Digitalization in food supply chains: A bibliometric review and key-route main path analysis

Technological advances such as blockchain, artificial intelligence, big data, social media, and geographic information systems represent a building block of the digital transformation that supports the resilience of the food supply chain (FSC) and increases its efficiency. This paper reviews the literature surrounding digitalization in FSCs. A bibliometric and key-route main path analysis was carried out to objectively and analytically uncover the knowledge development in digitalization within the context of sustainable FSCs. The research began with the selection of 2140 articles published over nearly five decades. Then, the articles were examined according to several bibliometric metrics such as year of publication, countries, institutions, sources, authors, and keywords frequency. A keyword co-occurrence network was generated to cluster the relevant literature. Findings of the review and bibliometric analysis indicate that research at the intersection of technology and the FSC has gained substantial interest from scholars. On the basis of keyword co-occurrence network, the literature is focused on the role of information communication technology for agriculture and food security, food waste and circular economy, and the merge of the Internet of Things and blockchain in the FSC. The analysis of the key-route main path uncovers three critical periods marking the development of technology-enabled FSCs. The study offers scholars a better understanding of digitalization within the agri-food industry and the current knowledge gaps for future research. Practitioners may find the review useful to remain ahead of the latest discussions of technologyenabled FSCs. To the authors’ best knowledge, the current study is one of the few endeavors to explore technology-enabled FSCs using a comprehensive sample of journal articles published during the past five decades

Trends and topics in IJPR from 1961 to 2017:a statistical history

This paper studies the history of the International Journal of Production Research (IJPR) by analysing the topics that have received the most attention in each of the journal’s publication years. Text mining exposed for scrutiny the most frequently mentioned and cited terms contained in the titles, abstracts and keywords of IJPR papers. Analyses suggest that the triad of scheduling/optimisation/simulation and supply-chain-related topics have been IJPR’s mainstays, but valuable opportunities remain for relevant topics that have not yet been concurrently and frequently studied. Results also show that terms related to sustainability and risk management topics have gained recent relevance. In addition, IJPR appears to complement its modelling technique focus with empirical methodological approaches to provide a well-balanced perspective, since the ‘case study’ term is common. Finally, a linear relationship is found between the number of papers that have covered certain topics and the number of citations those topics have received, highlighting which topics had fewer or more citations than expected, given the number of papers that covered those topics. IJPR stands as one of the most prestigious and established journals in its field and the results from this study indicate the evolving interests of the field for over half a century

Emerging research trends of total quality management in the COVID-19 pandemic: a dynamic evolution analysis

As the COVID-19 pandemic rages, the changing trends and emerging areas of total quality management (TQM) research before and after the COVID-19 pandemic are spotlighted, while the links between TQM and environmental social governance (ESG) are deeply discussed in this study. To explore the impact of the pandemic on TQM research, a comprehensive bibliometric analysis is conducted by collecting 1465 pre-pandemic and 76 post-pandemic publications from the WoS database. Further, the fundamental characteristics, conceptual structure and intellectual and social structure of TQM research are statistically analysed through bibliometric tools. Consequently, this article methodically sorts out the evolution, new research areas, primary sources, national collaboration networks and influential themes within an intricate and large TQM research system. The linkages between ESG and TQM are explored by focussing on some emerging topics after the outbreak such as sustainability and environmental management, which advances the innovative attempt towards the goal of cooperating sustainability. Finally, we offer some enlightening new perspectives on economic construction and social life during the pandemic to better cope with the negative effects of the pandemic

Artificial Intelligence as an Enabler of Quick and Effective Production Repurposing Manufactur-ing: An Exploratory Review and Future Research Propositions

