IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v7y2015i6p7512-7529d51004.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Role of Biotechnology in Sustainable Agriculture: Views and Perceptions among Key Actors in the Swedish Food Supply Chain

Author

Listed:
  • Karin Edvardsson Björnberg

    (Division of Philosophy, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Brinellvägen 32, SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden)

  • Elisabeth Jonas

    (Department of Animal Breeding and Genetics, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, P.O. Box 7023, SE-750 07 Uppsala, Sweden)

  • Håkan Marstorp

    (Department of Soil and Environment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, P.O. Box 7014, SE-750 07 Uppsala, Sweden)

  • Pernilla Tidåker

    (JTI—Swedish Institute of Agricultural and Environmental Engineering, P.O. Box 7033, SE-750 07 Uppsala, Sweden)

Abstract

Researchers have put forward agricultural biotechnology as one possible tool for increasing food production and making agriculture more sustainable. In this paper, it is investigated how key actors in the Swedish food supply chain perceive the concept of agricultural sustainability and the role of biotechnology in creating more sustainable agricultural production systems. Based on policy documents and semi-structured interviews with representatives of five organizations active in producing, processing and retailing food in Sweden, an attempt is made to answer the following three questions: How do key actors in the Swedish food supply chain define and operationalize the concept of agricultural sustainability? Who/what influences these organizations’ sustainability policies and their respective positions on agricultural biotechnology? What are the organizations’ views and perceptions of biotechnology and its possible role in creating agricultural sustainability? Based on collected data, it is concluded that, although there is a shared view of the core constituents of agricultural sustainability among the organizations, there is less explicit consensus on how the concept should be put into practice or what role biotechnology can play in furthering agricultural sustainability.

