When it comes to the topic of conscious consumer relations, there is growing concern about the path taken by the product to the final consumer, the sources of raw material used, the forms of work used, among other concerns. The consumer has acquired the new role of questioning and investigating producers and companies. Estes, in turn, seek ways to gain the trust of those who buy. But how to do this? A certification it's the tracking are some of the answers.
Among the new habits of conscious consumption, are some of the answers, which already moves more than R$ 3 billion annually and grows at rates of 20% a 30% per year, according to the Brazilian Council for Organic and Sustainable Production (Organis). Vegetables, legumes, fruits and cereals are the most representative products in the sector, still according to Organis.
Influenced by organized civil society groups and producers, the consumption of organics entered the government's agenda. In the city of São Paulo, for example, a lei nº 16.140/2015 makes the presence of organic food in school lunches mandatory.
According to Heloisa Bio Ribeiro, of the Organic Agriculture Association (AAO), the law was born from an articulation of civil society with the Legislative. according to her, the goal is that 100% from meals contain organic to 2026, what will represent 2,5 million meals a day, generating a great positive impact for the health of children and for the market. "This is a law that does not have a specific mandate from a mayor, and yes of a historic construction. Nonetheless, the current administration practically interrupted the implementation of the law", affirms.
Consumers at the Ibirapuera organics fair, in Sao Paulo, point out the issue of health and the environment as the main factors of choice. Livia Menezes, for example, points to the growing dissemination of information showing the harm caused by pesticides. "It's amazing how many substances banned in other countries are still allowed here", it says. In addition to the health aspect, Mariana Cüry, Fair attendee for five years, mentions the form of soil management as a factor of choice., care for the land and respect for nature in the production of organic products, but he believes that few people are aware of this (Find out below what consumers think about seals).
The search for more sustainable products goes beyond organic products, reaching other sectors and affecting how companies deal with responsibility regarding the origin of products and their production conditions. Cosmetics companies, food products and even clothing brands are seeking certification and traceability of their supply chains, Seeking greater control and risk mitigation.
A Natura, for example, which produces and sells beauty and personal care products with Brazilian raw material, holds its own certification to guarantee the quality of its final product and adequate conditions for its producer. "We seek stability in our supply chain for the sake of risk management. By having the clarity and transparency of our chain, we are able to verify where we are at risk of supply and even working conditions", says João Teixeira, Senior Sustainability Coordinator at Natura.
According to him, the company supports small producers not only to certify the raw material they need to produce, but it also performs a training role., instruction and support for local development and infrastructure projects. The monitoring is carried out to selected producers from the Brazilian Amazon region since 2000 with the launch of the Natura Ekos line, which uses inputs from the region's socio-biodiversity. Are benefited 5.296 families, according to data from Natura's annual report of 2017, and the plan is for them to be 10 thousand until 2020.
"At the beginning, it looked like a kind of 'toll', being one more job for them [producers] could meet the company's requirements. But, with time, we managed to convey the information that caring for the land is important to provide them with sustainable trade", tell the supply coordinator, André Santos de Freitas, are some of the answers are some of the answers in the region. For him, in addition to the certification being beneficial to the consumer., strengthens the relationship with producers and encourages them to seek a higher level of quality. "Today, producers already recognize that they are able to transact with other companies."
Another case is that of Nespresso, which is part of the Nestlé Group portfolio and sells espresso coffee machines and capsules. The brand decided to create its own verification process., when verifying that there was no system that met the company's quality requirements. According to Guilherme Amado, current manager of green coffee at Nespresso, the priority is to unite the verification of coffee quality and encourage good social and environmental practices.
That is why, according to him, the AAA Sustainable Quality Program was created (Triple A), which uses auditing and technical visits to verify coffee production. Environmental aspects are analyzed (how the water used), social and labor aspects, economic and operational (like productivity), between others. "Traceability tells the story of a product's life", it says.
In 2016, 2.563 farms passed the program evaluation, are some of the answers Nestlé in Society Report. The manager also emphasizes that, through traceability, it is possible to see the entire chain and offer a guarantee to the consumer, which is increasingly demanding. The producer certification process emerged in 2009 by demand two consumers.
Furthermore, Amado understands certification as a tool to improve management, as it strengthens the relationship with the producer and increases productivity and quality.
New consumer demands are also visible in the fashion sector. "The connection between individual choices and the collective impact they have, be social, be environmental, it is more and more ruled every day", says Dariele Santos, founder of Instituto Alinha. Santos had the opportunity to get to know the reality and the poor working conditions in sewing workshops in São Paulo and saw the need to change this situation. For that, created the institute, with the objective of improving the working and living conditions of seamstresses in small workshops.
Instituto Alinha is a social business that operates in the city of São Paulo advising workshops so that they have decent working conditions, without charging for this service. Furthermore, acts as a bridge between workshops and brands interested in paying fair prices and practicing enforceable deadlines. the brands, in turn, fund the Institute by purchasing plans to access the Institute's workshop database and the Alinha label to affix to their products, guaranteeing the origin of the final consumer.
