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1.6 Green supply chain management
The concept of green supply chain management was first introduced by US
Michigan State University in 1996 [28], the authors have drawn on the results of interviews
with five environmental managers in the furniture industry to develop a taxonomy of
environmentally-friendly (green) supply chain best practices. The results suggest that
in order to be successful, environmental management strategies must be integrated in
all stages of the supply chain, including procurement, manufacturing, packaging and
logistics. While the potential for performance improvement in all five of the companies
is evident, all of them demonstrated “pockets” of environmentally-friendly practices
(EFP) in different stages of their respective supply chains. US and other parts of the
academic world begun to study various aspects of the green supply chain management
[3], [29], [34], [48], [55].
Green supply chain management (GSCM) involves traditional supply chain
management practices, which integrate environmental criteria, or concerns, into
organisational purchasing decisions and long-term relationships with suppliers [24].
GSCM is defined as integrating environmental thinking into supply chain management,
including product design, material sourcing and selection, manufacturing and delivering
the final product to the customers, its consumpiton and end of serviceability [55].
A green supply chains aims at confining the wastes within the industrial system in
order to conserve energy and prevents the dissipation of dangerous materials into
the environment. It recognises the disproportionate environmental impact of supply
chain processes within an organisation. GSCM is often perceived as a new innovative
managerial tool, which can be used as a strategic weapon to gain competitiveness and to
simultaneously promote a firm’s environmental and financial performance [27]. GSCM
as a strategy to gain competitive advantage means that there is substantial interest
amongst the companies to take action to decrease their environmental impact. The goal
of adding value to the business and reducing costs in all parts of the production system
is identified as key drivers in order to increase competitiveness. The companies agree
that the common manufacturing objectives such as cost, quality, delivery and flexibility
will not be enough in order to stay competitive when external stakeholders require an
increased focus on sustainability [42]. Some famous foreign multinational companies
such as the Ford Motor Company, Hewlett-Packard Company, Valuable Clean Group
and General Electric Company regarded supply chain management as a strategic asset
and corporate culture acquiring corporate competitive advantage to filter into various
parts, various departments and employees.
As in the past and so also in the present, the practice of GSCM is understood
as a multi-dimensional concept which can be measured from different perspectives and
at different dimensions of GSCM practices. Already in 2005 Zhu et al. [64], proposed
a four-dimensional GSCM practices, namely internal environmental management,
external GSCM, eco-design and investment recovery. Holt and Ghobadian [32] suggested
internal environmental management practices, logistics, supplier assessment and evaluation,
green procurement and logistics policy, supplier education and mentoring, and industrial
networks as important GSCM practices. For example, according to Ninlawan et al. [43]
and Thoo et al. [58], green procurement, green manufacturing, green distribution and