Guest editorial: Resilience in the cold chain: a critical analysis of coordination mechanisms

Abstract

The concept of a supply chain coordination scheme in cold supply chain management for the cold chain logistic industry is new and relatively more complex than the supply chain of other industries (Das et al., 2023;Habibur Rahman et al., 2023). However, the process of cold chain management begins with the flow of goods and services from the point of provenience, that is, production to storage, transportation, distribution and consumption, involving the process of planning, controlling and efficient implementation to meet general need and customer satisfaction on a worldwide scale (Bogataj et al., 2005;Lotfi et al., 2023). Moreover, cold chain management includes cold products which having a short shelf life, cold transport, value addition and preservation, and infrastructure to provide an integrated cold chain to keep the product fresh in a chain of distribution from producer to consumer, Such as Bananas, from the harvest country of Philippines to end consumers in mainland China (Government Support and Initiative to Build a Robust Cold Chain Ministry of Food Processing Industries, Government of India NCCD Conclave with Nodal Officers For Cold-Chain Development, 2014). The case has been taken from the Indian cold chain logistics industry, which plays a critical function in setting up equipment and procedures or set of accesses that are intended to keep perishable goods like vegetables, fruits, flowers, meat, dairy products and so on (Chaudhari et al., 2023;Monteiro et al., 2023) and required distribution of these perishable goods under controlled environment on a priority basis (Li et al., 2023;Noble et al., 2023). Still, it involves many accomplishment processes like other supply chain management operations such as perishable green groceries processing, perishable goods production and other market drove the downstream process like finishing, perishable goods greengroceries and distributing cum retailing (Sarkar et al., 2023). Further, there are many intermediate processing steps in the cold supply chain, like other cold chain products (apparel products), such as auxiliary materials, production and service sectors involved in this supply chain. However, managing cold chains is more significant and complex than ordinary retail supply chains (Burgos and Ivanov, 2021). As a result, the cold supply chain has a relatively long lead time and relatively high uncertainty (essentially buyer-controlled business) in the whole supply chain. Cold products have short life cycles, high volatility, high market needs predictability, and many purchases (Cheng et al., 2020). Thus, one of the major business organizations in this cold supply chain management is the diminution of the lead time by combining various processes in the supply chain. Cold products in the cold supply chain reflect the downstream portion of an extended supply chain; its members include end consumers, goods owners, retailers, jobbers, distributors, perishable goods producers, and cold product suppliers. Cold chain logistics is an independent entity and may also ...