fuzzy multi objective approach for optimal selection of suppliers and transportation decisions in an eco efficient closed loop supply chain network abstract establishment of a closed loop supply chain clsc network has attracted immense significance due to government policies and societal demand for environmental consciousness however to enhance the financial and ecological impact of the network the forward and reverse supply chain networks must integrate well so that decisions taken in both areas complement each other in this study we propose an eco efficient clsc design for extending the existing supply chain of an indian firm that assembles inkjet printers the network design is configured as a multi objective model in a multi period setting and is mathematically formulated into a mixed integer programming problem with fuzzy objectives fuzziness provides flexibility to the decision makers because they must accommodate the conflicting nature of the objectives the fuzzy multi objective model incorporates the firm s economic and environmental concerns into the decision making process by selecting environmentally responsible suppliers to procure components based on sustainable criteria choosing appropriate recovery options for end of use eou inkjet printers and planning an efficient transportation network design for reducing the carbon emission of the distribution and collection activities the uniqueness of the proposed fuzzy clsc optimization model lies in providing an integrated decision making framework that can aid the manufacturer in making crucial strategic tactical and operational decisions of optimal selection of suppliers component order allocation recovery flow allocation and vehicle routing planning the novelty of the model also lies in simultaneously minimising the overall cost of the activities undertaken maximizing the performance of the component suppliers and minimising the carbon emissions of the associated transportation activities a weighted fuzzy mathematical programming approach is utilised for generating a fuzzy properly efficient solution as the desired compromised solution for the clsc network problem configuration the relevance of the model is justified using a real data set derived from a case study of the firm based in the northern capital region ncr of india the findings indicate that the proposed integrated clsc network model enables the firm in gaining sustainably from the numerous electronic product reuse opportunities in the indian market further while costly to begin with choosing suppliers with higher sustainable performance and vehicles with lesser emission rate could substantially enhance firm s sustainable image and result in higher profits in the future

biofuel investment in tanzania omissions in implementation abstract increasing demand for biofuels as a component of climate change mitigation energy security and a fossil fuel alternative attracts investors to developing countries like tanzania ample unused land is critical for first generation biofuels production and an important feature to attract foreign direct investments that can contribute towards agricultural modernization and poverty reduction initiatives despite the economic justifications the existing institutional and infrastructural capacities dictate the impacts of biofuels market penetrations furthermore exogenous factors like global recessionary pressure depressed oil prices below the level at which biofuel production were profitable in 2007 making tanzania s competitiveness and potential benefits questionable this paper investigates the extent that first generation jatropha based biofuels industry development in tanzania observed during fieldwork in kisarawe and bahi may fulfill policy objectives this paper argues that without strong regulatory frameworks for land investment management and rural development biofuel industrialization could further exacerbate poverty and food insecurity in tanzania the paper concludes with policy recommendations for first generation biofuel development while keeping in mind implications of second generation production since the topic is broad and multifaceted a multidisciplinary approach is used that includes political institutional and agricultural economics to analyze and conceptualize biofuel industry development and food security

the low skill trap recently it has become popular to argue that certain workers have fallen into a trap in which they have poor skills few job opportunities and a low return on training while others have not this paper demonstrates how such a trap can occur within a simple matching model with rent sharing rent sharing diminishes the worker s incentive to acquire skills however since firms also benefit from training rent sharing likewise induces job creation the subsequent improved matching prospects may offset the initial disincentive to invest however for this mechanism to be effective firms and workers must coordinate their actions if they do not the trap occurs

entrepreneurship start up costs and employment abstract we study the effects of business start up costs on employment in a model with managers workers and matching we show that higher start up costs discourage entrepreneurs and increase the fraction of the population who become workers job creation suffers and employment settles at a lower level we illustrate with evidence from major oecd economies where large variations in start up costs are correlated with large variations in employment levels

entrepreneurship selection and performance a meta analysis of the impact of education in developing economies this meta analytical review of empirical studies of the impact of schooling on entrepreneurship in selection and performance in developing economies looks at variations impact across specific characteristics of the studies a marginal year of schooling in developing economies raises enterprise income by an average of 5 5 percent which is close to the average return in industrial countries the return varies however by gender rural or urban residence and the share of agriculture in the economy furthermore more educated workers typically end up in wage employment and prefer nonfarm entrepreneurship to farming the education effect that separates workers into self employment and wage employment is stronger for women possibly stronger in urban areas and also stronger in the least developed economies where agriculture is more dominant and literacy rates are lower

