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1 – 10 of over 25000The greening of the supply chain initiative, as implemented by world‐class ISO 14001 certified companies, has already demonstrated how much it contributes towards greening the…
Abstract
The greening of the supply chain initiative, as implemented by world‐class ISO 14001 certified companies, has already demonstrated how much it contributes towards greening the industry of the region they operate in. The SMEs have been involved in such a green supply chain only to the extent of their participation as suppliers, distributors and in other capacities as business partners complementing the world‐class companies. All the same, in many regions, the environmental initiatives taken by the SMEs do conform to the different phases of the green supply chain. This study investigates if in the Philippine context this postulate is indeed true, and with the help of an empirical survey, establishes that the SME population in the Philippines do indeed carry out different phases of the green supply chain, though in a heterogeneous manner. This would be indeed expected given the heterogeneity in size and nature of business for SMEs in this region.
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Syed Asif Raza and Mohd. Nishat Faisal
This paper aims to develop efficient decision support tools for a firm’s environment protection by using greening effort while yet improving profitability by utilizing pricing and…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to develop efficient decision support tools for a firm’s environment protection by using greening effort while yet improving profitability by utilizing pricing and inventory decisions with discount consideration.
Design/methodology/approach
This study proposed a mathematical model for price- and greening effort-dependent demand rate with discount considerations. Later, the mathematical model is extended to the situation in which the demand rate is also dependent on the stock level, in addition to the price and greening effort. Efficient solution methodologies are developed for finding the optimal solution to the proposed models.
Findings
Simple yet elegant models are proposed to mimic real-life applications. Structural properties of the models are explored to outline efficient algorithms with quantity discounts.
Research limitations/implications
The paper considers monopoly and assumes deterministic demand. Only a more commonly observed all-units discount scheme is studied.
Practical implications
The models provide decision support tools for firms in pursuit of joint profit maximization and environment consciousness goals.
Social implications
The study develops environment-friendly approaches for inventory management and improving the profitability alike.
Originality/value
This study is among the first to consider environmental protection with an investment in greening effort along with inventory management and pricing decision. The study also explored the effect of all-unit quantity discounts.
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Andrew Ebekozien, Solomon Oisasoje Ayo-Odifiri, Angeline Ngozika Chibuike Nwaole, Aginah Lawrence Ibeabuchi and Felix Ebholo Uwadia
The high consumption of energy by buildings may have enhanced land degradation, flooding, air pollution and many other hazardous environmental issues. However, green practices in…
Abstract
Purpose
The high consumption of energy by buildings may have enhanced land degradation, flooding, air pollution and many other hazardous environmental issues. However, green practices in buildings have been proved as one of the successful technologies to mitigate these issues. Past studies have shown lax green practices in Nigerian buildings. Concerning public hospital buildings, this is yet to be explored. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the barriers to green practices and proffer possible policy solutions to promote hospital green buildings.
Design/methodology/approach
In attaining these objectives, the view of hospital building contractors, design team, hospital management and policymakers in the relevant ministries/agencies was engaged via virtual interviews. The collated data were analysed and presented in the thematic pattern.
Findings
Findings show that green building construction is extremely low in Nigeria, but the worst hit is the health-care buildings across the states. Government/policy-related, organisational/leadership-related, financial-related, technical-related, design team-related and stakeholders’ behaviour-related barriers emerged as the main six themes of barriers affecting public hospital green buildings implementation initiatives. Findings show that proffering possible policies to addressing these barriers may improve public hospital green construction across the states.
Research limitations/implications
This paper is limited to barriers to green buildings implementation in public hospitals in Nigeria, and data collection was through virtual interviews but does not affect the strength of the findings. Thus, this paper suggests that the sub-themes and variables/items that emerged from the collated data as presented in Figure 1 can be further developed quantitatively via questionnaire survey to validate and improve the reliability of results from this paper.
Practical implications
As part of this study’s implications, suggestions from this paper will stir up policymakers’ decisions, to be tailored towards achieving green buildings implementation initiatives in Nigerian public hospitals.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is probably the first that attempted to investigate the barriers to green buildings implementation in public hospitals in Nigeria.
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Ravindra P. Saxena and Pradeep K. Khandelwal
The purpose of this paper is to aim in general to understand the perception of industries in India – a fast growing economy, towards green philosophy and to investigate further…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to aim in general to understand the perception of industries in India – a fast growing economy, towards green philosophy and to investigate further what initiatives those industries have taken for becoming green.
