DOI: 10.5176/2251-1938_ORS20
Authors: Varimna Singh, Ashok Pundir and L. Ganapathy
Abstract:
A challenging goal in a supply chain for perishable goods is the efficient and effective coordination of inventory management and transhipment. The prevention of deterioration and spoilage significantly increase the inventory management cost. Perishable products require fast movement, which leads to increased transportation cost and constrained storage possibilities leading to out-of-stock situations. This paper deals with optimization models for integrated inventory and transportation of perishable products with in-transit degradation. We consider shipment of multiple products from a single production node to a single demand node using vehicles with varying capacities plying on a given set of frequencies. Fleets of vehicles are characterized by mode, capacity, travel cost and travel time. In order to study and examine this model we have simulated demand based pickup and delivery of various perishable products with varying life cycles and degradations patterns. A portfolio of perishable products is shipped to the destination according to demand. A series of LP models were used to identify the choice of transportation mode and transportation priority which effectively minimize the cost. The optimization results were statistically analyzed to discern relationships between various aspects of the model and the resulting cost components.
Keywords: Optimization; Transhipment; perishable goods; ANOVA
Updating...