Supermarket retailers - is your supply chain really as green as it should be?

Abstract

This short paper considers the issue of environmental supply chain transparency of retailers. It explains why progress on environmental issues in the retail sector depends not only on what retailers do, but on what their suppliers do. It explains the role of supply chain information in helping diagnose environmental supply chain issues, and how creating a database of public domain information from a wide variety of public domain sources can help. It then considers how use of advanced analytical techniques based on artificial intelligence can accelerate and simplify access to this information, allowing retailers to identify problem areas amongst suppliers quickly and efficiently. It examines a case study of a leading British grocery retailer to show what such data and analysis can reveal. Finally, it identifies all the stakeholders who need such analyses, and recommends actions they should take to improve retail compliance with environmental supply chain requirements.