Towards a Diagnostic Instrument to Identify Improvement Opportunities for Quality Controlled Logistics in Agrifood Supply Chain Networks

 Western-European consumers have become not only more demanding on product availability in retail outlets but also on other food attributes such as quality, integrity, and safety. When (re)designing food supply-chain networks, from a logistics point of view, one has to consider these demands next to traditional efficiency and responsiveness requirements. The concept ‘quality controlled logistics’ (QCL) hypothesizes that if product quality in each step of the supply chain can be predicted in advance, goods flows can be controlled in a pro-active manner and better chain designs can be established resulting in higher product availability, constant quality, and less product losses. The paper discusses opportunities of using real-time product quality information for improvement of the design and management of ‘AgriFood Supply Chain Networks’, and presents a preliminary diagnostic instrument for assessment of ‘critical quality’ and ‘logistics control’ points in the supply chain network. Results of a tomato-chain case illustrate the added value of the QCL concept for identifying improvement opportunities in the supply chain as to increase both product availability and quality. Future research aims for the further development of the diagnostic instrument and the quantification of costs and benefits of QCL scenarios

Exploring personal, business, and community barriers and opportunities for food entrepreneurs

2017 Summer.Includes bibliographical references.Specialty food businesses, characterized as local, craft or artisan, produce unique and highly differentiated food items often made in small quantities from high-quality ingredients. Nationally, the increasing market demand for specialty food is simultaneously spurring a growth in food entrepreneurship and food businesses that need access to licensed commercial space. Due to their unique values, a subset of food entrepreneurs may be considered 'social entrepreneurs' who use their business as a catalyst for social, cultural, or environmental change. This dissertation research model and hypotheses were developed as a triangulation of three innovative approaches to various fields of study influencing how the food sector is evolving to address emerging consumer and supply chain dynamics. These include; a) a new management behavioral concept, Perceived Business Effectiveness, b.) previous research on entrepreneur characteristics, and c.) potential experience and opportunities that may influence food entrepreneurs based on the Community Capital Framework. The primary objectives of this research are to determine the unique mission, values or community capital-based attributes of food entrepreneurs and to evaluate how this set of factors may affect a food entrepreneur's interest and key criteria when searching for commercial kitchen space. The primary methods included a national survey of food entrepreneurs (n=140) and a pilot program resulting in 4 case studies from Northern Colorado. Multidisciplinary empirical analysis was applied including gamma correlations to compare and contrast various factors and a 2-step probit regression analysis and the calculation of marginal effects from that model. Survey results found that food entrepreneurs in search of commercial kitchen space had dissatisfaction with finding appropriate space (p=0.04), availability of enough days/time to rent (p=0.00), location (p=0.07), availability of equipment (p=0.02), and parking (p=0.07). Results also found significant gamma correlations for questions related to food safety, social fairness, and resource mobilization indicators like sourcing locally and participating in the sharing economy. Further, respondents looking for commercial space were 9% more likely than those not looking for space to use a theoretical sharing economy technology to help them find and access commercial kitchen space. The three-month pilot program successfully placed four food entrepreneurs searching for production space in four different commercial kitchens in Northern Colorado. The kitchens included a school district, church, commissary kitchen, and functioning pizza parlor. A major contribution of this work is in the identification of key drivers for food entrepreneurs in the emerging access economy, suggesting that "access" to goods and services may becoming more desirable than "ownership" of them

Mathematical Methods and Operation Research in Logistics, Project Planning, and Scheduling

In the last decade, the Industrial Revolution 4.0 brought flexible supply chains and flexible design projects to the forefront. Nevertheless, the recent pandemic, the accompanying economic problems, and the resulting supply problems have further increased the role of logistics and supply chains. Therefore, planning and scheduling procedures that can respond flexibly to changed circumstances have become more valuable both in logistics and projects. There are already several competing criteria of project and logistic process planning and scheduling that need to be reconciled. At the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic has shown that even more emphasis needs to be placed on taking potential risks into account. Flexibility and resilience are emphasized in all decision-making processes, including the scheduling of logistic processes, activities, and projects

Tactical and operational planning of sustainable supply chains : a study in the frozen food industry

