Scaling Up Inclusive Business -- Solutions to Overcome Internal Barriers

Sustainability challenges including poverty, social unrest, climate change and environmental degradation have become ever more urgent. Business has the technology, innovation capacity, resources, and skills to play a key role in providing the radical solutions the world desperately needs.The objective of this brief is to kick off greater dialogue on the internal barriers companies face along the pathway to scale in inclusive business and how to overcome them. Building on the hands-on experience of businesses active in this space and the valuable insights of experts, the following pages identify some of the most common internal barriers and the solutions that leading companies are using to tackle them. We gained new insights by looking at the work of thirteen companies: CEMEX, Grundfos, Grupo Corona, ITC Ltd., Lafarge, Masisa, Nestlé, Novartis, Novozymes, SABMiller, Schneider Electric, The Coca-Cola Company, and Vodafone. We also interviewed two leading academics doing research in this area, Cornell University's Erik Simanis (United States) and Universidad de los Andes' Ezequiel Reficco (Colombia)

Valuing the SDG Prize in Food and Agriculture: Unlocking Business Opportunities to Accelerate Sustainable and Inclusive Growth

Business opportunities in the implementation of the SDGs related to food could be worth over US$2.3 trillion annually for the private sector by 2030. Investment required to achieve these opportunities is approximately US$320 billion per year.These 14 opportunities could also generate almost 80 million jobs by 2030, which represents around 2 per cent of the forecasted labour force.More than two-thirds of the value of the opportunities, and over 90 per cent of the potential job creation, is located in developing countries. That includes roughly 21 million jobs in Africa, 22 million jobs in India, 12 million jobs in China, and 15 million jobs in the rest of Asian developing countries

Unraveling the complexity of the organic catering supply chain

The last decade supply chains other than retail are becoming more interesting for organic sales because of significant market growth. In this out of home sector the article’s focus is on catering, since that’s where professionalism with respect to marketing and logistics has developed best. A model of the catering supply chain will show it’s organisational complexity, which is often mentioned as the main obstacle for introducing organic food. In this paper it is shown that this is a problem indeed, yet it relates to non-organic issues. It is shown that, by decomposing the problem of introducing organic food in catering, it can be embedded in a more general context leading to opportunities in knowledge transfer and other priorities in how to upscale organic catering

Technic and Collaboration Breakdown Structures: Drivers of collaborative problem solving approaches in a supply chain context

Problem Solving Methodologies have been par excellence a cornerstone element of the firms’ strategy on achieving effective continuous improvement. But the enterprise evolution towards an extended environment characterized by network-based organization has radically changed the problem solving paradigms. This paper aims to propose a generic and collaborative methodology addressing more complex and distributed problems, dealing with Supply Chain issues and having a key role as a driver for building global competitive advantages and create superior performances at a Supply Chain level

The normalisation of Food Aid: What happened to feeding people well?

In the UK, food poverty has increased in the last 15 years and the food aid supply chain that has emerged to tackle it is now roughly 10 years old. In this time, we have seen the food aid supply chain grow at a rate that has astounded many.  Recently that growth has been aided by a grant of £20m from a large supermarket chain. It appears institutionalisation is just around the corner, if not already here. It also appears that there is far greater emphasis on dealing with  the symptoms as opposed to solving the root causes of the problem. As an opinion piece, this paper reflects on some of the prevalent issues, and suggests some ways forward

Meeting the challenge of zero carbon homes : a multi-disciplinary review of the literature and assessment of key barriers and enablers

