THE SOCIAL
DIMENSION AND INDICATORS OF SUSTAINABILITY IN AGRIFOOD SUPPLY CHAINS
Renato Rocha Dias Santos
Universidade de Brazilia, Brazil
E-mail: renatoufv@bol.com.br
Patricia Guarnieri
Universidade de Brasília, Brazil
E-mail: patguarnieri@gmail.com
Otavio Moreira do Carmo Jr.
Universidade de Brazilia, Brazil
E-mail: otaviobahiano30@gmail.com
Silvia Araújo dos Reis
Universidade de Brazilia, Brazil
E-mail: silviaareis@yahoo.com.br
José Márcio Carvalho
Universidade de Brazilia, Brazil
E-mail: jmcarvalho1708@gmail.com
Carlos Rosano Peña
Universidade de Brazilia,Brazil
E-mail: gmcrosano@gmail.com
Submission: 10/31/2018
Revision: 11/21/2018
Accept: 12/06/2018
ABSTRACT
Several organizations aim
to establish and manage cooperative and collaborative actions in order to
incorporate the principles related to sustainable management in supply chains.
The indicators related to the social dimension are still barely explored in
academic research, since the perceived business practices are still emerging in
the contemporary world and in the organizational relations. The opposite of the
financial and environmental dimensions, which are already rooted in the
business environment. In agrifood chains, social aspects are essential when
suppliers are often impoverished farmers, and labor practices are generally
painful and exploitative. This paper aims to identify, in the international
literature, the state-of-the-art research related to social sustainability in
agrifood supply chains. To achieve this goal, a systematic literature review
covering papers published in the Science Direct, Directory of Open Access
Journals and Emerald Insight databases was carried out. Results indicate that
academic production is still low, despite its growth in recent years, and is
limited to approaches containing indicators of social sustainability related to
support communities affected by agrifood business. In addition, it evidences
arrangements among members of supply chains, mostly of the cooperative type,
having collaborative arrangements with more limited approaches among the
analyzed works.
Keywords: Agrifood
supply chains, Sustainable Supply Chain Management, Social Indicators,
Sustainability
1. INTRODUCTION
The
scientific production related to the social dimension of sustainability in
agrifood supply chains has been growing among authors of several areas of
academic knowledge, because it is a multidisciplinary theme that involves
several actions and practices along the supply chain. As pointed out by Hall
and Matos (2010), the fight against social exclusion through the insertion of
impoverished communities into sustainable supply chains has been debated by
scholars and it is growing.
In
order to achieve sustainability in supply chains, the process should not be
confined to just one organization, but consider the various actors involved and
extrapolate issues that go beyond the environmental ones. The concerns with the
social issues in effect, preserving the conditions of the workers in supplier
companies and forming collective partnerships for social development as a whole
should be considered (JENKINS, 2001; PAGELL; WU, 2009; GUARNIERI; TROJAN, 2019).
Thus,
the companies are subsidizing efforts to search for mutual gains in the supply
chain by adding value to social inclusion in order to gain new markets through
innovative mechanisms and a balance of power in the relations.
Distinguishing
and identifying what actions and practices related to social sustainability is
a challenge, since many academic works end up encompassing several research
fields jointly, not delimiting the boundaries between the dimensions of
financial, social or environmental sustainability. Therefore, this hinders an
in-depth analysis of the characteristics and application fields of social
issues in a Sustainable Supply Chain Management.
So,
summarizing indicators of social sustainability can expose the most studied
characteristics in the academic environment, verifying the most explored areas
and research gaps in still incipient investigation fields, is fundamental,
since it can trace characteristic elements of social sustainability present in
publications, guide potential themes in researches and disseminate practices
and experiences to the business community. Some indicators of social
sustainability proposed by Labuschagne and Brent (2005) provide a
categorization structure containing social indicators observed in sustainable
supply chains, which are subdivided into four spheres of action: internal human
resources, external population, stakeholder participation and macro-social
performance.
Assuming
that collective actions among members are essential to the management of
sustainable supply chains with a view to achieving social gains and mutual
benefits, it is elementary to expect that cooperative or more complex
practices, such as collaborative practices, are present in the relations
between the members that make up the supply chains and their related partners.
