Towards a Framework for Sustainable Development Planning in the Indonesian Natural Rubber Industry Supply Network

Abstract

Supply networks for natural resources such as rubber present significant opportunities to deliver global sustainability goals by reducing environmental, social and economic impacts of industrial activities. This research is using the Indonesian natural rubber industry as a case study. Early discussions with stakeholders highlighted a need for decision support tools to facilitate sustainability-related trade-offs in industry-wide and firm-level planning processes. The example used in this paper relates to rubber plantation replanting programmes and a three-way trade-off between customers’ needs for a steady flow of rubber, an industry need to improve its environmental sustainability and rubber plantation owners’ needs to maintain their financial sustainability which, in turn, influences social sustainability. An initial framework for sustainable development planning based on the case study and literature is proposed, and its use in the design of a computational simulation experiment using hybrid simulation models to predict the sustainability impacts of alternative replanting scenarios is reported.