Suggested Citation

  • Karin Edvardsson Björnberg & Elisabeth Jonas & Håkan Marstorp & Pernilla Tidåker, 2015. "The Role of Biotechnology in Sustainable Agriculture: Views and Perceptions among Key Actors in the Swedish Food Supply Chain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(6), pages 1-18, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:7:y:2015:i:6:p:7512-7529:d:51004
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/7/6/7512/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/7/6/7512/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hess, Sebastian & Lagerkvist, Carl Johan & Redekop, William & Pakseresht, Ashkan, 2013. "Consumers’ Evaluation of Biotechnology in Food Products: New Evidence from a Meta-Survey," 53rd Annual Conference, Berlin, Germany, September 25-27, 2013 156106, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA).
    2. Hansen, J. W., 1996. "Is agricultural sustainability a useful concept?," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 117-143.
    3. Robinson, John, 2004. "Squaring the circle? Some thoughts on the idea of sustainable development," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 369-384, April.
    4. ., 2006. "Sustainable Development," Chapters, in: David Alexander Clark (ed.), The Elgar Companion to Development Studies, chapter 123, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    5. Matin Qaim, 2009. "The Economics of Genetically Modified Crops," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 1(1), pages 665-694, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Joyce Tait & Alan Raybould & Monica Hoyos Flight & Amy McGoohan, 2023. "Circular and Networked Bioeconomies for Net-Zero Food Production: There is Nothing Magic About Circles," Circular Economy and Sustainability, Springer, vol. 3(4), pages 1907-1918, December.
    2. Jiuping Xu & Xianglan Jiang & Zhibin Wu, 2016. "A Sustainable Performance Assessment Framework for Plastic Film Supply Chain Management from a Chinese Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(10), pages 1-23, October.
    3. Katie Henderson & Bodo Lang & Joya Kemper & Denise Conroy, 2024. "Exploring diverse food system actor perspectives on gene editing: a systematic review of socio-cultural factors influencing acceptability," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 41(2), pages 883-907, June.
    4. Kamble, Sachin S. & Gunasekaran, Angappa & Gawankar, Shradha A., 2020. "Achieving sustainable performance in a data-driven agriculture supply chain: A review for research and applications," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 219(C), pages 179-194.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Julia Brown, 2014. "Evaluating Participatory Initiatives in South Africa," SAGE Open, , vol. 4(2), pages 21582440145, April.
    2. van Calker, Klaas Jan & Antink, Rudi H.J. Hooch & Beldman, Alfons C.G. & Mauser, Anniek, 2005. "Caring Dairy: A Sustainable Dairy Farming Initiative in Europe," 15th Congress, Campinas SP, Brazil, August 14-19, 2005 24234, International Farm Management Association.
    3. Endl, Andreas & Tost, Michael & Hitch, Michael & Moser, Peter & Feiel, Susanne, 2021. "Europe's mining innovation trends and their contribution to the sustainable development goals: Blind spots and strong points," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    4. Johan Swinnen & Alessandro Olper & Senne Vandevelde, 2021. "From unfair prices to unfair trading practices: Political economy, value chains and 21st century agri‐food policy," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 52(5), pages 771-788, September.
    5. Palaniappan, Gomathy & King, Christine A. & Cameron, Don, 2009. "CS - Complexity Of Transition To Alternative Farming Systems," 17th Congress, Illinois State University, USA, July 19-24, 2009 345531, International Farm Management Association.
    6. Millar, Neal & McLaughlin, Eoin & Börger, Tobias, 2019. "The Circular Economy: Swings and Roundabouts?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 11-19.
    7. Alcott, Blake, 2008. "The sufficiency strategy: Would rich-world frugality lower environmental impact," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(4), pages 770-786, February.
    8. Bachev, Hrabrin, 2018. "Управление На Аграрната Устойчивост В България [Governance of agrarian sustainability in Bulgaria]," MPRA Paper 83686, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Hametner, Markus, 2022. "Economics without ecology: How the SDGs fail to align socioeconomic development with environmental sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 199(C).
    10. Sini Forssell & Leena Lankoski, 2015. "The sustainability promise of alternative food networks: an examination through “alternative” characteristics," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 32(1), pages 63-75, March.
    11. Pervanchon, F. & Bockstaller, C. & Girardin, P., 2002. "Assessment of energy use in arable farming systems by means of an agro-ecological indicator: the energy indicator," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 72(2), pages 149-172, May.
    12. Shamsheer Haq & Ismet Boz, 2020. "Measuring environmental, economic, and social sustainability index of tea farms in Rize Province, Turkey," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 2545-2567, March.
    13. Cucari, Nicola & Wankowicz, Ewa & Esposito De Falco, Salvatore, 2019. "Rural tourism and Albergo Diffuso: A case study for sustainable land-use planning," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 105-119.
    14. Davine N. G. Janssen & Eunice Pereira Ramos & Vincent Linderhof & Nico Polman & Chrysi Laspidou & Dennis Fokkinga & Duarte de Mesquita e Sousa, 2020. "The Climate, Land, Energy, Water and Food Nexus Challenge in a Land Scarce Country: Innovations in the Netherlands," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(24), pages 1-27, December.
    15. Tiéfigué Pierrette Coulibaly & Jianguo Du & Daniel Diakité & Olivier Joseph Abban & Elvis Kouakou, 2021. "A Proposed Conceptual Framework on the Adoption of Sustainable Agricultural Practices: The Role of Network Contact Frequency and Institutional Trust," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-12, February.
    16. Mohammad Fazle Rabbi, 2025. "A Dynamic Systems Approach to Integrated Sustainability: Synthesizing Theory and Modeling Through the Synergistic Resilience Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(11), pages 1-23, May.
    17. Schouten, Greetje & Leroy, Pieter & Glasbergen, Pieter, 2012. "On the deliberative capacity of private multi-stakeholder governance: The Roundtables on Responsible Soy and Sustainable Palm Oil," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 42-50.
    18. Bachev, Hrabrin, 2020. "Evaluation of governance sustainability of Bulgarian agriculture," MPRA Paper 103478, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Theodoros Iosifides & George Korres, 2005. "European Integration and the Future of Social Policy Making," ERSA conference papers ersa05p11, European Regional Science Association.
    20. Shahzad Kouser & Matin Qaim, 2013. "Valuing financial, health, and environmental benefits of Bt cotton in Pakistan," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 44(3), pages 323-335, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:7:y:2015:i:6:p:7512-7529:d:51004. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.