Design/methodology/approach
The study is exploratory in nature and attempts to understand the behaviour of three types of industries, namely, durable, non‐durable and services towards green philosophy.
Findings
Results of the study reflect that industries in India, in general have a positive view for practicing green philosophy. They feel becoming green will help them in gaining the competitive advantage and will support them in sustainable growth. Also the industries that have a positive attitude towards greening have taken some measures and initiatives in this direction to establish a sustainable competitive advantage for succeeding in today's highly challenging and dynamic global markets.
Research limitations/implications
The present exploratory study provides a starting‐point for further research. Researchers can further explore whether industries using green philosophy were able to register a competitive advantage and could gain added market share and profits by becoming green. They can investigate the reason behind this green attitude, whether industries are using green practices for cutting costs in turn to increase their profits or whether they have a genuine concern for environmental protection and society's welfare and therefore adopting green practices in their industry.
Originality/value
Most of such studies in the field of green marketing and social economics are done in developed countries and remain conspicuously missing in the context of fast developing Asian countries. This research is a step to filling this gap and providing a platform for further research in this area.
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To lower the environmental damage of business we need to examine our “ecological footprint”. We need to move forward with the business at the same time. In order to solve that…
Abstract
To lower the environmental damage of business we need to examine our “ecological footprint”. We need to move forward with the business at the same time. In order to solve that dilemma, a value‐seeking and proactive approach to greening is proposed in the (general) management literature. However, literature on the role of supply chain operations, mostly published in the area of reversed logistics, has failed to develop grounded theory and frameworks to support the application of such an approach. Furthermore, research is needed that goes beyond the partial and fragmented contribution of reversed logistics. This research note looks at challenges for research on green steps to take, and green supply chains to make in practice, as a step up to lowering the ecologic footprint of supply chains.
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Benjamin Cohen, Kira T. Lawrence, Andrea Armstrong, Miranda Wilcha and Alexa Gatti
A coalition of students, professors, administrators and operational staff at Lafayette College designed an environmental module to integrate in-class curricular education with…
Abstract
Purpose
A coalition of students, professors, administrators and operational staff at Lafayette College designed an environmental module to integrate in-class curricular education with out-of-class environmental engagement. The purpose of this study was to improve the ethos of sustainability across campus.
Design/methodology/approach
The research reported here draws from qualitative and quantitative assessments to corroborate previous evidence that institution-wide collaboration is a necessary prerequisite for the successful development of such environmental campus programming.
Findings
It adds to those prior conclusions with the finding that three intertwined factors are critical keys to success. One is attention in the design process to coalition building between the academic, administrative and operational units of campus; second is a strong focus on organizational capacity; and third is explicit attention to preparing long-term management.
Practical implications
The particularities of college campuses, where student residence is temporary while the campus environment is continuous, require attention to organizational sustainability as much as the more common technical features of sustainability (e.g. energy, water, food, transportation systems, etc.). For small colleges seeking to implement similar programming to foster a culture of sustainability on their campuses, that commitment to organizational sustainability demonstrates that maintenance, durability and invested personnel are essential factors when similarly seeking interdisciplinary environmental education initiatives.
Originality/value
This paper describes the original program structure of Greening Lafayette. The program was built on the campus of Lafayette College through specific co-curricular, administrative, academic and facilities efforts. The paper details the approach Lafayette College students and faculty took to draw from best practices in campus sustainability, analyze their campus’ baseline engagement in and awareness of sustainability and leverage their college’s structures to design a program that generates a campus ethos of sustainability. It further elucidates the importance of ensuring the organizational sustainability of the program itself. While Greening Lafayette was designed for the context of a specific undergraduate campus, the program offers a model for faculty, students and administrators of other colleges and universities to build coalitions, design sustainability programming and develop an ethos of sustainability on their campuses.
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Tracy H. Porter, Vickie Coleman Gallagher and Diane Lawong
Organizations have viewed sustainability as a societal problem and unrelated to business. To recognize sustainability as an organizational issue requires companies to deal with…
Abstract
Purpose
Organizations have viewed sustainability as a societal problem and unrelated to business. To recognize sustainability as an organizational issue requires companies to deal with the challenge of transforming into environmentally sustainable enterprises. This requires institutions to align mission statements with values. The purpose of this paper is to replicate previous research in sustainability and the cultural facets which impact the process.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative case study method was used to analyze 25 organizations within the US Midwest with various contexts to determine how their respective cultures impacted their change initiatives. Specifically, the authors spoke to sustainability change agents with regard to their leadership and culture, and the factors that are conducive to (or barriers to) implementing sustainability initiatives.
