Cross-docking Centre Location in a Supply Chain Network: A Social Network Analysis Approach

The level of uncertainty, unpredictability and complexity is magnified in a food supply chain as compared to the conventional supply chains such as automobile and FMCG. This is mainly because of the short product shelf life and the need of high variety. This necessitates the food industry to adopt various quick response systems to achieve effective supply chain management. The situation becomes even more critical when dealing with humanitarian relief operations where time window is very short (usually 24 hours). One of the solutions which are adopted in modern food supply chains is to locate cross-docking centre (CDC). Cross-docking is used to reduce the turnaround time of the food products. The practical situation is complex as it caters to multiple customers. The number of suppliers, in such cases, plays a significant role. Selection of a right CDC is, therefore, a crucial task. It is a strategic decision and needs to be taken by considering the relationships between each stakeholder present in the supply chain. In this article, we present an approach to select one (or few) CDC/s facilities among n CDCs. The method is based on the relationship between each actor (actors are the stakeholders in the supply chain). The relationship is in terms of the physical flow of materials or information flow or another kind of flows or relationships that connects them to form a network. These network characteristics are required to find out key stakeholders. The present article proposes the application of social network analysis (SNA) to analyse the characteristics of the network, thus helping supply chain managers to locate strategic CDCs considering both qualitative and quantitative aspects. The proposed methodology can be easily extended to locate temporary warehouse site in the context of humanitarian relief operations.