Applying Social Life Cycle Assessment in the Thai Sugar Industry: Challenges from the field

Accepted Manuscript Applying Social Life Cycle Assessment in the Thai Sugar Industry: Challenges from the field

Jittima Prasara-A, Shabbir H. Gheewala PII:

S0959-6526(17)32419-8

DOI:

10.1016/j.jclepro.2017.10.120

Reference:

JCLP 10912

To appear in:

Journal of Cleaner Production

Received Date:

29 November 2015

Revised Date:

07 April 2017

Accepted Date:

11 October 2017

Please cite this article as: Jittima Prasara-A, Shabbir H. Gheewala, Applying Social Life Cycle Assessment in the Thai Sugar Industry: Challenges from the field, Journal of Cleaner Production (2017), doi: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2017.10.120

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ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT Highlights Title: Applying Social Life Cycle Assessment in the Thai Sugar Industry: Challenges from the field 

S-LCA was tested vis-à-vis its applicability for the Thai sugar industry sector.

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Social issues to improve are fair wages, health & safety, water and land rights.

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Reference flow should be selected to be comparable to other similar products.

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The S-LCA of Thai sugar industry should be conducted at provincial level scope.

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Applying Social Life Cycle Assessment in the Thai Sugar Industry: Challenges from the field Jittima Prasara-Aa*, Shabbir H. Gheewalab,c Climate Change and Adaptation Research Unit (CCARE), Faculty of Environment and Resource Studies, Mahasarakham University, Mahasarakham, Thailand bJoint Graduate School of Energy and Environment, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi, Bangkok, Thailand c Centre of Excellence on Energy Technology and Environment, PERDO, Bangkok, Thailand a

Abstract This paper discusses the challenges in applying Social Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) in the Thai sugar industry sector. A case study of an S-LCA of sugar in Nakhon Ratchasima province was undertaken following the UNEP/SETAC guidelines for S-LCA of products. Qualitative evaluation was made to assess an extent to which S-LCA is applicable for the Thai sugar industry sector. Based on the results from this study, the main challenges in applying S-LCA in the Thai sugar industry sector are diversity of scope of study and reference flow choices, difficulty in data collection and data, limited choices of social subcategories and indicators to assess social impact at product level for some stakeholder groups and absence of established interpretation approach. Though findings are derived for the sugar industry, many of them could also be applied to other systems. The main social issues that need urgent attention are problems such as cane trash burning that affects local health and safety, low wages, land and water rights. Appropriate ways to conduct S-LCA for Thai sugar industry have been suggested. In addition, it was suggested that the S-LCA of Thai sugar industry should be conducted at provincial level scope.

Keywords: Social Life Cycle Assessment; Sugar industry; Social subcategories; Thailand

*Corresponding

author. Tel.: +6643-754-435, Fax: +6643-754-435

E-mail address: [email protected]

1 Introduction

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The sugar industry plays an important role in the Thai economy. In 2015, following Brazil, Thailand was the second largest sugar exporter globally (Workman, 2016). The sugar industry provides feedstock for both food and fuel production. In Thailand, sugarcane is now mainly used to produce sugar and ethanol from molasses. Moreover, the by-products from sugar production process could be used to produce other useful products such as heat, electricity, pulp, bio-fertilizer and biogas (Gheewala et al., 2011; Kiatkittipong et al., 2009; Nguyen and Gheewala, 2008a; Nguyen et al., 2010; Pereira and Ortega, 2010; Ramjeawon, 2008; Renouf et al., 2013). In Thailand, sustainable development has been promoted widely in many sectors including the sugar industry. Sustainable development is defined as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). To help achieve sustainability, the so-called “triple bottom line” is often used. This concept promotes the organizations to consider environmental, economic and social aspects (Elkington, 2002). As appearing in the current Thailand’s sustainable development goals, a subtle balance of the economic, social and environmental aspects is the main basis to achieve the goals (United Nations, 2015). Life cycle thinking, considering all life cycle stages of a product or service, is a useful concept for moving towards sustainability. To this end, a combination of life cycle approaches such as Environmental Life Cycle Assessment (E-LCA), Life Cycle Costing (LCC) and Social Life Cycle Assessment (S-LCA) are promoted to use in Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment (LCSA) (Valdivia et al., 2013). E-LCA is a well-known technique used to assess the potential environmental impacts of a product or service along its life cycle (i.e. material acquisition, transportation, manufacture, use and disposal) (International Organization for Standardization, 2006). E-LCA has already been used to assess the environmental impacts of some products in the Thai sugar sector (Kongboon and Sampattagul, 2012; Nguyen et al., 2008; Silalertruksa and Gheewala, 2011b; Silalertruksa et al., 2009; Yuttitham et al., 2012). LCC has also been used to analyze economic aspects in all life cycle stages in the Thai sugar industry sector (Nguyen and Gheewala, 2008b; Silalertruksa and Gheewala, 2011a). Some economic and social aspects of these products have been investigated in Silalertruksa and

