The relationship between green supply chain management and performance: a meta-analysis of empirical evidences in Asian emerging economics

The purpose of this study is to understand the relationship between green supply chain management (GSCM) practices and firm performance in the manufacturing sector in Asian emerging economies (AEE) based on empirical evidence. Through a systematic literature review, we identified 50 articles that surveyed 11,127 manufacturing companies in the AEE and were published between 1996 and 2015. Subsequently, a conceptual framework was developed and analyzed through a meta-analysis of 130 effects from 25,680 effect sizes. The findings revealed that the GSCM practices lead to better performance in four aspects: economic, environmental, operational, and social performance. Moreover, the results indicate that industry type, firm size, ISO certification, and export orientation moderate several of the GSCM practice-performance relationships. Moreover, the findings of this research help managers and policy makers to have more confidence in the adoption of GSCM practices to improve firm performance. Such results also help researchers to better channel their efforts in studying the GSCM practices in Asian emerging economies. In addition, as meta-analysis has not been widely used in the supply chain management literature, our study is an important step in maturing the academic field by adopting this technique for confirming GSCM practice-performance relationships in the manufacturing sector of Asian emerging economies

The impact of knowledge competences on business performance: Moderation effect of 3D printing implementation

3D Printing allows companies to have full-control over production processes, resulting in overall business performance improvements. However, this relationship closely correlated with knowledge management competences (KMCs), which are associated with project complexity. This research explores a three-way moderation effect among 3D printing implementation, KMCs, project complexity, and business performance

Does the configuration of macro‐ and micro‐institutional environments affect the effectiveness of green supply chain integration?

Despite the importance of the general environment in affecting the effectiveness of green supply chain integration (GSCI), our understanding of the roles of different configurations of macro‐ and micro‐institutional environments remains limited. Based on institutional theory and resource mobilization theory, this study examined the moderating effects of the configurations of macro‐ and micro‐institutional environments on the GSCI performance link employing both a configuration and a contingency perspective. Our findings from a longitudinal survey of 206 Chinese manufacturing firms provide empirical evidence for the coexistence and nature of macro‐ and micro‐institutional environments and their moderating effect on the GSCI performance link. Specifically, the results revealed that Chinese manufacturers can be clustered into three groups with different macro‐ and micro‐institutional environments (i.e., cognizant, sensible, and conscious manufacturers). Furthermore, the configuration of macro‐ and micro‐institutional environments moderates the effect of green supplier integration on social performance, as well as the effects of green customer integration on financial, environmental, and social performance. This study contributes to both the GSCI literature and practices

Addressing modern slavery in supply chains:An awareness-motivation-capability perspective

PurposeThere is still significant variation in firms' efforts to address modern slavery issues in supply chains despite the importance of this grand challenge. This research adopts the awareness-motivation-capability (AMC) framework to investigate AMC-related factors that help to explain this variation.Design/methodology/approachThe authors hypothesize how AMC-related factors, including media coverage of modern slavery issues, slavery risks in supply chains and corporate sustainability performance, are related to firms' efforts to address modern slavery in supply chains. The proposed hypotheses are tested based on 201 UK firms' modern slavery statements and additional secondary data collected from Factiva, Factset Revere, The Global Slavery Index, Worldscope and Sustainalytics.FindingsConsistent with the AMC perspective, the test results show that firms put more effort into addressing supply chain modern slavery issues when there is greater media coverage of these issues, when firms source from countries with higher slavery risks, and when firms have better corporate sustainability performance. Additional analysis further suggests that firms' financial performance is not related to their efforts to address modern slavery issues.Originality/valueThis is the first study adopting the AMC framework to investigate firms' efforts to address modern slavery in supply chains. This investigation provides important implications for researchers studying firm behaviors related to modern slavery issues and for policymakers designing policies that enable firms to address these issues, in view of their awareness, motivation and capability

Thanks for the memories: exploring city tourism experiences via social media reviews

This study uses online reviews to explore memorable tourism experiences of tourists visiting different city attractions. Seeking to identify a collection of themes and concepts reflecting tourists' memorable experiences during their attraction visits, this study reveals the most shared tourism memories in cognitive-emotive-behavioral themes. By developing a matrix that categorizes tourist city attractions based on an ideographic approach, the study also argues that there are different types of tourist memorable experiences at different types of attractions (i.e., human-marker, nature-sight and human-sight tourist attractions). The findings extend previous understanding of the research in tourism experience and attractions by analyzing 156,986 TripAdvisor tourist reviews of the top ten most popular tourist attractions in London. This study also provides recommendations for destination management organizations and various city tourism stakeholders to plan, market and manage city tourism products and services

