Achieving Resilience: Resilient Price and Quality Strategies of Fresh Food Dual-Channel Supply Chain Considering the Disruption

Abstract

In the face of demand disruptions, dual-channel supply chains (SCs) that lack resilience may be more vulnerable. Reaching moderate SC resilience through coordination is essential for dealing with disruptions. This paper investigates the operation management of a dual-channel fresh-food SC (FSC) under disruption. The centralized and decentralized decision models propose joint quality efforts based on the consideration of quality preference and loss. From the perspective of SC resilience, we analyze how SC members can optimally make price, quality, and quantity decisions resiliently and robustly under the disruption of quality preference. The results show that (1) no matter the kind of decision model, considering quality preference disruptions can significantly increase the SC profit; (2) there is a resilience range in decisions with the influence of the disruption cost. The original optimal decisions in the resilience range are robust and sustain SC performance without change; and (3) the disruption significantly impacts offline channel retailers, who are at a disadvantage when competing with online channels. A centralized decision model can achieve higher profits and quality levels in response to demand disruptions. This paper extends the concept of resilience to the FSC and provides suggestions for fresh-food enterprises to conduct quality efforts and cope with demand interruption.

Fresh Produce Supply Chain Coordination Based on Freshness Preservation Strategy

“…Numerous scholars have improved the management of supply chains by constructing two-channel supply chains. Zhinan Li et al considered coordinating the operational management of a dual-channel fresh food supply chain in the case of supply chain disruptions, using decentralized and centralized decision models to enhance the resilience and sustainability of fresh food firms for the supply chain [25]. Wan N et al designed two supply chain structures to investigate the impact on option coordination separately.…”

Incentives to Enhance Production Reliability against Disruption: Cost-Sharing vs. Penalty

“…A large body of operational approaches for hedging against production disruptions have been proposed: multi-sourcing [17], carrying inventory [18,19], backup production options [20,21], demand management [9], and production process improvement [22,23]. Multi-sourcing is a commonly adopted approach used to mitigate the influence of the potential supply chain disruption.…”

“…Previous studies on these risks mainly focused on five important strategies, including multiple sourcing, backup supply, inventory, emergency purchases, and demand management. These strategies have been extensively studied, aiming to mitigate the negative consequences of production disruptions [7][8][9]. The second category of risks arises from unqualified raw materials, design deficiency, and a lower technology level, which are more probable to happen but endogenous and controllable.…”

Improved Reinforcement Learning for Preventing Consumer Food Waste in Volatile Food Markets

“…Food waste prevention is pointed out as one of the biggest contributors to reaching 2050 sustainability goals without requiring expansion of the cultivated areas by the World Resource Institute's 'Reducing FLW (2019)' report [27]. Similarly, food waste is pointed out as one of the main challenges of the food supply chain besides sustainability, food safety, and security [16]. Globally, nearly one-third of food produced for human consumption is lost or wasted, equaling a total of 1.3. billion tons of food per year.…”