Search results

The research is based on a critically analyzed literature review focused on the unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions of sustainable operations and supply chain management (OSCM), including the articles selected for this special issue.

The authors introduce the key concepts, issues and theoretical foundations of this special issue on “The hidden side of sustainable operations and supply chain management (OSCM): Unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions”. The authors explore these issues within this context, and how they may hinder the authors' transition to more sustainable practices.

The authors present an overview of unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs, tensions and influencing factors from the literature, and identify how such problems may emerge. The model addresses these problems by highlighting the crucial effect of the underlying state of knowledge on sustainable OSCM decision-making.

The authors limited the literature review to journals that ranked 2 and above as defined by the Chartered Association of Business Schools Academic Journal Guide. The main implication for research is a call to focus attention on unanticipated outcomes as a starting point rather than only an afterthought. For practitioners, good intentions such as sustainability initiatives need careful consideration for potential unanticipated outcomes.

The study provides the first critical review of unanticipated outcomes, trade-offs and tensions in the sustainable OSCM discourse. While the literature review (including papers in this special issue) significantly contributes toward describing these issues, it is still unclear how such problems emerge. The model developed in this paper addresses this gap by highlighting the crucial effect of the underlying state of knowledge concerned with sustainable OSCM decision-making.

Changing political landscape often renews the call for dramatic changes to federal community and economic development grant-in-aid programs. The most dramatic proposal in recent years was President Bush’s 2006 call to consolidate federal assistance programs for communities into a new block grant known as the Strengthening America’s Communities Initiative (SACI). This conceptual study reviews key characteristics of intergovernmental transfers including grant types, features, changes in the intergovernmental fiscal environment, the fungibility/flypaper debate, and the symmetry/asymmetry response of governments to declining intergovernmental revenue. The effects of intergovernmental transfers on state and local governments are connected to differences in grant design features. Potential fallout from proposed or similar changes to grant structure is discussed using the SACI proposal as an example.

The purpose of this paper is to explore recent calls to include social and environmental considerations in supply chains by analyzing the sourcing of raw materials from impoverished communities to reduce environmental impacts and social exclusion in biofuels production.

A case study methodology based on interviews and focus groups with supply chain members and other stakeholders is conducted in Brazil, a major biofuels producer and user. Two supply chain cases, fuel ethanol and biodiesel, illustrate the challenges of recent government policies and industry attempts to improve sustainability within the supply chain.

Although government and industry recognize the importance of providing opportunities for impoverished communities in biofuels supply chains, there remain considerable pressures to economize at the expense of sustainable supply chain policies. Sourcing from impoverished farmers who lack basic business knowledge, and distrust industry and government policy, compound these challenges.

While sustainability research now emphasizes the importance of considering interactions among economic, environmental, and social parameters, little is known about integrating poorly educated, impoverished farmers within supply chains. Basic business education is needed, and further research should explore entrepreneurial dynamics within impoverished communities.

Supply chain managers should acquire skills for engaging with impoverished farmers lacking formal education. Cooperatives can bridge knowledge asymmetries between buyers and suppliers, but will require support from industry if sustainable supply chain policies are to succeed.

Most sustainable supply chain scholars acknowledge the importance providing opportunities for impoverished communities, but few have explored how potential entrepreneurs from impoverished communities can participate as productive supply chain members.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the skills required for effective contract management of public–private partnership (PPP) projects over their contract duration. The growing body of literature indicating the lack of expertise in managing PPP-related projects within the public sector prompted this study.

The study, being an exploratory one, relied on a survey of 207 survey responses from a sample of PPP experts across the globe. The data from the survey are a rich mix of responses from public policy experts, construction professionals, project finance experts, lawyers and academic researchers in PPP.

It was found through exploratory factor analysis that project management, financial engineering, negotiations, risk management, forecasting, stakeholder management and technical skills were very critical for successful contract management of PPP projects. It was also found that regional characteristics influence skills prioritisation.

The results of this study can be validated on larger data sets in specific countries and across regions, sectors and variety of PPP projects. Currently, the authors conducted a general survey using convenience sampling.

The results send a clear signal to practitioners that infrastructure regulation training programs cannot be generalised. Training should be tailored to reflect regional and country-specific characteristics.

The increasing failures and remunicipalisations of privately financed infrastructures is a cause for concern. Little attention has been given to the complicity of PPP regulatory institutions responsible for contract governance of such projects. Studies are increasingly pointing to the absence of critical PPP skills among institutions responsible for managing PPP contracts. This lack of capacity has resulted in poor oversight of private companies providing public services resulting in poor services, and financial recklessness which threaten the sustainability of service provision.

This double special issue called for logistics solutions and supply chains in times of climate change. The purpose of this editorial is to investigate the current and future implications of climate change, and in particular, energy efficiency for logistics and supply chain management (SCM).

Against the backdrop of climate change, a conceptual framework is constructed that reflects on the immediate and tangible effects of a sustainable agenda on logistics and SCM.

Energy efficiency has been largely neglected in logistics and SCM. At the same time, considering energy efficiency requires considerable rethinking on the operational level (from transportation emissions to the cold chain) as well as even the conceptual level. The energy agenda needs a further development of logistics theory and practice.

The editorial highlights the challenges of sustainability and energy in the context of logistics and SCM pertaining to their novelty, importance and interdependence. SCM needs to develop new performance measures that include measures of energy efficiency, in order to adapt to an environment where the old assumption of low fuel costs does not hold stand.