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Gheewala (2011a), Prasara-A and Gheewala (2016) and Sawaengsak and Gheewala (2017). However, these previous studies only assessed economic and social performances of sugar based products on a limited group of stakeholders (i.e. workers and sugarcane growers). They have not yet covered all the social and socio-economic performances on different stakeholders along the whole life cycle of the products. To help achieve sustainability of the Thai sugar industry, this study will assess the social performances of Thai sugar production along its life cycle using S-LCA. Within the three life cycle approaches mentioned, S-LCA is the newest, and is still under development. S-LCA is a technique used to assess the social and socio-economic aspects of products and their potential positive and negative impacts along the life cycle encompassing extraction and processing of raw materials; manufacturing; distribution; use; re-use; maintenance; recycling; and final disposal. Note should be taken that assessment of positive impacts in S-LCA is currently under debate. The S-LCA technique is used to find social hotspots in the life cycle stages for moving towards improvement. The social hotspots are unit processes (in a region) with a situation that may lead to a problem, a risk or an opportunity, in relation to social topics of interest (UNEP/SETAC, 2009). Identifying social hotspots could help a company/organization to identify the processes (in a product’s life cycle) that need urgent improvement of social conditions. In 2009, UNEP/SETAC launched the guidelines for S-LCA of products (UNEP/SETAC, 2009). The framework of S-LCA in the UNEP/SETAC guidelines is similar to that of E-LCA. This is based on the idea that S-LCA could be conducted along with the E-LCA. Although the S-LCA framework is established, some issues in conducting S-LCA are still not yet settled. For instance, there is no consensus on the Social Life Cycle Impact Assessment (S-LCIA) methods to use. Several studies contributing to development of S-LCIA methods are reported in ChhipiShrestha (2014). There are some S-LCA case studies of several products in different countries such as roses (Ecuador and Netherlands) (Franze and Ciroth, 2011), waste recycling systems (Peru) (Aparcana and Salhofer, 2013), used polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles (Mauritius) (Foolmaun and Ramjeeawon, 2013), welding technologies (Germany) (Chang et al., 2015), strawberry yogurt (USA), (Benoit-Norris et al., 2012), notebook (Belgium) (Ciroth and Franze,

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2011), laptop computer (Sweden) (Ekener-Petersen and Finnveden, 2013; Ekener-Petersen and Moberg, 2013), technologies for water supply and wastewater treatment (Indonesia) (Lehmann et al., 2013), building materials (Iran) (Hosseinijou et al., 2014), biodiesel (Indonesia) (Manik et al., 2013) and photovoltaic modules (Germany and Italy) (Traverso et al., 2012). To date, there is no literature found on case studies of S-LCA in Thailand. In this study, the S-LCA technique will be used to test its applicability for the Thai sugar industry sector. Moreover, suggestions on appropriate ways in conducting S-LCA for the Thai sugar industry sector will be provided. 2 Materials and methods There are six steps in conducting this S-LCA study: site selection, screening process, selection of stakeholders, selection of social subcategories and indicators, data collection and impact assessment. Details of each step are described in the following sections: 2.1 General context and site selection This study was conducted as a screening one in order to find appropriate ways in conducting SLCA of products in the Thai sugar industry at a larger scale. Sugar was chosen as the object of the present pre-study because it is the main product of the sugarcane industry. Based on the authors’ experience on the field, there is no significant difference in practices involved in sugarcane cultivation and sugar production across the country. All sugar factories are Thai companies and are obliged to follow the national policies. For example, sugarcane is sold at the national regulated fixed price and the standard on national regulated minimum wages applying to all sectors must be followed. Therefore, it was assumed that sugarcane cultivation and sugar production practices are similar across different areas. Sugarcane farms in Thailand consist predominantly of small farms (with areas of less than 10 hectares) owned by individuals. There are fewer large farms owned by sugar factories or individuals. A large number of sugarcane farms are contracted with the sugar factories; however, some small farms are not. Owners of small farms normally work for themselves. At

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times, they will also hire local laborers when needed. Larger farms need more laborers; these may be both locals and laborers from other areas. The site selected to study was one district of the Nakhon Ratchasima province in the northeastern region of Thailand which is the largest sugarcane producing area in the country. In 2014, this region generated more than 40 percent share of the total national sugarcane production. Within the north-eastern region, Nakhon Ratchasima province had the largest sugarcane plantation areas (Office of Agricultural Economics, 2014). In the selected site studied, the major economy is agriculture. Sugarcane is the main agricultural product in this district. There is a sugar factory located nearby this district. Most of its households grow sugarcane to sell to this sugar factory. In this area, there are several small sugarcane farms. Most sugarcane farm owners in this area are contracted with the sugar factory. Those contracted farmers gain support from the factory in terms of production improvement, mechanics and loans. However, they are required to feed the certain amounts of sugarcane to the factory. Workers in the sugarcane farms in this district are most locals. All stakeholders included in this study and numbers of surveys investigated are described in section 2.4. Data were collected during June 2015. Though some factors such as local/non-local (seasonal) workers and small/large farms, may cause different social performances, this screening study only includes data from small farms and local workers. This is because a majority of the farms in the area studied are small, and only local workers were available to provide information at the time of study. 2.2 Screening process A screening process is done to help identifying processes that are sensitive to the total social impacts of a product studied. It was suggested that only stakeholders from the groups that are sensitive to the function of product under study should be included in the system boundaries (Macombe, 2013). In this study, a screening process using social hotspots analysis was conducted to help finding processes in the product’s life cycle that play an important role in the total social impacts in the Thai sugar sector.

