Compras organizacionais sustentáveis: um estudo no setor da construção civil em Juiz de Fora (MG)

Abstract

The United Nations Organization aims to collaborate with the practice of sustainable development for the whole society through its program called the 2030 Agenda. The program is composed of 17 Sustainable Development Goals, among which contemplate SDG 12, which aims to ensure responsible production and consumption patterns, being this what served the main interest of this study. Among the different social actors that can collaborate with the 2030 Agenda, the organizations are pointed out, highlighting the importance of analyzing their sustainable consumption through their organizational buying process. Taking into account the environmental impacts that the civil construction sector generates in its activities, this study aims to understand the organizational buying process of companies in the civil construction sector in Juiz de Fora/MG, regarding the adoption of practices that aim at sustainable development. For this, a qualitative study was made, with semi-structured interviews with a panel of experts, represented in the study by managers of companies in the civil construction sector in the city of Juiz de Fora (MG). Interviews with 11 experts were done, which enabled the data generation. The data analytics occurred using the content analysis technique, proposed by Bardin (2011). As a result, based on the perception of the interviewees, practices which appear to be consistent with some actions of the sustainable purchase were identified, even if not uniform and sometimes isolated. In that regard, the surveyed organizations, contribute to sustainable development, even if in a partial way, but with improvement intentions. It was possible to observe that some motivations related to the adoption of these sustainable practices can be related to the organizational culture of organizations which, explicitly or implicitly, addresses the issue of socioenvironmental responsibility, and to the fact that they consider responsibility as a means to achieve a competitive advantage. Beyond that, it was found that organizational buying process decisions for these interviewees are mainly based on three aspects of management: cost, quality, and deadline. Ultimately, some sustainable procurement characteristics pointed out by the interviewees as a part of their work routine are the option to work with local suppliers; analyze the origin of the material; whenever possible, reuse materials, and avoid waste.