This project aims at analyzing the technical feasibility and socio-economic impacts of the implementation of the extended enterprise concept (network of enterprises) in the food industry in Latin America. At the same time the project promotes the technology transfer from Europe to Latin America, and the incorporation of varied research skills, focusing on tools, methodologies, standards and training. The proposal contributes to the development of the global information society with particular focus on its contribution to the sustainable improvement of the agricultural and agro-industrial production. Today the Latin American economy offers a challenging and fluctuating market. Global economic associations such as the MERCOSUL / MERCOSUR are expected to have major impacts in the region. The local food processing industry primarily involves small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) that tend to function independently on a weak capital base. To these SMEs it is becoming clear that the real competitive advantage can only be achieved and sustained through the creation of relationships and strong information links among the enterprises involved in the various steps of the value chain. In our view the creation of an extended enterprise is inevitable in order to efficiently utilize all of the relevant human, organizational, and business resources and to facilitate the necessary interdependencies between the suppliers (farmers), manufacturers, distributors, sellers and ultimately customers. In the Extended Enterprise model core product functionalities are provided separately by individual enterprises who come together to provide a customer defined product or service. For instance, in the production of canned tomato paste, the enterprises which might work together to constitute an extended enterprise include wholesalers and retailers, can producers and their supply chain, food processors and packers, farmers and fruit growers, transportation and delivery enterprises. That is the realization of the agribusiness concept (J.H. Davies) defined as the set of all operations involved in the processing and distribution of the agropecuary products. Emerging Information Technology capabilities such as EDI-Electronic Data Interchange, STEP-Standard for Technical data Exchange on Products, etc., support the emergence of the extended enterprise. Inter-enterprise and intra-enterprise networking across the value chain can be supported by today's advances in computing and telecommunication technologies and their emerging integration into the Information Superhighway. Due to the complexity of the addressed problem, in our opinion, the design and development of an Extended Enterprise concept in food industry should be addressed through a two-phase approach. In the first phase, covered in this proposal, the consortium intends to study and analyze food value added chains in Latin America and carry out a feasibility study on the potential for an Extended Enterprise approach. The consortium is planning to address the second phase of the project, namely the possible implementation of a pilot Extended Enterprise involving the various actors in the chain, viz. farmers, processors, distributors, etc., as a follow up project to SCM+. Clearly, the results of the feasibility study stage are absolutely necessary input to a possible second phase and indeed follow on project. The project involves several diverse application domains - tomatoes, olive, coffee, milk, etc. - within the food industry, including SMEs involved as associated partners in the project. As a first step, this study concentrates on the strong existing links between the producers (farmers) and the food processing enterprises in Latin America. The project will study the current situation and analyze the requirements set by the technological, organizational, social, business process reengineering (BPR), etc. aspects of this industry and the need to be considered in applying the supply chain management and Extended Enterprise approach. This stage will be followed by the evaluation of the impacts and benefits that are likely to result for the SMEs in food production through the creation of an integrated network and associated information network within the supply chain. In parallel to the problem analysis and the study and design of an extended enterprise for this industry, efforts will be spent on the evaluation of other complementary functionalities that can be supported by an information network, such as on the effect of the management of seed distribution, crop disease control management, and multi-media based training on agricultural techniques and advanced technologies. This project produces a comprehensive report analyzing all technological and socio-economic requirements and expected consequences for/of the implantation of an extended enterprise concept in various food processing subsectors. This report will be an important contribution to the definition of development strategies in this area. A possible follow on project could focus on the implementation of a pilot case based on the most promising of the analyzed cases. The results of this project will be disseminated in international workshops/conferences and journals. Complementarily training activities, both through in site seminars and people exchange, will be performed.

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