A Roadmap to Green Supply Chain System through Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Implementation

Abstract

Green supply chain is a supply chain system focusing on environmental impacts and the efficiency of energy used. A green supply chain will be achieved if a system is able to track down all information regarding the environmental influence. However, a green supply chain will not be possible without enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation in organizations. ERP is the integrated information system overlooking manufacturing processes from raw materials to finished products. However, the successful implementation of ERP depends on four critical factors: defining business cases, prepare system and users, stabilizing to obtain normal operations and maintaining and upgrading. Moreover, learning organization (learning from own experience and learning from others) is another key ingredient for the successful implementation. Last but not least, process mapping from “As- Is” to “To-Be” models is also a powerful technique which facilitates the implementation by identifying the process models of current and future ones. Moreover, the featured functions of ERP for a green supply chain should include the capability to keep and track the environmental data of raw materials from suppliers, to prepare an environmental report for each product from raw materials to finished products, to keep the environmental data regarding logistics and transportation and to comply with the ERP software used by third-party manufacturers.