Key Challenges to Sustainable Humanitarian Supply Chains: Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic

COVID-19 has had a major impact on health, economic, social, and industrial activities. It has disrupted supply chain management and affected the movement of essential supplies to a large extent. This study aims to identify and evaluate the challenges hampering sustainable humanitarian supply chain management (SHSCM). Twenty critical challenges to SHSCM are identified using a comprehensive literature review, and three strategies were developed. The challenges and strategies were verified using expert input. The challenges were evaluated using the neutrosophic analytic hierarchical process (AHP) method. The neutrosophic TODIM (an acronym in Portuguese for interactive multicriteria decision making) method was then used to select the best strategy. The findings reveal that facility location problems, short lead times for emergency supplies, spread of rumors, rapid emergence of new clusters, and doubt concerning the available remedy are five critical challenges in SHSCM during COVID-19. Public–private partnerships are identified as the best strategy in SHSCM. Finally, this paper discusses the implications to sustainable development goals in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era.</jats:p

Locating a bioenergy facility using a hybrid optimization method

In this paper, the optimum location of a bioenergy generation facility for district energy applications is sought. A bioenergy facility usually belongs to a wider system, therefore a holistic approach is adopted to define the location that optimizes the system-wide operational and investment costs. A hybrid optimization method is employed to overcome the limitations posed by the complexity of the optimization problem. The efficiency of the hybrid method is compared to a stochastic (genetic algorithms) and an exact optimization method (Sequential Quadratic Programming). The results confirm that the hybrid optimization method proposed is the most efficient for the specific problem. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

A Facility Location-Allocation Model for Determining Number of Depot to Distribute Material in the Rattan Furniture Industry by Considering Dynamic Demand

This paper is a study of a facility location-allocation problem in the rattan furniture industry. There are six production centers (PCs) of rattan furniture in Surakarta and its surroundings. However, their export sales are decline due to some possible problems in raw rattan distribution network from the sources centers (SCs), e.g. Borneo and Celebes Island to production centers. In the previous research, the model was expanded to support local government decide to determine optimal number of depot by consider static demand. This policy is aimed to cut the distribution channel and reduce total supply chain costs. Due to changing of global market, the demand is fluctuate. The previous model cannot anticipate this situation; consequently the local government needs a facility location-allocation model by considering dynamic demand. The objective of this research is to develop a model for supporting the local government to decide optimal number of depot by considers dynamic demand. A mixed integer non-linear programming (MINLP) was proposed to minimize total supply chain costs. The proposed model assumed that the demand for multiple products is known in advance. The potential raw rattan depot and source locations as well as their maximum capacities are also known. Finally, the proposed model can be used as instrument decision making to determine facility location-allocation. Keywords: dynamic demand, a facility location-allocation model, rattan industry competitiveness, total supply chain costs

The economic and environmental performance of distribution networks: A case study from the petrochemical industry

Designing a company's distribution network is a challenging task that requires the consideration of different aspects. In this respect, especially trade-offs between, for example, operational costs and customer service are the focus of the companies' attention. However, growing concerns of governments and customers about environmental protection have raised awareness towards the environmental impact of operations. Activities associated with the distribution of products, i.e. transportation and warehousing, are not yet subject to strict environmental regulations, but this situation is expected to change soon. Companies must, therefore, start to concentrate not only on economic but also on environmental aspects in the design of their supply chain. Based on a case study from the petrochemical industry, this paper presents a way to combine both, economic as well as environmental criteria, when evaluating (strategic) distribution network design decisions. The results show a trade-off between total (distribution) costs and transport carbon emissions. (author's abstract

Modelling Fresh Strawberry Supply "From-Farm-to-Fork" as a Complex Adaptive Network

 The purpose of this study is to model and thereby enable simulation of the complete business entity of fresh food supply. A case narrative of fresh strawberry supply provides basis for this modelling. Lamming et al. (2000) point to the importance of discerning industry-specific product features (or particularities) regarding managing supply networks when discussing elements in "an initial classification of a supply network" while Fisher (1997) and Christopher et al. (2006, 2009) point to the lack of adopting SCM models to variations in products and market types as an important source of SCM failure. In this study we have chosen to move along a research path towards developing an adapted approach to model end-to-end fresh food supply influenced by a combination of SCM, system dynamics and complex adaptive network thinking...

