Lean agriculture: identifying key components across diverse industries

Abstract

The lean philosophy has long since moved from manufacturing plants to other operations such as insurance and healthcare. The agriculture industry is no different in terms of production processes, facilities, people, and challenges. However, agriculture provides a different set of challenges due to seasonal variability, bulk production, processing and problems in handling and storage. An opportunity exists to introduce the Lean concepts in more depth in agriculture given the magnitude of waste and losses in this industry. Therefore, the aim of this study is to conduct a rapid literature review in order to retrieve available research on Lean implementation in the agriculture industry to direct future research. The study identified one hundred and two studies highlighting the different applications of Lean-Agri. Given the increase in publication over the years, it is evident that research into Lean-Agri is increasing but more research is needed to further highlight its value and its range of applications.