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Before field data collection, the social hotspots of the Thai sugar sector were assessed using the Social Hotspots Database (Benoît Norris, 2014). They were analyzed using the Social LCIA Method 0.9V0.01/Standard in SimaPro 8.0.4.24. Five social categories, i.e. labor rights, health & safety, human rights, governance and community were assessed (Norris et al., 2013). The results showed that the Thai sugar sector has a total single score of 334.3 Pt/1 USD (2002). This consists of 10.66 Pt in labor rights & decent work subcategory, and 323.64 Pt in health & safety subcategory. This means that the Thai sugar sector has high social impact on health & safety, followed by labor rights & decent work. Based on social impact contribution analysis, it was found that the sugarcane production sector contributes about 84 percent of total impacts of the sugar industry. Therefore, field data collection was focused on stakeholders involved in sugarcane production. To make the assessment comprehensive, data about stakeholders involved in other processes were also collected from the field but the numbers of samples were smaller than that of the sugarcane production sector (see numbers of stakeholders included in this study in section 2.4). Based on the social hotspots analysis previously mentioned, the main social subcategories that are impacted are health & safety and labor rights & decent work. Hence, these subcategories will be focused on in this S-LCA study as they are proven to have high risk on the stakeholders involved. In the Social Hotspots Database, under the social category “health & safety”, there are two social themes: injuries & fatalities and toxics & hazards. For the social category “labor rights & decent work”, there are nine social themes: child labor, forced labor, excessive working time, wage assessment, poverty, migrant labor, freedom of association, unemployment and labor laws (Norris et al., 2013). Where possible, attempt will be made to incorporate these social themes in this S-LCA study (see Table 2 for the social subcategories and indicators examined in this study). However, due to unavailability of data, some social theme such as migrant labor will be excluded from this study. 2.3 Functional unit and system boundaries The functional unit set for this study is 1 tonne of sugar. Although qualitative and semiquantitative indicator results in S-LCA could not be expressed in proportion to the functional unit, it is suggested in the UNEP/SETAC (2009) guidelines that a functional unit needs to be

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set for S-LCA. It is stated there that setting functional unit for S-LCA is as fundamental as in E-LCA because it is the starting point to determine a product system. The system boundaries set for this study are shown in Figure 1. The processes included are sugarcane production, transportation, consumption and waste disposal. It is noted that the sugar production is not included because data from the stakeholders involved in sugar production was not available at the time of study. However, based on the screening process described in the previous section, sugar production is not seen to dominate the overall impacts. However, it is worth to also include data for sugar production when available in the future.

Sugarcane production

Transportation

Sugar production

Consumption

Waste disposal

Figure 1 System boundaries 2.4 Selection of stakeholders involved Five groups of stakeholders were selected for this study following the five suggested stakeholder categories in the guidelines for Social Life Cycle Assessment of Products of UNEP/SETAC (2009). These include workers, consumers, local community, society and value chain actors. It is noted that an attempt was made to avoid people who share roles in more than one stakeholder groups in order to avoid biased opinion for each stakeholder group as suggested in Manik et al. (2013). Description and numbers of interviewees included in this study are presented in Table 1. Table 1 Description of the stakeholders included in this study Stakeholder group

Descriptions

Numbers of surveys

workers

employees in sugarcane farms

101^

consumers

consumers in the area studied

30

people who live in area

30

representatives from local

12*

local community society

government, public organizations etc. who live in

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the area value chain actors

farm owners and contractors

35

for transportation

^ This includes 71 interviews conducted by sugar factory staff (see details in section 2.6). * Attempt was made to obtain at least 30 surveys for each stakeholder group but only 12 representatives for the society stakeholder group participated in the study. 2.5 Selection of social subcategories To find appropriate social subcategories to examine the main subcategories from the relevant international standards/guidelines, namely UNEP/SETAC (2009), Sustainability Assessment of Food and Agriculture Systems (SAFA) (Natural Resources Management and Environment Department of FAO, 2013) and Bonsucro (2014), were listed for the stakeholders to select. They were asked to identify what are most important to them (from the list given). For this, one person could only select one subcategory that is most important to each one. In addition, they were asked to identify the subcategories in which they feel affected (both positively and negatively) by the sugar industry. For this, stakeholders could select more than one subcategory. Moreover, open-ended questions were asked to identify other problems (that may not be in the list given) created by the sugar industry which affect the stakeholders. 2.6 Data collection Data used in this S-LCA study are required from different groups of stakeholders, i.e. workers, sugarcane farm owners, consumers, local community, society and value chain actors. Having established a working partnership with a sugar factory for this research project helped to get contacts with the sugarcane farm owners as many of them are contracted with the sugar factory. To prevent receiving biased opinions of other stakeholders towards the sugar industry, data about other groups of stakeholders that are not dependent on the sugar factory were collected by the authors with help of local people. Getting locals involved in this research project is one way to help building trust of the stakeholders. In addition, when contacting the potential interviewees, the authors tried to make sure that they understand that this research is funded by