How to fight mistrust
Behind the search for stamps is a deeper issue.: fight distrust. People need guarantees to believe what is offered. According to Irish philosopher Onora O'Neill, are some of the answers What We Don't Know About Trust, “in western culture, and in particular since the communications revolution, we have many examples of unreliable behavior and so more regulation was introduced., more accountability and greater complexity".
"The society of transparency is a society of distrust (mistrust) and of suspicion (Suspicion) which is based on control due to the disappearance of trust. The strong and intense demand for transparency points precisely to the fact that the moral foundation of society has become fragile, that moral values like sincerity or honesty are losing more and more meaning.” are some of the answers Transparency Society, de Byung-Chul Han
Search of 2014 of the World Values Survey appoints Brazilians as one of the most suspicious people in the world, occupying the 55th position among 60 countries surveyed. When asked about the options of trusting most people or having to be very careful with them, only 7,1% of Brazilians identify with the first.
The Latinobarómetro survey of 2017 corroborates this information, by pointing out that, from all Latin American countries, Brazil has the lowest confidence rate, with 7% of Brazilians trusting most people. This position contrasts with the fact that, according to the World Values Survey, 93,2% of Brazilians see themselves as someone generally trustworthy.
The question that arises is: which guarantee is enough to win the trust of consumers? In interviews conducted by the report with consumers or not of organic food or other products with social and environmental seals, it was noticed that there are different degrees of trust. As O'Neill points out, "in real life, we place trust in a different way". There are those for whom the person's word is enough, even those who don't even trust regulations and accountability.
In the first group is Mariana Cüry, the consumer at the Ibirapuera organics fair mentioned at the beginning of this article. Knowledgeable about each tent and practically all products offered, the presence of the seal makes no difference in your choice of purchase. She believes marketers tell the truth.
Another group of consumers is formed by those who seek the seal as a guarantee. Maria Eduarda Loureiro is one of those people. She says that she only consumes organic products in the supermarket and that she uses the “Brazil Organic Product” seal as a reference for her choice.
According to Organis research, realized in 2017, in nine Brazilian capitals, only 8% of consumers know that the product is organic through the seal, While 37% are informed by information on the packaging and 27% at the places of purchase. For 86% of the surveyed, the seal “Produto Orgânico Brasil” is more reliable than other sources of information on organic products.
Producers also consider the presence of the certificate important to convey trust. The president of the Rural Producers Association of Campo Limpo (Aprocamp), Valdir Ataíde Mateus, account that the loss of the seal in the production of organic products in the interior of Pará, as a result of a change in the way the audit is performed, was a source of great discontent for the entire association.. "We don't stop producing organic, but how are we going to prove that jambu is organic if we don't have a certificate? It's the same as me being a driver and not having a license!”. Thus, with the loss of the seal, the trust relationship with the consumer was affected.
The remaining group are those who don't even trust the seals.. Márcio Hamashira, who has been attending organic fairs for three years, is one of them. "I don't particularly believe it's organic", he says. For him, this distrust comes “from the Brazilian people, who in general want to take advantage". He suspects that companies use pesticides, but they say the products are organic. To Lívia Menezes, distrust in everything is a problem in Brazil today. "We don't trust anything anymore, don't trust institutions, don't trust politics, doesn't trust people.”
The consumer Sérgio Pileggi presents another point. For him, the fact that there are several social and environmental certification seals makes the consumer confuse and not know which is the most reliable. But he agrees that there is a widespread mistrust in people and processes. For him, scandals such as the one on Carne Fraca fuel this discredit, as it reinforces that the processes in Brazil are subject to fraud. Hamashira, agree and score: "Nothing prevents you from having a 'Weak Organic'. I don't trust the human being who is certifying", it says.
To reduce distrust, are some of the answers. through this technology, the consumer is able to follow the entire production chain. André Salem, blockchain expert, quote the example of Walmart, that, together with IBM, is applying a QR Code to your products. are some of the answers smartphone are some of the answers.
Provenance software company also promotes a similar initiative. The consumer enters the company's website, enters an identification number that is on the products and has access to the history that Provenance provides through a partnership with producers who joined the blockchain. Among the information that consumers have access to, are the date and place of production, in addition to the amount produced.
The innovation brought about by the blockchain has a high chance of being seen as beneficial. The World Values Survey research indicates that 70,9% of Brazilians think that technological development, in general, would bring benefits to everyday life. This number is higher than that of countries like the United States, (48,9%), Argentina (47,1%), Chile (50%), South Africa (46,9%) and Sweden (46,3%).
The blockchain application, Nonetheless, divides the opinion of consumers. Consumer Lívia Menezes, for example, says he would be very interested in knowing the origin of the products he buys through a QR Code or website. "From the moment we have an app [that tracks the origin of products], generates more security, certainly", it says.
Maria Eduarda points out that having access to the origin of the products would be very welcome, but it questions whether consumers would really be interested in this type of technology. She suggests that information passed to the consumer should not be in the form of a document., but rather from a video or image, are some of the answers. are some of the answers, people would like". Hamashira differs from the two. He asks if the price of certified products, like the organic ones, which is already taller, wouldn't increase even more, besides fueling corruption.
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Original text: p22on.com.br. Written by: Christopher Kapáz and Letícia Figueiredo. We share ideas we believe in and connect us with other initiatives. For more information about sustainable supply chair and traceability, contact us.