operations research for green logistics an overview of aspects issues contributions and challenges the worldwide economic growth of the last century has given rise to a vast consumption of goods while globalization has led to large streams of goods all over the world the production transportation storage and consumption of all these goods however have created large environmental problems today global warming created by large scale emissions of greenhouse gasses is a top environmental concern governments action groups and companies are asking for measures to counter this threat operations research has a long tradition in improving operations and especially in reducing costs in this paper we present a review that highlights the contribution of operations research to green logistics which involves the integration of environmental aspects in logistics we give a sketch of the present and possible developments focussing on design planning and control in a supply chain for transportation inventory of products and facility decisions while doing this we also indicate several areas where environmental aspects could be included in or models for logistics

biofuels in developing countries are comparative advantages enough this paper investigates the role of comparative advantage on biofuel policy adoption results show that different countries have different drivers to create biofuel policies gdp proves to be more significant for oecd countries while arable land and feedstock prices are more significant for non oecd countries land allocation may also be of importance we speculate that a naturally endowed comparative advantage may not necessarily equate to a successful biofuel industry

social and techno economical analysis of biodiesel production in peru peru has introduced a law to promote the use of biofuels with the objective to increase employment strengthening agriculture development providing an economic alternative to illegal drug production in this work the costs of biodiesel production from oil palm and jatropha were analyzed under different scenarios they include the participation of associations of smallholders and commercial producers as raw material provides in biodiesel business in peru the scenarios considered have a strong social dimension in which they explicitly consider how productions 39 costs change when smallholders supply a proportion of the feedstock to the industry production cost profiles were generated using the chemical process simulation and economical evaluation software packages provided by aspen technology total production cost found for oil palm biodiesel production ranged between 0 23 and 0 31 usd l and jatropha biodiesel production costs were between 0 84 and 0 87 usd l these production costs were analyzed and compared to biodiesel ex factory prices and diesel fuel production cost factors the results suggest that including smallholders in the supply chain can be under some conditions competitive with liquid biofuel production systems that are purely large scale c 2012 elsevier ltd all rights reserved

reducing start up costs for new firms the double dividend on the labor market starting a firm with expansive potential is an option for educated and high skilled workers if there are labor market frictions this additional option can be seen as reducing the chances of ending up in a low wage job and hence as increasing the incentives for education in a matching model we show that reducing the start up costs for new firms results in higher take up rates of education it also gives rise through a thick market externality to higher rates of job creation for high skilled labor as well as average match productivity we provide empirical evidence to support our argument

biofuels and food security micro evidence from ethiopia abstract there is considerable controversy about the impact of biofuels on food security in developing countries a major concern is that biofuels reduce food security by increasing food prices in this paper we use survey evidence to assess the impact of castor production on poor and food insecure rural households in ethiopia about 1 3 of poor farmers have allocated on average 15 of their land to the production of castor beans under contract in biofuel supply chains castor production significantly improves their food security they have fewer months without food and the amount of food they consume increases castor cultivation is beneficial for participating households food security in several ways by generating cash income from castor contracts they can store food for the lean season castor beans preserve well on the field which allows sales when farmers are in need of cash or food spillover effects of castor contracts increases the productivity of food crops increased food crop productivity offsets the amount of land used for castor so that the total local food supply is not affected

integrated fuzzy multi criteria decision making method and multi objective programming approach for supplier selection and order allocation in a green supply chain abstract an organization s environmental performance is affected by its suppliers environmental performance and selecting green suppliers is a strategic decision in order to be more competitive in today s global market the supplier selection problem involves several quantitative and qualitative criteria in the supplier selection process if suppliers have limited capacity or other constraints it is necessary to determine the best supplier and order quantity of each supplier in this paper we present an integrated approach of fuzzy multi attribute utility theory and multi objective programming for rating and selecting the best green suppliers according to economic and environmental criteria and then allocating the optimum order quantities among them at first the fuzzy analytic hierarchy process and fuzzy technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution is applied in order to analyze the importance of multiple criteria by incorporating experts opinion and to determine the best green suppliers next multi objective linear programming is used to consider and to formulate various constraints such as quality control capacity and other objectives the objective of the mathematical model is simultaneously to maximize the total value of purchasing and to minimize the total cost of purchasing to handle the subjectivity of decision makers preferences fuzzy logic has been applied the efficiency and application of the proposed approach has been illustrated with a case study in an automobile manufacturing company the obtained results help firms establish a systematic approach for tackling green supplier selection and order allocation problems in a realistic situation finally managerial implications conclusions and directions for additional research are introduced