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a governmental agency and it aims to help find recommendations to support the community’s well-being. 2.6.1 Data on workers and sugarcane farm owners Data on workers and farm owners were collected from the field by face-to-face interviewing workers and sugarcane farm owners in April 2015. The interviews with the workers were conducted by the authors. On the other hand, the interviews with the farm owners were conducted by the staff of the sugar factory that, being a partner in our research project, was willing to provide data for this study. Data were then collected through the staff of the sugar factory because most farmers are contracted with the sugar factory and so the factory staff have direct contacts with them. However, site visits and interviews (by the authors) with laborers working in sugarcane farms were used to validate the data. 2.6.2 Data on other stakeholders Data on consumers, local community, society and value chain actors were collected from the field by face-to-face interviewing of people in those stakeholder groups (which were selected randomly) in the area nearby the studied sugar factory. 2.7 Impact assessment method Two types of S-LCIA methods are described in Parent et al. (2010): impact pathways and performance reference points methods. Impact pathways method should be used with a clear impact pathway methodology for the social impact categories of interest. This method is used when conducting S-LCA for large scale data such as sector or country scale. Performance reference points method is more accurate for site specific data (Chhipi-Shrestha et al., 2014). At present, in the absence of an established impact pathway methodology for all the social impact categories of interest, the performance reference points method was adopted. When using performance reference points method, social inventory data are used to compare with the thresholds (Parent et al., 2010). Inventory data can be quantitative or semi-quantitative such as check-list data like yes/no (Chhipi-Shrestha et al., 2014). Some of these indicators and

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thresholds were selected from the guidelines/standards (i.e. UNEP/SETAC, Bonsucro and SAFA), and some were designed by the authors. The selection of these indicators was based on their relevance to the sugar supply chain and data availability. The indicators from the S-LCA guidelines of UNEP/SETAC, Bonsucro (the standard for sugar production) and SAFA were selected as they are directly involved with S-LCA of a sugar product. However, it should be noted that some relevant indicators were not included in this study due to data unavailability. The indicators designed by the authors are marked with the sign “^” in Table 2. These indicators were designed to assess how the stakeholders perceived social performances of the sugar industry, following the impact assessment concept of Manik et al. (2013). The indicators used are calculated as percentages of stakeholders answering yes/no to the question(s) designed for each social subcategory. Some indicators are designed as percentages of stakeholders answering “yes”, while some are designed as answering “no”. This depends on the threshold of each indicator. For example, in subcategory “fair wage”, for the indicator “government regulated wage”, the threshold is that all the workers receive at least the government regulated minimum wage. The indicator is designed as a percentage of workers answering “no” to the question “Do you receive at least the government regulated minimum wage (300B/day)?” If there is any worker reporting that he/she does not receive at least the government regulated minimum wage, this implies negative performance in this subcategory. For the same subcategory, but another indicator (with a question “Do you feel that you receive fair wages?”), the indicator is designed as a percentage of workers answering “yes” to the question. This is because there is no regulation on whether the workers feel that they receive fair wage. If the workers report that they receive fair wages, this implies positive performance in this subcategory. The inventory indicators (questions asked) for each social subcategory are presented in Table 2. In performance assessment, the collected inventory indicator results are compared with their thresholds. The social performances obtained from this step could be both positive and negative. To ease comparison of social performances across different subcategories, the performances are calculated as percentages of stakeholders reporting negative/positive performances (for each inventory indicator). For the subcategory having more than one inventory indicator, average positive and negative percentages (of different inventory indicators) are used. Here, the higher positive percentage means better social condition and higher negative percentage means poorer social condition. If the percentage is equal to zero, it

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means that the sugar industry is not identified contributing to either positive or negative performance for that particular subcategory. In next step, the percentage of social subcategories identified by stakeholders as most important are required to further interpret the results. Following the impact assessment concept of using stakeholders’ expectation and perception in Manik et al. (2013), this study applied the comparison of importance of subcategories and their degree of impacts identified by stakeholders. The social subcategory with high percentage of stakeholders identified as most important; together with high percentage of negative performance means that this subcategory needs urgent improvement. On the other hand, the ones with high percentages of stakeholders identified as most important; together with high percentage of positive performance means success of the sugar industry in the development of social conditions. 3 Results 3.1 Social subcategories identified as most important by different stakeholders Social subcategories that are most important for the stakeholders, the indicators used for each subcategory and results of the indicators are presented in Table 2. It is seen that not all the subcategories listed are selected to be the most important issue for them. Percentage shares of social subcategories identified by different stakeholders as being the most important for them are shown in Figures 2 a-d. Note that all of the interviewees in the “consumers” stakeholder group identified health and safety as the most important social subcategory and this result is not shown in Figures 2 a-d. Table 2 Results of social impact categories investigated Stakeholders

Subcategories

Fair wages* Workers Health and safety*

Indicators - Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that you receive fair wage?”^ - Percentage of workers answering “no” to a question “Do you receive at least the government regulated minimum wage (300B/day)?”1,2,3 - Percentage of workers answering “no” to a question “Does your employer supply appropriate personal protective

Results 95% (positive performance) -93% (negative performance, they receive about 200B/day but meal is provided at work) -30% (negative performance)

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Free of discrimination*

Free of forced labor*

Social benefits*

Fair working hours

Free of child labor Freedom of association and collective bargaining Satisfaction of job

Consumers#

Health & safety* Consumer privacy

equipment?”1,2,3 - Percentage of workers answering “no” to a question “If the personal protective equipment is supplied, do you use it?”2 - Percentage of workers answering “no” to a question “Do all workers present on the field have access to drinking water in sufficient quantity?”2 - Percentage of workers answering “no” to a question “Do all workers present on the field have access to first aid and provision for emergency response?”2 - Percentage of workers answering “no” to a question “Do male and female workers get the same wages for doing same task?”1,2,3 - Percentage of workers answering “no” to a question “Are percentages of male/female workers are equal?”1,2,3

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-20% (negative performance)

