Managing a Sustainable and Resilient Perishable Food Supply Chain (PFSC) after an Outbreak

Abstract

It is a challenging task to manage a perishable food supply chain (PFSC), due to the product’s short lifetime and to demand uncertainty. Even worse is the fact that, because of the multitude of participating stakeholders in production, distribution, and retailing, the PFSC becomes complex and thus particularly vulnerable to crises. Product shortages that result from an outbreak like COVID-19 often cause customers to seek alternative sources of supply, possibly with a larger purchasing amount (i.e., hoarding), leading to even severer demand uncertainty after the shortage period. To manage a sustainable and resilient PFSC after an outbreak, supply chain partners need to share and use the right information to facilitate decision making. A system dynamics simulation was thus applied to study a cheese supply chain with three tiers. Three scenarios that cause product shortages were simulated. Seven balanced feedback loops and two reinforced feedback loops were identified from the simulation model. Through the feedback loop dominance analysis, we identified four dominant loops that facilitate the generation of endogenous demand. In order to alleviate the negative influence of endogenous demand, it is suggested that the information sharing that causes endogenous demand be stopped and a loosely coupled strategy to support decision making utilized.

Sustainable supply chain management towards disruption and organizational ambidexterity: A data driven analysis

“… I20 Supply chain vulnerability SC vulnerability is the susceptibility or exposure to a disruptive event in the supply chain Blackhurst et al (2018) ; Azadegan et al (2020) ; Viljoen & Joubert (2018) ; Nakatani et al (2018) ; Konig & Spinler (2016) ; Chowdhury & Quaddus (2016) ; Chen et al (2015 b); Ethirajan et al (2020) . I21 Sustainability Sustainability in the SC is defined as managing the supply chain functions aligned with the social, environmental, and economic sustainability requirements of the stakeholders to reduce sustainability risks in supply chain and improve market performance Seuring & Müller (2008) ; Sharifi et al (2020) ; Chatterjee & Layton (2020) ; Chen et al (2020) ; Handfield et al (2020) ; Zhu & Krikke (2020) ; Kamble et al (2020) ; Niu et al (2020) ; Quayson et al (2020) ; Ivanov (2020) ; Shareef et al (2020) ; He et al (2020) ; Nayak & Dhaigude (2019) ; Maiyar & Thakkar (2020) . I22 Uncertainty “Uncertainty” refers to a state that cannot be directly expressed by a certain amount of information, which describes a situation that cannot be ascertained, or where there are different possibilities.…”

COVID-19 pandemic related supply chain studies: A systematic review

“…One study ( Yuen et al, 2020 ) explored the causes of such panic buying and found that several factors, such as perceived threats, fear of the unknown, the copying of others’ behavior, and other social psychological factors are in play. As a solution, one study ( Zhu and Krikke, 2020 ) suggests that information that may lead to panic buying should not be disseminated to the public. At the same time, non-essential products have seen downward demand, because the income of customers has declined and they prefer to save money for an uncertain future ( Abhishek et al, 2020 , Chiaramonti and Maniatis, 2020 ).…”

Effects of COVID-19 on the Italian agri-food supply and value chains

“…In particular, small fluctuations in downstream demand correspond to amplified swings in upstream demand. Considering the effects of COVID-19 on food supply chains, the spike in demand for some categories of goods affects the correctness of the forecasts of the supply chain actors furthest from the final demand ( Zhu and Krikke, 2020 ). Producers of the goods most in demand during the lockdown, for example, could react by using flexibility tools that increase production to absorb demand and prepare adequate stock levels.…”