Abstract

Food supply chains are receiving increased attention due to rapid depletion of natural resources, increasing quality standards and rising food safety and security concerns. Implementing sustainability practices in food supply chains is believed to overcome such emerging challenges. However, limited studies address sustainability implementation concerns, particularly in cold food supply chains. Thus, this study attempts to identify factors hindering sustainability implementation in cold food chain networks by considering a case of UK artisan cheese producers. Survey data is utilised to identify and prioritise barriers for implementing sustainability following fuzzy analytic hierarchy process and sensitivity analysis. The analysis identified several key barriers, including initial investment cost, firm size and unawareness of government regulations. The internal barriers significantly dominate the implementation of sustainability practices in comparison to external barriers. Lack of consensus regarding the concept of sustainability by different stakeholders is observed to be an issue negatively affecting the level of integration in SMEs. Findings will help food and dairy SME's in gaining competitive advantage through the successful implementation of sustainability practices.

摘要

由于自然资源的迅速枯竭、质量标准的提高以及食品安全和保障问题的日益严重，食品供应链正受到越来越多的关注。在食品供应链中实施可持续性实践被认为可以克服这些新出现的挑战。然而，有限的研究解决了可持续性实施问题，特别是在冷食供应链中。因此，本研究试图通过考虑英国手工奶酪生产商的案例来确定阻碍冷食链网络可持续性实施的因素。在模糊层次分析过程和敏感性分析之后，调查数据用于识别和优先考虑实施可持续性的障碍。分析确定了几个关键障碍，包括初始投资成本、公司规模和对政府法规的不了解。与外部障碍相比，内部障碍在很大程度上主导了可持续性实践的实施。据观察，不同利益相关者对可持续性概念缺乏共识是对中小企业整合水平产生负面影响的一个问题。调查结果将帮助食品和乳制品中小企业通过成功实施可持续发展实践获得竞争优势。