Institute of Social Marketing Conference

Social Marketing and Socially

Responsible Management:
Changing Times, New Challenges
November 2010
Track two: Socially Responsible Management

The applicability of industrial symbiosis

praxis to improving the environmental
sustainability of supply chains
Dr. Luciano Batista
Lecturer in Operations Management

Environmental sustainability of supply chains

Is this a relevant issue?
It is a significant part of the wider debate on how industry meets the
challenges of sustainability (Seitz & Wells, 2006)
green supply chains

green marketing

environmental management
ISO 1400 standards
green purchasing strategies

CSR

life cycle assessment

environmental marketing

Pressures from various stakeholders (Faisal, 2010)

Finding ways of involving the parts of a supply chain system in synergistic

relationships is likely to achieve better results than each part trying to do
its best in isolation.

Industrial symbiosis
What is it?
Sharing of utility, services, information and by-product resources among
industrial actors in order to add value, reduce costs and improve environment
(Agarwal & Strachan, 2008)

It focuses on the flow of materials and energy (Seuring, 2004)

It tries to engage separate industries (Chertow, 2007)
Collaboration and synergistic relationships are key aspects of industrial
symbiosis initiatives (Bansal & McKnight, 2009)

Industrial symbiosis
Traditional system
Products
Natural resources
Waste to disposal

Symbiotic system
Products
Natural resources

Waste to disposal
Waste to resource

Natural resources

Products
Waste to disposal

Industrial symbiosis
Example

Source: Zhu et al. (2007)

The food sector

Why to look at the food sector?
Considerable challenges:
Limited arable land and natural resources
Continuous increase of food consumption
Exponential growth of populations and
livestock
Environmental impact of food production and
food chains
New expectations of customers and the society

Food supply chain

Inputs from the
environment

Energy, water, fossil fuels,

chemicals, land, labour>

Outputs to the
environment

Waste, by-products,
pollutants>

The food sector

Question
Can organisations involved in a
food supply chain system get
engaged in symbiotic
relationships that can potentially
improve not only their own
environmental sustainability, but
also the performance of the
supply chain system they are part
of?

Institute of Social Marketing Conference

Social Marketing and Socially
Responsible Management:
Changing Times, New Challenges
November 2010
Track two: Socially Responsible Management

Thank you!
Dr. Luciano Batista
Lecturer in Operations Management
L.Batista@open.ac.uk

References

Agarwal, A. and Strachan, P. (2008). Is Industrial Symbiosis only a Concept for Developed
Countries?, The Journal for Waste & Resource Management Professionals, The Chartered
Institution of Wastes Management, 42.

Bansal, P. and Mcknight, B. (2009). Looking Forward, Pushing Back and Peering Sideways:
analysing the sustainability of industrial symbiosis, Journal of Supply Chain Management, 45(4),
p.26.

Chertow, M. (2007) 'Uncovering Industrial Symbiosis', Journal of Industrial Ecology, 11 (1), p.11.

Faisal, M. (2010). Sustainable supply chains: a study of interaction among the enablers, Business
Process Management Journal, 16(3), p.508.

Seitz, M. and Wells, P. (2006). Challenging the implementation of corporate sustainability,

Business Process Management Journal, 12(6), p.822.

Seuring, S. (2004) 'Industrial Ecology, Life Cycles, Supply Chains: differences and interrelations',
Business Strategy and the Environment, Sep/Oct2004, 13(5), p.306.

Zhu, Q.; Lowe, E.; Wei, Y. and Barnes, D. (2007), Industrial Symbiosis in China - A Case Study of
the Guitang Group, Journal of Industrial Ecology, 11(1), p.31.