Drivers of green cooperation between Chinese manufacturers and their customers: an empirical analysis

Although green customer cooperation can help manufacturers increase their overall performance, it is difficult for manufactures to effectively achieve green customer cooperation. This paper discusses how manufacturers can achieve green customer cooperation through the theoretical lens of capability-based view. It suggests that internal green process innovation and learning from their customers can lead to green customer cooperation and such positive relationships are dependent upon senior management's calculative and affective commitment towards the customer firms. Using multi-respondent data collected from 217 Chinese manufacturing firms, the results show that both green process innovation and learning from customers drive green customer cooperation. However, affective commitment counter-intuitively diminishes the positive effect of learning from customers on green customer cooperation, while calculative commitment further strengthens this effect. This paper contributes to green supply chain management literature by conceptually explaining and empirically proving the effects of green process innovation and learning from customers on green customer cooperation and the moderating role of calculative and affective commitments. Based on the research findings, the paper gives practical suggestions to Chinese manufacturers and their customer firms regarding green cooperation and the dynamics of senior management's commitment towards the customer firms

Impacts of supply chain integration on product- and service-oriented mass customisation capability: the role of customer need

Purpose This study aimed to investigate how different supply chain integrations (SCIs) (i.e. information integration and organisational integration) would impact product- and service-oriented mass customisation capability (MCC) differently and the moderating role of characteristics of customer needs (i.e. customer need tacitness and diversity). Design/methodology/approach From the perspective of information processing theory (IPT), the authors tested the hypotheses using survey data from 277 Chinese manufacturers. Findings The findings indicate that both information and operational integration contribute to product- and service-oriented MCCs. Operational integration promotes product-oriented MCC more, whereas information integration has a greater impact on service-oriented MCC. In addition, customer need tacitness negatively moderates the impact of operational integration on both product- and service-oriented MCC. Customer need diversity negatively moderates only the impact of operational integration on service-oriented MCC. Practical implications Managers should focus on not only the position (internal or external) but also the function of SCI when making decisions towards enhancing MCC. Diverse abilities to integrate with different functions are associated with different MCCs. Originality/value This study distinguishes between product- and service-oriented MCCs and provides novel insights for understanding how to enhance MCC from a SCI perspective

Institutional distance and location choice: an experimental approach to the perception puzzle

In this research, we designed and implemented a unique vignette experiment to study the effect of managers’ perceptions of institutional distance on foreign location choice, as well as the moderating effect of managerial international experience and preferred entry mode on this relationship. We employ an experimental vignette methodology (EVM) approach applied in the context of Chinese managers to test the causal relationships depicted in our hypotheses. In this way, we measure the decision-makers' perceptions ex ante, i.e., in conjunction with and prior to a decision about a foreign location choice. Our findings show that managers’ ex-ante perceptions of institutional distance negatively affect decisions on foreign location choice. Also, we find that managerial international experience and preference for high commitment entry modes mitigate the negative effect of managers’ perceptions of institutional distance on foreign location choice. This research study adds to our understanding of the effect of managers’ perceptions of institutional distance and managerial contingencies on foreign location decisions. Further, it advances novel experimental design in international business research in general and on foreign location choice in particular

The role of Guanxi in green supply chain management in Asia's emerging economies: A conceptual framework

In recent decades, rapid industrial modernization and economic growth have brought substantial environmental problems such as air pollution, hazardous waste, and water pollution for the Asian Emerging Economies (AEE), in particular China, Taiwan, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and South Korea. These countries have started to adopt green supply chain management (GSCM) as a strategy to reduce the environmental impact. There are anecdotal evidences that the adoption of GSCM in this region is partly influenced by Guanxi – a cultural norm, which plays a significant role in relationship governance within supply chain activities among the AEE. Based on a systematic literature review, we develop a conceptual framework that characterizes the drivers and barriers for the adoption of GSCM practices, incorporating Guanxi as a moderator in the manufacturing sector of the AEE. The conceptual framework addresses the roles of two types of Guanxi in the adoption of GSCM: the relational Guanxi at individual level based on social exchange theory and the aggregated Guanxi at firm level derived from social capital theory. This recognition of Guanxi at two separate decision levels help companies better manage their relationships while they green their supply chains. Directions for future research and managerial implications are discussed accordingly

Green supply chain management in manufacturing sector in Asian emerging economies

