The increasing frequency of extreme climatic events requires urgent planning, designing, and retrofitting of the built environment to adapt to evolving risks. In these efforts, cul-tural heritage assets need special attention due to their historical, cultural, economic, and social value to communities. This paper introduces a framework for resilience-enabling interventions in cultural heritage assets incorporating the United Nations Scorecard for assessing disaster resilience of cities. The scorecard addresses essential aspects such as governance and financial capacity, plan-ning and disaster preparation, disaster response, and post-event recovery. The proposed multi-scale framework involves identifying and analyzing current and future risk scenarios for critical hazards. For the identified scenarios, the framework facilitates the assessment of the impacts of interventions on cultural heritage assets using performance indicators. An analysis of possible interventions for cultural heritage assets is conducted, recognizing their historical and cultural value and proposing targeted solutions that consider local geographic contexts, such as using traditional materials. Conse-quently, the proposed approach enables the comparison of plausible interventions to mitigate risks and enhance the resilience of cultural heritage assets and their urban or rural context.

This paper performs an exploratory case study with Vietnamese timber firms, to discover what supply chain risks are perceived by companies. Emerging economies like Vietnam enjoy important advantages like low labour and production costs, access to internal resources, favourable geographic position and trading schemes issued by the European Union. Yet, diverse supply chain risks may hinder further growth, including risks related to access to supplies, compliance management, infrastructure, obsolete production machinery, and lack of skilled workforce. Compared to previous research, this paper contextualises existing knowledge in supply chain risks and mitigation strategies in an emerging economy like Vietnam. From a practitioner viewpoint, decision makers can boost the timber sector through targeted investments in modern infrastructure and adapting timber plantations to existing quality standards.

This study examines the potential of an integrated bio-commodity supply-production center. Previous research has demonstrated the financial viability of circular bio-economies through Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) or simulation. However, these models 1) do not incorporate the necessary logistics operations for biomass collection and storage, 2) do not integrate and optimize those with the requirements of multi-products line lot sizes. A Geographic Information System (GIS) based model is proposed, integrating insertion and genetic algorithms with a hybrid (ABM-DES) simulation model. A case study in Greece's Fthiotida region, a hub for olive cultivation, investigates the production of pellets, olive cakes, and pomace oil from prunings and Two-Phase Olive Mill Waste (TPOMW). The findings suggest that the model allows for a more accurate estimation of impacts when considering the supply and production operations. In particular, it shows how the frequency and lot sizes of replenishment cycles, influenced by the varying numbers of mechanized harvesters employed, significantly impacts the fluctuation observed in the return on investments. Running the model, it is found that the optimized system with two harvesters can reach a breakeven point, within just 36 months, and corresponding emissions of about 622,041 kgCo2eq. This provides a benchmark for other olive industries to harness unexploited resources.

Studies in the agro-industry sector have shown the importance to evaluate the feasibility of an IBLC (a multi-product transformation plant). This paper develops a model to simulate the performance of an IBLC in Spain, using a combined approach: AHP, TOPSIS, and a hybrid simulation model. Results show that profits can be incremented by about 55.7% and environmental emissions of KgCO2e per tonne of bio-commodity produced, reduced by 24.2%. The scientific contribution covers the development of a simulation model that dynamically select suppliers based on a combination of social, environmental, and economic criteria. In addition, the model can be used to evaluate the economic and environmental feasibility of the IBLC by integrating the suppliers selection with the operations of a multi-product transformation plant.

Business world has reached a complexity tipping point, increasing the risk of disruption consequences not to remain localised in a single company but to reverberate on the entire Supply Chain. Literature now pays great attention to studying this ripple effect, which can critically undermine resilience of the entire Supply Chain. This work further investigates ripple effect by analysing the presence of cycles among these chain reactions using Fuzzy Cognitive Maps. This methodology allows to link multidimensional and multidisciplinary concepts: by unveiling this information, managers and policymakers are provided with more details about the system behaviour. The research method exemplified uncovers the causal relationships among factors influencing Supply Chain Resilience, providing necessary insight to break or reinforce such connections. A case study of an automotive industry Supply Chain is presented to show the application of the proposed methodology into an operating context: 15 different cycles have been enumerated, explaining how connections among these factors ultimately impact Supply Chain Resilience. 

