Implementation of the circular supply chain management in the pharmaceutical industry

Abstract

The ever-increasing levels of pollution and waste creation have subjected industries around the world to incorporate the concept of circular economy (CE) in their supply chains. The amalgamation of the CE approach along with supply chain management is called circular supply chain management (CSCM). Among other industries, the pharmaceutical industry is also involved in damaging the ecosystem. Hence, an effective framework for the adoption of CSCM in a particular industry is very essential. Therefore, this paper aims to devise a model that will help the pharmaceutical industries to adopt CSCM in their organizations. For this purpose, the study in the first phase identifies ten barriers that are working as an impediment in the adoption of the CSCM approach. To counter those barriers, the study in the second phase identifies a set of twelve enablers. To analyse the barriers and enablers, the study uses a new hybrid methodology. For allocating weights and prioritizing the barriers, the fuzzy multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) technique, i.e. fuzzy full consistency method (F-FUCOM) is used, whereas the total quality management tool, i.e. fuzzy quality function deployment (FQFD) is used to rank the enablers. The results from F-FUCOM suggest “lack of financial resources and funding”, “market challenges”, and “lack of coordination and collaboration among the entire supply chain network” to be the top-most barriers, respectively, whereas the results achieved from the FQFD suggest “industrial symbiosis”, “Reverse Logistic (RL) infrastructure”, and “block chain technology” to be the top-ranked enablers, respectively. The provision of a facilitating framework for the adoption of CSCM in the pharmaceutical industry and the newly developed hybrid methodology are both novelties of this study.

Analyzing the key performance indicators of circular supply chains by hybrid fuzzy cognitive mapping and Fuzzy DEMATEL: evidence from healthcare sector

“…The circular supply chain is described by integrated circular economics (CE) into SCM (Aiassi et al, 2020 ). The global issues are moving towards CSCM due to increasing concern about world population and waste (Khan & Ali, 2022 ; Tirkolaee & Torkayesh, 2022 ). Nevertheless, there is limited research adopted for studying the internal hospital performance in the CSC.…”

“…For this aim, a circular supply chain (CSC) results in zero waste, based on improving the collaboration among stakeholders and integration of surrounding industries and environmental factors (Farooque et al, 2019 ). Based on the recycling policy, reuse and reduction are vital features of CSC (Khan & Ali, 2022 ). Therefore, CSCM strategies are appropriate procedures for gaining operational advantages by considering structural adjustments in the companies (Tseng et al, 2021 ).…”

Logistics performance: critical factors in the implementation of end-of-life management practices in the pharmaceutical care process

“…Likewise, financial constraints, lack of managerial support, and lack of knowledge and experience influence hesitancy to convert to new sustainable systems (Kouhizadeh et al, 2021 ). Khan and Ali ( 2022 ) mention that the lack of financial resources and funding, market challenges, and lack of coordination and collaboration across the entire supply chain network were listed as the main barriers while industrial symbiosis, reverse logistics infrastructure, and blockchain technology as the top-ranked enablers. Hosseini-Motlagh et al ( 2022 ) present a contract model based on the sharing of cost savings associated with drug disposal that can maximize supply chain profitability and coordinate the two levels of the reverse chain under competition.…”

A transition management methodological framework towards an industrial symbiosis within a circular economy

“…Frameworks (Ghisellini & Ulgiati, 2020;Iacovidou et al, 2021;Kerdlap et al, 2019;Khan & Ali, 2022;Walmsley et al, 2019), roadmaps (Vanhamäki et al, 2020), strategies (Kalmykova et al, 2018;Pan et al, 2015) and models (Chari et al, 2022).…”

“…Moreover, when symbiosis comes to be considered within a broad CE concept, analytical frameworks are more frequent in the literature. Studies that focus on developing better information-gathering capabilities (Iacovidou et al, 2021) work on barriers and enablers (Khan & Ali, 2022) or help to identify technologies (Kerdlap et al, 2019) stand out. In this sense, studies are also beginning to show that strategies that consider the entire value chain (Kalmykova et al, 2018) and therefore include a larger group of stakeholders (Masi et al, 2017) are beginning to be implemented.…”