The Assurance of Food Safety in Supply Chains via Relational Networking : A Social Network Perspective

Purpose – Taking a social network perspective, this paper develops a framework for the assurance of food safety via relational networking. Design/methodology/approach – We consider both informal and formal relational networking, and explore a firm's learning orientation, risk aversion and consumer pressure as potential precursors to such relational networking. We further hypothesize relational networking to generate both industry and supply chain knowledge, which we suggest to be beneficial for contamination detection. The model is tested with survey data collected among food producing firms in India, the world's second-largest food producer. Findings – We find a positive influence of consumer pressure on both a firm's learning orientation and risk aversion, which in turn affect both informal and formal relational networking. Informal networking further generated industry knowledge and was beneficial for contamination detection. Formal relational networking influenced supply chain knowledge, which in turn enabled contamination detection. Originality/value – Recent food product related safety breaches, which have, in the worst case, led to fatalities, illustrate the importance of food safety in supply chains. This study represents the first systematic investigation of relational networking in the context of food safety from the perspective of social network theory