Mainstream Supply Research Articles

Lessons learned from humanitarian logistics to manage supply chain disruptions

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) outbreak affects not just populations but also global and local economies and supply chains. The outbreak itself has impacted on production lines and manufacturing capacities. In response to the outbreak, policies have been put in place that blocks the movement of people and materials, causing supply chain disruptions. Mainstream supply chain management has been at a loss in responding to these disruptions, mostly due to a dominant focus on minimizing costs for stable operations, while following lean, just‐in‐time, and zero‐inventory approaches. On the other hand, pandemic response supply chains, and their related supply chain disruptions, share many characteristics with disaster response and thereby with humanitarian supply chains. Much can thus be learned from humanitarian supply chains for managing pandemic‐related supply chain disruptions. What is more, facing, and managing, supply chain disruptions can be considered the new norm also in light of other disruptive forces such as climate change, or financial or political crises. This article therefore presents lessons learned from humanitarian supply chains that help mitigate and overcome supply chain disruptions. These lessons not only relate to preparedness and mobilization, but also relate to standardization, innovation, and collaboration. Together, they brace organizations, supply chains, and societies, to manage current and future disruptions.

천음속 선형 터빈 캐스케이드에서 막냉각 및 내부냉각이 적용된 2단 터빈 베인의 냉각성능 연구: 전냉각효율 측정

The present study investigated the cooling performance of the second stage turbine nozzle vane using a transonic linear turbine cascade test facility. For experiments, 500 hp or 2,250 hp compressor and electric heaters were used for mainstream supply and 50 hp compressor for secondary flow supply and a single nozzle vane with adjusted sidewalls on each side of the nozzle was installed in the test section. The test nozzle model having complex cooling configuration was made of Inconel 718 using metal 3D printing technique. The overall cooling effectiveness of the cooled turbine nozzle vane was measured using two Infrared cameras. Four different sets of experiments were conducted under two different mainstream conditions, subsonic and transonic conditions and the corresponding Reynolds numbers of the mainstream are 6.5x10SUP5/SUP and 1.3x10SUP6/SUP based on chord length, respectively. The results showed that overall cooling effectiveness on the nozzle vane surface is dominated by internal heat convection in a rib-roughened surface, film cooling flow around the leading edge region and heat conduction around the hole and pin-fins. When comparing the results at different inlet Reynolds numbers of the internal cooling passage, the internal cooling configuration has more dominant effect on overall cooling performance than film cooling. Therefore it is obvious that overall cooling effectiveness as well as film cooling effectiveness should be taken into account to assess exact cooling performance and characteristics on turbine nozzle vane cooling design.

Resource Security Strategies and Their Environmental and Economic Implications: A Case Study of Copper Production in Japan

Japan is a nation which is highly dependent on the import of raw materials to supply its manufacturing industry, notable among them copper. When extracting copper from ore, a large amount of energy is required, typically leading to high levels of CO2 emissions due to the fossil fuel-dominated energy mix. Moreover, maintaining security of raw material supply is difficult if imports are the only source utilized. This study examines the environmental and economic impacts of domestic mineral production from the recycling of end-of-life products and deep ocean mining as strategies to reduce CO2 emissions and enhance security of raw material supplies. The results indicate that under the given assumptions, recycling, which is typically considered to be less CO2 intensive, produces higher domestic emissions than current copper processing, although across the whole supply chain shows promise. As the total quantity of domestic resources from deep ocean ores are much smaller than the potential from recycling, it is possible that recycling could become a mainstream supply alternative, while deep ocean mining is more likely to be a niche supply source. Implications of a progressively aging society and flow-on impacts for the recycling sector are discussed.

A Counterfeit Solution for Pharma Supply Chain

This paper provides a detailed overview of the blockchain technology and how it can be used to build a foolproof system in eliminating counterfeit products in pharmaceutical industries. Study by various reports indicate that counterfeit products entering the mainstream supply is by far one of the ma

Domestic soybean to compensate the European protein deficit: illusion or real market opportunity?

This article is an attempt to analyse the potential for EU-grown soybean to become a credible market alternative in order to reduce the European protein deficit. The analysis is conducted from the perspective of the European feed industry. The market analysis shows that the EU has very little control on its soybean supply. Moreover, the nature of the EU protein deficit calls for an increase of the availability of protein-rich ingredients. With a favourable outlook from the point of view of the demand, the most relevant growth model should be determined in order to improve the competiveness of soybean for EU arable crops farmers. The two main options are niche markets as a first step to reach mainstream supply or a more direct approach towards mainstream supply which would very probably require public support.

