Prioritising Factors Affecting Cold Chain Logistics Performance and Their Implication for Sustainability

Abstract

A significant portion of agricultural and healthcare products share the feature of being perishable. If not properly handled from the point of production to their use or consumption, using cold chain logistics (CCL) systems, their quality deteriorates causing economic, social, and environmental consequences. The focus must extend beyond boosting agricultural productivity and investing in procuring pharmaceuticals to include robust CCL practices that reduce perishable product losses during grading, sorting, packing, storage, processing, and transportation considering sustainability. The CCL in developing countries lags behind, is in the nascent stage, is not much explored, and faces challenges; there is paucity of previous studies addressing issues of sustainability. This study aims to prioritise factors affecting perishable products’ CCL performance and their implication for sustainability. After conducting a comprehensive literature review, and consulting experts and practitioners, the study employed thematic analysis to generate factors affecting perishable products’ CCL performance. The study employed the decisionmaking trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) technique to identify and categorise CCL performance-related factors into cause and effect groups. Subsequently, total interpretive structural modelling (TISM) and cross-impact matrix multiplication applied to classification (MICMAC) were employed to establish interrelationships among the factors. The study identified and prioritised factors affecting perishable products’ CCL performance and their implication for sustainability. The findings of this study will guide perishable products’ supply chain leaders and government officials what to focus on for reducing losses and improving sustainability.

Keywords: Perishable, Cold Chain Logistics, Sustainability, Thematic Analysis, DEMATEL Analysis

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