The outbreak of Covid-19 created disruptions in manufacturing operations. One of the most serious negative impacts is the shortage of critical medical supplies. Manufacturing firms faced pressure from governments to use their manufacturing capacity to repurpose their production for meeting the critical demand for necessary products. For this purpose, recent advancements in technology and artificial intelligence (AI) could act as response solutions to conquer the threats linked with repurposing manufacturing (RM). The study’s purpose is to investigate the significance of AI in RM through a systematic literature review (SLR). This study gathered around 453 articles from the SCOPUS database in the selected research field. Structural Topic Modeling (STM) was utilized to generate emerging research themes from the selected documents on AI in RM. In addition, to study the research trends in the field of AI in RM, a bibliometric analysis was undertaken using the R-package. The findings of the study showed that there is a vast scope for research in this area as the yearly global production of articles in this field is limited. However, it is an evolving field and many research collaborations were identified. The study proposes a comprehensive research framework and propositions for future research development

Innovation, Internationalization and Entrepreneurship

Over the past years, businesses have had to tackle the issues caused by numerous forces from political, technological and societal environment. The changes in the global market and increasing uncertainty require us to focus on disruptive innovations and to investigate this phenomenon from different perspectives. The benefits of innovations are related to lower costs, improved efficiency, reduced risk, and better response to the customers’ needs due to new products, services or processes. On the other hand, new business models expose various risks, such as cyber risks, operational risks, regulatory risks, and others. Therefore, we believe that the entrepreneurial behavior and global mindset of decision-makers significantly contribute to the development of innovations, which benefit by closing the prevailing gap between developed and developing countries. Thus, this Special Issue contributes to closing the research gap in the literature by providing a platform for a scientific debate on innovation, internationalization and entrepreneurship, which would facilitate improving the resilience of businesses to future disruptions

Contextual impacts on industrial processes brought by the digital transformation of manufacturing: a systematic review

The digital transformation of manufacturing (a phenomenon also known as "Industry 4.0" or "Smart Manufacturing") is finding a growing interest both at practitioner and academic levels, but is still in its infancy and needs deeper investigation. Even though current and potential advantages of digital manufacturing are remarkable, in terms of improved efficiency, sustainability, customization, and flexibility, only a limited number of companies has already developed ad hoc strategies necessary to achieve a superior performance. Through a systematic review, this study aims at assessing the current state of the art of the academic literature regarding the paradigm shift occurring in the manufacturing settings, in order to provide definitions as well as point out recurring patterns and gaps to be addressed by future research. For the literature search, the most representative keywords, strict criteria, and classification schemes based on authoritative reference studies were used. The final sample of 156 primary publications was analyzed through a systematic coding process to identify theoretical and methodological approaches, together with other significant elements. This analysis allowed a mapping of the literature based on clusters of critical themes to synthesize the developments of different research streams and provide the most representative picture of its current state. Research areas, insights, and gaps resulting from this analysis contributed to create a schematic research agenda, which clearly indicates the space for future evolutions of the state of knowledge in this field

Can Industry 5.0 Technologies Overcome Supply Chain Disruptions? - A Perspective Study on Pandemics, War, and Climate Change Issues

Industry 5.0 (I5.0) is the next industrial revolution that will leverage human intervention in collaboration with intelligent, logical, and smart machines to attain even more user-preferred and resource-efficient manufacturing and supply chain solutions. The main aim of this article is to study I5.0 technologies in supply chains when these are affected by disruptive phenomena such as those created by wars, climate change or pandemics. A systematic literature review methodology was conducted to understand the present knowledge connected with this theme. This study summarises 194 research articles from the period 2009 to 2022 to understand the present knowledge connected with this theme. The research findings show a significant gap related to the adoption of I5.0 technologies to prevent or overcome supply chain disruptions. 194 articles, including journal and review articles, were identified in the literature. The study provides a novel and insightful concept related to I5.0 within the context of supply chain disruptions. The potential applications of I5.0 and Industry 4.0 are elaborately discussed in three areas, namely: (1) disruptions in supply chains due to pandemics; (2) disruptions in supply chains due to war; and (3) disruptions in supply chains due to climate change. Finally, this study highlights research implications and proposes future research avenues that will contribute to further exploring the adoption of I5.0 technologies to prevent, manage and overcome disruptions in supply chains