Competitive landscape, informed consumers and stringent regulations have forced many manufacturing small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to focus on operational efficiency along with sustainability issues in recent years. While many manufacturing organisations have been taking lean initiatives for the past few years for operational excellence, an impulsive rush to adopt lean without a strategic deployment vision has led to scattered implementation of lean tools and projects without desired success. Many researchers and practitioners prescribe value stream mapping as a foundation for lean transformation initiatives; however, little empirical work is available on the symbiosis of lean and green paradigms to reap maximum benefits. This research, through a systematic methodology and a novel tool called Green Integrated Value Stream Mapping (GIVSM), integrates both paradigms in a case study on a U.K. packaging-manufacturing SME. Applying the GIVSM demonstrates that simultaneous deployment of lean and green paradigms have synergistic effect for improving both operational efficiency and environmental performance. In addition, continuous improvement framework with sustainable procurement is proposed to overcome the lean-green misalignments. This study also provides a guiding reference for practitioners to undertake similar improvement projects and identifies opportunities to expand this academic research on integrated lean-green approach into other industry sectors.

Past few years have continuously seen an increase in intensity and frequency of climate-related disasters in non-mature economies. Most of these losses can be attributed to inefficient and ineffective management of humanitarian logistics and supply chains during the preparedness, response and reconstruction phases of disaster relief operations. Previous researches have focussed primarily either on the response phase of humanitarian logistics or on the humanitarian supply chain coordination issues mostly within international or local NGOs. We present results of a research on how a novel integrated lean and agile (leagile) framework could be employed to efficiently and effectively manage humanitarian logistics and supply chain management (HLSCM) in a local jurisdiction (i.e. public sector) of a disaster-hit region in a non-mature economy. Through this leagile framework, we identify inefficiencies and opportunities of improvement in HLSCM. Our recommendations can be used by both public and private sector organisations dealing with humanitarian emergencies to increase the efficiency of their response and performance during a disaster. Our research also informs guiding principles of UN Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction to include a leagile framework for achieving both effective and efficient responses to disasters in its priorities for action. We further suggest future research agenda in this field in order to augment the resilience of both public and private organisations.

Background: The culture of fast food consumption is replacing the traditional meal. It is an emerging trend among the younger generation. Their ready availability, taste, low cost, marketing strategies and peer pressure make them popular. Stress in medical students’ life and study load would be factors that negatively influence their diet.Methods: A cross sectional study was carried out among undergraduate medical students of a medical college in north Karnataka from May to October 2018. 178 students consisting of both boys and girls participated in the study and were interviewed using a pre-tested structured questionnaire. Data collected was analysed.Results: A total of 178 medical students participated in the study out of which 84 were males (48%) and 94 were females (52%). Majority of them (92%) resided in the hostel within the campus and only a few were local residents (8%). Mean age of subjects was 20±1.4 years. Taste was the main reason given by students which led to increased consumption of fast/junk food (46.7%). Chocolates were the most commonly consumed food followed by soft drinks. Majority of the students (87%) were well aware of the side effects of these fast/junk foods.Conclusions: Fast/junk foods preference and consumption are highly prevalent among medical students despite their knowledge about its health hazards.

This study delves into the dynamics of pragmatic interoperability, focusing on the case of a digital ecosystem in India —the eKrishi platform—which combines of industry 4.0 technologies with human-centric principles. Through qualitative analysis, we unveil the motivations shaping system and business-level interoperability alignment. We found that three categories of sustainability metrics—socio-economic, socio-ecological, and eco-efficiency— are driven by diverse pragmatic views. Furthermore, we found that system-level alignment is driven by actors’ defensive strategy for compliance and standardization, while business level interoperability is underpinned by actors’ offensive strategy for social and economic innovation. The study introduces a 2 × 2 alignment framework—corporate citizenship, regulatory stewardship, corporate stewardship, and value chain stewardship—offering nuanced insights. By aligning systems and business motives for pragmatic interoperability, we contribute towards theory building on interoperability and provide practical implications for guiding stakeholder alignment in Industry 4.0 initiatives.