Rethinking the near collapse of certification programmes in commodity value chains: A temporal myopia perspective

Daniel Siaw, David Sarpong*, David Botchie, George Ofosu

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Drawing on temporal myopia as a lens, we explore the near collapse of certification programmes in commodity value chains. Developing our contribution in the context of the Ghana cocoa industry, data for our inquiry comes from semi structured interviews and focus group interviews with loosely connected industry actors, including, farmers, certification officers, regulators, and licenced buying companies. Providing insight into the performative drivers and sustenance of certification programmes, we argue that the pursuit of short-term advantages derived from a repertoire of micro-practices constitutively impede certification programmes. These uncoordinated practices, in reinforcing short-term preferences, we found, precipitates the decoupling of certification standards from present and future value capture, inevitably, producing the delayed and catastrophic problem of the near collapse of the certification programme. The implications for the theory and practice of commodity value chains are presented.
Original languageEnglish
Article number103073
JournalJournal of Rural Studies
Volume103
Early online date16 Sept 2023
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Oct 2023

Bibliographical note

Copyright © 2023, Elsevier. This accepted manuscript version is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Data Access Statement

Data will be made available on request.

Keywords

  • Certification programmes
  • Cocoa
  • Commodity value chain
  • Temporal myopia

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