Designing a Sustainable Innovation Model for Small and Medium Businesses in the Food Industry

The growing need of the society for food, the reduction of food resources and nutritional imbalance, the environmental damage in the food industry, the water shortage crisis and the changing climate, the urgent need to address the major environmental consequences and move towards sustainable development in this sector is essential. The main purpose of this research is to design a model of sustainable innovation for small and medium businesses in the food industry. In this research, by comprehensive review of research literature and interviews with experts and managers in the field of food industry and using thematic analysis method, important factors and variables in sustainability innovation in small and medium businesses were identified and extracted.Then, interpretive structural modeling was used to determine the priorities and relationships between the factors. Finally, the analytic network process was used to determine the weight of each factor. The results indicate that government policy, green social pressure and green culture of society are the most important factors in the formation of sustainable innovation. And government should focus on green strategies formulatin, organizational capabilities reinforcement and acquisition of economic competencies between firms.