Path to improvement
Jamie Barsimantov, co-founder and COO of SupplyShift, says the combination of SISC metrics with SupplyShift’s technology platform will directly empower farmers and their industry partners to better assess and improve sustainability performance. He says the tool was in the test phase in November and will be targeted for rollout after the first of the year.
Two large agribusinesses and one large grower group will be a part of the initial group of users of the SISC tool in SupplyShift.
SupplyShift is a seven-year-old California company and provides a global network for supply chain responsibility information. Big brands such as Walmart and other retailers use the platform to request data from their suppliers.
SupplyShift has projects that range from collecting data from female coffee farmers in Rwanda to collaboration with the global nonprofit The Sustainability Consortium. The consortium counts Walmart and Kroger among its founding members and uses SupplyShift to ask suppliers about sustainability attributes. Some of those brands could, in theory, also could use the data gathered in the SISC online calculator.
The need for supply chain transparency is a big part of the value of SupplyShift, Barsimantov says. Demand for transparency and sustainability data is multiplying the burden on the supply chain to collect data and make sense of it.
Growers can make data available to customers, but who will help those suppliers make it valuable for their own operations?
“People have fatigue about providing information, but I think it is more about lack of value. If you fill out a survey and submit it, and you don’t hear anything back ever, what was the point of that?” he says.
“But if you hear that, compared to people that are like you, you’re actually not doing so good on this and you are doing much better on that, and if your peer group are your customers, then all of a sudden you are interested.”
Being able to put data in one place, whether that data relates to sustainability, food safety or other topics, can make it easier to share and create visibility for the supply chain.
“In the end, it is all about trying to help farmers understand how they are doing, and how they best improve,” he says.
More to come
Edwards says that SISC is currently working on a food loss metric, expected to be finished in the spring. The metric is out for review now and has been piloted.
Various buyers in the supply chain are particularly interested in certain metrics, she says, noting that Walmart is aligned with the metrics for nutrient and water use. Many brands are interested in the food loss metric, she says.
“There are different ways that different groups are using our metrics,” she says.
The simple irrigation efficiency metric captures how well the plants are using the water.
“It’s a true efficiency metric, which is really great because that way a grower can be using it as a management tool, as it takes soil type and climatic region out of the equation in the way the metric is interpreted.
“The more efficient you get, the better it is,” she says.
SISC has been doing projects with Western Growers Association and packer-shippers in the Salinas area, taking into account the efficiency metric, the generalized water metric, and the nutrient metric.
“Part of what we’re trying to do is help them be able to respond to the Walmart sustainability survey,” she says.
Duda Farm Fresh Foods is doing a separate project on its operation near Ventura where it is applying almost all the metrics, Edward says, seeking to “baseline” its operations and get experience using the metrics as a management tool. Lipman Farms also is doing a project using the metric measures, particularly related to water use and efficiency.
Panera recently joined SISC and Edwards says the company is seeking to understand metrics its suppliers could provide to it.