Findings
The original study demonstrated the presence of seven contextual conditions which are important in the process of imbedding sustainability within the institution. This research found the same dimensions to be present; however, they manifested differently 15 years later.
Practical implications
The original research offered a somewhat dark picture of the sustainability change initiatives within organizations. The current study however; offers a much more positive perspective which demonstrates organizations appear to have progressed with regard to sustainability.
Originality/value
This is a replication study whereby we discovered similar themes as to the nature of contextual factors that can hinder or advance sustainability initiatives; however, the findings 15 years later show a marked difference in the current state of affairs and the ability to implement sustainability initiatives.
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Pourya Pourhejazy and Oh Kyoung Kwon
Nowadays, climate change and environmental pollution have become major international concerns, in which logistics and manufacturing activities are playing the major role. In the…
Abstract
Nowadays, climate change and environmental pollution have become major international concerns, in which logistics and manufacturing activities are playing the major role. In the past decade, more attention has been directed toward environmental issues than ever before. The Paris agreement is one of the most recent milestones in this regard. Due to local and international legislation, managers are highly encouraged to seek out sustainable innovations and strategies to reduce the negative impacts of their business activities. An array of academic and practical activities has been formed around the greening of the supply chain (SC). This paper attempts to review and classify green supply chain management (GSCM) disciplines and best practices from a practical point of view. The authors also investigate the different areas of application and review the GSCM practices in some well-known companies. On this basis, the paper disclose the superiority of Apple company over the other studied cases in applying green practices, particularly in the manufacturing and design areas, while the parcel delivery company has been quite active in the green transportation and green marketing. It is also shown that all of the reviewed cases have been successful in implementing green logistics initiatives thus far.
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Mohammad Hossein Zarei, Ruth Carrasco-Gallego and Stefano Ronchi
While humanitarian supply chains (HSCs) inherently contribute to social sustainability by alleviating the suffering of afflicted communities, their unintended adverse…
Abstract
Purpose
While humanitarian supply chains (HSCs) inherently contribute to social sustainability by alleviating the suffering of afflicted communities, their unintended adverse environmental impact has been overlooked hitherto. This paper draws upon contingency theory to synthesize green practices for HSCs, identify the contingency factors that impact on greening HSCs and explore how focal humanitarian organizations (HOs) can cope with such contingency factors.
Design/methodology/approach
Deploying an action research methodology, two-and-a-half cycles of collaboration between researchers and a United Nations agency were completed. The first half-cycle developed a deductive greening framework, synthesizing extant green practices from the literature. In the second and third cycles, green practices were adopted/customized/developed reflecting organizational and contextual contingency factors. Action steps were implemented in the HSC for prophylactics, involving an operational mix of disaster relief and development programs.
Findings
First, the study presents a greening framework that synthesizes extant green practices in a suitable form for HOs. Second, it identifies the contingency factors associated with greening HSCs regarding funding environment, stakeholders, field of activity and organizational management. Third, it outlines the mechanisms for coping with the contingency factors identified, inter alia, improving the visibility of headquarters over field operations, promoting collaboration and resource sharing with other HOs as well as among different implementing partners in each country, and working with suppliers for greener packaging. The study advances a set of actionable propositions for greening HSCs.
Practical implications
Using an action research methodology, the study makes strong practical contributions. Humanitarian practitioners can adopt the greening framework and the lessons learnt from the implementation cycles presented in this study.
Originality/value
This is one of the first empirical studies to integrate environmental sustainability and HSCs using an action research methodology.
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Mark Starik, Timothy N. Schaeffer, Polly Berman and Amanda Hazelwood
Universities and colleges, as societal educational institutions, have relatively recently attempted to begin to upgrade their multiple relationships with their natural…
Abstract
Universities and colleges, as societal educational institutions, have relatively recently attempted to begin to upgrade their multiple relationships with their natural environments, as have other institutions. However, “greening” initiatives of higher education institutions appear to have received far less attention in various bodies of academic literature than have the environmental policies and practices of these other institutions. This article highlights four US universities’ “campus ecology” projects, initially characterizing major elements of each, using a common organizational effectiveness model which has been widely employed in organization‐related academic fields.
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