Tobias Rebs

Sustainable supply chain management: a modeling perspective

Nowadays, the integration of sustainability into supply chain management (SCM) is a key issue for ensuring corporate competitiveness in face of dynamic ecological and social environments. This paper reviews 185 journal publications of the last 20xa0years that formalize issues related to sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) in quantitative models. In a content analysis, modeling and SCM characteristics as well as sustainability and SSCM constructs are elaborated. The models are assessed numerically by counting frequencies of occurrence and by clustering the paper sample according to selected characteristics. The findings indicate that SSCM models predominantly focus on deterministic approaches and the integration of environmental aspects of sustainability while neglecting stochastic modeling techniques and the consideration of social factors. By now, comprehensive modeling approaches are most often employed on intra-organizational levels whereas broader application areas are assessed by less complex models. The integration of pressures and incentives of external stakeholders or the formalization of sustainable supplier management and sustainability risks are identified as future research perspectives. Furthermore, the interrelationships between the triple bottom line dimensions are to be scrutinized in greater detail in order to avoid focused optimization of selected sustainability criteria. Seven modeling guidelines are derived from the reviewed literature to facilitate future model-based SSCM research.

Quantitative Modeling of Sustainability in Interorganizational Supply Chains

The consideration of environmental and social aspects has become essential for the management of supply chains where decision-making is particularly supported by formal models. This chapter reviews interorganizational quantitative models for sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) by employing content and cluster analyses. The paper sample consists of 62 formal models that meet the selection criteria for this literature review. The selected articles are analyzed with regard to sustainability and supply chain management constructs derived from related conceptual literature. In pursuit of greater insight into model types in conjunction with stakeholder triggers for SSCM and sustainable risk management, this review confirms the preponderance of deterministic approaches focusing on the interplay of economic and environmental aspects while social indicators are broadly omitted. It is detected that stochastic approaches to model all factors of the triple bottom line of sustainability are missing so far. Moreover, the operationalization of stakeholder pressures and incentives as well as sustainability-related risks is underrepresented, which calls for further research in this respect.

Toward the Integration of Sustainability Metrics into the Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) Model

The consideration of ecological and social impacts of supply chains is becoming a pressing issue and a competitive advantage for companies. Therefore, sustainability-related aspects have to be identified and integrated into supply chain management to allow for sustainable performance measurement. However, the widely recognized Supply Chain Operations Reference (SCOR) model and its extensional Green SCOR model do not comprehensively address the triple bottom line (TBL) of sustainability, i.e., the interplay of the economic, environmental, and social dimensions, especially because social aspects are neglected so far. Furthermore, the ecological metrics are mainly output oriented, thereby omitting input factors that are crucial to environmental performance. Against this background, this chapter (1) elaborates on literature concerned with the integration of the TBL of sustainability into supply chain management processes and (2) develops a conceptual framework to match sustainability metrics to the SCOR processes. On the one hand, the resulting conceptualization contributes to closing the current research gap on the integration of sustainability metrics into supply chain process models, and on the other hand, it alleviates practice application through compatibility with the standardized SCOR model. It is found that environmental metrics can be directly related to existing SCOR process elements, while social metrics are more difficult to integrate. Nevertheless, the research presented should subsequently be subject to empirical validation and formal mathematical modeling to shed light on holistic sustainability performance measurement of supply chains.

Sustainable Supply Chains: Recent Developments and Future Trends

Sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) has become a highly relevant topic in scientific research as well as in managerial practice. This chapter summarizes the findings of several reviews of SSCM literature. In addition, propositions and guidelines for future SSCM research are given. Based on these insights, the structure of the book at hand and the coherence of the book chapters are outlined.

Sustainable Supply Chain Management at the Base of Pyramid: A Literature Review

In recent years, establishing partnerships with actors from the so-called base of the pyramid (BoP) has become a pivotal task for firms that operate or do business in developing countries. By engaging in BoP markets, firms are able to meet their own growth targets while simultaneously stimulating the economic development of poor countries. Due to the increasing relevance of sustainability, business decisions have to be made under consideration of economic, environmental, and social criteria. As a consequence, new challenges for supply chain management (SCM) arise. Even though these management theories are somehow connected, only little attention has been given to linking BoP research and sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) yet. This chapter sheds light on this research area. A systematic review and content analysis of 76 related papers is presented to examine the state of research. The examination of sustainability constructs reveals a clear dominance of social aspects and a deficit in environmental sustainability consideration in SCM, while the integration of all three dimensions of sustainability is still occasional. The study contributes to research by analyzing the coherence of sustainability, in particular its social and societal aspects, and SCM at the BoP. Practitioners gain insights on social and societal aspects of SCM in context to poverty alleviation and making business with the poorest members of the world.

Opportunities of Combining Sustainable Supply Chain Management Practices for Performance Improvement

Considerable efforts for research on sustainable supply chain management have become evident in the past years. Besides conceptual studies and quantitative models, empirical research on corporate practices has been contributing to promote reductions of impacts on the environment and society. The systematic combination of practices is, however, not yet approached in literature. Therefore, this chapter presents results derived from a systematic literature review based on a recently developed framework for managing sustainable supply chain practices. Through contingency analysis on the selected publications, correlations between the framework dimensions and categories enable the identification of dominating and underrepresented initiatives. Lastly, corporate reports published by five German automotive manufacturers are examined. Results show that both sustainable procurement and waste management practices are strongly correlated with a firm’s production management practices. Moreover, general issues of waste management are most often discussed in concert with distributional and customer relationship practices. In contrast, corporate governance and supplier relationship practices are implemented isolated from other initiatives. The apparent lack of integration between these practices motivated a second round of analysis, which considers 21 more specific categories. The findings are further compared to sustainability leaders’ examples to offer managerial insights and opportunities to enhance sustainable supply chain performance. This chapter focuses specifically on sustainable supply chain practices and introduces the concept of “initiative combination rent,” contributing nonetheless to further the understanding of how companies can improve supply chain and sustainability performance.

System Dynamics of Dependent Requirements Variations in Automotive Supply Networks – Insights on a Horizontal Bullwhip Effect

Addressing the root causes of schedule instability, particularly the unreliability of suppliers’ production processes in a supply network, can help to curtail short-term demand variations and increase the overall supply chain efficiency. Hence, we introduce a stylized automotive supply chain with two suppliers and a single original equipment manufacturer (OEM). This supply chain can be disrupted by a shortage occurring at one of the suppliers due to random machine breakdowns, what consequently creates dependent requirements variations (DRV) affecting both the OEM and the other supplier. Using a System Dynamics (SD) simulation which contains the said mechanism causing schedule instability, comparative simulation scenarios were carried out to gain theoretical insights with regard to the nature of DRV. As a result, the simulation study shows that the Bullwhip Effect is not just detectable on a vertical supply chain level under demand uncertainties, but also on a horizontal supply chain level when production risks are present.