Credibility in crisis: Determining the availability and credibility of online food supply chain resources during the COVID-19 pandemic

Disruptions from COVID-19 forced agricultural business owners to navigate the uncertainty of market disruptions with limited information. As an effect, the quality of information available for agricultural businesses to adapt to changes was a concern. The purpose of this study was to determine the availability and credibility of resources for agricultural businesses to make informed decisions about food markets during COVID-19. Source credibility was the guiding framework to achieve the research objectives of 1) Describe resources available related to impacts of COVID-19 on the food supply chain, 2) Determine the credibility of available resources. A quantitative content and textual analyses were employed. Results revealed 401 terms used to describe resources (n = 779). Eleven of the top 36 terms were used over 100 times. These were: farmer, resources, farm, market, business, local, health, safe, supply, agriculture, and chain. The majority of resources (66%, f = 514) were mid-level credible sources (industry/business organization, online/print news source, nonprofit), and 32.2% (f = 251) were of the highest credibility (university scientists, USDA scientist, Extension). Implications of this work show an opportunity for university and Extension systems to publish resources and serve as credible sources related to this particular crisis.

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The potential of bio certification to strengthen the market position of food producers

Modern Supply Chain Research and Applications ◽

10.1108/mscra-05-2020-0013 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽

Author(s):

Yevhen Kononets ◽

Horst Treiblmaier

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Data Collection ◽

Food Supply ◽

Design Methodology ◽

Food Supply Chain ◽

Food Markets ◽

Content Type ◽

Face To Face ◽

Web Tools ◽

Qualitative Analyses

PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to critically evaluate the applicability of bio certification in farmers' activity to reduce unfair trading practices in the food supply chain. The secondary purposes are describing the economic reasons of using bio certification and perspectives of using web trading platforms among food producers.Design/methodology/approachData collection included face-to-face interviews with 15 Austrian and German farmers who operate on bio food markets as well as a quantitative survey regarding their assessment of unfair trading practices. This study presents both quantitative and qualitative analyses.FindingsBio certification is more likely unable to eliminate or mitigate unfair trading practices in the food supply chain, however bio certification is able to increase efficiency of farmers together with other web tools.Originality/valueThe study is the first to empirically investigate the applicability of bio certifications, its advantages and impact on unfair trading practices in the food supply chain. It focuses on small and medium-sized food producers and farmers. The research also reveals the perspectives of using web trading platforms in farming activity.

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Impact of modern Retail over Food Supply Chain Management

Global Journal For Research Analysis ◽

10.15373/22778160/january2014/71 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 3 (1) ◽

pp. 45-47

Author(s):

N.Arunfred N.Arunfred ◽

◽

Dr.D.Kinslin Dr.D.Kinslin

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Supply Chain Management ◽

Food Supply ◽

Food Supply Chain ◽

Chain Management

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Identifying Business-to-Business Unfair Trading Practices in the Food Supply Chain: The case of Cyprus

New Medit ◽

10.30682/nm2001b ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 19 (1) ◽

pp. 19-34 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Marinos Markou ◽

Andreas Stylianou ◽

Marianthi Giannakopoulou ◽

Georgios Adamides

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Food Supply ◽

Small Businesses ◽

State Level ◽

Strategic Partnerships ◽

Food Supply Chain ◽

National Legislation ◽

Food Supply Chains ◽

Enforcement Policy ◽

Monitoring And Enforcement

Unfair Trading Practices (UTPs) between businesses in the food supply chain have a significant impact on the various stakeholders involved, and on the environment. So far, no attempt has been made at the Member State level for the identification of UTPs in the food supply chain and their impact on the relevant stakeholders. This study drew on this gap and attempted to identify the UTPs that exist in the Cypriot food supply chain, assess their impact on the involved stakeholders and provide guidelines that will assist the transposition of EU relevant Directive to the national law. To achieve this goal, the study was based on a quantitative survey of a representative sample of businesses using a specific questionnaire. The results showed that particular UTPs do appear in the food supply chain with a different frequency, while the majority of businesses have been victims of UTPs in the last five years. Notably, the estimated cost of UTPs as a percentage of the business annual turnover is considered important ranging from 5.7% for retailers to 31.9% for farmers. Thus, most participants agree that UTPs in the agricultural food sector should be regulated by national legislation. We argue that the national legislation for UTPs should be a mix of policies that integrate private, administrative and judicial methods of monitoring and enforcement. Policy and decision makers should seek to reinforce the role and the bargaining power of small businesses in the food supply chain. This might be accomplished through the development of efficient producers’ organizations, short food supply chains, interbranch organizations and strategic partnerships.