closed loop supply chain network equilibrium under legislation this paper expands previous work dealing with oligopolistic supply chains to the field of closed loop supply chains the model presented has been formulated with the intent of examining issues surrounding the recent european union directive regarding waste of electric and electronic equipment weee the network modelled consists of manufacturers and consumer markets engaged in a cournot pricing game with perfect information closed loop supply chain network equilibrium occurs when all players agree on volumes shipped and prices charged certain properties of the model are examined analytically numeric examples are included and have been solved using an extragradient method with constant step size the equilibrium solution obtained provide interesting insights that lead into a number of areas for future research

biofuel development in ghana policies of expansion and drivers of failure in the jatropha sector abstract biofuel development was mainly promoted in several parts of africa as an energy security or rural development strategy jatropha was the biofuel feedstock that received the most interest across africa from investors however jatropha expansion gave rise to a number of contested issues which produced conflicts winners and losers access to land was at the heart of several of these conflicts though some success stories of individual jatropha projects have been documented the overwhelming majority of these projects in africa have either collapsed or faced significant difficulties understanding the reasons behind the failure of the jatropha sector is an important gap in the academic literature while the lessons learnt from failed projects could inform future policies and practices this literature review synthesizes the key drivers of failure of the jatropha sector in ghana as identified in the literature and complemented through site visits and expert interviews it identifies a number of reasons behind the failure of individual jatropha projects such as poor business planning institutional barriers limited community participation unfair compensation practices obstacles posed by civil society and unconstructive involvement of chiefs the findings indicate the systemic nature of these problems as they often worked synergistically to catalyse the collapse of many jatropha projects in ghana re vitalising the biofuel and especially the jatropha industry is virtually impossible given the current challenges this would require a renewed political interest in ghana particularly to deal with the deficits of the land administration institutions

macroeconomic effects of regulation and deregulation in goods and labor markets product and labor market deregulation reduce and redistribute rents leading economic players to adjust to this new distribution it typically comes with distribution and dynamic effects to study these effects we build a macroeconomic model on two central assumptions monopolistic competition in the goods market which determines the size of rents and bargaining in the labor market which determines the distribution of rents product market regulation determines entry costs and the degree of competition labor market regulation determines the bargaining power of workers we show the effects of deregulation we then use our results to discuss the political economy of deregulation and recent macroeconomic evolutions in europe

role of multiple stakeholders and the critical success factor theory for the sustainable supplier selection process abstract the concept of sustainability has become an essential theme for many industries and organisations due to a heightened sensitivity towards environmental protection and social responsibility at the same time firms still need to achieve economic viability and retain their competitive advantage because suppliers are the first entity and the initial source of any supply chain organisations should select their suppliers by a careful evaluation of their critical success factors csf achieving a successful sustainable supply chain management sscm strategy requires a firm to consider its stakeholders views based on the csf theory and by considering the multi stakeholders view in a sustainability perspective this work provides a decision support system for the sustainable supplier selection sss problem in a real world textile industry located in the emerging economy of india through a three phase methodology this study examines indian suppliers by considering the sustainability views of various stakeholders including employees customers researchers shareholders and a government environmental officer the csf priorities show that the first four influential csfs are categorized as social concerns i e maintaining long term relationships and alliances stakeholder empowerment equity labour sources and individual human rights the fifth factor is an environmental issue i e production of polluting agents among the five suppliers being evaluated in this work supplier 4 receives the top ranking specifically the results show that the supplier rankings are highly influenced by csf s social dimensions hence to validate the influence of csf s social dimensions in relation to the sss process a sensitivity analysis has been done by varying the respective weights the study concludes with the relevant managerial implications and limitations

efficiency of investment in human and physical capital in a model of bilateral search and bargaining a matching model is used to analyze the effect of search frictions on incentives to invest in human and physical capital equilibrium involves inefficient low levels of investment the source of the inefficiency cannot be attributed solely to either search or bargaining schemes that assist matching are pareto improving while the ratio of workers to firms remains fixed intermediaries that pay owners according to the amount of capital carried into the market are able to generate efficient outcomes such intervention may not eliminate inefficiencies when the ratio is endogenized policy implications include encouragement of investment even while abstracting from growth this paper examines investment in human and physical capital in an environment with explicit frictions in particular i analyze a random matching model where workers must search for employers and vice versa but one that is generalized beyond the previous literature to include ex ante investments on both sides of the market 2 the model generates equilibria with inefficiently low levels of investment to identify the source of the inefficiency its robustness to variations in the environment is considered i also analyze a generalized version of the model in which individuals can choose whether to invest in physical or human capital i e whether to become employers or workers the model predicts that the