This thesis was submitted for the award of Doctor of Philosophy and was awarded by Brunel University LondonIn recent decades, rapid industrial modernization and economic growth have resulted in substantial environmental problems such as air, waste and water pollution in Asian emerging economies (AEE). Green supply chain management (GSCM) has attracted increasing attention from scholars and practitioners as a strategy to reduce negative environmental impacts while achieving economic, operational, social and environmental benefits. As the results of empirical studies on the impact of GSCM practices on firm performance are not conclusive, there is a clear academic need for research to identify whether GSCM practices lead to desirable firm performance, and if so, what the subsequent outcomes are. Therefore, this study first aimed to identify the effect of the adoption of GSCM practices on firm performance. In doing so, a meta-analysis was conducted of 130 effects from 25,680 effect sizes from 50 empirical articles that surveyed 11,127 manufacturing companies. The meta-analysis results indicated that the adoption of GSCM practices led to better performance in four aspects: economic, environmental, operational, and social. Then, this study developed a conceptual framework based on a systematic literature review of 42 papers published between 2005 and 2016. In this framework, the author specifically examined the moderating effect of Guanxi on the relationships between drivers/barriers and the adoption of GSCM practices. In doing so, this study opens a new avenue of research by proposing the roles of Guanxi on the adoption of GSCM practices while accounting for various drivers and barriers. Academic knowledge regarding the adoption of GSCM practices is scarce. Some anecdotal evidence suggested that the adoption of GSCM in this region is partly influenced by Guanxi, a cultural norm which plays a significant role in relationship governance within supply chain activities in the AEE. However, studies on the effects of Guanxi in GSCM are in their infancy, and they simply note Guanxi's importance without detailing how it might influence, positively or otherwise, the adoption of GSCM practices. In addition, the initial academic evidence on supply chain barriers and stakeholders’ drivers inspired this study to take them into account regarding the antecedents for the adoption of GSCM practices within the scope of manufacturing supply chains in the AEE. By drawing on the stakeholder theory and social exchange theory, this study also aimed to investigate the effect of antecedents including stakeholders’ drivers and supply chain barriers on the adoption of GSCM practices as well as the moderating role of Guanxi on the given effects. For doing so, this study used data from 418 manufacturing companies from four major industrial parks in China. There are two reasons for conducting this survey in the manufacturing sector in China. Firstly, China is currently the world's largest and fastest-growing emerging economy and a global production base, exporting a wide variety of merchandise and accounting for 40% of the worldwide manufacturing outputs of different products. Secondly, environmental management has been observed to be a critical factor affecting the prosperity of Chinese manufacturing enterprises. SPSS 20.0 and AMOS 20.0 software were used to analyse the data by using two suitable and effective statistical techniques, namely, covariance-based structural equation modelling (CB-SEM) and hierarchical moderated regression. The findings showed that Guanxi is a significant moderator in reducing the negative impact of high perceived costs and complexity of regulations on the adoption of GSCM practices. Furthermore, the results also indicated that Guanxi reduces the positive relationship between suppliers’ advice and communities’ pressures on the adoption of GSCM practices. In addition, this study extended the body of knowledge on the adoption of green supply chain practices by manufacturing companies in the AEE through the lens of stakeholder theory and social exchange theory. This study contributes to current literature at different levels. First, the meta-analysis conducted in this study has important implications for the research community on sustainability and GSCM in emerging economies. The meta-analysis results indicate that GSCM practices led to better performance in four aspects: economic, environmental, operational, and social. Specifically, the GSCM practice–performance relationship was the strongest for economic performance, followed by operational and environmental performance. Second, in light of the rapidly increasing body of literature on adopting GSCM practices but the scarce literature on Guanxi, this study proposed and empirically tested the effects of Guanxi in enhancing positive drivers and reducing the negative effects of barriers to the adoption of GSCM practices. In this way, this study provided empirical evidence that building Guanxi is essential to ensuring better chances of implementing GSCM practices. In terms of further research, first, based on the meta-analysis conducted in this study, the limited empirical evidences on the relationship between GSCM and social performance indicated that more studies are needed in this domain. Second, given the complexity of this theoretical framework, this study only considered Guanxi as a dyadic between a focal company and its suppliers. Future studies may consider evaluating a focal firm’s comparative Guanxi by measuring the degree of centrality using its network position index. This concept is drawn from the social network theory in which the degree of centrality denotes the level of being at the core of a network by comparing the distance of the position of an individual’s linkage to others in the network at the firm level. Finally, given the similarities among emerging economies, further studies can apply these results in less-explored regions in the AEE such as Korea, Malaysia, and Thailand and emerging economies outside Asia, such as Brazil and Turkey