Identifying these arrangements aims to consolidate the understanding of these
concepts in relation to the social sustainability practices used and
illustrates the academic approach taken by the researchers regarding
cooperation and collaboration to improve social issues.
In
agrifood chains, implementing a sustainable management is complex, since it
encompasses a great variety of specificities that compose this type of
relationship and entails different social aspects when it comes to raw material
suppliers, especially when they are small impoverished rural producers, besides
that the social issues are still few studied (GUARNIERI; TROJAN, 2019).
Maloni
and Brown (2006) highlight that these supply chains are complex because they
involve sensitive elements external to the business and, also require
labor-intensive applications at all stages of the chain.
In
order to obtain subsidies for studies related to social sustainability in
agrifood supply chains and existing collective arrangements, the objective of
this paper is to identify in the literature the state-of-the-art research that
operates under the social sustainability dimension, identifying related
indicators and vital cooperative or collaborative practices. For this purpose,
it was carried out a descriptive, exploratory and qualitative research through
the systematic literature review technique. The systematic review was based on
the Cronin, Ryan and Coughlan (2008) protocol, through database searches on the
Science Direct, Directory of Open Access Journals and Emerald Insight websites,
using descriptors related to social sustainability in agrifood chains.
The
result of the research indicates that the academic production of research
related to social sustainability in the agrifood supply chain is still scarce,
although it has shown a significant growth in recent years. Among the
indicators of social sustainability that are less present in publications,
macro-social issues related to regional or national impacts were the least
considered by the authors. This paper demonstrates that the collaborative
arrangements related to infrastructure sharing and the integration of
productive processes among the agrifood supply chain are also few studied. The results
also demonstrate that collective actions are more exploited when related to
cooperation than collaborative arrangements.
2. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
2.1.
Sustainable
supply chain management
The
formulations of supply chain management related concepts are outlined in the
late 1980s and early 1990s, leveraged by business consultants, and were object
of attention by researchers and academics (LAMBERT; COOPER; PAGH, 1998).
Regarding sustainable management in a supply chain, Srivastava (2007) points
out that it is compartmentalized in different approaches, and a systemic view
on the subject is necessary.
As
part of a systemic view inherent in sustainable management, Carter and Rogers
(2008, p. 368) defined sustainable supply chain management as: “strategic,
transparent and consecutive integration of the social, environmental and
financial objectives of an organization in the systemic coordination of the
main interorganizational processes to improve the long-term financial
performance of the individual company and its supply chains.”
The
emergence of these new relationships that underpin sustainable management
emerges from the new organizational needs among the entities of the supply
chain, which stems from a greater need to optimize productive and energy
resources for cost reduction and value generation (KLEINDORFER; SINGHAL; VAN
WASSENHOVE, 2005). However, Pagell and Wu (2009) point out that actions related
to the environmental dimension excel in organizational practices, as they
relate and reflect in financial aspects. In this context the financial aspects
drive to the improvements in the efficiency of resource, which are prerequisite
for competitiveness and, the social aspects have a secondary role.
A
new order is given to organizations and academics, where waste reduction,
quality, optimization of natural resources and processes with social benefits
become essential elements for better practices (SRIVASTAVA, 2007). According to
Green, Morton, and New (1998), the concept has established itself as a factor
that provides financial gains.
Considering
the new elements that integrate a SSCM, Pagell and Wu (2009) establish that the
integration and new behaviors are part of this new conception of supply chain.
Integration should involve aspects of quality, management, common objectives,
values and fulfillment of commitments. New behaviors are projected on the
participation of external actors in the supply chain in forming networks,
transparency, traceability, certifications and differentiation of products,
processes and services.
In
relation to the elements that can configure a sustainable supply chain, Carter
and Rogers (2008), when evaluating the sustainability performance of an SSCM,
cite the following dimensions of analysis: integrated strategy, collective risk
management, organizational social aspects and transparency. Seuring, Sarkis and
Muller (2008) emphasize the clear and impersonal communication and the
development of suppliers in socio-environmental issues as elements to obtain
sustainable products.
Elkington
(1997) added that only with the balance between the financial, social and
environmental issues, it would be possible to properly conceptualize
sustainable development; any postulated and based organizational practices that
are said to be sustainable must necessarily be based on the Triple Bottom Line
(TBL).
2.2.
