Different paths to improving together: a taxonomy of buyer-supplier collaborations for sustainability in food supply networks

Purpose – Extant research shows collaboration among supply chain (SC) partners can address the significant environmental impacts of industrial food systems, but can be risky and resource-intensive. Past studies have predominantly treated buyer-supplier sustainability collaborations as a single aggregate concept missing the theoretical richness. This study aims to provide a more nuanced understanding of these collaborations for jointly improving sustainable food supply networks.

Methodology – A multiple case study was conducted covering 8 SCs in the Dutch food processing industry, using data from 27 interviewees and extensive secondary material.

Findings – By applying the dynamic relational view, this study identifies three types of buyer-supplier collaboration, reflecting three paths of sustainable value creation: (1) the bilateral path, featuring equal participation and extensive collaboration, yielding substantial environmental and economic benefits; (2) the buyer-driven path, where the buyer leads the collaboration to address sustainability issues that are raised by stakeholders, relying on supplier expertise to improve SC traceability and sustainability reputation, albeit at higher costs; (3) the supplier-driven path, where the supplier leads the collaboration for incremental environmental and economic improvements.

Originality – The three identified types of collaboration form a novel taxonomy for improving sustainability in food supply networks, representing different paths for SC partners to achieve progressively more substantial sustainability improvements. This taxonomy challenges the perspective that adopting sustainability invariably leads to increased costs by providing evidence of simultaneous economic and environmental improvements. Practical implications – The taxonomy results provide practical guidelines to assist managers in selecting the most suitable collaboration type for their specific sustainability goals and more effectively address sustainability challenges.