Strategic decision support systems for short supply chain development in the agrifood sector

Abstract

There has been an interest in short food supply chain recently which has stemmed from the need of improving the flow both of products and information from suppliers to customers. Although, many tools have been developed in order to increase the performance of supply chain, they haven't succeeded in helping managers make strategic decisions concerning the operations of the short food supply one. In the agrifood sector, practitioners face short food supply chains as integrated systems that incorporate all the processes of traditional supply chains. Thus, decision support systems (DSSs) are required to help managers handle these processes properly. Most of the existing studies focus on the improvement of individual firms or processes more than on the design of an entire food supply chain. So, the purpose of this paper is to propose such a strategic DSS model that based on the Strategic information systems planning (SISP) process, could provide a holistic approach to effective decision making in short supply chain in the agrifood industry. This model supports product managers to improve the effectiveness of food supply operations.