Scrutinizing blockchain applicability in sustainable supply chains through an integrated fuzzy multi-criteria decision making framework

Sustainability has become increasingly important over the last three decades and has proven to be a key enabler for constructing resilient supply chains. Customers who want their products to be authenticated for sustainability put pressure on Original Equipment Manufacturers and suppliers to become more sustainable on a global scale. Moreover, social sustainability issues have become more challenging to address, and a growing number of stakeholders put emphasis on societal concerns. To this end, decision-makers are becoming increasingly interested in applying disruptive technologies to address societal, environmental, and economic concerns and accomplish sustainability goals. Researchers argue that disruptive technologies such as blockchain may be implemented to assist supply chains towards building sustainability. However, our literature analysis concluded that existing research has not quantitatively examined the critical functions of sustainable supply chain (SSC) for blockchain applicability using a decision framework. Therefore, this research, through Fuzzy SWARA-COPRAS-EDAS and COPELAND-based framework, is aimed at investigating the most feasible functions of a SSC for potential blockchain implementations. Using this framework, the critical functions of a SSC were ranked against the benefits of blockchain. The findings of this study implied that while sourcing, delivery, transformation and product recovery proved to be the most appropriate functions of SSCs for blockchain applications, customers and product use was the least feasible one. This study aids decision-makers in gaining a more thorough understanding of where in a SSC blockchain may create additional value. (C) 2021 Published by Elsevier B.V.

Automated summary

Sustainability has become increasingly important in constructing resilient supply chains. Customers' demand for sustainable products has put pressure on manufacturers and suppliers to become more sustainable globally. Decision-makers are interested in applying disruptive technologies like blockchain to address societal, environmental, and economic concerns. However, existing research lacks a quantitative examination of the critical functions of sustainable supply chains (SSCs) for blockchain applicability. This study investigates the most feasible functions of SSCs for potential blockchain implementations and suggests that sourcing, delivery, transformation, and product recovery are the most appropriate functions. This research provides valuable insights for decision-makers on where blockchain can create additional value in SSCs.