0%

0%

0%

-80% (negative performance, percentage of female is higher because more male workers work in other sector such as construction that pays higher wages) - Percentage of workers answering 0% “no” to a question “Is the sugarcane farm you work in free of forced labor?”1,2,3 - Percentage of workers answering -100% (negative performance) “yes” to a question “Do workers received social benefits?”1 - Percentage of workers 0% answering “yes” to a question “Does your maximum working hours exceed 60 hours per week?”2 - Percentage of workers 0% answering “no” to a question “Do you volunteer to work overtime and the overtime work is paid at premium rate?”1,2 - Percentage of workers answering 0% “yes” to a question “Is there any child labor in the sugarcane farm you work in?”1,2,3 - Percentage of workers answering 0% “no” to a question “Do you have freedom of association and collective bargaining?”1,2,3 - Percentage of workers answering 90% (positive performance) “yes” to a question “Are you satisfied with your job?”^ Percentage of workers answering -40% (negative performance, “yes” to a question “Do you feel some local consumers claim that that the sugar industry contributes sugarcane trash burning affects to this social subcategory (both their health) positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 7% (positive performance)

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End of life responsibility

Feedback mechanism

Transparency

Local employment*

Delocalization and migration*

Safe & healthy living conditions*

Access to material resources* Local community Access to immaterial resources*

Community engagement

Respect of cultural heritage

Respect of indigenous rights

“yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^

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0%

0%

0%

100% (positive performance)

75% (positive performance)

-45% (negative performance, some locals claim that sugarcane trash burning affects their health) 15% (positive performance)

10% (positive performance)

5% (positive performance)

2% (positive performance)

2% (positive performance)

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Percentage of workers answering 0% “yes” to a question “Do you feel Secure living that the sugar industry contributes conditions to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 100% (positive performance) Contribution to “yes” to a question “Do you feel economic that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both development* positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 0% “yes” to a question “Do you feel Public commitments to that the sugar industry contributes sustainability issues* to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 0% “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes Society Free of corruption* to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 0% “yes” to a question “Do you feel Technology that the sugar industry contributes development to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 0% Prevention & “yes” to a question “Do you feel mitigation of armed that the sugar industry contributes conflicts to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering -20% (negative performance) “yes” to a question “Have you ever Water rights* experienced legitimate water contest by other users?”^ Percentage of workers answering -10% (negative performance) “yes” to a question “Have you Land rights* ever experienced legitimate land contest by other users?”^ Percentage of workers answering 4% (positive performance) “yes” to a question “Do you feel that the sugar industry contributes Fair competition* to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Value chain Percentage of workers answering 5% (positive performance) actors “yes” to a question “Do you feel Promoting social that the sugar industry contributes responsibility* to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 10% (positive performance) “yes” to a question “Do you feel Supplier relationships that the sugar industry contributes to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ Percentage of workers answering 0% “yes” to a question “Do you feel Respect of intellectual that the sugar industry contributes property rights to this social subcategory (both positively and negatively)?”^ *subcategories that are identified by stakeholders as being the most important to them

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^these indicators were designed by the authors #only

local consumers were included in this study

1adapted

from the S-LCA guidelines of UNEP/SETAC; 2adapted from Bonsucro: 3adapted from SAFA

0% performance means the sugar industry neither contributes to positive nor negative performance on that social subcategory Free of forced Social benefits, 3 labor, 7

Fair wages, 53 Free of discrimination, 10

Health and safety, 27

Figure 2-a Percentage share of social subcategories identified by workers as being the most important Access to Local immaterial employment, 33 resources, 8

Access to material resources, 8 Safe & healthy living conditions, 25

Delocalization and migration, 25

Figure 2-b Percentage share of social subcategories identified by local community as being the most important Free of corruption, 8 Public commitments to sustainability issues, 17

Contribution to economic development, 75

Figure 2-c Percentage share of social subcategories identified by society as being the most important

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Promoting social responsibility, 4

Land rights, 17 Water rights, 50

Fair competition, 29

Figure 2-d Percentage share of social subcategories identified by value chain actors as being the most important Results shown in Figures 2 a-d seem intuitive in that, for workers, the most important issue is fair wages. For consumers, health and safety is the most important issue for all of them. For local community, local employment is the most important. For society, economic development is no doubt given as the most important issue. For value chain actors (sugarcane farm owners and contractors for transportation), it is interesting that water rights and fair competition are the most important issues. 3.2 Social performances of the sugar industry 3.2.1 Negative performances Percentages of negative performances for different social subcategories are presented along with percentages of social subcategories identified by stakeholders as being the most important to them in Figure 3.

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100 80 60 40 20 0 -20 -40 -60

% identified as most important % identified negatively affected Promoting social responsibility

Fair competition

Free of corruption Water rights value chain actors Land rights

Access to material resources

Access to immaterial resources Contribution to economic development society Public commitments to sustainability issues

Safe & healthy living conditions

Social benefits Health & safety consumers Local employment local community Delocalization and migration

Free of forced labor

Free of discrimination

-100

Fair wages workers Health and safety

-80

Figure 3 Negative social performances of sugar industry for key social subcategories There are both negative and positive net performances caused by the sugar industry. Considering together with importance of social subcategories identified by stakeholders, it is seen that fair wages and health and safety (for workers, local consumer and local community) are the biggest issues. These social subcategories have highest percentage of stakeholders identified most important; while having highest negative performance. This means that these social subcategories need urgent improvement. It should be noted that the consumers included in this study are limited to only local consumers. Thus, they may be affected by the same problem as other local community members. Some of local consumers and local community reported that the cause of this problem is emissions from cane trash burning that affects their health and safety. A few stakeholders also mentioned that in the sugar milling season, overloaded trucks transporting sugarcane to sugar mills can cause problems to the road structure and to locals sharing the road.

