| Under the background of low-carbon economy development in the worldwide, and theimplementation of carbon labeling system, China is especially in the deep contradictorybetween the economic development and ecological fragile. Therefore, promoting theinnovation of low-carbon economy in the system and route innovation with Chinesecharacteristics, is a good wish of constructing "beautiful China", which is becoming theconnotation of the great rejuvenation, and a new beginning of "Chinese dream", the commonaction of the Chinese nation. Industrial enterprises as the major part of carbon emissions inChina, should become a chief force in the low-carbon economy development. So, in China,promoting low-carbon economy must rely on low-carbon manufacturing transformation ofindustrial enterprises. The food industry possessing the largest consumer groups around theworld, is the first pillar industry and basic livelihood industry in our country. Under thepressure of low-carbon manufacturing transition in the country and the requirements ofinternational carbon labeling in the future, how to boost the food industry sustainabledevelopment of economy, society, resources and environment in a higher level and broaderrange in China, has become one of the important standard to measure its modernization.Therefore, promoting the low-carbon manufacturing of China’s food enterprises in our country,will fully embody the scientific development, which reflects the social responsibility of theenterprise, also reflect a significant contribution of China as a responsible big country to theworld civilization and progress. And the in-depth research of low-carbon manufacturingtransformation process of food enterprises in China will enrich and explore the theory andpractice of sustainable food supply chain with Chinese characteristics, and eventually formthe successful experience for all industrial enterprises to follow, serve the governmentdecision in low-carbon economy. These above constitute the main purpose of this study.This study focused on the combination of theoretical and empirical level. At thetheoretical level, we took the theory of producer behavior, stakeholder theory, the plannedbehavior theory, food life cycle analysis theory and the multi-disciplinary method based oneconomics. At the empirical level, we united multiple samples from the typical region inChina, on the basis of summarizing the universal law of low-carbon transformation of China’sindustrial enterprises, to in-depth explore the transition path of food enterprises. This studyintroduced the advanced international principles of PAS2050to find the low-carbonmanufacturing transition path of food enterprises. The theoretical framework of main factorsaffecting low-carbon willingness and behavior of China’s food enterprises were verified inthis study, which to lay the foundation for food enterprises achieving low-carbonmanufacturing transition and to support the relative policy implications.The main conclusions of this paper are:(1) China’s food enterprises already have certainwillingness to carry out low-carbon manufacturing and have adopted some low-carbonmanufacturing behaviors. Environmental management practices of these food enterprises arestill prefer the end-of-pipe, to a certain extent affect their smooth transformation tolow-carbon manufacturing;(2) Low-carbon manufacturing of food enterprises should be coordinated with various interests of the main sakerholders including the government. Theearly promotion of low-carbon manufacturing of China’s food enterprises should more rely onthe government.(3) The main factors affecting between the willingness and behavior oflow-carbon manufacturing in the food enterprises are obviously different. This studyconfirmed that the business managers, firm size, energy consumption, technical capacity,market demand, ISO14000environmental management standards and governmentinvolvement were the main factors affecting low-carbon manufacturing willingness of foodenterprises. The main factors affecting food enterprises in low-carbon manufacturing behaviorwere energy consumption, technical capabilities, ISO14000environmental managementstandards and government involvement, that is, promoting low-carbon manufacturingbehavior of food enterprises should be based on government external promotion, and obeyedto environmental management standards to combine the energy consumption withtechnological innovation capability by these food enterprises;(4) Environmental managementstandard must be compatible to corporate low-carbon manufacturing behavior. Based on theISO14000system, industrial enterprises should be promoted the low-carbon manufacturingbehavior. This study confirmed that food enterprises take environmental managementmeasures with the combination of low-carbon manufacturing technology was step-by-stepprocess. Enterprises should be supervised to seriously implement the environmentalmanagement measures combined with low-carbon manufacturing behavior;(5) Low-carbonmanufacturing of food enterprises should be focused on the combination of energyconsumption and technological innovation. For China’s food enterprises, to achieve the initialstages of low-carbon manufacturing was the best combination of energy consumption andlow-carbon technology innovation, further improved energy efficiency, and graduallydeveloped into the production process of non-energy carbon emission reduction and the cleanenergy introduction, eventually achieved a low-carbon cycle.The main innovations of this paper are, firstly, we completely constructed the theoreticalframework of the low-carbon manufacturing transformation of China’s food enterprises, andby tracking a typical enterprise to verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the theoreticalframework; Secondly, we took the PAS2050to analyze the carbon emissions in themanufacturing process of food enterprises, and Initially improved the carbon footprintmeasurement based on existing theoretical work in the food production chain; Last but not theleast, in two provincial areas of China, we took a wide range of empirical research, in-depthanalyzed low-carbon manufacturing status of the food enterprises in the first time. Thescientific methods, the reliable results and the important meaning were provided a referencefor the the government decision-making in the long run.A research of the transformation of low-carbon manufacturing and the promotion ofcarbon labelling system in food enterprises is worthy of further exploring. The research ofChina’s food enterprises to achieve low-carbon manufacturing transformation in the futureshould be focused on: further using the combination methods of experimental economics andsystem dynamics to conduct a systematic study; Secondly, the future research should be basedon the full life cycle of food and commence in the integration of the food chain; Finally, weshould pay more attention to horizontal case analysis and dynamic tracking the multi-enterprises. Based on the purpose of providing carbon-labeled food and low-carbon, weshould dynamicly search the transformation path of low-carbon manufacturing of China’sfood industry in the practice and in all directions. |
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