48 research outputs found
Blockchain Technology and the Circular Economy: A Systematic Literature Review
This paper aims to offer an overview of what the features are in the existing state of research in the field of blockchains in the circular economy. A total of 79 articles published up to 31 May 2022 have been extracted from Scopus and Web of Science. The research design has enabled us to identify what characterises the present state of research on the use of blockchains in the circular economy. It has also allowed us to obtain a new categorisation scheme of the research that has identified five themes and the contributions in each theme, and has allowed us to highlight several research gaps. The review findings indicate that the literature revolved around five research themes, namely, the relationship between blockchains and Industry 4.0, the potentials of blockchains for circular economy practices, the role of blockchains in energy management, the role of blockchains in waste management and the impact of blockchains on sustainability. This review suggests several opportunities for future research and provides some helpful implications for researchers and practitioners. To the authors’ best knowledge, this study represents one of the first attempts to investigate the interplay between blockchain technology and the circular economy
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
Exploring food supply chain trends in the COVID-19 era: A bibliometric review
Recently, the food supply chain (FSC) has been severely disrupted due to the COVID-19 pandemic, putting the vital flow of food products from farmers and producers to the ultimate consumers at risk. Furthermore, due to the pandemic, several food organizations have been prompted to rethink their strategies for the future. Although the literature on FSC research in the COVID-19 era is increasing, no attempt has been made to summarize this stream of research using bibliometric techniques. This paper fills this knowledge gap and looks at the current scholarly discourse around the FSC and COVID-19. Applying bibliometric techniques, 287 journal articles were extracted from Scopus and analyzed to determine the temporal evolution of FSC research, the most productive journals, researchers, countries, and the most relevant keywords and publications. To construct a keyword co-occurrence network and categorize the relevant literature, we used the computer program VOSviewer. The findings demonstrate the rapid expansion of FSC research during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the top authors, publications, and nations for scientific output were also determined. Keyword co-occurrence network and detailed qualitative analysis both illustrate that FSC research revolves around six main themes: the impact of COVID-19 on the FSC and agriculture, FSC resilience, food waste and insecurity, fisheries and aquaculture, blockchain technology, and governance and innovation. This study represents the first effort to map worldwide FSC research in the COVID-19 era and draw on a comprehensive collection of journal articles and bibliometric approaches. It offers academics, practitioners, and decision-makers a snapshot of the state of the art in the FSC field and points to where further research is needed
The role of blockchain technology in the transition toward the circular economy: Findings from a systematic literature review
The circular economy (CE) has emerged as a paradigm to protect the environment and the well-being of future generations. In parallel, Blockchain technology (BC) has emerged as a critical enabler for accelerating the transition toward a CE. In order to understand and summarize prior research on the role of BC in the CE, we conducted a systematic literature review (SLR) of 70 seminal articles published before July 2022. Six main themes emerged: a) CE approaches and practices, b) BC and the integration of the Internet of Things (IoT), c) sustainable supply chain management, d) BC and the CE in the COVID-19 era, e) sector-specific BC applications, and f) barriers to BC adoption in the CE. Furthermore, we develop a comprehensive framework that integrates stakeholders, strategies and practices, industrial sectors and a BC-enabled CE
Mapping the knowledge domain of green procurement: a review and bibliometric analysis.
The goal of green procurement, also called green purchasing, is to reduce waste and improve operational efficiencies to enhance sustainability. Although this practice has gained importance in recent years and garnered significant scholarly attention, there is a lack of bibliometric studies evaluating the green procurement field. To close this gap, we leverage bibliometrics to comprehensively summarize the literature and identify existing research hotspots and trends. Specifically, we employ bibliometric tools to analyze keywords, identify influential authors, universities, and research areas and reveal the most important publications in terms of citations. The analysis shows that sustainable development, sustainability, green supply chain management, and green public procurement are core topics related to green procurement. The co-citation analysis further reveals five important research clusters in the literature, namely green public procurement, green supply chain management, green supplier selection and evaluation of green performance, networked sustainable procurement, and green procurement in the construction sector. This study makes a contribution to the green procurement literature by summarizing this quickly growing field and providing timely guidance as to future research directions
Mapping the scholarly research on restaurants: a bibliometric analysis
Given the recent surge in restaurant research, there is a need for timely reviews employing quantitative methods to portray the intellectual structure of the field. This paper aims to address this gap by conducting a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of restaurant research on the Web of Science database. The research investigates the dynamic evolution of the restaurant literature during three critical stages between 1995 and 2021. Based on 1146 journal articles published by 1849 authors, the paper analyzes different bibliometric networks, including co-citation, keyword co-occurrence, and collaboration networks. The study additionally highlights the most influential scholars and publications in the restaurant field. Results indicate that restaurant research has grown exponentially over the last five years. Findings also show that consumer behavior, consumer satisfaction, consumer-brand relationships, corporate social responsibility, and green restaurants represent the contemporary hotspots in restaurant research. Finally, the study provides practical implications and some opportunities for future research
The landscape of public procurement research: a bibliometric analysis and topic modelling based on Scopus
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to investigate the structure and dynamics of academic articles relating to public procurement (PP) in the period 1984–2022 (up to May). The researchers also intend to analyse how this knowledge domain has grown since 1984.
Design/methodology/approach
A bibliometric analysis was carried out to examine the existing state of PP research. Based on 640 journal articles indexed in the Scopus database and written by 1,247 authors over nearly four decades, a bibliometric analysis was conducted to reveal the intellectual structure of academic works pertaining to PP.
Findings
Findings reveal that PP research from Scopus has significantly increased in the past decade. Major journals publishing PP research are International Journal of Procurement Management, Journal of Cleaner Production, Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management and Public Money and Management. Results also indicate that authors’ cooperation network is fragmented, showing limited collaboration among PP researchers. In addition, results suggest that the institutional collaboration network in PP research mirrors what is commonly referred to as the North–South divide, signifying insufficient research collaboration between developed and developing countries’ institutions. According to the co-occurrence keyword network and topic modelling, PP revolves around five main themes, including innovation, corruption, sustainable and green PP, PP contracts and small and medium enterprises. Based on these results, several directions for future research are suggested.
Social implications
This paper provides an increased understanding of the entire PP field and the potential research directions.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first-ever application of bibliometric techniques and topic modelling to examine the development of PP research since 1984 based on scholarly publications extracted from the Scopus database