For the health and safety subcategory in stakeholder “workers”, there are some negative performances (see results in Table 2). Thirty percent of the sugarcane farms do not provide the

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protective equipment. In addition, twenty percent of them reported that the personal protective equipment were supplied but not used by the workers. For this issue, the sugar industry may help educate the laborers working in the sugarcane farms about the health and safety issues. It is suggested that this health and safety problem should be addressed and that this subcategory should be included in future research. In the fair wages subcategory, it is interesting that despite having wages lower than the government regulated minimum wage, ninety five percent of the workers reported that they feel that they receive fair wages. They added that wages received from working in sugarcane farms are considered fair compared to other agriculture sectors in the same area. Moreover, this was considered fair in the sense of how each worker receives wages compared to other workers working in the same job. The results from the two indicators used in this study for fair wages subcategory could not provide a clear answer whether the sugar industry causes negative performances in this subcategory. However, this subcategory is recommended for future investigations since it is identified as most important by workers. Moreover, it is recommended that the indicators used for this subcategory should be improved to capture more dimensions of the fair wage issue as identified in Fair Wage Network (2016). Free of discrimination shows negative performances in Figure 3. There are two indicators used for this subcategory, i.e. wages discrimination over different genders and percentage of male and female workers. Result of the first indicator shows no effect (see Table 2) but the second indicator shows negative performance. This is because percentage of female workers is higher than that of male workers. However, more information from interviews with workers suggests that there is no gender discrimination in hiring workers. They added that many male workers choose to work in other sectors such as construction that pays higher wages. Social benefits subcategory also shows negative performance in Figure 3. The indicator used for this subcategory is to ask whether the workers receive social benefits from the employers. All the workers reported that they receive no social benefits from the employers. However, this seems to be common in the Thai agricultural sector. The jobs in the sugarcane sector and other agricultural sectors are temporary and not contracted which is probably why there are no social benefits provided.

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Regarding the water and land rights issues, a small number of sugarcane farm owners reported that they sometimes have conflicts with other users for access to water and land. It is suggested that the future work should also investigate the water and land rights issues of the competitive sectors to provide useful recommendations. Water seems to be more important than land, considering the percentage identified important by the sugarcane farm owners. There may be different reasons behind this. Other information may be collected in the future work, such as farmer land ownership, source of water they depend on, competing sectors etc. which will help in meaningful interpretation of the results. 3.2.2 Positive performances Percentages of positive performances for different social subcategories are presented along with percentages of social subcategories identified by stakeholders as being the most important to them in Figure 4. 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20

% identified as most important % identified positively affected Promoting social responsibility

Land rights

Fair competition

Water rights value chain actors

Free of corruption

Public commitments to sustainability issues

Access to immaterial resources

Contribution to economic development society

Access to material resources

Delocalization and migration

Safe & healthy living conditions

Social benefits

Health & safety consumers Local employment local community

Free of forced labor

Free of discrimination

Health and safety

0

Fair wages workers

10

Figure 4 Positive social performances of sugar industry for key social subcategories Figure 4 shows that the sugar industry benefits most in generating local employment (for local community) and contribution to economic development (for society), followed by

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delocalization and migration, access to material and immaterial resources (for local community), promoting social responsibility and fair competition (for value chain actors), respectively. Having the sugar factory located in the area brings job opportunities for the locals. This directly promotes economic development in the society. When locals have jobs near their hometown, they do not need to seek employment elsewhere. This in turn helps to reduce delocalization and migration. Moreover, facilities and services are established within the area for the sugar industry’s employees. The locals can also benefit from getting access to material and immaterial resources from having the sugar factory located in their area. Taking into consideration the significance of social subcategories and the social performances found in this study, the suggested social subcategories that are applicable for the Thai sugar industry are those provided in the guidelines/standards and also identified important by the stakeholders. These include fair wages, health and safety, free of discrimination, free of forced labor and social benefits (for workers); health and safety (for consumers); local employment, delocalization and migration, safe and healthy living conditions, access to material and immaterial resources (for local community); contribution to economic development, public commitments to sustainability issues and free of corruption (for society); water and land rights, fair competition and promoting social responsibility (for value chain actors). The main social issues that need urgent improvement are those identified as important by stakeholders, who are socially harmed by the industry (such as problems of cane trash burning that affects local health and safety, low wages, land and water rights). However, it was found that not all social subcategories selected to assess in this study were given significance by the stakeholders interviewed. Some social subcategories selected from the list in international guidelines like UNEP/SETAC (2009) such as prevention and mitigation of armed conflicts, free of corruption and respect of intellectual property rights, may be less relevant to the Thai sugar industry sector. 4 Discussion In this section, qualitative evaluation is made to assess the extent to which S-LCA is applicable for the Thai sugar industry sector. 4.1 Applicability of S-LCA for the Thai sugar industry