SOCIAL
SUSTAINABILITY AND ITS INDICATORS
The
financial issue and, later, the actions aimed at the environmental dimension
have emerged as the main pillars of corporate sustainability in organizations,
whereas the social aspect is often ignored and with low application to business
(HOLLIDAY et al., 2002, VISSER; SUNTER, 2002, GUARNIERI; TROJAN, 2019).
It
is often common that social factors are not included in analysis procedures for
project feasibility, limited to the verification of compliance with the current
legislation by the organizations, next to collaborators and employees (VIFELL;
SONERYD, 2012). Elkington (1997) already warned that some militants, in favor
of sustainable development, considered that ethical, social and cultural issues
have no relation to sustainability, since sustainability is related to resource
efficiency.
According
to Sarkis, Helms and Hervani (2010), sustainable development is displayed with
a conceptual approach when involve aspects related to the environmental
dimension, placing social issues on the fringe in organizations.
However,
Elkington (1997) emphasizes that the business world is part of society, and
that the levels of trust that it holds are dependent on the levels of
investment in human capital. Fukuyama (1995) already stressed that living in a
society with ethical standards will allow strong cohesion in social
relationships and business will cost less.
Thus,
ethical and socially responsible behavior should not be limited to the behavior
of an organization only, but to the supply chain to which it is embedded or may
influence, as well as in the markets in which it participates (ELKINGTON,
1997).
With
the conceptual evolution of social sustainability, some factors were placed as
central to their perception and involved actions next to the impacted
communities and others, emphasizing the administration of social and internal
resources to organizations such as people management and skills training
(FOLADORI, 2002; DYLLICK; HOCKERTS, 2002; AHMED; MCQUAID, 2005). Social
indicators are more adequate ways of measuring the generation of wealth coupled
with social and individual well-being than the conventional measures applied
nowadays (ELKINGTON, 1997).
In
systematizing the indicators of social sustainability, Labuschagne and Brent
(2005) propose in a study to verify the social aspects in the sustainability of
industrial processes, a categorization structure of social indicators observed
in a given supply chain, which are subdivided into 4 spheres of action: (i)
Internal Human Resources; (ii) External Population; (iii) Stakeholder
Participation; and (iv) Macro-Social Performance.
Internal
Human Resources: These resources correspond to the management of
internal people participating in organizations within a sustainable supply
chain, focusing on collaborators, employees, outsourced workers, among others
present in labor relations, and are subdivided into: (a) employment stability,
which relate to job opportunities and compensation for service with greater
complexity accompanied by a fair and equitable remuneration; (b) occupational
health and safety, which includes safe and healthy work practices in actions
such as the prevention of accidents and occupational diseases, gender,
ethnicity and racial equality, as well as respect for human rights and
compliance with national and international legislation; and (c) capacity
development, which encompasses training practices for innovation and
development of skills among workers and members of the supply chain
(LABUSCHAGNE; BRENT; ERCK, 2005).
External
Population: This dimension is focused on the impacts of the
operations of a given organization or a supply chain in communities that may be
impacted or influenced by a particular economic activity. It involves aspects
that guarantee gains as the individual working skills of the population as
health, psychological integrity, well-being levels, education, training and
interpersonal skills, called (a) human capital. (b) Productive capital refers
to collective aspects, such as infrastructures that guarantee the well-being of
the individual; and the formation of networks of trust, cooperation and
reciprocity between the enterprise and those affected, which can be measured by
sensory stimuli (aesthetics, noise levels and odor). The third and final
characteristic of this dimension is linked to community capital (c) which
involves actions that guarantee the legitimacy and preservation of cultural
assets; combat to social pathologies; social security, economic welfare and
social cohesion (LABUSCHAGNE; BRENT; ERCK, 2005).
Stakeholder
Participation: Stakeholder participation is measured by the
organization's availability and willingness to provide information, fostering
transparency to the supply chain and empowering stakeholders with regard to
decision-making power and capacity to influence organizations (LABUSCHAGNE;
BRENT; ERCK, 2005). This process reflects on improved cooperative actions and
can radiate into a collaborative chain, and to a greater degree, the
coordinative chain. Thus, this sphere is subdivided into two aspects, (a)
information provision and (b) stakeholder influence.
