Global and local supply chain sourcing design: cost and delivery reliability comparison in unimodal and intermodal transportation

The design of the sourcing strategy is key to gain a competitive advantage. In recent times, supplier failure is one of the most crucial risks of supply chains. The purpose of this study is to investigate the cost of local and global sources of the supply chain (SC) with the comparison of delivery reliability. The approach of this study applied data from one of the largest paper and board industries in Asia. We used a bi-objective mixed-integer linear programming (BOMILP) model for the formulation of the problem. Pareto optimal solutions are generated by implementing the multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA) to facilitate decision-makers to trade-off between cost and delivery reliability. The results reveal significant savings of 138.51 million Pkr per year by contracting with local suppliers (Pakistan) as compared to global suppliers from Turkey, China and Vietnam. However, the delivery reliability of global suppliers is higher than local suppliers. Further, this study can be developed by investigating the performance, wastage, and quality of the supplies provided by local and global suppliers.