance access to financial services, deepen 

capital markets and create Sharia-compliant alternative for 

small and/or risk-averse investors (Khiyar, 2014). Moreover, 

Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) sukuk has 

demonstrated (Khouildi e Kassim 2018) a relevant attitude and 

―potential to be developed as innovative shariah-compliant 

mechanism as shown by Malaysian experience in issuing the 

SRI sukuk to develop socially-related projects including the 

educational and green energy sectors‖. In this respect, a 

particular mention can be done in relation to Green sukuks 

(Aassouli et al. 2018) since ―Mitigating climate change and 

achieving the SDGs by 2030 requires national, regional, and 

international partnerships and collaborations, as well as the 

development of alternative segments of modern finance.‖ To 

that extent, it is important to underline the importance of 

developing Green sukuks for Islamic finance. In fact, that 

particular instrument could be a booster for an international 

mobilization of funds both from Muslim and non- Muslim 

investors in order to create social outcomes and a relevant 

contribution to social development and to reach the goals of 

                                                           
5
 https://www.lexico.com/definition/zakat 



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SDGs 7-9-13-15.  

 

This study presents the results of research in the field 

of Islamic finance and sustainable development goals and 

could be a starting point for further studies on the fields of 

knowledge that emerged from this bibliometric analysis.  

A bibliometric method was used to analyze the characteristics, 

citation patterns, and content of 15 documents published in 

international academic journals, book and chapter reviews, 

editorial materials, and proceedings papers. By adopting this 

scientific method, the analysis presents the state of art of the 

research on the field of the relation between Islamic finance 

and sustainable development goals.  The main findings have to 

be linked with the keyword analysis which helped to 

understand what are the present themes in literature in regard 

of Islamic finance and sustainable development goals. Another 

important finding is that the researches on this field are mostly 

related to Muslim countries. It also emerges that academics of 

non-Muslim countries may contribute with researches related 

to possible applications of Islamic finance to contribute to the 

achievement of sustainable development goals in their 

countries (Corvo e Pastore 2019). That gaps on literature 

suggests that a lot of work can be done on that field, 

particularly observing the potential outputs of that relationship.  

 

The bibliometric analysis showed that the most cited 

articles explore very interesting themes:  

- The link between social development and sustainable 
health systems; 

-  The relationship between Islamic fintech and its 
achievements in endorsing SDGs; 

- The relevance of waqf forest investments in climate and 
environment protection; 

- The role of Islamic public-private partnership (PPPs) 
projects in sustaining infrastructure investment. 

 

4.2 Implications for institutions, banks, enterprises and 
customers 

Based on the study's preliminary evidence and if 

supported by further research, Islamic finance and sustainable 

development goals have a proven relation that can be 

enhanced by all levels of stakeholders, from governments, to 

banking institutions, to social enterprises (Iannaci e Mekonnen 

2020), PPPs and SMEs that have to coordinate their actions in 

order to generate a positive impact and effective sustainable 

development.  

 

The use of Islamic finance to achieve sustainable 

development goals is a reality and the academical and 

economic discussion on that field has just begun and could 

benefit of an indefinite growth. It implies that it is time to 

enhance the role of Islamic finance toward 2030 Agenda’s 

targets through ethical investments that will generate social 

impact and sustainable growth. However, a part from the 

above mentioned 10 SDGs that had been found in relation 

with Islamic finance, a particular effort must be done in 

integrating that kind of ethical finance also in regard of the 

other SDGs, particularly those related to SDG 4 - Quality 

education, SDG 5 - Gender equality and SDG 16 - Peace, 

justice and strong institutions. These SDGs, particularly in 

Muslim countries, which have a deeper relation with Islamic 

finance, need to be taken under serious consideration and may 

attract social investments to grant to the involved citizens 

better life conditions which, for those countries,  are not 

actually at an acceptable level (OECD 2020). 

 

As already underlined in previous studies, Muslim 

countries particularly suffered a lack of coordination between 

banking and social institutions and often failed in the past to 

convey money in social projects (Olanrewaju, Shahbudin, e 

Zakariyah 2020). In non-Muslim countries, on the other hand, 

as already said, there is a higher awareness on the field of 

social finance (P. P. Biancone e Radwan 2019)and toward the 

achievement of sustainable development goals, but the 

countries usually fail to attract Islamic finance investments, 

due to their legislation which is not completely ready to 

welcome Islamic finance tools (P. P. Biancone 2014; P. 

Biancone, Secinaro, e Radwan 2020; Masiukiewicz 2017; 

Kalimullina 2020; Grassa e Hassan 2015; Alharbi̇ 2016). 

 

At this point and considering the actual period of deep 

crisis, from an economic, environmental and social point of 

view, it seems very important to invest on sustainable 

development also through Islamic finance. 

 

4.3 Limitations and future research  
The study shows a limitation, related to the adoption of 

the bibliometric method even as it considers books, chapters, 

articles published in international and academic journals, 

editorial materials, reviews, and proceedings papers. The 

purpose of this study is to provide insights that other scholars 

can draw upon and explore further in the process of theory 

development. Therefore, this study invites scholars to increase 

their efforts to provide further researches on this field.  

 

These findings suggest that there is an initial awareness 

on the specific area of research, as demonstrated by the 

analysis of the literature that puts the basis for a general 

reflection on the possible opportunities and challenges coming 

from the match between Islamic finance and sustainable 

development goals. The originality of the research is the 

application of a quantitative approach to discover the relation 

between Islamic finance and social impact which could 

hopefully generate further empirical studies investigating the 

impact of this relationship. To this extent, it must be 

underlined the lack of academic awareness in the field of SDG 

4 – Quality education, SDG 5 – Gender equality, SDG 6 – 

Clean water and sanitation, SDG 12 – Responsible 

consumption and production, SDG 14 – Life below water, 

SDG 16 – Peace, justice and strong institutions e SDG17 – 

Partnership for the goals, which are not mentioned at all in the 

papers considered. These SDGs, however, are particularly 



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relevant for a sustainable development proving that higher 

attention must be put at all levels in order to play positive 

actions to achieve this SDGs and develop an academic debate 

on the field. 

 

In conclusion, with the aim of demonstrating the 
connection between Islamic finance as a tool for the 
achievement of sustainable development goals, this research 
confirms the initial question and shows really interesting 
outputs for a huge number of stakeholders that can make a lot 
of work in the future in order to create value from social and 
sustainable activities through Islamic finance. 

 

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78. https://doi.org/10.6087/kcse.232. 

Aassouli, Dalal, Mehmet Asutay, Mahmoud Mohieldin, e 

Tochukwu Chiara Nwokike. 2018. Green Sukuk, 

Energy Poverty, and Climate Change: A Roadmap 

for Sub-Saharan Africa. Policy Research Working 

Papers. The World Bank. 

https://doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-8680. 

Abbas, Ahmad, e Andi Ayu Frihatni. 2020. «The Social Role 

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