There is growing pressure on businesses and governments to pay more attention to the environmental and resource consequences of the ever-increasing production, distribution and consumption of ...agro-based products. Major issues in the sustainable development agenda include how to ensure the involvement of producers, particularly small farmers, in sourcing networks as well as in the institutional initiatives that help them to meet the stringent food safety and quality regulations. Corporates, especially in retailing, could play a critical role in creating sustainable agri-food chains.
Assessing, designing and implementing more sustainable agri-food systems has become a high priority in scientific research and political agendas worldwide. The ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict is ...highlighting the fragility of globalised food distribution systems, and there is a need to focus on alternatives. This manuscript assesses the sustainability of two largely opposing marketing alternatives, namely Territorial Short Food Supply Chains (TSFSCs) and Large-Scale Food Distribution (LSFD). Specifically, the cases of Bogota (Colombia) and Cordoba (Spain) are analysed, where the development of TSFSCs has very significant in recent years but which are of a very different nature. For this purpose, a multi-criteria model based on the Analytic Network Process (ANP) methodology has been developed, considering multiple economic, social and environmental criteria. The model has been evaluated by four interest groups. The results show that the social sub-criterion – distribution of added value – is highly prioritised, and that the TSFSCs are the most sustainable alternatives globally in both cities. In Bogota, direct sales (farmers market) are prioritised, whilst in Cordoba, chain with a local retail (specialised shops). The contribution of TSFSCs to ecosystem services, equity, territorial cohesion and the revitalisation of the economy is highlighted. By interest groups, civil society, academia and public administration prioritise TSFSCs. However, the market players in Cordoba prioritise LSFD with national product. The results indicate that TSFSCs have the potential to contribute to the consolidation of sustainable and resilient food systems.
•Territorial Short Food Supply Chains (TSFSCs) are prioritized as the most sustainable forms of food chain.•TSFSCs stand out for their performance in environmental and social criteria.•TSFSCs contribute to ecosystem services, equity and territorial cohesion.•Large-Scale Food Distribution (LSFD) stands out in economic criteria.•Public policy support to TSFSCs can contribute to the consolidation of sustainable and resilient food systems.
•Explore the impact of blockchain on the imported fresh food supply chain.•Provide pricing strategies for the blockchain-based supply chain when blockchain is beneficial.•Examine the value of ...blockchain in the sales of imported food.•Discuss the impact of retailers’ risk attitudes on blockchain-based fresh food supply chain.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, blockchain has been widely used to trace imported fresh food information from sources to destinations. Motivated by observations of real-world practice, we studied the role that blockchain played in imported fresh food supply chains. We first developed the basic models to examine the cases without and with blockchain. We derived the optimal pricing decisions for the supply chain and the conditions under which using blockchain was profitable under each model. To assess the robustness of the results, we then analyzed how risk attitudes affected the optimal supply chain decisions. We found some interesting results: When the effect of assuaging consumers’ safety concerns brought by blockchain was not obvious, blockchain was more likely to help the manufacturer and retailer increase their profits; otherwise, the value of blockchain was not significant. Besides, the risk-averse manufacturer and retailer would decrease their prices in response to the risks of demand fluctuations. Also, the blockchain platform would benefit from the risk-averse manufacturer and retailer but suffer from risk-averse consumers.
The leveraging of tourism's potential for backward linkages is critical for enhancing local impacts in developing countries. The aim is to analyse food supply chains of tourism accommodation ...providers in the coastal region of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Based upon 50 hotel interviews it is demonstrated the coastal tourism economy of KwaZulu-Natal is characterised by a pattern of sourcing by hotels which is on the one hand geographically localised but on the other hand, is not pro-poor. The food supply chain of high end accommodation establishments is articulated mainly through a network of intermediaries with linkages that only marginally incorporate the area's groups of poor agrarian producers. Findings are contextualised within wider international debates relating to pro-poor tourism, of the building of linkages between tourism and agriculture as a whole and barriers to strengthened pro-poor linkages between accommodation establishments and poor producers.
► Backward linkages are critical for maximising tourism local impacts. ► Linking tourism and agriculture offers opportunities for pro-poor impacts. ► Study shows linkages are geographically localised with limited pro-poor impacts. ► Multiple barriers must be addressed for pro-poor impacts to be realised.
Purpose Natural disasters cause serious operational risks and disruptions, which further impact the food supply in and around the disaster-impacted area. Resilient functions in the supply chain are ...required to absorb the impact of resultant disruptions in perishable food supply chains (FSC). The present study identifies specific resilient functions to overcome the problems created by natural disasters in the FSC context. Design/methodology/approach The quality function deployment (QFD) method is utilized for identifying these relations. Further, fuzzy term sets and the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) are used to prioritize the identified problems. The results obtained are employed to construct a QFD matrix with the solutions, followed by the technique for order of preference by similarity to the ideal solution (TOPSIS) on the house of quality (HOQ) matrix between the identified problems and functions. Findings The results from the study reflect that the shortage of employees in affected areas is the major problem caused by a natural disaster, followed by the food movement problem. The results from the analysis matrix conclude that information sharing should be kept at the highest priority by policymakers to build and increase resilient functions and sustainable crisis management in a perishable FSC network. Originality/value The study suggests practical implications for managing a FSC crisis during a natural disaster. The unique contribution of this research lies in finding the correlation and importance ranking among different resilience functions, which is crucial for managing a FSC crisis during a natural disaster.
