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The purpose of this paper is to find out possible barriers of information technology (IT) applications in the supply chain system of sugar industry in India. All these barriers have their strategic importance for serving the supply chain partners in better way and also help in improving the Indian agrarian economy. The study is a blend of theoretical and practical frameworks, which would focus on those key factors or IT barriers leading to implementation of IT in the sugar supply chain.

The paper is based on theoretical exploration of potential barriers IT applications in the supply chain system of sugar industry in India and prioritizing these barriers by employing multi-criteria decision-making approach.

The findings of this paper are identification of barriers of IT applications in the supply chain system of sugar industry in India, and ranking of these barriers in terms of its severity.

Potential barriers of IT applications in the supply chain system of sugar industry in India considered in to the study are 11 in total. There can be more barriers of IT applications in the supply chain system.

This study reveals the application of analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and fuzzy AHP to Indian sugar industry for prioritizing the IT barriers which influence the sugar supply chain.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the challenges before India for electric vehicle (EV) adoption by 2030. The study further looks into the measures taken by the Government of India (GOI) to promote research and development in EV sector and what is yet to be done.

In the present study, the challenges are identified allied to the commercialization of EVs in India. The data are collected, analyzed and compiled through secondary sources. The secondary data give a concise insight and comprehensive information regarding what is occurring around the globe as well as in the Indian context. Further, the challenges are investigated through a focus group study consisting of 11 participants from industry and academia.

The findings from the study are the critical roles of sharing economy and public utilities in the promotion of EV adoption, given the high cost of EV, lack of infrastructure and poor purchasing power of Indian customers. The sharing economy perspective provides various opportunities for the government to manage the resources (electric-powered transport system) optimally. Further, the study compares the global perspective in assigning the target figures.

The study highlights the facilitating role of the shared format in EV technology promotion but ignores the hurdles that can come in its implementations. Also, the focus group study has its limitation as it relies more on participants' perceptions and opinions.

The present study assists GOI and various stakeholders in having a realistic plan rather than daydreaming with overambitious goals. The diffusion of technology as a shared format (especially in the context of EV) has not been academically approached in the past literature.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate three techniques to extract human factor information from specific railway maintenance tasks. It describes the techniques and shows how these tools can be applied to identify improvements in maintenance practices and workflow.

Three case studies were conducted on single group of technicians (n=19) at a railway maintenance workshop in Luleå, Sweden. Case study I examined the posture of the technicians while they were changing the brake shoes of freight wagons; the study employed the Standard Nordic Questionnaire and a videotape using the Ovako Working Posture Analysis System (OWAS). Case study II looked at maintenance repair times required to change the wheel axle on freight wagons at the workshop. A video filming method suggested by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work was used to measure actual maintenance time. Finally, case study III considered the technicians’ (n=19) perception of work demands, their control over the work and their social support while performing maintenance tasks (brake shoe and wheel axle maintenance); to this end, the case study used a demand control support questionnaire.

In the first case study, the Standard Nordic Questionnaire confirmed that technicians at this particular railway vehicle maintenance workshop suffer from back and shoulder pain. The Ovako Working Posture Analysis showed that 21 percent of the working time required to fit the brake wedge and cotter pin fits into two OWAS categories: category 3, where “change is required as soon as possible,” and category 4, where “change is required immediately”. Problems stem from poor workplace layout, incorrect posture and inaccessibility of tools and components. In the second study, the video analysis indicated that the working time to change the wheel axle of a freight wagon is greatly affected by poor workplace layout. The third case study showed that the technicians have lower “psychological demands” (mean=13), “higher control over work” (mean=16) and “high social support” (mean=22).

The objective of this study was to apply knowledge about human factors to the functional relationships between maintenance personnel, tasks and the working environment to improve safety. If the workplace layout, working posture, maintenance manuals and accessibility of tools are poorly planned, maintenance performance can be adversely affected. The results of this study should assist maintenance management to design new policies and guidelines for improving the work environment.

Three case studies were conducted at a railway maintenance workshop in Luleå, Sweden, to collect data on how human factors affect various railway maintenance tasks.

Demanding customers, legislation and raw materials shortages in the modern world have forced companies to minimize the system's environmental impact. The paper seeks to analyze the economic impact of blending in sustainable paper industries in countries such as India.

A linear programming model for a paper supply chain is proposed to minimize paper manufacturing cost by optimally blending wood pulp and after‐use paper under various conventional supply chain constraints. The issues of quality, environmental concern and reusability in the paper industry have also been taken into account.

Improving quality of after‐use paper by proper recovery network reduces the manufacturing cost. Increasing proportion of wood fiber in the finished paper decreases the cost, even at the cost of degradation in the environment. Thus, it is up to the manufacturer to reflect its degree of environmental concern to the government and society by assigning appropriate environmental and quality opportunity costs in the model.

Difficulty in obtaining the estimates of the environmental and quality cost is a major limitation of the study.

This research provides manufacturers with a simple mathematical model to compare the economic feasibility of blending wood pulp and after‐use paper depending on the market situation.

The major contribution of the model is its capability to study the economic impact of blending by considering some of the important sustainable development issues like environment, quality, shortage, and reusability under one objective function.

This paper aims to present a review of literature to assess the progress of research on managerial issues in the pharmaceutical industry globally.

Literature from peer‐reviewed journals available on online databases was collected for the last decade, using the keyword search technique, and then classifying it according to major managerial issues, research methodologies used and geographical zones.

