Corporate Social Responsibility in PepsiCo - Case Study Example

The paper “Corporate Social Responsibility in PepsiCo" is a  spectacular example of a case study on business. PepsiCo’s press release (Sept 19, 2011) addressed PepsiCo’s effort with China’s Ministry of Agriculture to promote and develop sustainable farming in China’s countryside. The report highlighted how the company viewed corporate social responsibility and how it is going to serve the public at large and emerge as a socially responsible company. Until recent years, business functions were viewed as confined to the narrow aspects of profit maximization and corporate success. But, in very recent years, ethics, social responsibility, morality, and community well-being have got significant attention in business literature as well as corporate landscape.

Why has PepsiCo to work with China’s ministry in developing agricultural farms? It is simply to meet customers’ changing needs and wants. Consumers are now more aware as well as concerned about the surroundings they are living in. they not only demand superior quality goods or services but also to keep their nature sustainable. No business can survive long unless it is ethically good and socially responsible. When it comes to the case of PepsiCo, it is planning to build sustainable agricultural farms in China’s countryside so that they can promote irrigation, fertilizing and effective crop-management techniques. The company proposes to gain from agricultural and green-products from the farms. It is driven by a tailored approach to investment that can achieve both commercials as well as social objectives. China’s air is too polluted to breathe and therefore the agricultural program taken by PepsiCo will be viewed as an extremely significant step in the way a business approached corporate social responsibility.

Bateman and Snell (2003, p. 147) viewed that corporate social responsibility is the obligation of a business towards the society in order to maximize positive effects and minimize negative effects that a business may face from society. Economically, a business is responsible to produce goods or services, market them and earn profits out of it. But, socially, the business should look at the social well-being of the people that it is working with and ensures promoting social wellness. From being a polluter, the businesses have turned to be protectors of the environment. Rather than becoming un-fair traders, large numbers of businesses are tempted to be concerned about fair trade.      

Corporate is required to foresee what people view right and wrong. Apart from the designing, developing, manufacturing and marketing products or services, the managers and corporate leaders are required to analyze what are rights and what are wrongs from the customers’ point of view (Gomez, Mejia and Balkin, 2002, p. 56). Consumers are the people who decide are rights and what are wrong in relation to ethics and social responsibility. Products and services may be fully thrown out of the market if consumers perceive them to be unethical, or as not meeting social responsibility. PepsiCo’s efforts to develop sustainable agricultural farms in China is, therefore, a strategic step to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage because Corporate Social Responsibility is more than the business function and an essentially important technique that can help a business stay long in the market as well.