An Integrated Model for the Harvest, Storage, and Distribution of Perishable Crops

Coordination of the production and distribution activities represents a significant opportunity to cut costs and limit waste in the food supply chains. In this paper, we propose two mathematical models. The first one aims to integrate the harvesting, storage, and distribution activities of an agricultural company dealing with perishable products. The second one promotes horizontal collaboration between heterogeneous agri-companies for the distribution phase, in order to achieve cost savings. Computational experiments, conducted on a set of real-life instances, confirm the effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed models, which provide multi-level support. At the tactical level, managerial insights suggest the most profitable parameter setting, in terms of harvesting frequency and quality of service. At the operational level, the use of a heuristic framework can support the decision-making of the companies, suggesting when collaboration is profitable.

Automated summary

The paper proposes two mathematical models for coordinating production and distribution activities in agricultural companies to reduce costs and increase efficiency. Computational experiments confirm the effectiveness of the models, providing multi-level support. Managers can use the insights provided by the models to set the most profitable parameters, while a heuristic framework can aid companies in making profitable collaboration decisions at the operational level.