dc.description.abstract | Changing market dynamics make shippers want responsive supply chains. They also want to create more sustainable, environmentally conscious supply chains with the aim of meeting stringent regulations and anticipating main competitors. These developments are prompting some executives to re-evaluate current supply chain strategies, the role 3PL provides, relationships with their 3PL providers, and how a 3PL provider could help customers with green supply chain initiatives.
However, the 3PL evaluation model suggested before seem to focus partially either on generic 3PL purchasing circumstances or on supplier’s environmental performance; therefore, important 3PL evaluation criteria for a supply chain perspective and the linkage between 3PL and green supply chain are identified through literature review and pre-test analysis and are modeled within a AHP decision-making framework.
This study concluded that the critical dimensions in evaluating 3PL providers for GSCM are enumerated as follows: general company considerations, general environmental considerations, capability to help with the greening of processes and supply chain, long-term relationship, fit between logistics practices and supply chain structure, capability to improve environmental efficiency; expected capability of process and supply chain improvement, green purchasing and investment are less valued by shippers, which manifests that although user respondents believe 3PL providers can help with the greening of processes and supply chain operations, and they are closely considering the strategic logistics services 3PL providers can offer, they still need to be shown that their 3PL providers have the capabilities and deep business expertise needed to move to the strategic partner level. The top 12 criteria are “quality of services”, “price of services”, “ISO 14000 certification”, “facilitating reverse logistics”, “environmental staff training”, “quality of management”, “global capabilities”, “improving transportation and/or docking scheduling”, “improving transportation efficiency”, “capable IT”, “providing efficient inventory management” and “flexibility in operations and delivery”.
Last, the results of the empirical validation show that the proposed 3PL evaluation model for GSCM is feasible in real-world practices.
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