Green product development framework: empirical evidence from Chinese automotive supply chains
Abstract
Purpose
The study aims to develop and test a supply chain wide green product development framework of focal firms and their major suppliers, in the context of the Chinese automotive industry.
Design/methodology/approach
An in-depth case studies approach is adopted for this study. Three automotive sector upstream supply chains involving 17 firms and 51 experts as respondents were interviewed on the importance and implementation effectiveness of 6Rs (reduce, redesign, recover, remanufacture, reuse and recycle) across the manufacturer and their respective tier 1 and tier 2 suppliers.
Findings
The results indicate that the Chinese automotive sector supply chains are mainly focused on “reduce” practices with immediate environmental and economic benefits. The investigated firms however had future implementation plans for “redesign” and “recovery” practices to become comprehensive in green product development (GPD).
Research limitations/implications
The study facilitates automotive firms, industry policymakers and researchers the understanding of incorporating comprehensive GSCM practices across the upstream supply chain to achieve circularity. The study focused on upstream supply chain due to the concentration of major production practices in this section of the supply chain. However, the downstream supply chain equally deserve attention as well as the need to understand the mediating and moderating roles of the different Rs to tease out the pros and cons of achieving overall environmental sustainability.
Originality/value
There are very limited studies on comprehensive GPD for achieving optimal GSCM and sustainability. By simultaneous looking at a focal firm and its upstream supply chains GSCM practices, this study addresses a system-wide comprehensive GPD issues from implementation of 6Rs perspectives in the supply chain.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to express their gratitude to the Editor-in-Chief, associate editors, and the reviewers for providing constructive comments that greatly improved the readability of the paper. Additionally, the authors extend their appreciation to Professor Jayanth Jayaram of the University of Oklahoma for his invaluable guidance in the design and development of the study. Furthermore, the second author would like to offer special thanks to the British Council for awarding the project “Education Partnership for Promoting High Value Manufacturing Supply Chain Systems (EPPHVMSCS)” under the UK-China-BRI Countries Education Partnership Initiative scheme.
Citation
Abdulrahman, M.D.-A. and Subramanian, N. (2023), "Green product development framework: empirical evidence from Chinese automotive supply chains", Benchmarking: An International Journal, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/BIJ-10-2022-0614
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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