Digital technologies like satellites, sensors, and smartphones are becoming increasingly fundamental instruments for promoting more sustainable aquatic food systems in potentially disruptive ways. They go beyond simple quantification of key production parameters by creating new opportunities to collect, analyze, and communicate increasingly precise and diverse data on sustainability issues at larger scales and increasingly in real-time.
A team of researchers from Wageningen University and Research explored how digital information processes and the actors introducing them affect the governance of aquaculture value chains. This paper delves into a transformative perspective on coordination within global value chains, highlighting the profound impact of digital technologies on sustainability outcomes.
The adoption of digital technologies to ensure sustainability catalyzes the creation of digital information processes, reshaping value chain transactions and making them governable. The key factor lies in the ability to encode these processes, signifying a paradigm shift in the coordination dynamics of global value chains.
Digital governance reshapes value chains
The infusion of digital technologies introduces novel dimensions into value chain governance, redistributing roles and responsibilities among lead firms, digital lead actors, and producers. A distinctive focus on digital information processes reveals an emerging governance structure, where the ability to control these processes becomes paramount, relying heavily on codification. This evolution prompts a reassessment of traditional power structures, drawing attention to the new authority exercised by entities orchestrating digitalization.
“By incorporating new actors and informational processes, these forms of digital sustainability assurance challenge existing notions of how global value chains are governed,” report the researchers.
Digital Actors as Governing Entities
Recognizing that entities behind aquaculture management applications, satellite image providers, and sustainability risk scoring algorithms function as governing actors signifies a fundamental shift. These digital tools, by making value chains governable, present unprecedented opportunities for ensuring sustainability in aquaculture. This governance role coexists with other actors, such as lead firms and producer organizations, forming a landscape of collaborative governance.
Interaction between traditional and digital coordination
While the leading role of digital information processes is emphasized, it is crucial to recognize the persistent influence of global lead firms in shaping global production and consumption. The interaction between traditional coordination by lead firms and digital governance deserves in-depth exploration. The control dynamics between digital service providers and lead firms depend on contractual agreements regarding data ownership, access, and use.
Challenges and Opportunities in Digital Governance
Digitalized information processes introduce opportunities and challenges for environmental reform. Issues related to data ownership and access and the influence of major digital actors on sustainability norms deserve exploration. Examining contracts covering data ownership and use between value chain actors and digital assurance providers could uncover opportunities for precompetitive data sharing to enhance sustainability.
Empowering Aquaculture Producers in the Digital Age
The role of producers in ensuring sustainability in the digital landscape requires closer examination. Research avenues should explore how producers respond to and shape digital sustainability assurance, designing effective governance agreements that integrate producers, digital lead actors, and lead firms. Understanding approaches that empower producers to adopt sustainable practices and those leading to their marginalization is crucial to grasping the implications of digital governance.
Conclusion
The researchers conclude that “instead of empowering existing lead firms to increase control over suppliers, digital technologies are increasingly allowing these digital lead actors to establish a new form of ‘governance through digitalization’ that has significant implications for the roles, responsibilities, and strategies of value chain actors and digital sustainability assurance providers alike.”
They also highlight that “as these lead actors become more prominent, their control over digital data flows constitutes a new form of value chain governance with the potential to have a greater impact on the direction towards sustainability.”
As global aquaculture value chains increasingly pivot towards sustainability decisions shaped in the digital realm, unraveling the intricate dynamics of digital governance becomes imperative. This research not only underscores the transformative potential of digital technologies but also emphasizes the need for adaptive governance structures that foster sustainability in the changing landscape of aquaculture.
Contact
Sake R. L. Kruk
Environmental Policy Group
Wageningen University and Research
Hollandseweg 1, 6706 KN Wageningen, The Netherlands.
Email: sake.kruk@wur.nl
Reference (open access)
Kruk, S.R.L., Toonen, H.M. and Bush, S.R. (2023), Digital sustainability assurance governing global value chains: The case of aquaculture. Regulation & Governance. https://doi.org/10.1111/rego.12571
