An integrated framework for the assessment of environmental sustainability in wood supply chains

Abstract

Nowadays, sustainability is one of the critical factors for the success of supply chains in organizations and firms that strive to maintain a competitive edge in the market. In wood industry, due to the need for integrating several business units such as forest entrepreneurs, carriers, pulp and paper mills and sawmills, such industries encounter various difficulties in maintaining effective supply chain collaborations. Literature on wood furniture industry seems to be lagging in terms of research on sustainable supply chain operations. To fill this gap, this study aims at identifying the critical factors that stand as a barrier between manufacturing and environmental sustainability in wood furniture industries. To achieve this aim, an integrated framework based on the triplet of Hierarchical Clustering, Analytical Hierarchy Process and Best-Worst Method has been proposed and implemented in a leading furniture manufacturer in UAE. The results show that waste management is the primary concern when an organization wants to pursue manufacturing environmental sustainability. Resources come in the second place where non-renewable resources should be substituted by renewable ones. The results were supported by a sensitivity analysis which confirms that higher attention should be directed to recycling of wood waste. Findings of this study provide recommendations to managers and decision makers on how to improve the manufacturing environmental sustainability in wood furniture industries to achieve the Triple Base Line (TBL) concept of sustainability and integrate sustainably in industry 4.0 context.