Macro-social
Performance: This performance is linked to aspects where the
organization can influence external populations in the supply chain regionally
or nationally. They can be measured by indicators related to: (a)
socio-economic performance, which may be, tax generation, GDP growth and
currency consolidation; or by (b) socio-environmental performance, which
measures the organization's potential to generate welfare to target communities
and its monitoring, as well as legal procedures that help consolidate
regulations with governments and society (LABUSCHAGNE; BRENT; ERCK, 2005).
3. METHODS AND RESEARCH TECHNIQUES
In
order to guarantee adequate reliability and validity of the literature review,
the author must specify the criteria used in the research, following the
subsequent steps: (i) formulate the research question; (ii) define inclusion or
exclusion criteria; (iii) select and access the literature; (iv) evaluate the
quality of the literature included in the evaluation; (v) analyze, synthesize
and disseminate the results (CRONIN; RYAN; COUGHLAN, 2008). Thus, the criteria
and filtering process used for this systematic literature review are presented:
Definition
of the research question: What are and what is the approach of the current
studies related to social sustainability indicators in the sustainable
management of the agrifood supply chain, and what collective and integrative
actions are identified?
Definition
of the inclusion and exclusion criteria: The criteria are
keywords associated with Boolean operators, scientific databases, publication
period and types of articles. As the proposed study deals with a multidisciplinary
theme, there may be periodicals in several areas of knowledge, such as:
Administration, Production Engineering, Process Engineering, Sociology, Law,
Environmental Engineering, Agronomy, among others. This article was delimited
for scientific research: Science Direct, Directory of Open Access Journals and
Emerald Insight.
The
use of various collection databases aims to broaden the variety of studies and
later, to use objective criteria for refinement and selection of the most
representative ones. After choosing the scientific bases for research, we
defined the period of publication that considered the last 10 years, covering
from 2006 to 2016. The keywords were defined for the search of factors that are
part of the social dimension and were delimited under the book Cannibals with
Forks by Elkington (1997), considering the combined descriptors, preserving, in
all combinations, the term supply chain as the base axis for the search in the
databases. The search combinations were: (a) supply chain, social development,
food, (b) supply chain, social development, agriculture, (c) supply chain,
social development, agrifood, (d) supply chain, social responsibility, food,
(e) supply chain, social responsibility, agriculture, (f) supply chain, social
responsibility, agrifood, (g) supply chain, social sustainability, food, (h)
supply chain, social sustainability, agriculture, (i) supply chain, social
sustainability, agrifood, (j) supply chain, social justice, food, (l) supply
chain, social justice, agriculture, (m) supply chain, social justice, agrifood,
(n) supply chain, social truth, food, (o) supply chain, social truth,
agriculture, (p) supply chain, social truth, agrifood, (q) supply chain, ethic,
food, (r) supply chain, ethic, agriculture, (s) supply chain, ethic, agrifood.
Regarding
to the selected articles, it was defined that only articles published in
periodicals would be considered, excluding those published in annals of events,
patents, quotations and book chapters. The Boolean operator used was the AND, excluding
the OR and NOT operators, since the results should reflect articles related to
the social sustainability of agrifood supply chain.
Literature
selection and access: Overall results using keyword combinations in the
Science Direct, Directory of Open Access Journals and Emerald Insight databases
totaled 63 publications. Considering the established exclusion criteria, 12
publications were excluded from this population, since they were related to
events and book chapters, and 7 were repeated publications of articles already
collected in the research bases when the combined descriptors were applied.
Thus, 44 articles were selected for further analysis and verification for
inclusion in the sample.
Evaluation
of the literature quality included in the review: Considering the
Science Direct database, 18 articles were selected applying the descriptors and
the exclusion criteria, but only 10 were selected to compose the sample, since
8 were eliminated because the topics, after analysis of the summary and introduction
of each publication, were not related to the proposed study and were excluded
due to their content. At the Directory of Open Access Journals database, of the
10 studies selected after the first exclusion criteria, only 6 were selected
for the sample and the others were excluded because they did not align to the
proposed objective after analyzing the abstracts published in the portal.
Finally, with respect to Emerald Insight, 16 articles were selected and 13
included in the sample, since these were aligned with the objectives proposed
by this article. Considering the exclusion criteria applied, the sample that
will compose the analysis totalize 29 articles.
