Naranjo Clemente, Esthela Solange
(2018)
The mapping of commodity certifications in sustainable procurement.
[Dissertation (University of Nottingham only)]
Abstract
Sustainability requires a high level of traceability, as many organisations do not have visibility over their supply chains, it is difficult to trace all the actors involved in the network, especially considering that supply networks are getting more complex over time. Certifications have been gaining popularity within the commodity industry to ensure environment preservation, good condition for producers and workers, as well as decreasing poverty levels. Therefore, companies are now labelling their products to show their ethical and environmental certifications to gain more acceptance within consumers and to avoid bad press from NGOs and media.
This research explores topics as Sustainable Procurement, Sustainable Supply Chains, Ethical and Responsible Procurement and Sustainability Certification Schemes to understand which are the responses against these ethical dilemmas, specifically to identify what commodity certifications currently exist, how these certifications are different and what do they have in common in order to develop a typology analysis. For data collection, we used theoretical sampling and theoretical saturation, and for the comparative analysis, it was used case-by-case comparisons to recognise patterns in the data. Moreover, as a result of the typology development, five categories of commodity certification schemes in sustainable procurement were identified based on dimensions as scope, governance structure, standards definition, certification requirements, issue classification, range of products, supply chain focus and auditing process.
This study takes into account a new view to categorise the current offer of commodity certification schemes in sustainable procurement that is not centred on success factors but on the core of their processes and management. Furthermore, companies can use these categories as a tool to select which certification scheme is more suitable for their products and appropriate to match their sustainability strategies.
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