Decision-making supported by digital ecosystems has been increasingly studied during recent years, especially due to improved technical capabilities to collect, store, and analyze large amounts of data. The literature recognizes that these systems can reduce response time of managers and enhance a cost-efficient recovery of supply chains. However, there is a lack of methodological frameworks to evaluate the benefits of these platforms. In addition, there is still little understanding of the risks in ocean container transport and their implications for supply chains. This paper proposes and applies a mathematical model for evaluating the impacts of digital platforms, with a focus on solutions to mitigate risks in sea transport operations. The model is based on scenarios and decision tree models to evaluate the impacts of a supply chain digital ecosystem on full containers shipped from Asia to Europe implemented by four companies. Results show monetary savings per scenario in the range from €3448 to €79,242. The most significant savings are expected on unplanned transshipments, cargo damage, export inspections, container detention, and container release.

Recent studies have found positive effects from hospital focus on both quality and cost. Some studies indicate that certain patient segments benefit from focus, while others have worse outcomes in focused hospital departments. The aim of this study was to establish the relationship between hospital focus and performance in elective surgery. We studied obesity surgery procedures performed in Sweden in 2016 (5152 patients), using data from the Scandinavian Obesity Surgery Registry (SOReg) complemented by a survey of all clinics that performed obesity surgery. We examined focus at two levels of the organization: hospital level and department level. We hypothesized that higher proportions of obesity surgery patients in the hospital, and higher proportions of obesity surgery procedures in the department, would be associated with better performance. These hypotheses were tested using multilevel regression analysis, while controlling for patient characteristics and procedural volume. We found that focus was associated with improved outcomes in terms of reduced complications and shorter procedure times. These positive relationships were present at both hospital and department level, but the effect was larger at the department level. The findings imply that focus is a viable strategy to improve quality and reduce costs for patients undergoing elective surgery. For these patients, general hospitals should consider implementing organizationally separate units for patients undergoing elective surgery.

Fuel is one of the most important cost items that road carriers include in their freight rates. It has been demonstrated that unexpected changes of fuel costs influence mobility, logistics performance and profit margins. Experts believe that criminal organizations are targeting the transport sector to steal, smuggle and contraband diesel fuel. Today, very little data exist across the scientific community, depicting this phenomenon. Hence, the goal of this study is to shed light on the problem of diesel theft in freight transport, with a focus on determining its magnitude, its geographical displacement, main modus operandi, and potential impact of protective measures. A survey is developed and used to collect data from members of the Swedish Association of Road Transport companies. Replies from 189 companies are collected (18.9% response rate) and analyzed. Overall, this study unveils that about 150,225 l of fuels have been stolen from Swedish road carriers. In addition, data reveals that only a minority of these companies are affected by the problem, opening the hypothesis that attacks are geographically concentrated in areas where transport/logistics operations are intense. Several devices are available today to avoid fuel theft. Among those, tank gauging and radar-based technologies are preferred by companies, in view of their deterring effects. 

This chapter explores the feasibility and advantages of integrated biomass logistics centres (IBLCs). These are centres aiming to collect residues from farming activities and transform these into new intermediate bio-products. Operations in these IBLCs aim to achieve economies of scale through integration of resources and business lines, while creating technical and environmental advantages for firms and societies. The experience from one agro-industry case study in Spain (fodder production) highlights the importance of leadership roles to manage the newly created supply chains, through the identification of strategic objectives and the coordination of operational activities. Hence, the scope of this chapter is to review the concept of IBLCs under the lens of supply chain management leadership. Thereafter, it will discuss the potential to transfer the IBLC concept to emerging markets, with examples for African agricultural crops.

Latest years have seen companies in the supply chain dealing with increasing larger amount of data. The ultimate goal is to develop digital ecosystems combined with sensor data to allow companies, including suppliers, logistics service providers, transport carriers, freight forwarders, manufactures to jointly and (almost) openly share data, improve visibility, and optimize operations. In this paper we conceptualize an algorithm that collects maritime transport data, and thereby computes more accurate ETAs. Thereafter, we discuss implications for data-driven management across several functions of a supply chain, e.g. purchasing, marketing, inventory policies, transport synchronization and adaptive process planning.