Table 1 summarizes the quantitative
of search returns, of publications deleted by exclusion criteria, and of
articles excluded by content analysis; at the end, a detailing of the articles
that will compose the sample of this literature review is presented.
Table 1: Quantitative selected for analysis
Analysis,
synthesis and dissemination of results: This step
demonstrates the analysis for each selected article considering the contents of
the articles housed in the portals Science Direct, Directory of Open Access
Journals and Emerald Insight. Thus, the data were tabulated in electronic
spreadsheets and classified with the respective authors by: social
sustainability indicators, classified according to the Labuschagne, Brent and
Erck (2005) criteria; cooperative actions, identified according to the Britto
(2002) and Brito (2001) classifications; collaborative actions and scope
classifications, according to the dimensions of Barrat (2004); research design;
collaborative relationships among members of the supply chain; predominant
research design.
4. PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION OF DATA
Indicators
related to social sustainability were identified in the articles that compose
the sample collected, considering the criteria established by Labuschagne,
Brent and Erck (2005) and were classified according to the dimensions
established by the same authors. It should be emphasized that indicators play a
mutable and evolving role in response to the aspirations of society and the
conceptual evolution of the understandings and can be developed in future
moments as organizations actually evaluate their net contributions to the real
generation of social wealth to the society (Elkington, 1997).
Table
2 presents the results of the indicators present in the articles analysed and
correspond to each author of the publications. In it the classification of
indicators identified in light of the analysis of the articles are placed, as
well as the sphere of the indicators to which they belong.
Table 2: Social
Sustainability Indicators in Agrifood Supply Chains
Analyzing
Table 2, it is possible to observe, in the majority, social sustainability
indicators related to the external population (25), followed by the stakeholder
participation (20), internal human resources (11) and, lastly, indicators
related to the macro-social performance (6). These results already demonstrate
a greater academic approach on elements that are external to the target
organization, since indicators related to internal human resources are present
in only 11 articles.
Among
the spheres of sustainability indicators, considering the external population,
it is verified that human capital was the predominant indicator, being
approached in 22 articles. The frequency of approaching this indicator in the
analyzed articles demonstrates the importance given to human aspects such as
health, education and local development of the communities, due to the impacts
of agrifood enterprises. Elkington (1997) emphasizes that aspects related to
human capital should encompass broader aspects of society and the potential for
wealth creation in order to contemplate health, education and skills in
populations.
In
the category related to stakeholder participation, most articles deal with the
stakeholder influence (19) followed by the information provision (15). Thus,
the authors highlight the empowerment of stakeholders and the importance of
more effective positioning and relationship strategies, especially of the most
fragile members in the agrifood supply chain. Another highlight in the
indicators is related to the provision of information, in order to reduce the asymmetry
in supply chains, as well as providing social and environmental information to
different internal and external groups.
The
indicators inherent in internal human resources organizations have shown to be
practically aligned with issues of prevention of occupational diseases and
labor safety actions, framed under the health and safety indicator.
The
results related to macro-social issues obtained a lower number of approaches
among the other indicators considered in this study, addressed in only 6 articles
when considering aspects related to social and environmental performance. The
socio-environmental performance of a macro-social analysis considers social and
environmental transformations at regional and national level, being one of the
reasons for the low approach in these studies, since the impacts on a larger
scale are generated by enterprises with larger scale of agrifood production and
extrapolate most of the articles, which are practically composed of case
studies.
The
articles that compose the sample presented indicators of social sustainability
that presuppose that, for its effectiveness and transition to sustainability in
agrifood supply chains, it is necessary to provide cooperative or collaborative
arrangements among stakeholders. Silva and Lourenzani (2011) stress that
cooperative arrangements between agents of an agrifood supply chain favor
alternatives for the insertion of more fragile entities into the distribution
and commercialization channels, and also in the improvement of social welfare.
Based
on the collective and integrative cooperation and collaboration relationships
identified in the sample articles, as specified in Table 3, it is noteworthy
that all articles displayed cooperative approaches as emphasized by Chen et al.
(2017), the collaborative arrangements have become a concern for companies,
mainly regarding the balance among environmental, social and economic issues.
