The Factors of the Collaboration between the Upstream Supply Chain Actors: Case of the Automotive Sector in Morocco

Abstract

This communication aims to identify collaboration determinants between actors in the supply chain of the automotive industry in Morocco. In fact, much research and publication have been conducted in the areas of relationships in the European and North American context supply chain (SC), which have to have a comprehensive understanding of the determinants that can influence the collaborative relationship between actors in the industrial supply chain. However, in developing countries such as Morocco, few authors have attempted to examine this question. In this context, it seemed appropriate to study industrial relations in order to achieve a better understanding of the determinants of collaboration. By entering in a sequential process, our methodology consists of two phases: an exploratory qualitative-to contextualize the model through semi-structured interviews with 15 actors of Moroccan automotive industry and the other confirmatory quantitative based on the development of a questionnaire to collect data and test hypotheses. Data collection was conducted among 67 companies. The empirical findings indicate that the determinants both transactional (dependence, formalization and control) and relational (trust, commitment, communication and information technology) influence the collaboration.

Supply Chain Collaboration and Trust in the Philippines

“…This means that a high level of trust between parties in a supply chain engagement is not necessary for a collaborative planning and decision-making process, like a sales and operations planning (SOP), as this could be a process or a system initiated by management and needs to be followed by the various planning stakeholders. Second, other perspectives of trust, such as transactional trust (dependence, formalization, and control) (Mamad and Chahdi, 2013), contractual and competence trust (Jones et al, 2010), and institutional trust (the regional context where the buyer and sellers are located) (Vieira et al, 2013;Nguyen and Liem, 2013), could be associated with collaborative planning and decision making. Doney and Cannon (1997) and Gullet et al (2010) noted that the real test of the presence of trust in a company is the sharing of private and even proprietary information between the supply chain parties.…”

“…Trust is a critical determinant of collaboration as trust based on the skills, experience, and reputation of the parties in the engagement reduces potential conflict between them (Mamad and Chahdi, 2013). The relational perspective of trust provides relevant insights as to the value and complexity of measuring and building trust for an effective buyer-supplier relationship.…”

Logistics and supply chain management research in Africa

“…From our literature review, it seems that most features of SCM concepts used to explain logistics and SCM issues in Africa are similar to those mobilized and discussed in academic literature such as integration, coordination and cooperation. That has been the case for the research of Eyaa et al (2010) on SMEs' supply chains in Uganda, Mamad and Chahdi (2013) on the Moroccan automotive sector and Wamalwa (2014) on the Kenyan tea industry; all of whom investigated collaborative relationships in supply chains. Also, vertical and horizontal coordination in supply chains have been studied by Daviron and Gibbon (2002) in their study of Ghana and the Ivory Coast and Bouachouch and Mamad (2014) in Morocco, whereas the research of Martens et al (2012) represents an endeavor to investigate supply chain integration in sub-Saharan Africa.…”

Collaboration in Supply Chain Management

“…They observed that the benefit of firms with trust-based collaboration acheived better performance. Another research explored the collaboration between upstream supply chain in the automotive sector (Mamad and Chahdi, 2013). The finding is that trust has a positive impact on supply chain collaboration.…”