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'National Report: Abuse of Superior Bargaining Position under Bulgarian Law,' in Anna Piszcz and Adam Jasser (eds), Legislation Covering Business-to-business Unfair Trading Practices in the Food Supply Chain in Central and Eastern European Countries, Warsaw, 2019

SSRN Electronic Journal ◽

10.2139/ssrn.3389333 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Anton Dinev

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Food Supply ◽

European Countries ◽

Eastern European ◽

Food Supply Chain ◽

National Report ◽

Bargaining Position ◽

Eastern European Countries ◽

Business To Business

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An Agent-Based Model of Regional Food Supply Chain Disintermediation

Agent-Directed Simulation Symposium (ADS 2017) ◽

10.22360/springsim.2017.ads.014 ◽

2017 ◽

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Food Supply ◽

Agent Based Model ◽

Food Supply Chain ◽

Agent Based ◽

Regional Food

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Sustainable Food Logistics Systems

The Oxford Handbook of Supply Chain Management ◽

10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190066727.013.26 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Zhaohui Wu ◽

Madeleine Elinor Pullman

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Food Supply ◽

Food Systems ◽

Food System ◽

New Technology ◽

Cold Chain ◽

Community Supported Agriculture ◽

Food Supply Chain ◽

Sustainable Food ◽

Chain Management

Food supply chain management is becoming a critical management and public policy agenda. Climate change, growing demand, and shifting patterns of food production, delivery, and consumption have elicited a series of new challenges, such as food security, safety, and system resiliency. This chapter first introduces the typical players in a food supply chain and examines the global food system characterized by consolidation and industrialization. It then discusses some critical topics of the sustainable food supply chain that aim to address these challenges. These topics include traceability, transparency, certification and standards, and alternatives to industrialized food systems, including cooperatives, community-supported agriculture, and roles of small and medium-sized growers in regenerative agriculture. The chapter ends with a discussion of several important emerging logistics management topics, including last-mile delivery, new technology, and cold chain management.

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AI-Enabled Efficient and Safe Food Supply Chain

Electronics ◽

10.3390/electronics10111223 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 (11) ◽

pp. 1223

Author(s):

Ilianna Kollia ◽

Jack Stevenson ◽

Stefanos Kollias

Keyword(s):

Supply Chain ◽

Food Supply ◽

Latent Variable ◽

Food Production ◽

Domain Adaptation ◽

Experimental Studies ◽

Food Supply Chain ◽

Food Retail ◽

Expiry Date ◽

Safe Food

This paper provides a review of an emerging field in the food processing sector, referring to efficient and safe food supply chains, ’from farm to fork’, as enabled by Artificial Intelligence (AI). The field is of great significance from economic, food safety and public health points of views. The paper focuses on effective food production, food maintenance energy management and food retail packaging labeling control, using recent advances in machine learning. Appropriate deep neural architectures are adopted and used for this purpose, including Fully Convolutional Networks, Long Short-Term Memories and Recurrent Neural Networks, Auto-Encoders and Attention mechanisms, Latent Variable extraction and clustering, as well as Domain Adaptation. Three experimental studies are presented, illustrating the ability of these AI methodologies to produce state-of-the-art performance in the whole food supply chain. In particular, these concern: (i) predicting plant growth and tomato yield in greenhouses, thus matching food production to market needs and reducing food waste or food unavailability; (ii) optimizing energy consumption across large networks of food retail refrigeration systems, through optimal selection of systems that can be shut-down and through prediction of the respective food de-freezing times, during peaks of power demand load; (iii) optical recognition and verification of food consumption expiry date in automatic inspection of retail packaged food, thus ensuring safety of food and people’s health.

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