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Overview of applicability level of S-LCA in the Thai sugar industry sector is presented in Table 3. The evaluation of the applicability level is done for each phase of the study. In the goal and scope definition phase, S-LCA is seen to be applicable to a large extent as there was no large obstacle in conducting the study. Other phases of the study, S-LCA seems to be less applicable. More detailed discussions for each point of concern are in the following sections. Table 3 Applicability level of S-LCA in the Thai sugar industry sector Phase of the study Goal and scope definition Life Cycle Inventory Analysis Life Cycle Impact Assessment

Level of applicability To large extent

Interpretation

To limited extent

To medium extent To limited extent

Limitations Diversity in scope of study and reference flow choices Difficulty in data collection and data quality Limited choices of social subcategories and indicators for some stakeholder groups to assess social impact at product level No specific established interpretation approach

4.1.1 Scope of study and reference flow The purpose of this study is to provide appropriate ways to conduct S-LCA of Thai sugar industry at a larger level. With regards to setting the system boundary, an attempt was made to find whether the company, provincial or regional level is the most appropriate way. The authors propose that the S-LCA of the Thai sugar industry should be conducted at the provincial level scope. This is because social impacts on the sugarcane farmers are important. It was found that sugarcane production sector contributes nearly 84 percent of total social impacts of the sugar industry (see Section 2.2). When considering a system boundary at company level (sugar factory) in one sugar factory, there were contracted sugarcane farmers from different provinces. Thus, it may be difficult to identify locations of the local community and society. Therefore, setting the system boundary for S-LCA of the Thai sugar industry is thought to be more appropriate at provincial or regional level scope. However, the authors propose provincial level scope over regional level scope as it would give more useful results at a more detailed scale. A selection of reference flow is another challenge in the goal and scope definition phase. As recommended in Macombe and Loeille (2013), S-LCA should be conducted to compare social

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impacts between comparable products to provide meaningful results. For this study, the functional unit set and reference flow was 1 tonne of sugar. This is fine with the objective to assess the social performances along life cycle of sugar product. However, it may be less meaningful when used for comparing with other products. If the objective of this study is to compare social impacts of sugar with other products, the reference flow should to be selected carefully to be comparable with other products. For example, in case of the social indicator “wages” for workers in sugarcane production, in Thai sugarcane farms, wages are paid in different basis. Some tasks/sites are paid daily/monthly per person, per area of sugarcane farm, or per tonne of sugarcane produced. In the case of comparative S-LCA of sugar with other products, instead of calculating reference flow as a weight of products required in the systems studied, it may be more appropriate to calculate reference flows as incomes gained from the sugar product/other product (in relation to the functional unit set). This would make it easier to express the wages paid in comparable product systems. 4.1.2. Difficulty in data collection There are different issues in data collection for this study. For S-LCA, data from different stakeholders such as workers, consumers, local community, society and value chain actors are required. Discussion here refers to the difficulties found by the authors when collecting data on the field for this S-LCA study by face-to-face interviewing stakeholders. Getting stakeholders to participate in the research is the main thing. S-LCA requires people’s opinions about social impacts of product/sector. Providing opinion about this issue seems to be sensitive to the stakeholders. In contacting the stakeholders for data collection, trust is another issue. For future work, it is suggested that researchers should contact stakeholders through people they trust. These may include local agricultural promotion officers, village heads, and representatives from government or non-government organizations that they are familiar with. These people should have no conflicts and bias against the stakeholders. The purposes of the research should be explained well to the stakeholders before asking them to participate in the project. Simplicity is the key issue for questionnaire development. Based on the researchers’ experience in conducting interviews with different stakeholders, they are more comfortable with simple

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questions with yes/no answers. To capture more detailed information, the questionnaire should be designed to be as simple as possible. In most cases, stakeholders prefer being interviewed in their own language. The researchers may hire locals or people who speak local dialects to help with the interviewing. Well-designed interview guidelines should be given to all the interviewers. Interpretation of social indicators for different people can have significant impact on the overall results. From the researchers’ experience, stakeholders were often confused with access to material and immaterial resources, free of discrimination, delocalization and migration, public commitments to sustainability issues, fair competition and promoting social responsibility issues. It is suggested that all the interviewers should make clear understanding about the definition of each subcategory before conducting the interviews. The stakeholders would request explanations about the meaning of each subcategory in order to give their opinions. 4.1.3 Data quality Integrity issue of the data collected is found in this study. The information about some sensitive social issues for the workers was collected through the sugar factory participating in the project. This is because most sugarcane producers are contracted with the sugar factory. Some questions may be sensitive to the sugarcane farmers such as questions related to health and safety issues, wages paid to laborers and discrimination issues. There is power relation between the sugar factory and farmers as also mentioned in Lehtonen (2011). Collecting information about those sensitive social issues of sugarcane farmers by the staff of sugar factory (that they are contracted with) may yield biased opinions. To deal with this problem, site visits and direct interviews with sugarcane farmers were conducted by the researchers to validate the data. For future work, data should be collected from different sources to validate the data (triangulation technique) as suggested in Ramirez et al. (2014). This may include both primary and secondary data. 4.1.4 S-LCIA method and interpretation At present, there is no established S-LCIA method and interpretation approach to be used specifically for Thai sugar sector. However, this seems to be inherent in S-LCA. It would be

