Pricing in sustainable global container transport

Abstract

The last decade has witnessed an increase in the consideration of environmental factors in global transportation and shipping, mostly as a consequence of regulation and media attention. Policy measures and the threat of public indictment have acted as powerful incentives for transport operators to green their global supply chains. It can be argued though the effective environmental measures are those that are embedded in the company business thinking, and not those only imposed by law. The present paper is the attempt to operationalise this idea in the context of global container transport. In particular, the paper argues that in order to integrate environmental factors in global logistics processes it is necessary to link them to the concept of value delivery through adequate pricing mechanisms. The paper also discusses how non-traditional forms of pricing are a valuable method to integrate the environmental dimension in container shipping and logistics value propositions.