Q1: Analyzing the given data and information above in the case study, suggest 4-5 potential opportunities to improve the sustainability of the companys supply chain.

Q2: Determine how a strategy to be followed in implementing the provided suggestion from your answer.

questions at the cnat. Sustainability has become an increasingly pressing issue in supply chain over the last few years. Rethinking and re-planning the activities of companies from a sustainable perspective is no longer a voluntary choice - they have become a duty and companies are now called upon to question their environmental impact. Sustainability is now a factor in all business decisions concerning supply chain activities and processes, and not just in terms of the environment. Commonly known as Sustainable Supply Chain (SSC), where transparency and sustainablity are keywords and fundamental components of new business strategies. This new direction carries a twolold advantage for companies: it aliows them to structure and manage a sustainable, efficient, and responsive supply chain, as demanded by customers, and it ensures a resilient supply chain network. As evidence of the rapid evolution of a market-oriented towards sustainability, in just a few years, numerous international and national guidelines have been defined and implemented for measuring environmental performance: the iSO 14001 standard, the EMAS scheme, and the GRi 4.1 guidelines, to name a few. The Role of Simulation in Supply Chain Environmental Sustainability Rapid changos in the business environment push managers to study competiors and defend market share. These changes, such as those regarding sustainability and social responsiblity, increase complexity in company systems and the wider environment. in this regard, the use of simulation provides a systematic approach to typical supply chains challenges. Simulation is different to traditional analytical tools and methods such as spreadsheets and linear programming. It is dynamic and provides greater opportunities for supply chain network design, analysis, and optimization. A supply chain simulation represents the logical rules of a network and, by allowing them to execute and interact over time, gives a dynamic representation of the supply chain network full of detail about the relationships between each element of supply chain neswork. The method can capture more detail and give deeper and more easily understood insights . In this case, supply chain simulation alows the consideration of both traditional performance indicators and new objectives oriented towards sustainabilty. The approach models realty according to the desired level of detal using different variables. Specifically, simulation succeeds in describing how these variables behave and interact over time, giving insight into their causal relations. As an example, the following are some action areas in which simulation can be applied effectively in the sustainability field: - Preduction: designing and implementing new production paradigms based on the principles of the circular economy, such as reducing the amount of raw materials, re-using waste products, and using alternative materials with reduced environmental impact: - Inventory: moditying inwentory policies to leverage stock replenishment parameters with the result of optimizing transportation resource utilization while taking into consideration the costs and emissions deriving from the loading and unloading processes: - Transportation: determining optimal volumes for transportation and which routes and means of transport best reduce CO2 emissions: - Distribution: designing the distribution network to increase supply chain environmental sustainabilty. 1:17 vill 4614 Several advantages come from employing simulation for analyzing supply chain environmental sustainablity, including: - Better representation of business reality, thanks to the introduction of variables with stochastic behavior that can describe processes subject to great variability: - In-depth analysis of risks and opportunities linked to modifications of existing parameters or the introduction of new paradigms, enabliod by the devolopment of benchmarks between difforent models that can support decision-making processes: - Optimization of relovant parameters to achieve optimat solutions valid only in the given contoxt - that is, 'ad-hoc' solufions: - Systems view of the network - allowing the capture of changes in business performance relating to changes in the supply chain. Introduction To a Dairy Industry Sustainability Case Study In Italy, the food sector, which includes agriculture, the food industry, and distribution (including HORECA), is one of the country's leading economic sectors with revenues over 500 billion euros. At the same time, it is also one of the most polluting. Estimates suggest that, overall, the sector is responstle for a quarter of the total CO2 equivalent emissions produced by human activily, of which more than half comes from meat production, In addition, the agrifood sector also causes several other emvironmental issues: - Soil depletion and erosion (cavsed by imsasiee farming and monoculture); - Deterioration of water resources (caused by the use of pesticides and fertilizers, as well as inefficient ploughing and pasturingk - Food waste and loss: in 2019, FAO has eitimated a Food Loss Index of 14% worldwide, with serious environmentat, economic, social, and ethical consequences. Action is necessary, as demonstrated by the European Commission itself by launching the Farm to Fork (F2F] strategy. The goal is to tum the eurozone, including its food sector, into a model of sustainability. In this respect, this blog highlights possible improvements in the environmental performance of companies by acting on a company's business strategy and showing the importance of supply chain sustainability. More specifically, the case study focuses on the yogurt sector, which since 2020 has been giving increased attention to sustainable development, focusing mainly on the recyclability of the packaging used. The Methodological Approach for Increasing Supply Chain Sustainability The approach used in the case study is based on research and on the formulation of hypotheses necessary to create an initial scenario and subsequent improvement intervention scenarios. These scenarios are the resut of development undertaken in supply chain simulation sottware acolseistas For supply chain sustainability, software tooks offer many possibilties. The starting case accounted for the following iltems: - Distreution of customer demand and tacilfies (vupgliers, factories, and warehouses) on the italian territory: - Production and imentary policies typical of the yogurt supply chain: - Supply, distribution, and transportation logic - Eoonomic dimensions (prices and costs) for the analyzed supply chair: - Emvironmental footorint paramelers of each process, such as consumpbon of rescurces (water and energy) and harmful emissions (measared in terms of equivalent bilos of CO2 ). The improvement strategies streamine the supply thain-replacing the materass used for primary and secondary packaging, and impiementing production interventions that reduce the consumption of energy. water, and raw materiah. The improvements achieved weth the alternative scenarios may not be vald plobaly. none of the proposed strategies should be considered the onty viable solution. On the contary, the results demonstrate how sustainabily decisices must ofien eonsidw at other impacted perlomance areas. Whi such an approach, the role of simutation elearfy emerges as the most sutable. This biog is exploratory, descriptive, and explanatory. The stralegy and te approwch used can be repeated for other interventions of the same type and need adagtation only according to the sector consideced and the desired pertomance objective. Case Study: The Yogurt Supply Chain Initial Situation The supply chain in the case study is structured based on examples from the moat important companies in the ltalian dairy sector, with features appreprialely adxyted to the simulation context. The main characteristics of the supply chain model are: - Upstream in the production chain, there are two supplers: one for supplying the raw maleriaks (milk and powdered mik) used to produce yogurt, while the second supplies materias for primary packaging (jars), secondary packaging (cartons/rays), and tertiary packaging (glastic fimm for palesization); - Six distribution centers serve the italian teritory. They receive pallets trom the factory supply retailers; - Downstream in the supply chain, the end customers (retailen) receive palets with packaged yogur, ready to be placed in stores and sold: - In addition, a disposal teation for products that reach their expiraten dats or are no longer sellable; - All transport is considered and takes into account the best trucking roules. The simulations carried out on the supply chain model highlighted critical areas for impeovement rogarding sustainabilty. - Waste equal to 6.4% of total consumable yogurt production and expired yogurt production equal to about 0.3% of total production: - High consumption of water and energy throughout the supply chains * High CO2 emissions in production from the use of packaging materals with a high epvirongoatilimanet