Growing local: case studies on local food supply chains

In an increasingly commercialized world, the demand for better quality, healthier food has given rise to one of the fastest growing segments of the U.S. food system: locally grown food. Many believe that relocalization of the food system will provide a range of public benefits, including lower carbon emissions, increased local economic activity, and closer connections between consumers, farmers, and communities. The structure of local food supply chains, however, may not always be capable of generating these perceived benefits. Growing Local reports the findings from a coordinated series of case studies designed to develop a deeper, more nuanced understanding of how local food products reach consumers and how local food supply chains compare with mainstream supermarket supply chains. To better understand how local food reaches the point of sale, Growing Local uses case study methods to rigorously compare local and mainstream supply chains for five products in five metropolitan areas along multiple social, economic, and environmental dimensions, highlighting areas of growth and potential barriers. Growing Local provides a foundation for a better understanding of the characteristics of local food production and emphasizes the realities of operating local food supply chains.

Print E-mail The Farm Fresh Healthcare Project: Analysis of a Hybrid Values-based Supply Chain

An emerging literature on values-based supply chains offers models for meeting both the scale-based requirements and values-based goals of farm-to-institution initiatives. These models seek to incorporate conventional supply chain norms of efficiency, standardization, and affordability while meeting the diverse social and environmental values motivating the local food movement. Values-based supply chain models to date have been derived largely from cases of farmer cooperatives and food hubs that have purposefully designed their operations to incorporate alternative agrifood movement values. A model that deserves more attention is hybrid values-based supply chains that incorporate both conventional and alternative resources, infrastructure, and markets. Of the few studies examining hybrid models, some point to benefits such as established supply chain relationships, expertise, and infrastructure that match the needs of institutional purchasers, while others argue that conventional intermediaries reproduce marginalizing structures of mainstream supply chains. This paper explores these tensions through analysis of the Farm Fresh Healthcare Project (FFHP), a farm-to-hospital initiative in the San Francisco Bay Area that engages a set of hospitals' existing regional produce distributors to supply products from local small and midscale family farmers. By engaging conventional intermediaries, the project benefited from existing supply chain infrastructure shaped by norms of efficiency, standardization, and affordability. This paper analyzes the extent to which FFHP actors succeed in embedding in their supply chains a range of non-economic values, including transparency, communication of qualities of provenance and production, decision-making equity, environmental stewardship, and social equity in the form of supporting small and midscale family farmers.

Effects of transaction costs on mushroom producers’ choice of marketing channels: implications for agricultural market access in Swaziland

Mushrooms are highly perishable agricultural commodities, and as such their marketing is invariably associated with high transaction costs. Despite the mushroom enterprise gaining popularity in a number of sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries, where production is dominated by rural-based small-scale farmers, no research has been done to study the nature and complexity of transaction costs encountered by these producers in attempting to participate in mainstream supply chains. This study uses cross-section data obtained in 2011/2012 from mushroom producers in Swaziland to study the effects of transaction costs on producers’ choice of marketing channels and the quantity of mushrooms supplied. Having used Cragg’s model for analysis, the results indicate that producers’ decisions of where to sell their mushrooms are significantly affected by household labour endowment, production capacity, access to cooling facilities and market information, and producers’ bargaining position. Meanwhile, the quantities of mushrooms sold are significantly influenced by the difficulty in accessing reliable transport and producers’ level of uncertainty in meeting buyers’ quality requirements. The study concludes by highlighting potential interventions that could minimise marketing and transaction costs and further improve the general agricultural marketing environment in Swaziland.

A Simulation Supply Chain Model for a Sustainable and Environment Friendly Poultry Industry: Insights from Bangladesh

The focuses on environment and reverse supply chain have increased in recent years among academic and industry circle. Yet, Bangladesh poultry is to achieve environmental sustainability in her extended forward and reverse supply chain. In this paper, supply chain model developed based on a case poultry industry. Design science and case method under positivist and quantitative paradigm followed to develop simulation model using simul8 application to fit the real poultry case. The objectives of this paper are to review literature, develop simulation supply chain model and later tested it through historic data. The results briefly discussed and model capturing the relationship among forward, reverse and mainstream supply chain of the case. Different random trial runs of the simulation model have shown in the result section to find out optimality.