potential impacts of biofuel development on food security in botswana a contribution to energy policy abstract biofuel development continues to be a critical development strategy in africa because it promises to be an important part of the emerging bio economy however there is a growing concern that the pattern of biofuel development is not always consistent with the principles of sustainable development this paper assesses the potential of the impacts of biofuel development on food security in botswana drawing on informal and semi structured interviews the paper concludes that there is potential for the development of biofuels in botswana without adverse effects on food security due mainly to availability of idle land which accounted for 72 of agricultural land in the eastern part of the country in 2008 it is suggested that farmers could be incentivized to produce energy crops and more food from such land although it is hypothesized that the implementation of biofuel development programmes in other countries had an impact on local commodity prices during the period 2005 2008 in botswana it is argued that local biofuel production may not necessarily lead to a substantial increase in commodity food prices because land availability is not a major issue the paper makes policy recommendations for sustainable biofuel development in botswana

bio diesel a global scenario abstract recent days underground carbon resources are dwindling at a faster rate this triggered primary interest in development of bio fuel as substitute to petroleum based fuel for alleviating world energy and economic crisis this review explores the environmental impacts of bio fuels on the road transportation and a large scale impact of bio fuel crops on food based agricultural lands which are now more gainfully used for churning out vehicle fuel a global bio diesel production is depicted with an appropriate data from 1991 to 2012 also this article explains in detail the bio diesel status which includes crop type climatic conditions yield oil concentration land use availability and policy impacts of 27 different countries across the world in addition this article extends to classify the potential bio fuel feedstocks obtainable in each country

sustainability of biofuels in latin america risks and opportunities several latin american countries are setting up biofuel programmes to establish alternative markets for agricultural commodities this is mainly triggered by the current success of brazilian bioethanol production for the domestic market and for export furthermore the global biofuel market is expected to increase due to ambitious biofuel programmes in the eu and in the usa colombia venezuela costa rica and guatemala are focusing on bioethanol production from sugarcane whereas biofuel production in argentina is based on soy biodiesel recent developments of the biofuel sector take place extremely rapid especially in argentina which became one of the five largest biodiesel producers in the world in 2008 till date no specific biofuel sustainability certification systems have been implemented in latin american as well as on global level this fact and the predominant use of food crops for biofuel production raise concerns about the sustainability of biofuel production related to environmental and social aspects this paper provides an overview of the hotspots of conflicts in biofuel production in latin america it investigates presently available sustainability tools and initiatives to ensure sustainable biofuel production in latin america finally it provides an outlook on how to integrate sustainability in the latin american biofuel sector

space for innovation for sustainable community based biofuel production and use lessons learned for policy from nhambita community mozambique abstract this paper provides insights and recommendations for policy on the opportunities and constrains that influence the space for innovation for sustainable community based biofuel production and use promoted by the mozambican government nhambita community established jatropha trials in 2005 initial results were promising but crop failure and the absence of organized markets led to scepticism amongst farmers we start from the idea that the promotion of community based biofuel production and use requires taking interactions between social cultural biophysical economic political and legal subsystems across different scales and levels of analysis through time into account our analysis demonstrates that heterogeneous farming strategies and their synergies at community level should be carefully assessed furthermore national and international political and legal developments such as the development of biofuel sustainability criteria influence the local space in which community based biofuel developments take place we conclude that ex ante integrated assessment and creating an enabling environment can enhance space for sustainable community based biofuel production and use it may provide insights into the opportunities and constraints for different types of smallholders and promote the development of adequate policy mechanisms to prevent biofuels from becoming a threat rather than an opportunity for smallholders

biofuel developments in mozambique update and analysis of policy potential and reality abstract climate change rising oil prices and concerns about future energy supplies have contributed to a growing interest in using biomass for energy purposes several studies have highlighted the biophysical potential of biofuel production on the african continent and analysts see mozambique as one of the most promising african countries favorable growing conditions and the availability of land water and labor are mentioned as major drivers behind this potential moreover the potential of biofuel production to generate socio economic benefits is reflected in the government s policy objectives for the development of the sector such as reducing fuel import dependency and creating rural employment this article provides an overview of biofuel developments in mozambique and explores to what extent reality matches the suggested potential in the country we conclude that biofuel developments mainly take place in areas near good infrastructure processing and storage facilities where there is skilled labor available and access to services and goods moreover our analysis shows the need to timely harmonize current trends in biofuel developments with the government s policy objectives as the majority of existing and planned projects are not focusing on remote rural areas and in absence of domestic markets principally target external markets

