Sustainable Operations through Product Philanthropy: Models and Applications in Food Inventory Donation

直到最近，人们才开始发现可持续发展的下一个前沿：减少食物浪费。在加拿大，为人类生产的食物约有40%被浪费。食物浪费是一个巨大的问题。在经济上，由于食物和资源的浪费，这是一个巨大的损失。在环境方面，大多数食物垃圾最终进入垃圾填埋场，排放的甲烷危害是二氧化碳的25倍。从道义上讲，这是错误的，因为每八个加拿大家庭中就有一个是粮食不安全的。这一问题的一个潜在解决方案是捐赠食品库存。也就是说，食品供应链上的公司将(多余的)食品捐赠给慈善机构。轶事和实证研究表明，粮食捐赠是一种三重底线解决方案。首先，它可以通过申请税收抵免和降低处置成本来提高公司的税后利润。其次，它服务于穷人。第三，它通过减少进入垃圾填埋场的食物腐败数量来保护地球。*然而，食物库存捐赠或产品慈善(例如，商品捐赠)总体上仍然不那么常见，特别是在加拿大。为了进一步告知利益相关者是否以及如何实施产品慈善，研究人员呼吁进行经济建模和严格的分析。我们的建议是第一个响应这一呼吁的。我们的长期目标是为产品慈善产生决策支持工具、管理见解和政策建议。在短期内，我们的目标是回答三个关键问题：加拿大当前的政策如何影响公司的运营(例如生产)、营销(例如定价)和捐赠(何时和多少)决策？它们是否带来了利润的提高和浪费的减少？如果不是，更好的政策是什么？在这里，我们将分析加拿大是否应该效仿美国的政策，允许为捐赠产品的市场价值(而不是成本)提供税收抵免，以及韩国对垃圾填埋场的使用实施税收处罚的政策。我们将从调查三个背景开始。首先，多个产量不确定的农场向需求不确定的杂货零售商出售产品。零售商可以捐赠多余的库存，农场可以将有化妆品缺陷的滞销产品捐赠给慈善机构。其次，零售商(如百吉饼商店)决定每一时期购买的新产品的数量，并在每一时期结束时决定捐赠金额和结转到下一时期的金额。第三，供应商向在库存和/或零售价上竞争的零售商销售产品。这里的一个重点是调查产品慈善是否会导致零售价格上涨，这一直是制药行业的一个担忧。我们将使用优化和博弈论等工具。*2012年，欧洲议会通过了一项决议，到2020年将食物浪费减少50%，并将2014年定为“反对食物浪费的欧洲年”。现在是加拿大认真对待食物浪费的时候了，我们相信我们提出的研究将是一个很好的开始。

Only recently have people begun to discover the next frontier of sustainability: food waste reduction. In Canada, about 40% of food produced for humans is wasted . Food waste is a huge problem. Economically, it is a colossal loss due to the waste of food and the resources used. Environmentally, most food waste ends up in landfills emitting methane which is 25 times more harmful than carbon dioxide. Morally, this is wrong because one in eight Canadian families are food insecure. A potential solution to this problem is food inventory donation. That is, firms along food supply chains donate (excess) food to charities. Anecdotes and empirical studies have shown food donation as a triple-bottom-line solution. First, it can improve a firm's after-tax profit by claiming tax credit and reducing disposal cost. Second, it serves the poor. Third, it protects the planet by decreasing the amount of food spoilage going to landfills.******However, food inventory donation, or product philanthropy (e.g., merchandise donation) in general, is still not that common, especially in Canada. To further inform stakeholders on if and how to implement product philanthropy, researchers have called for economic modeling and rigorous analyses. Our proposal is the first to answer this call. Our long-term goal is to generate decision support tools, managerial insights, and policy suggestions for product philanthropy. In the short term, we aim to answer three critical questions: how do the current Canadian policies impact a firm's operational (e.g., production), marketing (e.g., pricing), and donation (when and how much) decisions? Do they lead to profit improvement and waste reduction? If not, what are the better policies? Here, we will analyze if Canada should adopt the U.S. policy which allows tax credit for the market value (not the cost) of the donated products and the South Korean policy imposing tax penalty for landfill use. We will start by investigating three settings. First, multiple farms with yield uncertainty sell to a grocery retailer with demand uncertainty. The retailer can donate excess inventory and the farms can donate unsalable products with cosmetic imperfection to charities. Second, a retailer (e.g., a bagel store) decides on the amount of new products to buy for each period, and at the end of each period, the amount of donation and the amount to carry over to the next period. Third, a supplier sells to retailers competing in inventory and/or retail price. A focus here is to investigate whether product philanthropy leads to retail price inflation, which has been a concern in the pharmaceutical industry. We will use tools like Optimization and Game Theory.******In 2012, European Parliament adopted a resolution to reduce food waste by 50% by 2020 and designated 2014 as the "European Year against Food Waste". Now it is the time for Canada to become serious about food waste and we believe that our proposed research will be an excellent start.**