Bullwhip effect: Modelling and simulation of a sinusoidal stimulus considering food waste

Abstract

Background: The current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has stressed why a change towards resilient, robust and sustainable supply chains is more imperative than ever. This is especially true for supply chains of perishable foods, where issues such as the bullwhip effect cause not only economic but also environmental damage.

Objectives: The key objectives of this study are to gain a deeper insight into correlations regarding the causes of the bullwhip effect and to see how a sinusoidal stimulus is affecting the generation of food waste.

Method: A simplified beef food chain was modelled in Tecnomatix Plant Simulation®. As the bullwhip effect consists of a simplified parameterisation of an excitation duration (period length) and its height (amplitude), these two variables were used to generate a sinusoidal stimulus. The simulation results were statistically verified and checked for commonalities and differences with the already established scientific knowledge.

Results: While the expected higher sensitivity of the front links of the supply chain to waste generation can be confirmed, the results of a long stimulation period suggest that the negative effects of the bullwhip effect do not increase indefinitely.

Conclusion: The analysis of the results has shown that previous theories can be transferred, but that the variation of the variables entails new insights for the interdependencies of the amplitude and period length and their influence on the output variable waste.

Contribution: The study contributes to a more holistic understanding of the bullwhip effect and, in particular, its implications within a perishable food supply chain.