Behavioral issues at the consumer/physician level and non‐behavioral issues in pricing and medical expenses are studied the most, followed by supply chain management, research and development and manufacturing and services operations management. There is scope for conjunction of research efforts across themes and players. The studies focus on the developed nations through the application of field research and mathematical modeling techniques. The studies in the American region focus more on development and marketing while studies in Europe are aligned towards manufacturing and distribution in the industry. Studies in the developing nations are mostly exploratory in nature and require more focus on issues of research and development and marketing in addition to a substantial increase in overall research efforts. More trans‐continental studies are needed to consolidate research efforts globally.

The review is not exhaustive of all studies available on the industry and each of the issues. Conference papers, unpublished material and lectures were excluded.

Identification of the present and emerging issues together provides practitioners in healthcare systems with an idea of available techniques and strategies to solve problems in healthcare/pharmaceutical management.

A study on research of management issues in the pharmaceutical industry across the world has perhaps not been conducted in the recent past: this paper fills part of that gap.

The purpose of this paper is to present a systemic analysis of the complex interaction of factors affecting the reverse logistics (RL) processes in a pharmaceutical supply chain (PSC).

This study uses a systems thinking approach. Initial problem structuring involved the analysis of behavior-over-time of main variables and incorporated stakeholder analysis. Further, a participative group model building process was used to develop a systems model.

The model was analysed to identify a set of feedback loops operating in the system responsible for the complexities of the problem. To address this, the stakeholders identified three strategic interventions. The first intervention relates to returns avoidance by alleviating market flooding of medicines, second intervention aims at improving the infrastructure for quality and performance management and the third targets balanced risk sharing between the main stakeholders involved in the supply chain. The findings suggest strong linkage between RL network design and key activities in returns management. The study lays a platform for developing a simulation model.

Data collection was confined to stakeholders belonging to a PSC based in the South Indian state of Kerala and excluded the participation of doctors due to practical constraints. The application of systems thinking and modelling was limited to the qualitative phases of the methodology.

The study illustrates a participative process capable of revealing the differing viewpoints of multiple stakeholders involved in a PSC.

It provides a holistic approach based on the systems thinking and modelling methodology for analysing the complexities related to RL in the Indian pharmaceutical industry.

The purpose of this paper is to identify barriers to implement green supply chain and to understand their mutual relationship. Green supply chain management (GSCM) barriers are identified using available GSCM literature and on consultations with experts from industry and academician. Interpretive structural model (ISM) was developed to identify the contextual relationship among these barriers.

A group of experts from industries and academics was consulted and ISM is used to develop the contextual relationship among various GSCMBs for each dimension of GSCM implementation. The results of ISM are used as an input to fuzzy matrix of cross-impact multiplications applied to classification (MICMAC) analysis, to identify the driving and dependence power of GSCMBs.

This paper has identified 14 key GSCMBs and developed an integrated model using ISM and the fuzzy MICMAC approach, which helps to identify and classify the important GSCMBs and reveal the direct and indirect effects of each GSCMB on the GSCM implementation. ISM model provides only binary relationship among GSCMBs, while fuzzy MICMAC analysis provides precise analysis related to driving and dependence power of GSCMB, to overcome this limitation, integrated approach is developed.

ISM model development and fuzzy MICMAC analysis were obtained through the judgment of academicians and industry experts. It is the only subjective judgment and any biasing by the person who is judging the GSCMBs might influence the final result.

This is first kind of study to identify GSCMBs and further, to deploy ISM and fuzzy MICMAC to identify and classify the key GSCMEs that influence GSCM implementation in the organization. The results will be useful for business managers to understand the GSCMBs and overcome these GSCMBs during GSCM implementation in an organization.

In order to address operational effectiveness in the banking sector caused by the 2008 global economic crisis, the purpose of this paper is to examine the nature of operational wastes that exist within four large Greek banks.

A Delphi study was undertaken with ten managers and ten employees.

The waste of underutilised people is found to be the dominant form of waste present and affecting the efficiency of banking operations, and managers and employees consider the waste of underutilised people as having a significant influence on the efficiency of the banking sector.

This has implications for managers of banking operations needing to address efficiencies in an increasingly competitive global economic environment. The paper also highlights the drawbacks of analysing typologies of waste across organisations and industrial sectors.

While some studies have examined the overall efficiency banking sector, to date, none has explored the nature of the inefficiencies that manifest as waste.

The purpose of this work is to make an IoT-based low-cost and power-efficient portable system to control irrigation using a threshold value algorithm and to measure soil-irrigation-related parameters such as soil moisture, soil temperature, humidity and air temperature.

This paper presents a threshold value algorithm to optimize power consumption and to control irrigation process.

The system uses ESP-12F 8266 as the main microcontroller unit to monitor and control irrigation system. The system also consists of an actuator system that triggers automatically based on a threshold value algorithm. An open-source cloud platform is used to monitor and store all the data for future perspective. To make the system run for a long time without any human intervention, a solar panel is used as an alternate source of energy for charging the 12V lithium-ion battery. The battery takes 2.64 h for full charging considering peak intensity of sunlight. A capacitive moisture sensor is included using less expensive 555 timer and calibrated to measure water content in the soil. The 555 timer is used in astable mode of configuration to generate a signal of 572 KHz. The calibrated sensor data when compared with a standard SEN0193 moisture sensor shows an error of 3.4%. The prototype model is made to optimize the power consumption. This can be achieved by utilizing sleep mode of ESP-12F 8266. The total cost involved to make the system is 3900.55 Indian rupees and around US$54.90.

The device is tested in a flower garden during winter season of Nagaland, India, for 75 days to collect all the data and to automate the irrigation process.

The proposed threshold value algorithm optimizes the power consumption of the device, and wastage of water is reduced up to 60% as compared to the traditional method of irrigation.