Green supply chain management – food for thought?

Abstract

This paper investigates the impact of green supply chain management (GSCM) practices on the performance of UK food retail small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). A quantitative approach using a nonprobability sampling of 84 participants was employed. Based on the literature review, five hypotheses were developed and tested using the partial least square-structural equation modelling (SEM-Smart PLS 2.03) approach. The reviewed literature revealed that key internal drivers (ID) and external pressures (EP) stimulate organizations to initiate GSCM Practices in UK food retail SMEs. Though empirical findings strongly supported the statement that ID influence GSCM practices but they did not show a significant relationship between EP and GSCM practices. Literature also suggests that practicing GSCM can help improve the efficiency, brand image (BI) and profitability, and thus improve the overall firm performance which is also empirically proved. This study helps enrich existing theories on SCM and organizational performance. As to practical impact, this study should facilitate SMEs in GSCM practices and thus help green the economy. While the findings of this study have limited generalizability as the data were collected from UK SMEs only and the sample size was comparatively small, this research establishes a foundation for further study in this domain.

Sustainable Supply Chain Management in the Automotive Industry: A Process-Oriented Review

“…Looking at the fourth column of Table A1, it can be realized that only six papers analyzed a particular industry within the frame of SSCM research. They include mineral [24], textile [25], biorefinery [26], oil and gas [27], food [28], and fashion [29]. This analysis discloses that despite the high number of literature review studies conducted in SSCM, no study can be found that solely focused on the automotive industry.…”

Inter-Organizational Supply Chain Interaction for Sustainability: A Systematic Literature Review

“…Several studies center the effect on performance. In addition to the articles focusing on social and environmental performance, the performance effects relate to the economic dimension, through improved quality [30], increased flexibility [30], profit [11,26,66], reduced costs [70], improved financial outcome [55,91], decreased risks [10], innovativeness [72], competitive advantages [63,73,92,97], green value creation [70], positive reputation and legitimacy [26,63], and operational performance [23,30,71]. Improved performance is however described in unspecific terms in most studies-where few show actual measurements for the performance effects, or capture investments or costs-however, there are exceptions with a clearer focus on performance measurement [71,96].…”

“…In terms of industries studied, single industries such as textiles [63,85,103,117], foods [26,64,77], and automotive [105,122] are focused on. The textiles industry research can be illustrated by investigating the detection and remediation of modern slavery through interaction based on monitoring of the supply chain [117].…”

“…The largest category includes more than one industry, primarily survey studies of different manufacturers [23,30,56,110], and multiple case studies [14,59,89] within different industries. An investigation of addressed supply chain actors displayed that-as in the very definition of a supply chain-actors such as suppliers [12,64,77,87,117], manufacturers [12,22,30,56,59,82], retailers/brands [20,26,59,73,88], and wholesalers, e.g., [39] are included; even if studies of wholesalers are rare. Empirical data on IOSCI from the logistics service provider (LSP) is rare [133]; presented in only four studies [62,70,73,99], despite the transport sector being the second largest emitter of green-house gases [134].…”

Green Supply Chain Management: A Primer

“…It improves financial performance and reduces risk by avoiding hazardous material. Other benefits for a company include greater efficiency of assets, improve brand image, less waste elimination, greater innovation, reduction of production costs, mitigation of risks and innovations, reuse of raw materials, improved productivity, increased profitability, and improved overall company performance [4]. Some of these benefits are illustrated in Figure 2.…”