Can innovation be institutionally-driven?- The case of institutional entrepreneurs in the restructuration of the mauritian vegetable supply chain
Résumé
The reform of the sugar protocol between the European Union (EU) and the African Caribbean and
Pacific (ACP) countries affected the Mauritian agricultural sector tremendously: it spelt a decrease of 36 per cent
in the price of sugar for producers. In reaction, the Mauritian sugar industry has undertaken a massive
diversification within sugar: production of other sugar cane products and by-products, as well as diversification in
vegetable production at an industrial level. The entry of large sugar cane producers from the corporate sector on
the vegetable market has had a number of repercussions on the vegetable supply chain, one of which being the
emergence of institutional entrepreneurs. A qualitative study of the vegetable supply chain was conducted among
the different actors concerned. It revealed the following findings: new entrants in the vegetable supply chain have
caused an institutional change. Institutional entrepreneurs have emerged and in turn established new institutional
rules and standards of practice that have changed the institutional structure of the vegetable supply chain. This
paper identifies at a first stage, two main factors favouring the emergence of institutional entrepreneurs in an
organisational field. Firstly, a moderate degree of institutionalisation provides the adequate environment for
actors to deliberately initiate changes through entrepreneurial processes. Secondly the multiplicity of institutional
referents across organisational fields, in this case, the sugar cane and the fresh vegetable supply chains,
provides the right environment for creative entrepreneurial action. At a second stage, this paper identifies the
innovative managerial and marketing practices brought about in vegetable production and distribution by the
institutional entrepreneurs, and the impact of these new practices on incumbent actors. This study uses a
sociological neoinstitutional perspective and provides empirical evidence of the factors affecting actors’ agency
and more specifically the conditions in an organisational field that favour strategic behaviour among actors. This
research also helps to shed some light on how changes in the institutional structure of a field can drive the
innovation process. This paper can help in further research on innovation and institutional entrepreneurship.
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