Nowadays, the management in the food sector is facing dynamics and complexity in supply chains more than ever. Managers need to figure out new sustainability issues in their company in order to gain a competitive advantage. Planning and design of a food supply chain are associated with an integrated and complicated decision-making process. To design and evaluate the performance of a food supply chain, different criteria and conflicting objectives must be integrated. Besides, the decisions need to be taken at different levels (strategic, tactical and operation) and stages (supplier, manufacturing, distribution, and transportation). Furthermore, the sector has been considered as the second biggest emitter of greenhouse gases after energy, and it requires cutting the emissions from its growth. Not to mention that food supply chains are heavily associated with social structures since many players and agents are involved in this system. However, there have been few attempts to optimize economic, environmental and social concerns simultaneously, especially in food supply chains. Incorporating sustainability dimensions into decision making and finding a trade-off between objectives are challenging. This is even more challenging when a supply chain deals with issues related to perishability and seasonality. Therefore, a decision support tool that can consider all these aspects is required. In this thesis, the aim is to propose a novel and more realistic approach to design sustainable supply chains. The primary objective of this thesis is to develop an integrated tactical-operational planning model for sustainable supply chains. First, we provide a supply chain model to support the tactical planning that integrates the three dimensions of sustainability: total cost, GHG emissions, and social responsibilities. Secondly, we extend our model in order to ensure a more realistic representation of the supply chain considered in this research by proposing a multi-objective optimization model. A solution methodology is developed to cope with multiple conflicting objectives in reasonable solution time. In addition, the operation of a supply chain network is simulated using a discrete-event simulation model to analyze the supply chain network configuration obtained from the tactical planning model. The tactical optimization model can get insights on the best network configuration which combined with the operational simulation model helps realize the practicability of a given configuration and sustainable strategy. Eventually, this study propose an integrated approach to validate the decisions made at the tactical planning level and ensure the feasibility of sustainability goals in both planning levels. This work gives researchers and practitioners insights on how to design/redesign a sustainable supply chain and evaluate supply chain performance in order to achieve sustainability goals

Effective use of product quality information in food supply chain logistics

Food supply chains have inherent characteristics, such as variability in product quality and quality decay, which put specific demands on logistics decision making. Furthermore, food supply chain organization and control has changed significantly in the past decades by factors such as scale intensification and globalization. In practice, these characteristics and developments frequently lead to supply chain problems, such as high levels of product waste, product quality problems, and high logistics costs. Recent technological developments have created the opportunity to gather, process, and communicate more information on the status of processes and products to support logistics decision making, providing business opportunities to realize performance improvements, and add extra value by differentiating products to specific market segments. This will, however, require the development of effective logistics management strategies that ensure the supply of products of appropriate quality in a cost-effective way to each stage of the supply chain. This thesis studies the use of product quality information in logistics decision making in food supply chains, captured in the following central research question: How can the effectiveness of logistics decision making in food supply chains be improved using advanced product quality information? This research question is investigated using four case studies: two in the context of the European Q-porkchains project (i.e. in pork supply chains), and two in the context of the European Veg-i-Trade project (i.e. in fruit- and vegetable supply chains). In these cases we investigated the impact of variability in product quality and quality decay on chain processes and studied if use of product quality information can improve logistics decision making regarding product sourcing and process design. In each case decision support models were developed – in close cooperation with industrial partners - to quantify the impact. Case study 1: Process design for advanced sorting of meat products The first case study, presented in chapter 2, considers the process design of a meat processing company that seeks to add value by sorting meat products for a specific product quality feature. The relation between product sorting, processing efficiency and process design is investigated using a discrete event simulation model. Results indicate that increasing sorting complexity by use of advanced product quality information results in a reduction of processing efficiency, whereas use of production buffers was found to mitigate negative effects of high sorting complexity. The simulation allows practitioners facing segmented customer demand to assess which scenario offers the best trade-off between benefits and drawbacks resulting from efforts to improve responsiveness and flexibility. Case study 2: Livestock sourcing decisions The second case study considers a meat processing company that faces quality feature variation in animals delivered to its slaughterhouses. To support sourcing decisions and ensure that the right product quality is received at its slaughterhouses two stochastic programming models are developed that exploit product quality data gathered during earlier deliveries. The presented implementations reveal that uncertainty in supplied product quality can be reduced using historical farmer delivery data, which improves processing performance. Case study 3: Product sourcing in international strawberry supply chains The third case study relates to an international strawberry distributor that faces frequent product quality problems and substantial product waste. Different sourcing strategies were tested using a combination of both a slow, but cheap transport mode (i.e. sea and truck), and a faster, but more expensive mode (i.e. plane). The performance of these sourcing strategies is examined using a discrete-continuous chain simulation that includes microbiological growth models to predict quality decay. Simulation results reveal that standard cost parameters (that do not take quality decay into account) result in substantial product waste, but if cost for expected shelf-life losses are included in the order policies the effectiveness of product sourcing for the considered supply chain is improved. Case study 4: Use of form postponement for food waste reduction The fourth case study concerns an international lettuce supply chain that struggles with effective product sourcing. Form postponement (FP) is a supply chain strategy which delays processing steps until a demand is realized. This allows a reduction of the total inventory in the supply chain. We studied supply chain scenarios that differ in where and when in the supply chain whole crop lettuce is converted into processed lettuce products. A discrete-continuous chain simulation model revealed that application of FP reduced both product waste and age and improves point-of-sale product quality. Integrated findings The findings of this thesis demonstrate that decision makers can improve logistics decisions and reduce food waste by using product quality information and predicting changes in product quality. The developed quantitative decision support models provided essential insights into trade-offs resulting from information-based supply chain performance improvement strategies. The presented case studies demonstrate that supply chain flexibility and responsiveness is required to reduce the impact of product variability and product quality decay. Increasing responsiveness and flexibility typically comes at the expense of other performance dimensions. This research demonstrates the potential of use of product quality information in food supply chain logistics, which may contribute to the effectiveness of food supply chains by improving consumer satisfaction, reducing overall costs, and reducing food waste.</p