Eco-innovation in Agribusiness: systematic review of literature

Abstract

The global socio-ecological crises faced by contemporary society require the development of environmental innovations based on sustainability, denominated in this study, as eco-innovations. In the agricultural / agribusiness context, this need becomes even more evident, given its direct relationship between agro ecosystemic impacts and market mechanisms. In view of this situation, the research carried out had the objective of analyzing the different approaches of eco-innovation in the agricultural / agribusiness context, existing in the literature. For this, a systematic review of the literature was made from high impact scientific papers published in the Scopus and Web of Science databases. The results obtained demonstrated a temporal evolution of the publications, predominantly in the last three years, associated to a conceptual evolution of the phenomenon studied. The eco-innovation approaches were divided into four groups: eco-innovation in products and processes; diffusion of eco-innovation; life cycle assessment, and; eco-innovation systems. Thus, scientific efforts are synthesized in favor of the understanding and feasibility of this phenomenon and its different interfaces. As tendencies and challenges for the eco-innovation in the analyzed context, the multidisciplinarity of this theme is mainly, which makes it difficult to establish strategies for its development. However, it presents a set of potentialities that involve environmental innovation in agribusiness, presenting possible guidelines for the sustainable development of agricultural activities.