A tactical model for planning the production and distribution of fresh produce

• Published in: Annals of operations research Vol. 190; no. 1; pp. 339 - 358
• Main Authors: Ahumada, Omar, Villalobos, J. Rene
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Boston Springer US 01.10.2011; Springer; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Agricultural production; Agriculture; Business and Management; Combinatorics; Costs; Crops; Decay; Decisions; Distribution; Distribution costs; Harvest; Integer programming; Linear programming; Mathematical analysis; Mathematical models; Mixed integer; Operations research; Operations Research/Decision Theory; Perishable goods; Planning; Programming; Studies; Supply chains; Theory of Computation; Transportation; Mexico; Production and distribution planning; Perishable products; Linear programming
• ISSN: 0254-5330; 1572-9338
• DOI: 10.1007/s10479-009-0614-4

We present an integrated tactical planning model for the production and distribution of fresh produce. The main objective of the model is to maximize the revenues of a producer that has some control over the logistics decisions associated with the distribution of the crop. The model is used for making planning decisions for a large fresh produce grower in Northwestern Mexico. The decisions obtained are based on traditional factors such as price estimation and resource availability, but also on factors that are usually neglected in traditional planning models such as price dynamics, product decay, transportation and inventory costs. The model considers the perishability of the crops in two different ways, as a loss function in its objective function, and as a constraint for the storage of products. The paper presents a mixed integer programming model used to implement the problem as wells as the computational results obtained from it.