Examining the effects of green supply chain management practices and their mediations on performance improvements

Abstract

Environmental pressures have caused green supply chain management (GSCM) to emerge as an important corporate environmental strategy for manufacturing enterprises. For manufacturers to fully realise the performance potentials of GSCM, they need to integrate internal GSCM practices emphasising functional coordination with external GSCM practices such as cooperation with suppliers and customers in the implementation. Using coordination theory, this article examines three models used to evaluate the mediation relationships between the external and internal practices of GSCM with respect to environmental, economic, and operational performance. We posit that the strategic stance of manufacturing enterprises in improving their overall performance and competitive position requires a joint coordination of internal and external GSCM practices. Survey data collected from 396 Chinese manufacturing enterprises are used to validate our arguments by testing the mediation effects of two categories of GSCM practices. Our empirical results show support for the mediation effects, which indicates the importance for manufacturers to coordinate between the internal and external aspects of implementing GSCM practices to reap the performance benefits. Coordinating internal and external GSCM practices to seek performance improvements is an important aspect of the manufacturing operations strategy. The dynamics of implementing GSCM practices and the performance contingencies are worthwhile topics to pursue in future research.

Keywords:

• environmental management
• supply chain management
• coordination theory
• mediation
• organisational performance
• operations strategy

Acknowledgements

We are grateful for the helpful comments of two anonymous reviewers on an earlier version of this paper. This work is supported by a grant from the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars (71025002), the National Natural Science Foundation of China Project (projects 71033004 and 70772085), the Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University in China (NCET-09-0082) and NSFC-JSPS (70911140101). Lai is fully supported by a grant from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (GRF PolyU 5440/09H).

Notes

Note

1. In our study, internal GSCM practices include a general grouping of activities such as eco-design, management practices, and internal financial policies in support of environmental programs. External GSCM practices include green purchasing, customer cooperation, and investment recovery.