Information sharing and sales format strategy under platform economy and cap-and-trade

Abstract

We develop a low-carbon supply chain including an online retail platform and a manufacturer, taking into account cap-and-trade mechanism. The online retail platform withholding the forecasting demand information chooses whether to share it or not and chooses the reseller format or the agency sales format. The manufacturer produces the low-carbon product and decides the carbon emission reduction level. Therefore, we establish two scenarios (non-information sharing; information sharing) in the reseller format model and the agency sales format model, respectively. Firstly, we derive the members’ equilibrium decisions and explore the online retail platform’s information sharing strategy. We find that the carbon emission reduction efficiency and sales format play important roles in information sharing strategy. Then, we examine the effects of information sharing strategy on carbon emission, consumer surplus, and social welfare. We find that sharing information is always beneficial to the environment, and may create more positive social value. Finally, we investigate sales format strategy and find that it depends on the carbon emission reduction cost.