Brenes-Peralta Laura, Jiménez-Morales María Fernanda, Campos-Rodríguez Rooel, Vittuari Matteo
DISTAL, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
Agribusiness School, Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Cartago, Costa Rica.
Int J Life Cycle Assess. 2021;26(10):2056-2071. doi: 10.1007/s11367-021-01964-4. Epub 2021 Sep 9.
Several frameworks coincide in the importance of addressing social impacts to ensure sustainability. However, the agri-food sector, regarded as key in sustainable production, still neglects to identify potential social impacts when applying life cycle approaches. This work contributes to understanding the social performance of three agricultural products from a Latin American and Caribbean developing country as Costa Rica while recognising the challenges of Social-Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) application in this context.
S-LCA represents a powerful technique to evaluate the potential social impacts of a product. Three case studies were analysed through S-LCA, using the subcategory assessment method (SAM) to characterise the social impacts and detect hotspots in the production of green coffee, raw milk and leafy vegetables. Primary data was collected through questionnaires to relevant informants and observations. In addition to secondary information, these data and information were used to assess eight impact subcategories for the farmer and worker stakeholder groups and nine subcategories for the local community.
The main results suggest that the Costa Rican institutional and market frameworks provide an enabling environment for a generally positive social performance in the studied cases. The assessed stakeholders can fulfil basic needs through access to inputs and services and achieve fair-trading conditions. Child labour, forced labour and evidence of environmental or health risks for the surrounding communities were absent. Important efforts to address the delocalisation, migration and child labour were observed, suggesting the potential development of social handprints in further studies. However, the farm production phase, related to farmers and workers, entails hotspots regarding social security and women's empowerment. Moreover, farmers appear as the most vulnerable group because of their overall social performance.
S-LCA helped identify relevant areas of intervention in the context of these particular case studies; however, further research and capacity building are recommended to tackle the detected challenges, both in the agri-food chains and in the use of S-LCA. Furthermore, these findings can aid in future decision and policy-making to improve and safeguard the positive social performance observed in the studied products.
The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11367-021-01964-4.
多个框架都强调解决社会影响对于确保可持续性的重要性。然而，被视为可持续生产关键领域的农业食品部门，在应用生命周期方法时仍忽视识别潜在的社会影响。这项研究有助于理解来自拉丁美洲和加勒比地区发展中国家（如哥斯达黎加）的三种农产品的社会绩效，同时认识到在此背景下应用社会生命周期评估（S-LCA）的挑战。
S-LCA是评估产品潜在社会影响的有力技术。通过S-LCA对三个案例进行分析，采用子类别评估方法（SAM）来描述社会影响并找出绿色咖啡、生牛奶和叶菜类蔬菜生产中的热点问题。通过向相关信息提供者发放问卷和进行观察收集原始数据。除了二手信息外，这些数据和信息被用于评估农民和工人利益相关者群体的八个影响子类别以及当地社区的九个子类别。
主要结果表明，哥斯达黎加的制度和市场框架为所研究案例中的总体积极社会绩效提供了有利环境。被评估的利益相关者能够通过获取投入和服务满足基本需求，并实现公平交易条件。不存在童工、强迫劳动以及对周边社区环境或健康风险的证据。观察到在解决非本地化、移民和童工问题方面做出了重要努力，这表明在进一步研究中社会手印具有潜在发展空间。然而，与农民和工人相关的农场生产阶段在社会保障和妇女赋权方面存在热点问题。此外，由于总体社会绩效，农民似乎是最脆弱的群体。
S-LCA有助于在这些特定案例研究的背景下识别相关的干预领域；然而，建议进一步开展研究和能力建设，以应对在农业食品链以及S-LCA使用中发现的挑战。此外，这些研究结果有助于未来的决策和政策制定，以改善和保障在所研究产品中观察到的积极社会绩效。
在线版本包含可在10.1007/s11367-021-01964-4获取的补充材料。
