Drivers and Barriers for Collaborative Environmental Sustainability : Transport Buyers' Perceptions

• ABSTRACTPurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate transport byers perception of drivers and barriers for collaborative environmental sustainability and how this interrelate with the companies’ degree of knowledge about logistics service providers and their degree of collaboration with these logistics service providers.Design/methodology/approachThis research is based on an electronic questionnaire-survey distributed to Danish transport buyers. The questionnaire was distributed to 344 transport purchasers of which 82 have made complete and useful answers leading to an overall response rate of 24 per cent.FindingsThe main drivers for environmental sustainability are identified as: 1) demand from top management to focus on environmental sustainability, 2) avoiding loosing reputation, and 3) a feeling of ethical obligation. The main barriers are identified as: 1) difficulties to visualize the benefits of sustainability, 2) lack of data and information about sustainability, and 3) customers are not willing to pay for sustainability. In addition, the paper provides evidence for that the drivers for environmental sustainability positively affect knowledge of logistics service providers and collaboration with environmental issues.458NOFOMA 2014 Proceedings Copenhagen Business SchoolResearch limitations/implicationsThis research is based on a survey of Danish companies purchasing logistic services and thus solely represents a Danish transport buyer perspective. Thus, future research can explore how the view is different in specific logistics buyer and service provider relationships and other national contexts.Practical implicationsMore research is needed on a differentiated perspective on environmental sustainability in the relation to the purchase of materials versus service offerings.Originality/valueThis paper provides evidence of a paradoxical nature of drivers and barriers for environmental sustainability grounded in the extant body of literature compared with the empirical findings in this study. 

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Ekonomi och näringsliv -- Företagsekonomi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Economics and Business -- Business Administration (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

drivers

barriers

environmental collaboration

transport buyers

logistics service providers

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

kon (ämneskategori)