Brito
(2001) reinforced this statement. Among the cooperative actions identified,
these were classified according to Britto (2002) and, also presented in Table
3. In the classifications of cooperative approaches, interorganizational
cooperation was predominant (25), followed by technological cooperation (21)
and, finally, technical-productive cooperation (11). Therefore, there is a
predominance of cooperation involving elements that influence decision-making
between chain entities or the cooperative network, followed by cooperative
actions related to information exchange that optimize the innovation process and,
to a lesser extent, cooperating to improve operational and production
efficiency among chain or network agents.
Based
on the collective and integrative cooperation and collaboration relationships
identified in the sample articles, as specified in Table 3, it is noteworthy
that all articles displayed cooperative approaches. Among the cooperative
actions identified, these were classified according to Britto (2002) and also
presented in Table 3. In the classifications of cooperative approaches,
interorganizational cooperation was predominant (25), followed by technological
cooperation (21) and, finally, technical-productive cooperation (11).
Therefore, there is a predominance of cooperation involving elements that
influence decision-making between chain entities or the cooperative network,
followed by cooperative actions related to information exchange that optimize
the innovation process and, to a lesser extent, cooperating to improve
operational and production efficiency among chain or network agents.
Table 3: Categories of cooperative and
collaborative actions.
On
the other hand, in collaborative actions, where an evolutionary relationship is
expected and presupposes a joint implementation and shared management by common
objectives within supply chains, 15 of the 29 articles collected in the sample
displayed this type of integration among the members. Collaborative actions are
classified according to Barrat (2004), and it is shown that in the sample there
was a predominance of collaborative interactions in information sharing (11)
and technological and scientific dissemination (11). The results show that the
collaborative arrangements are evidenced in researches that investigate
agrifood supply chains of organizations where this interaction predominates to
overcome information flow bottlenecks and promote technological cooperation
between entities.
The
collaborative arrangements for infrastructure sharing and integration of
productive process were presented only in 6 and 1 articles of the sample, respectively.
Observing
the analysis of these interactions, it can be seen that collaborative
arrangements are scarce in articles when they refer to the infrastructure
sharing and the production process, which shows very distinct characteristics
of business among the members in the agrifood supply chain, since rural
producers, retailers, wholesalers and branches of industry present a very
distinct configuration of activity and economic and social development.
However, because they are chains with a high degree of uncertainty and price
volatility, overcoming bottlenecks related to information asymmetry and the
incorporation of technological processes, especially for farmers, makes the
research more compelling.
When
verifying the types of collaborative interactions between vertical and
horizontal, the latter was presented in 7 articles and the former, in 9.
Considering the vertical collaborative interactions, the occurrences were:
industry / supplier (3), retailer / supplier (3), supplier / industry / consumer
(2) and industry / retailer (1). As for horizontal interactions, there was
predominance of interactions between suppliers (4), and in the others, only 1
article.
The
vertical collaborative relationships identified displayed a close relationship
in the integrative relations with suppliers, which, in this case, are presented
in most approaches with integrations between rural producers. The same happens
in the horizontal interactions, with higher frequency of rural producers, where
the formalization of groups, associativism or cooperativism, shaped the
collaborative arrangements. This information demonstrates that the authors'
approaches to raise issues that involve relationships with farmers becomes
necessary, since they are seen as the most sensitive and weakened link compared
to other entities, hence the investigation of collaborative interactions next
to partners and suppliers of the same level, with a view to forming collective
arrangements to access markets.
The
number of articles in the sample related to the state-of-the-art of social
sustainability in the agrifood supply chain in the last 10 years shows a
growing tendency during the period considered that began in 2006. Figure 1
shows the number of articles per year in the sample.
Figure 1: Number
of studies per year - period from 2006 to 2016.
The Figure 1 displays an increase
in the number of studies elaborated, whose peak occurs in 2016, the year in
which 7 studies were produced so far, since the year has not yet finished. The
trend line drawn shows the increase in studies related to social sustainability
in the agrifood supply chain. Thus, more studies published in subsequent years
are expected.
Despite
of the research nature, 2.72% of the sample adopted the qualitative approach
for the investigation and only 28% the qualitative-quantitative. No article
with predominantly quantitative research was observed. The nature of research
focused on qualitative studies, given that a large part of the research designs
has been turned to case studies, designs that contain characteristics of
research aimed at deepening and understanding phenomena in detail.
