Decision support for innovative and sustainable e-grocery logistics
Abstract
E-groceries, i.e. buying and selling food products online, is gaining increased interest, especially in urban city centers. To keep products fresh, providers have to deliver goods quickly, requiring substantial logistical efforts to guarantee service quality. Delivery of such orders to customers, however, is challenging as delays and inefficiencies lead to high costs and further contribute to food waste. The focus of this work is on inventory and delivery strategies. While in traditional brick and mortar stores, e.g., supermarkets, customers can select the product based on quality and expiration date, in e-groceries, primarily the provider performs this selection, which has a considerable impact on food waste, customer satisfaction and service quality. Shipping goods close to expiration reduces spoilage and food waste; however, customers prefer products with a long-lasting shelf life. This conflict and its impact on food logistics is little studied even though it has major implications to various stakeholders such as customers, e-grocery providers, logistic partners and policy-makers. To support sustainable provision of food to urban city centers as well as to contribute to a reduction in food waste, this project develops a decision support system to plan, route and schedule food deliveries to end-customers. Therefore, different inventory policies, e.g., first-in-first-out, first-expired-first-out, last-in-last-out, and different delivery modes, e.g., direct door-to-door delivery or consolidation strategies, are investigated in this work within an agent-based simulation. This simulation is further integrated in a decision support system and combined with geographic information systems and logistical optimization methods to analyze the given problem settings. Based on various test scenarios originating from Vienna, Austria, different delivery and inventory policies are investigated. Furthermore, managerial and policy implications are provided and discussed in this project to facilitate innovation in urban food logistics and to contribute to a reduction in food waste.
Food Logistics Decision Support Simulation Optimization E-Grocery Food Waste
Publikationen
A Decision Support System To Reduce Food Waste In E-Grocery Logistics
Autoren: Fikar, C Jahr: 2017
Conference & Workshop proceedings, paper, abstract
Project staff
Christian Fikar
Dr.rer.soc.oec. Christian Fikar MSc.
christian.fikar@boku.ac.at
Project Leader
01.01.2017 - 14.06.2018
Patrick Hirsch
Assoc. Prof. Priv.-Doz. Mag. Dr. Patrick Hirsch
patrick.hirsch@boku.ac.at
Tel: +43 1 47654-73419
Project Leader
15.06.2018 - 31.12.2018