biofuel production and its impact on food security in low and middle income countries implications for the post 2015 sustainable development goals abstract the post 2015 sustainable development goals sdgs aim to strengthen the achievements of the millennium development goals mdgs there are 17 sdgs the first two tackle ending poverty and hunger as well as food insecurity under nutrition and sustainable agriculture to address these goals requires eradicating chronic hunger this paper examines challenges associated with biofuel production and how they relate to sdgs and their targets we mainly focus on challenges associated with biofuel production not adequately addressed in the sdgs it draws from a range of peer reviewed and grey literature to advance the understanding of how biofuel production will impact the post 2015 development agenda the findings suggest that increasing use of food crops to produce biofuels in the united states european union japan and brazil has been one important element in explaining the steady rise in staple food prices since 2000 while this is a potential threat to food and nutrition security in low and middle income countries biofuel production also offers significant opportunities in low income countries there are several challenges to the development and harnessing of biofuels these include 1 the interaction between biofuel production and climate change 2 biofuel production and foreignisation of land 3 food wastage 4 poor governance and limited production capacity 5 biofuel production within a weak and fragmented policy framework 6 biofuel production land tenure and socio economic impacts 7 biofuel production and conflicts and 8 biofuel production and deforestation for the post 2015 sustainable development agenda to have an impact strong actions are required to protect rural communities as well as nurture the biofuels industry this should be matched by commensurate investments in food and nutrition security and transparent public private partnerships this calls for strong and pro poor policies on feedstock farming processing and trading such policies must address the rhetoric of stakeholder participation in land use management

efficient unemployment insurance this paper constructs a tractable general equilibrium model of search with risk aversion an increase in risk aversion reduces wages unemployment and investment unemployment insurance has the opposite effect insured workers seek high wage jobs with high unemployment risk an economy with risk neutral workers achieves maximal output without any unemployment insurance but an economy with risk averse workers requires a positive level of unemployment insurance to maximize output therefore moderate unemployment insurance not only improves risk sharing but also increases output

integrated assessment of sustainability trade offs and pathways for global bioenergy production framing a novel hybrid approach abstract current controversies and debates on bioenergy production in the areas of greenhouse gases emission reduction food and energy security social exclusion and welfare erosion and ecosystem deterioration attest to the challenges which the bioenergy sector has to overcome to achieve its global production potentials because it is yet an evolving sector the sustainability of bioenergy production in different regions is very elusive experiences show that bioenergy policies in one region can have impacts not only on its own but also on other regions social economic and ecological sustainability it is thus important to assess development pathways for bioenergy to exploit the potential benefits and forestall any unnecessary costs this paper frames a novel hybrid approach for assessing bioenergy potentials for regions with diverging economic social and ecological systems the approach is based on a conceptual framework that takes into account trade offs decisions on sustainability goals and production options in the assessment of bioenergy pathways it combines different empirical techniques for the systematic investigation of trade offs and pathways including fuzzy logic conjoint logit and path analyses to show the relevance and utility of these techniques for the integrated assessment of trade offs and pathways in bioenergy development we illustrated their application using results and data from previous related studies

biofuels development in sub saharan africa are the policies conducive this paper analyses national regional and international biofuels policies and strategies to assess whether these policies promote or undermine the development of biofuels sector in africa despite having a huge comparative advantage in land labour and good climatic conditions favourable for the growing of energy crops few countries in sub saharan africa have included biofuels strategies in their energy or national development policies further results show that while developed countries commit huge financial resources for research technology development and the provision of tax incentives to both producers and consumers there is little government support for promoting biofuels in africa although the consequences of biofuels on food supply remain uncertain the mandatory blending of biofuels with fossil fuels by industrialized countries will create demand for land in africa for the growing of energy crops for biofuels this paper urgently calls upon national governments in sub saharan africa to develop appropriate strategies and regulatory frameworks to harness the potential economic opportunities from biofuels sector development while protecting the environment and rural communities from the adverse effects of land alienation from the mainstream agriculture towards the growing of energy crops for biofuels at the expense of traditional food crops

a weighted max min model for fuzzy multi objective supplier selection in a supply chain abstract supplier selection is one of the most important activities of purchasing departments this importance is increased even more by new strategies in a supply chain supplier selection is a multi criteria decision making problem in which criteria have different relative importance in practice for supplier selection problems many input information are not known precisely the fuzzy set theories can be employed due to the presence of vagueness and imprecision of information a weighted max min fuzzy model is developed to handle effectively the vagueness of input data and different weights of criteria in this problem due to this model the achievement level of objective functions matches the relative importance of the objective functions in this paper an analytic hierarchy process ahp is used to determine the weights of criteria the proposed model can help the decision maker dm to find out the appropriate order to each supplier and allows the purchasing manager s to manage supply chain performance on cost quality and service the model is explained by an illustrative example