Within the built environment sector, there is an increasing pressure on professionals to consider the impact of development upon the environment. These pressures are rooted in sustainability, and particularly climate change. But what is meant by sustainability? It is a term whose meaning is often discussed, the most common definition taken from the Bruntland report as “sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). In the built environment, the sustainability issues within the environment, social and economic spheres are often expressed through design considerations of energy, water and waste. Given the Stern Report’s economic and political case for action with respect to climate change (Stern, 2006) and the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report’s confirmation of the urgency of the climate change issue and it’s root causes (IPCC, 2007), the need for action to mitigate the effects of climate change is currently high on the political agenda. Excess in carbon dioxide concentrations over the natural level have been attributed to anthropogenic sources, most particularly the burning of carbon-based fossil fuels. Over 40% of Europe’s energy and 40% of Europe’s carbon dioxide emissions arise from use of energy in buildings. Energy use in buildings is primarily for space heating, water heating, lighting and appliance use. Professionals in the built environment can therefore play a significant role in meeting targets for mitigating the effects of climate change. The UK Government recently published the Code for Sustainable Homes (DCLG, 2006). Within this is the objective of development of zero carbon domestic new build dwellings by 2016. It is the domestic zero carbon homes agenda which is the focus of this report. The report is the culmination of a research project, funded by Northumbria University, and conducted from February 2008 to July 2008, involving researchers from the Sustainable Cities Research Institute (within the School of the Built Environment) and academics, also from within the School. The aim of the project was to examine, in a systematic and holistic way, the critical issues, drivers and barriers to building and adapting houses to meet zero carbon targets. The project involved a wide range of subject specialisms within the built environment and took a multi-disciplinary approach. Practitioner contribution was enabled through a workshop. The focus of this work was to review the academic literature on the built environment sector and its capabilities to meet zero carbon housing targets. It was not possible to undertake a detailed review of energy efficiency or micro-generation technologies, the focus of the research was instead in four focussed areas: policy, behaviour, supply chain and technology.What follows is the key findings of the review work undertaken. Chapter One presents the findings of the policy and regulation review. In Chapter Two the review of behavioural aspects of energy use in buildings is presented. Chapter Three presents the findings of the review of supply chain issues. Chapter Four presents the findings of the technology review, which focuses on phase change materials. A summary of the key barriers and enablers, and areas for future research work, concludes this report in Chapter Five. Research is always a work in progress, and therefore comments on this document are most welcome, as are offers of collaboration towards solutions. The School of the Built Environment at Northumbria University strives to embed its research in practical applications and solutions to the need for a low carbon economy

Multiobjective optimization as a decision aid for managing build-to-order supply chains

This paper provides an overview of multiobjective optimization (MOO) as a decision aid in build-to-order supply chains (BTO-SC). The main features of BTO-SCs are discussed along with capabilities of MOO to enhance decision making at different points along the chain. Key decision points across a typical BTO-SC are identified and potential applications of MOO are discussed. A sample application is presented and future avenues for further research highlighted

Performance Assessment of Six Public Health Programs in Katsina State, Nigeria

This research aimed to evaluate the performance of six ongoing public health programs through core performance indicators in Katsina State, Nigeria. The healthcare delivery in Africa is mostly program-based. This requires that such programs need to be evaluated which may in turn help to identify any existing gaps towards the improvement of patients' access and coverage to their given service. We identified all active health facilities where our programs on malaria, Routine Immunization (RI), Family Planning (FP), Tuberculosis and Leprosy (TBL), HIV/AIDS, and Free Medicare (FMC) were being carried out. After that, a representative sample was derived to obtain data regarding five key performance indicators by using a Logistics Indicators Assessment Tool. Of 1,718 facilities, a total of 983 (57.22%) were visited, In other words, by assuming a normal distribution; each facility expectedly covers only 3,371 individuals. All programs provided different and diverse results on each indicator; however, the most obvious challenge was in the stock-out and demand vs. receipt of required medications. These are particularly for malaria, FMC, FP, and HIV. For instance, the stock-out lasted 222 days for malaria and 135 days for FP. Despite this, none of the programs had a lower than gold-standard near-term availability of required products. Program-based healthcare delivery is inadequate and ineffective unless the local system gets simultaneously developed. If required medications are not becoming available, optimal access, coverage, and benefits cannot be expected to be obtained. Clearly, Nigeria experiences a push system of meeting term supplies. Nigeria needs to strengthen its pharmaceutical system

Production of Innovations within Farmer–Researcher Associations Applying Transdisciplinary Research Principles

Small-scale farmers in sub-Saharan West Africa depend heavily on local resources and local knowledge. Science-based knowledge is likely to aid decision-making in complex situations. In this presentation, we highlight a FiBL-coordinated research partnership between three national producer organisations and national agriculture research bodies in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Benin. The partnership seeks to compare conventional, GMObased, and organic cotton systems as regards food security and climate change