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the same issue when conducting S-LCA in other sectors. Though the social life cycle impact assessment is possible, the applicability of S-LCA to the Thai sugar sector is considered to be of a limited extent when considering impact assessment and interpretation phases. There are recent development of several S-LCIA methods as reviewed in Chhipi-Shrestha (2014) and Wang et al. (2016). Wang et al. (2016) pointed out that most of the developed S-LCIA methods use performance reference points method. The S-LCIA could be conducted following/adapting from the developed S-LCIA methods. The S-LCIA method used in this S-LCA study was the performance reference points method (more detail has been described in section 2.7). The main challenges found in conducting SLCIA for this study are related to the choices of social subcategories and indicators and interpretation approach. For the stakeholder group “workers”, there are a wide range of indicators available from the relevant international standards/guidelines such as UNEP/SETAC (2009), Sustainability Assessment of Food and Agriculture Systems (SAFA) (2013) and Bonsucro (2014). However, for other stakeholder groups, such as consumers, local community, society and value chain actors, there are less available sources for choices of social subcategories and indicators. The methodological sheets for subcategories in S-LCA (UNEP/SETAC, 2013) provide some useful sets of social subcategories and indicators for these stakeholder groups. However, many of them refer to the behavior/conduct of organizations, and are not always suitable to use to assess social impact at product level as also discussed in Sousa-Zomer and Cauchick Miguel (2015). Another issue identified in the S-LCIA for this study was the lack of established interpretation approach. This makes it difficult to obtain meaningful information. Therefore, in the future, development of specific S-LCIA method for the Thai sugar sector is needed. For instance, a set of useful social subcategories and indicators that is suitable to assess the social impacts of different stakeholders for different products in the sugar refinery complex such as sugar, bioelectricity, ethanol and bio-fertilizer should be developed. Additionally, to overcome the limitation of the current adopted S-LCIA method, weighting of different social subcategories should be applied. Moreover, a clear interpretation approach should also be developed. 5 Conclusions and recommendations

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Based on the results of this study, it is concluded that S-LCA is applicable for the Thai sugar industry sector because it could provide supporting information for social well-being development. Suggested social subcategories to investigate for the Thai sugar industry are fair wages, health and safety, discrimination, forced labor, local employment, delocalization and migration, contribution to economic development, water and land rights. Considering the extents of importance and negative social performances assessed, the main social subcategories that need urgent improvement are fair wages, health and safety, water and land rights, respectively. For example, the issue of wages lower than the minimum regulated wage should be addressed urgently. In addition, the problem of cane trash burning should be taken care of urgently as it could affect health and safety of both workers and locals. Moreover, the issue of supply and use of protective equipment for workers should also be dealt with to help improve the well-being of the workers. Challenges in conducting S-LCA for Thai sugar sector are diversity of scope of study and reference flow choices, difficulty in data collection and data quality, limited choices of social subcategories and indicators for some stakeholder groups to assess social impact at product level and lack of established interpretation approach. Suggested appropriate ways to address these challenges for conducting S-LCA at larger level scope have been provided as follows: In case of comparative S-LCA study, the reference flow should be selected to make indicator results comparable to competitive product. Regarding the system boundary, it is suggested that the S-LCA of Thai sugar industry should be conducted at provincial level scope. In addition, some stakeholder groups that have not yet been included in this study may be included in the future work (such as workers in sugar factory and representatives from sugar factory). Data should be collected carefully with respect to stakeholders’ privacy and should be collected in the way that would not induce biased opinions of stakeholders. Contacts with stakeholders may be made through people they trust. These may include local agricultural promotion officers, head of villagers, representatives from governmental or non-governmental organizations who have no conflicts and bias against stakeholders. In addition, definitions of social subcategories should be well explained to the stakeholders. Moreover,

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questionnaires/interviews should be designed to be as simple as possible and the triangulation technique used to validate the data. Regarding S-LCIA method and interpretation approach, development of specific S-LCIA method for Thai sugar sector is needed in the future. For example, a set of suitable social subcategories and indicators for all stakeholder groups, to assess social impacts at product level, for different products in sugar industry should be developed. In addition, weighting of different social subcategories should also be undertaken to give the meaningful results. Moreover, an interpretation approach for the developed S-LCIA method should also be provided. Furthermore, recommendations provided in the paper, though derived for the sugar industry, could be applied to other systems as well.

Acknowledgement The Thailand National Science and Technology Development Agency is gratefully acknowledged for research funding under the project “Research Network for LCA and Policy on Food, Fuel and Climate Change” (Grant no. P-12-01003). Warin Wonok is gratefully acknowledged for her assistance with interviewing. Life Cycle Strategies Company is gratefully acknowledged for use of Social Hot Spot Database in SimaPro. Anonymous reviewers are gratefully acknowledged for their comments to help improve the quality of the manuscript. References Aparcana, S., Salhofer, S., 2013. Application of a methodology for the social life cycle assessment of recycling systems in low income countries: three Peruvian case studies. The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment 18, 1116-1128. Benoit-Norris, C., Cavan, D.A., Norris, G., 2012. Identifying Social Impacts in Product Supply Chains: Overview and Application of the Social Hotspot Database Sustainability 4. Benoît Norris, C., 2014. Data for social LCA. The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment 19, 261-265. Bonsucro, 2014. Bonsucro Production Standard Version 4.01. Bonsucro, London, UK. Chang, Y.-J., Sproesser, G., Neugebauer, S., Wolf, K., Scheumann, R., Pittner, A., Rethmeier, M., Finkbeiner, M., 2015. Environmental and Social Life Cycle Assessment of Welding Technologies. Procedia CIRP 26, 293-298.

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