Considering
the predominant research designs proposed, 3 categories were identified in the
extracted sample: case study; exploratory and descriptive; and literature
review. The predominant designs that were most used by the authors were the
case studies (86%), which shows that this type of design has an alignment close
to the qualitative researches computed in high percentage in the research
nature.
Exploratory
and descriptive articles and those produced by literature review were designs
used by only 2 articles. The results show that most of the authors focused on
deepening the indicators, actions, phenomena and processes related to social
sustainability of the chain or specific and chosen supply networks for
research. It should be noted that no studies that considered survey-type or
essentially experimental designs were detected.
5. CONCLUDING REMARKS
This
paper has identified, in the international literature, the state-of-the-art of
research on social sustainability in agrifood supply chains. Considering the
general analysis of the selected studies, there is a large predominance of
papers addressing social indicators related to actions with external
populations that are affected, influenced or impacted in some way by members or
processes. The most important aspects of the external population were those
inherent to the human capital, in factors such as health, education and
development of communities that supply raw materials. Another important
sustainability indicator refers to stakeholder participation, where it was
addressed the empowerment of more fragile entities in the chain and overcoming
market access bottlenecks with reduced information asymmetry to increase
efficiency gains for productive chains.
The
sustainable management of a supply chain foresees joint actions to provide
responsibilities among members as a prerequisite for their development and
advantages (CAO; ZHANG, 2011). The sustainability indicators identified in this
paper presuppose collective arrangements that were achieved cooperatively, when
working together to achieve a common goal (GUARNIERI, 2014).
Considering
the results of the analyses made, the studies analyzed predominantly expose
interorganizational and technological cooperation. This predominance
demonstrates that aspects related to the reestablishment of trust between the
entities that participate in the agrifood chains in order to provide
information exchange and improvement of production planning, especially for
suppliers of raw materials, is a fundamental condition for the social
sustainability of the chains. The analysis of the papers also shows that
cooperative technological aspects are fundamental to reduce the uncertainties
inherent in the agrifood supply chain.
Yet
in those articles where integrative aspects were identified, configured as
collaborative, in a joint and interactive action of the chain members, the
sample presented a smaller proportion in relation to the cooperative
arrangements extracted. This result indicates that the collaborative
relationships require a more complex analysis and appear to a lesser extent in
case-study studies of agrifood chains, since, being a more complex arrangement,
it presupposes a lower frequency of detection. In the collaborative approaches
detected, predominant is the sample of vertical relations involving, mostly,
suppliers, which indicates research universes aimed at rural producers, usually
the most fragile link in a supply chain containing large retailers and
wholesalers.
Due
to the evolution of the number of studies each year, it is observed that the
increase in research related to social sustainability in the agrifood supply
chain is increasing, although it is still low. The result reflects the greater
attention to the theme in recent years, since social issues are beginning to
emerge for a sustainable management in the supply chain, after a greater focus
on the aspects related to the financial and environmental dimensions.
The
present paper indicates gaps in the literature for the future development of
researches, as such as: (a) indicators of social sustainability in macro-social
issues that investigate aspects of regional or national impact regarding the
population gains obtained in the development of agrifood supply chains; (b)
collaborative actions and arrangements related to the infrastructure sharing
and integration of productive processes between entities of the agrifood supply
chain; (c) vertical collaboration between food industries and consumers; and
(d) horizontal collaboration among food industry, retailers and consumers.
As
limitations, the research was restricted to bibliographic queries in some
academic portals, and the results that demonstrate the state-of-the-art is
restricted to the sample analyzed. Because it is an exploratory and descriptive
study, the results, as well as the sample analyzed, are not statistical,
therefore, it is inappropriate to extrapolate for analyses at populational
levels. In addition, the articles that are the object of this analysis are
restricted to the social dimension in the agrifood supply chains, not
extracting indicators related to the environmental or economic dimensions,
although these are present in numerous articles of the sample.
Finally,
the study contributes to identify gaps related to the proposed theme, as well
as demonstrates the state-of-the-art of the researches on social sustainability
in agrifood supply chains, considering the sample filtering process. Thus, from
this scenario, new fields of research are indicated, given the gaps pointed out
by this study, which can be useful for practitioners and academics interested
in this field of knowledge.
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