The Impact of Frugal Innovation on Social Sustainability and the Guiding Role of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the Digital Era

Introduction

The founding principle of frugal innovation is to reduce a product or service's complexity and cost (Tiwari and Herstatt 2013). Innovations are considered frugal if they concurrently satisfy the three following requirements: significant cost cut, focus on essential functions, and improved performance level (Weyrauch & Herstatt, 2016). The idea of sustainability, which emphasizes resource management that is affordable and appropriate and has a positive influence on the environment and society, is inextricably tied to frugal innovations for example, saving energy and limited material resources while fostering grassroots entrepreneurship shown in Figure 1. The notion that frugal innovation helps to aims and goals for sustainable development, such as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN, is consistent with this viewpoint. Even though, it is further argued that sustainable development does not necessarily result from frugal innovation (Leliveld and Knorringa; 2018). It is argued that frugal innovation has the potential to simultaneously advance the SDGs and worsen capitalism's exploitation and inequalities, especially in developing countries (Schwittay 2011; Dolan, 2012). Leliveld and Knorringa (p. 2, 2018) advocated: “many of the frugal innovations for really short-term solutions (like cheap batteries or solar cells produced in Asia and sold in rural Africa) may qualify as frugal innovation on some indicators – low cost, affordable, functional – and may help to address short-term issues, but it is an open question to what extent these also contribute to longer-term developmental solutions for poor communities.” Moreover, it is argued that while economical innovations may have a chance of being sustainable at the product level, a wider, more comprehensive perspective is required at the level of community stakeholders to reduce business risks and accomplish the wider societal impact of innovations (Hyvärinen et al. 2016). Dressler & Bucher (2018, p. 276) narrated as: “Achieving sustainability means rethinking economic growth completely. That is where the concept of frugal innovations comes to mind.”

Figure 1.

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Source:https://www.google.com/search?q=frugal+innovation+products&tbm=isch&bih=560&biw=1366&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiaxpOGvrr6AhWhgXMKHeg3DbMQrNwCKAB6BQgBEKYC#imgrc=rIbLHhiLR_E54M

Various studies from the perspective of the organization highlights the need for a deeper comprehension of how frugal innovation and social sustainability innovation are related (Simoes et al. 2018; Khan 2016). Moreover, the way that frugal innovations are developed, controlled, and reported on in various contexts, such as top-down versus bottom-up, may help reveal how internal accountability and management systems can be used to reap the benefits and social implications of such innovations. This chapter highlights the role of frugal innovation on social sustainability and the guiding role of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the digital era. This chapter aim is to draw linkages between the ideas of social sustainability and frugal innovation while having the impact of SDGs by examining the literature that has already been written in both domains. Moreover, this link will deepen our understanding of how frugal innovation contributes to the advancement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) shown in figure 2, particularly those related to social sustainability.

Figure 2.

Sustainable Development Goals

Source:https://www.google.com/search?q=sustainable+development&tbm=isch&bih=560&biw=1366&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiaxpOGvrr6AhWhgXMKHeg3DbMQrNwCKAB6BQgBEKQC#imgrc=ZUszBwpNscHswM