Descrizione del progetto
Strategie efficaci del settore privato per il benessere dell’umanità
C’è un urgente bisogno di ridefinire gli effetti degli investimenti agricoli, dell’uso del territorio e del commercio sul benessere dell’umanità. Concentrazioni senza precedenti nelle catene del valore agro-alimentare stanno aumentando la disuguaglianza a livello globale e l’appropriazione di terreni sta minacciando la vita di milioni di persone. Occorre quindi che il settore privato sviluppi strategie per proteggere e favorire il benessere umano in modo equo. Tuttavia, la scienza attuale è inconcludente riguardo a quali strategie siano più efficaci e al modo in cui si possano affrontare i limiti. Il progetto COMPASS, finanziato dall’UE, analizza un intervallo di strategie del settore privato (quali imprese per i gruppi svantaggiati, sistemi di certificazione ed economie solidali) per delimitare le modalità con cui il riconoscimento della giustizia ambientale in tali strategie possa sostenere od ostacolare il benessere umano.
Obiettivo
Unprecedented concentration in agri-food value chains is reinforcing global inequality. Waves of land grabbing threaten the livelihoods of millions. Reshaping the effects of agricultural investment, land use, and trade on human well-being is thus an urgent challenge. Certification schemes (CS) such as “Fairtrade” have become a common strategy to meet this challenge. However, accumulating evidence shows that many CS have limited effects on well-being. Inclusive business (IB) and solidarity economy (SE) strategies are emerging alternatives. Inclusiveness and solidarity are widely believed to enhance well-being, but evidence and theories disprove this common belief. Environmental justice may be a necessary condition to understand and reshape the effects of CS, IB, and SE on well-being. However, lack of reliable data and comparative analyses limits understanding of these links. COMPASS will tackle these challenges. This project aims to demonstrate how environmental justice influences the effects of CS, IB, and SE strategies on human well-being. COMPASS is organized in four work packages (WPs) and focuses on the cocoa and coffee sectors of Peru and Switzerland. WP1 surveys organizations (n=120) to compare their instruments used in CS, IB, and SE strategies. WP2 surveys households (n=840) and uses set-theoretic and process-tracing methodology to explain the effects of CS, IB, and SE on well-being. WP3 identifies the rules that organizations (n=18) create to regulate land use, investment and trade, assesses their environmental justice, and explains how they influence well-being. WP4 generates context-sensitive generalizations of these effects, and it tests and advances pertinent theories. COMPASS breaks new ground by systematically comparing CS, IB, and SE strategies and their effects on human well-being. It develops a new strand of environmental justice research on private-sector strategies and it tests the transformative potential of environmental justice.
Campo scientifico
Programma(i)
Argomento(i)
Meccanismo di finanziamento
ERC-STG - Starting GrantIstituzione ospitante
3012 Bern
Svizzera