Organizational Water Footprint to Support Decision Making: a Case Study for a German Technological Solutions Provider for the Plumbing Industry

With water scarcity representing an increasing threat to humans, the environment and the economy, companies are interested in exploring how their operations and supply chains affect water resources globally. To allow for systematically compiling the water footprint at the company level, the organizational water footprint method based on ISO 14046 and ISO/TS 14072 was developed. This paper presents the first complete organizational water scarcity footprint case study carried out for Neoperl GmbH, a German company that offers innovative solutions regarding drinking water for the plumbing industry. The cradle-to-gate assessment for one year includes, besides facility-based production activities, purchased materials, electricity and fuels, and supporting activities, such as company vehicles and infrastructure. Neoperl’s total freshwater consumption amounts to approximately 110,000 m3, 96% thereof being attributable to the supply chain, with freshwater consumption through purchased metals playing the predominant role. Metals (mainly stainless steel and brass) are major hotspots, also when considering the water scarcity-related local impacts resulting from freshwater consumption, which mainly affect China and Chile. These results can be used to improve the company’s supply chain water use in cooperation with internal and external stakeholders by means of, e.g., sustainable purchase strategies or eco-design options to substitute water intensive materials.BMBF, 02WGR1429, GROW - Verbundprojekt WELLE: Wasserfußabdruck für Unternehmen - Lokale Maßnahmen in Globalen WertschöpfungskettenDFG, 414044773, Open Access Publizieren 2019 - 2020 / Technische Universität Berli

Optimization of the long-term planning of supply chains with decaying performance

This master's thesis addresses the optimization of supply and distribution chains considering the effect that equipment aging may cause over the performance of facilities involved in the process. The decaying performance of the facilities is modeled as an exponential equation and can be either physical or economic, thus giving rise to a novel mixed integer non-linear programming (MINLP) formulation. The optimization model has been developed based on a typical chemical supply chain. Thus, the best long-term investment plan has to be determined given production nodes, their production capacity and expected evolution; aggregated consumption nodes (urban or industrial districts) and their lumped demand (and expected evolution); actual and potential distribution nodes; distances between the nodes of the network; and a time horizon. The model includes the balances in each node, a general decaying performance function, and a cost function, as well as constraints to be satisfied. Hence, the investment plan (decision variables) consists not only on the start-up and shutdown of alternative distribution facilities, but also on the sizing of the lines satisfying the flows. The model has been implemented using GAMS optimization software. Results considering a variety of scenarios have been discussed. In addition, different approaches to the starting point for the model have been compared, showing the importance of initializing the optimization algorithm. The capabilities of the proposed approach have been tested through its application to two case studies: a natural gas network with physical decaying performance and an electricity distribution network with economic decaying performance. Each case study is solved with a different procedure to obtain results. Results demonstrate that overlooking the effect of equipment aging can lead to infeasible (for physical decaying performance) or unrealistic (for economic decaying performance) solutions in practice and show how the proposed model allows overcoming such limitations thus becoming a practical tool to support the decision-making process in the distribution secto

Designing the Last Mile of the Supply Chain in Africa: Firm Expansion and Managerial Inferences from a Grocer Model of Location Decisions

The recent interest in the expansion of retail food chains and the perceived problems resulting from competition between these new, sophisticated supply chains and the most basic of food distribution networks in emerging economies have been greatly debated in the literature. This paper is a seminal approach to examining South-South food firm (grocer) foreign direct investment by incorporating data on the informal market into a facility location decision model. There are unique environmental complexities that developing/transitioning economies present. The unique finding of this model is that informal employment patterns, in both Agricultural and non-Agricultural sectors, influence the firm’s location. Given the absence of data, South-South foreign direct investment managers perceive avid market transactions as indicators of demand and potential supply availability in formal and informal sectors. For example, Pick n’ Pay’s CEO stated recently that their growth in the Southern Africa supermarket business is a direct result of the informal market converting to the formal market.Supply Chain, Africa, Informal Markets, Facility Location Model, Demand and Price Analysis, Marketing, Q10,