Paper short abstract:

Suppliers in the global South are increasingly involved in multichain networks across North- and South-South value chains. This paper asks whether and to what extent multichain strategies affect suppliers’ economic upgrading? We explore this through the case of Kenya’s horticulture suppliers.

Paper long abstract:

An extensive body of research has examined the prospects for suppliers in the global South to upgrade within global value chains (GVCs) controlled by lead firms from, and oriented towards end-markets in the global North. However, the recent expansion of South-South trade has altered the geography of GVCs. Whilst studies highlight key differences between North-South value chains (NVCs) and South-South value chains (SVCs), less is known about the multichain strategies that suppliers employ as they simultaneously participate in NVCs and SVCs, and how these affect their prospects for economic upgrading. In this article we draw on the case of Kenyan horticultural first-tier suppliers to explore the implications that multichain strategies have for suppliers’ economic upgrading in terms of product quality, product diversification, and product sophistication. Using transaction-level customs data for the 2006-2018 period, we find that suppliers adopting multichain strategies experienced significantly more economic upgrading than suppliers operating only in NVCs or SVCs. However, there appear to be limits to the benefits of economic upgrading, depending on the type of multichain strategy employed. Our results are robust to the use of multilevel linear regressions (MLRs), propensity score matching (PSM), and system-GMM. The article highlights a critical need for GVC research to account for the multichain strategies of suppliers who increasingly serve multiple and overlapping value chains, and their implications for economic upgrading.