Determining and evaluating socially sustainable supply chain criteria in agri-sector of developing countries: insights from West Africa cashew industry

Social sustainability issues such as labour rights concern in the agricultural sector receive significant attention from several stakeholders. The role of small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs) that dominate the sector’s supply chain in developing countries remains critical in implementing initiatives to address these issues. Through a four-phase methodology, this study proposed the criteria of a socially sustainable supply chain (SSSC) guided by ISO 26000 and based on empirical evidence from the cashew industry. Subsequently, based on the Best worst method and Grey relational analysis, the criteria are evaluated by cashew manufacturing SME managers to determine how SSSC initiatives can be implemented. The study shows that food safety, labour and work condition, traceability, and child and force/prison labour emerge in order of importance as a pathway for implementation of SSSC. The study also provides insight into achieving SSSC among various manufacturing SMEs and understanding their assessed SSSC performance. The study suggests that agricultural sector SMEs that implement SSSC practices through social compliance or collaborations are more aware of the implementation challenges. On the other hand, SMEs that generate SSSC practices may perceive their social sustainability performance in the supply chain much higher than adopters who meet customers’ sustainability requirements.