Farming for Walmart: the politics of corporate control and responsibility in the global South

Abstract

To analyse corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a business tool and as a way to promote food security in the global South, this article draws on 65 interviews with supply chain personnel and a 2013 survey of 250 smallholder farmers in Nicaragua. Contrary to private governance literature, Walmart's efforts to control supply chains in Nicaragua are not advancing rural sustainability; feelings of mistrust and unfairness persist among farmers, and many are returning to local markets to regain independence. This analysis extends our understanding of why CSR is failing to help agrarian societies and confirms CSR as principally a business strategy.

Keywords:

• corporate social responsibility
• food security
• smallholder farmers
• supply chains
• Walmart
• retailers

Acknowledgements

We extend thanks to our Nicaraguan research team as well as all of the farmers and their families who shared their time and knowledge with us.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

¹All interviews were conducted under an agreement of confidentiality.

Additional information

Funding

We are grateful for funding from the International Development Research Centre in Ottawa, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Liu Institute for Global Issues at the University of British Columbia, and the Canadian Association for Studies in Cooperation.

Sara Elder is a doctoral candidate in the Institute of Resources, Environment, and Sustainability at the University of British Columbia. Her research focuses on private governance of agrifood supply chains in developing countries, particularly the consequences for the sustainability of smallholder farming. She has published journal articles in Progress in Development Studies (2014), the Journal of Rural Studies (2013), and World Development (2012). Email: [email protected]

Peter Dauvergne is Professor of International Relations at the University of British Columbia. He is the author of the award-winning books, Shadows in the Forest (MIT Press, 1997) and The Shadows of Consumption (MIT Press, 2008), and most recently the coauthor (with Jane Lister) of Eco-Business (MIT Press, 2013) and (with Genevieve LeBaron) of Protest Inc. (Polity, 2014).