Sustainable product-package design in a food supply chain: A multi-criteria life cycle approach

This paper presents a multi-criteria decision-making approach for the selection of a sustainable product-package design, accounting for the different actors within a food supply chain. The study extends the focus of sustainable packaging design to the collective of all supply chain actors. Decision criteria are identified via a literature review, and current product-package alternatives are collected via interviews. With the inputs of these criteria and the alternative designs, a multi-criteria decision-making problem is formulated and solved using Best Worst Method (BWM). BWM finds the weights of the criteria. Using these weights, the ranking of the alternatives is found. The implementation of the analysis took place for three selected products of the Kraft Heinz Company. Data on the preferences of the supply chain members of these selected products were collected, and the optimal package designs were selected. It is shown through sensitivity analysis that modifying the weights that decision makers assign to the preferences of the supply chain members and the importance of the dimensions of sustainability have an effect on the selection of the optimal design.