Sustainable food production and consumption are key to face the current climate and environmental crisis, hence innovation to produce food with lower impacts are taking more attention. Controlled ...environment agriculture, also known as vertical farming, is seen as one innovative approach to reduce impacts of producing food while also improving food security. Aeroponic is one of such innovations, which environmental impacts have not been well understood yet. Therefore, this study assesses the environmental impacts of aeroponic farm container system in the UK, including a full set of 19 indicators. The results show that energy requirements drive all the impacts, with climate change estimated at 1.52 kg CO2eq. per 1 kg of microgreens (pea shoots) using 2021 UK grid. Renewable powered systems improve almost all the impacts, with climate change reduced by up to 80 %, making this system competitive with conventional agricultural systems. This study proves that aeroponic farm container could offer lower impact food than equivalent imported to the UK, and that also could improve food security in terms of availability, stability, and access to food. Affordability issues need to be assessed in future work.
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•Energy source is critical to reduce most of the environmental impacts of aeroponics.•Aeroponic container farm system generates 1.52 kg CO2eq./kg peashoot using 2021 UK grid.•Solar & wind power lowers GHG emissions of aeroponic container farms by up to 80 %.•Renewable-powered aeroponic show lower GHG than salads imported from most of Europe.•Aeroponic container farms show competitive performance against conventional methods.
► We capture the deterioration of fresh food along the entire supply chain from a network perspective. ► We handle the exponential time decay through the introduction of arc multipliers. ► We study ...oligopolistic competition with product differentiation. ► We include the disposal of the spoiled food products, along with the associated costs. ► We allow for the assessment of alternative technologies involved in each supply chain activity.
In this paper, we develop a network-based food supply chain model under oligopolistic competition and perishability, with a focus on fresh produce. The model incorporates food deterioration through the introduction of arc multipliers, with the inclusion of the discarding costs associated with the disposal of the spoiled food products. We allow for product differentiation due to product freshness and food safety concerns, as well as the evaluation of alternative technologies associated with various supply chain activities. We then propose an algorithm with elegant features for computation. A case study focused on the cantaloupe market is investigated within this modeling and computational framework, in which we analyze different scenarios prior/during/after a foodborne disease outbreak.
COVID‐19 and Food Supply Chains Chenarides, Lauren; Manfredo, Mark; Richards, Timothy J.
Applied economic perspectives and policy,
March 2021, Letnik:
43, Številka:
1
Journal Article
Recenzirano
The COVID‐19 pandemic exposed critical weaknesses in the US food supply chain. Faced with the near‐complete loss of the food service distribution channel, stories of wasted food, failing suppliers, ...and food shortages were common. We argue that the pandemic revealed a fundamental lack of resilience in the food supply chain that, while causing short‐term welfare losses, need not have happened, and resulted from a failure of vision rather than a market failure in the traditional sense. We present a model of supply chain flexibility, grounded in real options theory, that demonstrates how firms can increase shareholder value by maintaining flexibility across supply chains. We present an example from the US fresh produce industry (onions) to demonstrate our hypothesis.
During the last decade, food waste has become an object of interest for both scholars and society. The existence of cosmetic specifications regarding the physical appearance of foods in the food ...supply chains is considered to be one of the important causes of food waste. The relevant aesthetic standards concern the product's weight, shape, and size and are thought to contribute considerably to food waste across multiple supply chain levels. It has been suggested that the abolition of these specifications could be a relatively easy way to prevent food wastage. However, there is a dearth of empirical research due to the lack of data on the extent to which foods are wasted as a result of cosmetic specifications only. Importantly, there is also a lack of insight into the decision-making process of supply chain actors regarding such suboptimal products. The present research aims to fill this gap by investigating the motivations and perceptions of supply chain actors in their strategies on how to handle suboptimal products in their business practices. From thirty-three interviews with primary producers, producer organizations, and retailers from Germany and the Netherlands, we derive initial insights into (1) the presence and nature of cosmetic specifications, (2) the impact of these specifications on food waste, (3) the motivations, abilities, and opportunities of supply chain actors to handle suboptimal products in their business practice and (4) their perspectives on the end consumers' willingness to buy and pay for suboptimal products. With the Motivation, Ability, and Opportunity (MOA) framework, we provide new understanding of supply chain actors' decisions concerning the production or wastage of suboptimal products, which can generate new and essential insights into the food waste problem.
•A qualitative research on supply chain actors’ decisions concerning suboptimal foods.•We identify the presence, nature and impact of cosmetic specifications on food waste.•Cosmetic specifications generate suboptimal foods, which are regularly wasted.•The Motivation, Ability, Opportunity model is used for suboptimal food decisions.•This generates new and essential insights into the food waste problem.
Increasingly, policymakers are setting ambitious goals for sustainability in public procurement, integrated across different pillars. Such ambitions are apparent in public catering services, where ...procurement models have been shifting towards greater localisation of supply chains and purchasing of more organically grown food. To date however, few studies have examined empirically what the impacts of different procurement models are across these multiple pillars of sustainability. This research aimed to fill the gap, by measuring and comparing the environmental, economic and nutritional outcomes of different models of school meals procurement. Case studies were undertaken of ten primary school meals services in five European countries, capturing different procurement model types. Results showed carbon emissions ranged from 0.95 kgs CO2e per meal in the lowest case to 2.41 kgs CO2e in the highest case, with adoption of low carbon food waste disposal methods and reduction of the amount of ruminant meat in the menus being the most important actions for lowering emissions. In terms of economic impact, local economic multiplier ratios ranged from 1.59 to 2.46, and although the level of local food sourcing contributed to these ratios, the effect was eclipsed, in some cases, by investment in local catering staff. Meanwhile, implementation of a robust standards regime and improving canteen environment and supervision were the most important actions for nutritional quality and intake. The paper discusses the implications of the findings for integrated, sustainable models of food procurement.
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